Pledging to Die (An FBI/Romance Thriller Book 11) Read online

  The deputy nodded, but the sheriff didn’t.

  “Nick, here, worked for the police. He’s seen a few bodies,” Elizabeth offered.

  “Yeah, but they still make me sick.”

  Chris whipped back the sheet. The look on both men’s faces proved one thing—they weren’t used to floaters. They both looked a little green.

  “Oh Christ,” muttered Sheriff Rakin.

  That was all it took. From her perch on a metal table, she held up two fingers. The men caught it, and the game began. Ethan tapped one finger against his cheek, as did Merry. Chris was too smart to go against the house. He went with Elizabeth’s bet of the deputy.

  “Our first girl has been in the water likely since the day she was killed. As you can see, while he weighed her down and wrapped her up, the fish still had some wiggle room to get in and find some dinner.”

  The deputy and sheriff looked horrified.

  “What happened to her fingers?” Nick asked, noticing they looked mutilated.

  Merry spoke up. “Well, the skin was a little too fragile to peel off to get a fingerprint, so Chris was nice enough to give me a couple fingers. I’m running them right now.”

  The deputy made a gagging sound, especially when Merry held the evidence bag up for him to see. In it were the woman’s missing digits.

  “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,” he muttered, crossing himself.

  This time, Elizabeth couldn’t help herself. “Holy shit! Is that who Chris has on his tables? Man, God’s going to be pissed. I see the apocalypse coming.”

  The tech team snickered among themselves.

  “Doctor Leonard, she’s molting,” Elizabeth said, when he moved her arm. Immediately, Merry was at his side with a tray for him to hold the large flap of peeling skin.

  “That happens when you’re in the water for a while.”

  While both men looked green, it was the deputy who started to lose it.

  Ethan pushed the biohazard can toward him without even looking up, and just in time for the man to violently toss his cookies. When he rolled it from the room, all the while puking, Elizabeth grinned.

  “Pay up,” she stated.

  Merry and Ethan both pulled twenties from their pockets and passed them to Chris and Elizabeth.

  “What’s going on?” Sheriff Rakin asked.

  “It’s a little game we play,” explained Chris Leonard, giving him all the details. “Pick the puker. We won. I believe that’s a streak for us,” he stated.

  Elizabeth gave him an air fist bump, knowing she wasn’t going to make contact while he was playing in the dead.

  The sheriff didn't look happy. “That’s pretty shitty, Elizabeth.”

  “Yeah, everything about our jobs tends to lean that way,” she replied. “When you look at this mess every day, you have to do something to forget that people suck.”

  “Wow. You’re not the sweet girl you once were,” he stated, crossing his arms.

  The tech team started laughing like that was the most outrageous thing they’d ever heard.

  “Ignore them. I don’t let them out of the cage all that often, and when we get back to FBI West, they’re all going into solitary, if you know what I mean.”

  They shut up pretty fast.

  “Back to our victim,” Elizabeth stated.

  “Her name is Felicity Magliozzi,” stated Merry. “We’ve positively ID’d her.”

  “COD, Doc?” Elizabeth asked.

  “Well, it wasn’t drowning. Felicity was struck on the back of the neck with a blunt object. It fractured all the bones and severed the spinal cord. She was dead shortly after.”

  “How about all the cuts?” asked the sheriff.

  “She’s a mess,” Chris stated. “Someone hacked away at her. Most importantly, she’s missing her heart.”

  That piqued Elizabeth’s interest. “Could something have gotten in there and eaten it?”

  Nick Rakin looked even more green, but also determined to hold his ground.

  “We found some fish in the gaping wounds. It looks like they got in, but then couldn’t get out. They died next to the buffet.”

  Ethan made notes. “Okay, so one is missing a heart, and we have some gluttonous fish.”

  “What else?” Elizabeth asked, ignoring the look from the sheriff. If he didn't like the way she ran this shop, he was free to head out. Friendship only went so far in their world.

  “Well, he was sloppy about it. This wasn’t some surgeon, that’s for damn sure. He cut her open, broke violently through the ribcage, reached in, and pulled out her heart. The aorta is cut, but not cleanly.”

  “Is anything else missing?”

  “There’s a negative on that. All her organs are there. I can’t explain why he sliced up her stomach.”

  “Maybe torture beforehand?” Elizabeth asked. “What if he sliced her, and then got bored? We’ve had some wackos taking hearts before.”

  Chris shrugged. “Here’s where it gets tricky. I can tell you she was already dead when they made the cuts, but I can’t tell you whether or not she had her heart. The edges of the incisions weren’t pink. There was very little blood flow to the wounds. So, her heart was stopped. Since the spinal cord did her in, that’s all I can tell you. What if he gets off on cutting them?”

  She thought about that. “How about tox?”

  Merry spoke up, “I’ve run it, and she was a walking time bomb. Not only was she full of alcohol, but she was also full of drugs. Maybe her heart exploded out of her chest.”

  “What was the cocktail of choice?” Ethan asked.

  “She was dosed up with Xanax. She’d be super compliant and very relaxed. She was riding two depressants.”

  “Did she pop them or was she given them?” Elizabeth asked.

  Chris stepped in. “We can’t tell. She has too many fishy bite marks. If they stuck her, we won’t be able to find the hole. Plus, her skin’s degrading pretty fast.” He picked up a big piece that had fallen off. “See?”

  Well, that sucked, but they still had two more victims.

  “How about sex? Usually they go hand in hand, especially since we know she was coming from that rocking frat kegger. We all know how drunken college boys think.”

  Merry snorted, “Oh, she was definitely rocking. I found five different samples.”

  The sheriff looked appalled. “As in…”

  Merry nodded. “She was used thoroughly. One might say she was a drugged up train.”

  “Was it consensual?” Ethan asked, as he worked on more of a profile.

  “There was very little damage to the soft tissue in her body. For all we know, she went from man to man, like a bee trying to pick up the pollen.”

  That didn't get them anywhere.

  “Well shit,” Elizabeth muttered. “If you said rape, we could kick the door in and take them all in for questioning.”

  Chris was well aware. “I know, boss, but I can’t. She had no trauma. They were either gentle, or she was conducting the sex train and having a damn good time.”

  The sheriff looked sickened. “What the hell kind of woman has sex with that many men? It should be one at a time for a reason.”

  The entire tech team started snickering.

  “I’ll boot you all back to FBI West, and Callen will be waiting for you,” she stated.

  That shut them up.

  The sheriff looked confused, but he didn't say anything. Thankfully, Elizabeth didn't have to explain. While she wasn’t embarrassed by it, she didn't like to give the tech team more fodder for the gossip mill.

  Chris jumped in to save his boss, “On to the second victim?” he asked.

  “Yep. I’m ready,” Elizabeth stated. She couldn’t wait until Callen got there. He was her note monkey, and she missed his secretarial skills—among other things.

  “Is our second victim, Veronica Libbey?” she asked.

  Meredith confirmed it.

  “What’s COD?” she asked.

  “She was strangled.”
/>   Ethan looked up. “I’m sorry, but not bludgeoned?” he asked. “Our killer switched it up?”

  “It looks like he did.”

  It was odd to have a serial killer doing two different modes of murder. Generally, they picked what worked for them, and then stuck to it the entire time. This was going to make it harder to track one person, and he knew it.

  “What was missing?” Elizabeth asked, hopping down off the table. She wanted a closer look. When she got to the side of the body, Chris stuck his gloved hand in the horizontal incision across her abdomen. He tugged it open so she could look inside.

  “No stomach or liver.”

  “But she has her heart, right?”

  “Yep.”

  This was odd, even for Elizabeth. “Why would a killer take a heart, a liver, and a stomach?”

  Chris grinned. “Yeah, that’s not my department. I tell you how they died, and you find the nutjob doing it.” Then he pointed at Ethan. “The why is all on him.”

  Blackhawk laughed. “I have all the fun.”

  Elizabeth noticed that the victim’s eyes were open. Well, what was left of them. The fish had snacked. It grossed her out, but she was getting better with them. “Wait,” she said, noticing something.

  “What?” the sheriff said, getting closer.

  “Close her eyes, Chris.”

  He did what she asked and they stared.

  “Why the hell are her eyelids mutilated?”

  “Again, I have no idea.” He began rooting around in her gut and immediately, the sheriff began gagging.

  “Don’t puke,” both Elizabeth and Chris stated, getting ready to cover the woman if he started spewing.

  When he held it in, Chris continued, “This is what else I noticed,” he said, running his finger over the cuts on her eyelids, and the incision across her belly.

  Elizabeth stared at it under the lighted microscope.

  “Can I tell her?” asked Doctor Leape, who, until that moment had been silent.

  Chris rolled his eyes. “Yeah, go ahead.”

  “I didn't notice this at first,” he stated, “but Doctor Leonard did. He’s awesome at his job.”

  The kid was wasting Elizabeth’s time. “I’m well aware of his genius. We go way back, and I trained him from newbie-dom. Now, spill it, or I’m going to pull your liver out and tap dance on it.”

  He looked surprised. “Uh, the angles of the cuts are all in the same direction.”

  “Which way?” she asked.

  “To the right.”

  Before he could explain, she already had the answer. “We have a leftie.”

  The sheriff and young ME looked surprised.

  “This isn’t my first body,” she stated. “Hell! It’s not my thousandth. Doctor Leonard and I have done this dance many times before.”

  Chris grinned. “Want to see the hyoid?” he asked, lifting the flap of neck skin that covered it. His fingers ran over the bone, pointing out the break. “I could use Doctor Magnus,” he hinted.

  “No.”

  “But,” he said.

  “Not happening.”

  “Come on!”

  Ethan put his foot down. “Not going to happen, Doctor Leonard. If we give you Tony, he then will whine that he needs Jaxon, and before we know it, the budget is blown up. You have a free ME and your tech team.”

  “You used to be the fun one,” he stated.

  She laughed. “I think he’s a lot of fun.”

  “Elizabeth!”

  Ignoring his outrage, she continued on. “Merry, was the tox the same?”

  “Yeah, it was. We found Xanax and booze. She ate before her death. She was munching on corn chips and what appears to be salsa,” she stated.

  As if timed, Chris held up the jar with the liquefied food in it. It sloshed sickly back and forth in a slurry of grossness.

  The sheriff gagged again.

  “How about sex? Please tell me that it’s vastly different from the first victim.”

  “I wish I could,” Merry stated. “We pulled five sets of DNA, and it matched the same five from the first victim. Your second victim was playing with the same dicks.”

  “So, she was at the party and had sex with the same five men? How many guys do you think go to a frat party?”

  Ethan laughed. When she looked over at him, he tried to feign innocence. “What?”

  “We’ll discuss your college days later,” she stated. “Anyway, you figure one hundred people at a party, and two of our victims managed to sleep with the same five guys? I’m not a statistician, but that sounds almost impossible.”

  It was giving validity to the premise that the frat boys were playing some sick game.

  “Could it be ritualistic?” Chris asked. “It wouldn’t be the first time we’ve come across Satan worshipers or the occult.”

  He had a very valid point.

  “It could be,” Ethan stated.

  “Wait!” the sheriff interjected. “Are you saying we have a bunch of Satan worshipping serial killers?”

  “Maybe.”

  He didn't look happy. “That can’t be good.”

  Yeah, it never was.

  “How about our last victim? Before you give me her name and all the details, I want to know if she had contact with the same potential DNA donors.”

  Merry nodded.

  “Three of four? Shit! I wish we had that other body. Are we sure we dredged that pond enough?” she asked Sheriff Rakin.

  “I can send my men back in, Elizabeth, but we’re pretty sure we got them all. It’s not that big of a body of water.”

  She thought about it. “We’ll put it on the back burner for now. If more women go missing, that’s the first place we’re going to look. In fact, how about you have your deputy talk to the campus cops? They should patrol that area heavily.”

  He made notes.

  “On to our last patient,” stated Chris, pulling back the sheet. “We have Lori Denny, and she was located behind the library by…”

  Chris stopped talking.

  Elizabeth knew why. He wasn’t sure if he should out their agent.

  “What were you going to say?” Nick asked.

  Chris didn't know what to do.

  Instead, Elizabeth opted to trust her old friend. “The woman who found her is one of ours,” she stated.

  “What?”

  “The woman who…”

  “I heard what you said. I just didn't expect you to have agents undercover in the school. How many are we talking?” he asked.

  “Four.”

  Ethan gave her the look. It was a risk. They were giving out sensitive information to the man.

  Elizabeth saw his concern. “Listen, Nick. They’re under without guns. I can’t have you saying jack shit about this to anyone. If their covers get blown, I’m coming right for you. I’ll kick your ass so hard, you’ll not be able to sit for month, and on your next prostate exam, there will be boot marks.”

  He looked offended. “Come on. You think I’d…?”

  Ethan cut him off. “We don’t think. We warn first, and then deal with the ramifications later.”

  He sighed. “Okay. Fine. I won’t say anything.”

  It was good enough for her. “Chris, finish with our victim Lori.”

  “What’s COD?” Ethan asked.

  Chris laughed. “Well, Director Blackhawk, you’re about to have more fun. This girl, our fourth victim, was stabbed in the heart.”

  He closed his eyes, trying to make a connection. “Seriously?”

  “Yep. One shot, and it did her in. She didn't have a chance.”

  Pulling back the sheet, they saw that she was the worst of them all. It looked like some sick animal had peeled back her entire torso and dug around like a madman inside her.”

  “Oh my God,” muttered Nick, as he rushed to the other garbage can. He began puking for all he was worth.

  “Not happening,” stated Elizabeth when Ethan held out his hand, expecting his money back. “It’s
first to puke. The deputy went down first.”

  He grinned. At least he tried.

  “Focus on the case,” Elizabeth suggested, “and maybe I’ll buy you lunch with my ill-gotten gains.”

  That worked for him. “I don’t know what to do with all the different methods of killing.”

  “You people are sick,” stated the sheriff. “You can stand over that mess and not feel anything?”

  Elizabeth went to say something, but her ME beat her too it.

  “Want to know what I feel?” he asked. “I feel sorrow. Here is someone’s daughter, and she’s gone forever. You come in here, judge us, and think that we’re heartless. We do this day in, day out, and we don’t get a break. We’re not heartless, Sheriff. What we are is out for justice. If we didn't stand for these women, who would? You and your puking sheriff? You take one look at her ruined body, and I know what you’re thinking.”

  The man looked shocked at the ME’s lecture.

  “You think, ‘Shit! I’m glad the FBI is here to pick up the slack on this one’.” Before the man could protest, Chris went on, “We stand in this. We dig in this, and we see it at night when we go to sleep. You may see us joke around, but the only reason we do it is because if we didn’t, we’d all stand here and cry. She had a name. She had a face. We’re going to give her dignity, despite what you think of us.”

  Elizabeth was proud. “I love my team.”

  The sheriff didn't say anything.

  “He’s right, Nick. We close almost every case we touch. This team, they’re the best. If you want to solve something, then you want them doing the work. I trust them with my life, and if we need to joke around to get through it, so be it. It’s laugh or burn out, and no one can afford the latter. Last year, my techs dug through a hundred dead bodies to find the truth. I give them latitude, and expect the same.”

  “I didn't mean to offend,” he finally said. “You just seemed to be taking it lightly.”

  She laughed. “I have four kids at home. I just had a baby less than four months ago. I take this so seriously, that I put the dead before my own children—Ethan too. We sacrifice to do the job, and it doesn’t matter how we get the results, just that we get it done.”

  “Again, I’m sorry.”

  She shrugged. “It’s no big deal. Normally, and what my people are expecting, is for me to tear you a new one because of what you just said. We go way back, Nick, but if it comes to them or you, I’ll protect them any day. Friendship only gets you so far in this room. Results get you to the end.”