II.
"Cassie? Cassie, honey, I'm home!" Darla set her coat on the countertop, grateful that her job let her afford enough heating to combat the perpetual station chill. Maybe in a few more years she'd have earned enough that they could move back to Earth to live closer to family.
"Cassie?" she called again. Strange; Cassie was usually back from her after-school programs by now. But Darla dismissed the automatic worry: a fifteen-year-old girl could be expected to come home late once in a while, right?
A glance into the kitchen showed a skillet still on the stove; the eggs in it were burned black, but the smoke detector must have shut off the stove's power. A glass lay on its side near the sink, water pooled around it, and a plate had shattered on the floor. Dammit, Cassie, how often do I have to tell you to clean up after yourself? The worry was back full force now.
Claws skittered on the living room floor, and Darla jumped--but it was only Cheddar, his orange eyes dilated and bottle-brush tail lashing. He hissed at her and scampered down the hall toward Cassie's bedroom. His paws left red prints on the floor, and for one long, confused moment, Darla wondered where in the world he'd gotten into red paint.
* * *
"White female, fifteen years old. Found unclothed in her bedroom, arms and legs spread wide. Bruising around the neck and petechial hemorrhaging in the eyes points to strangulation; however, loss of blood suggests the victim's heart was still beating when the stabbing began. Epithelials under the fingernails show that she fought back, but she was probably rendered unconscious by the strangulation.
"Cause of... cause of death, twenty-seven stab wounds to the torso. Five stab wounds are situated on and around each nipple. The rest are scattered on the lower abdomen in a... smiley face pattern.
"Despite the suggestive posing of the body, there is no vaginal tearing or semen. She's not a virgin, but it doesn't look like she's engaged in sexual activity in a while--"
"Doesn't make what happened to her any nicer, does it?"
Agnes almost dropped her forceps. "Dammit, Clarence, do you really have to do that?"
"Of course he does," Miller's partner--what was her name? Mary or Maria or something like that--said with a queasy smile as Agnes turned off her recorder. "You work in the morgue, Dr. MacArthur--the only way to scare you is to be a sneaky bastard."
Sighing, Agnes laid the recorder down and returned the smile. "I'm sorry, I just... haven't had one this bad in a while."
No one asked what "this one" was.
Miller's eyes skipped over the body, and Agnes knew the sterile environment didn't help any. It was still a dead child, and lying on the cold metal of the autopsy table wasn't much more dignified than lying in the pose she'd been found in.
The detective cleared his throat, and both women jumped. "You find anything in her mouth?" he asked.
"Wait--hold it." The smiling young detective's face had gone pale. "I think--I'm gonna go find a handy toilet," she said, and dashed out.
"She's a nice girl," Agnes said.
"She's my partner," Miller grunted back.
"She's still a nice girl."
"Quit playing the meddling spinster and show me what you got."
Agnes nodded, retrieving the sealed baggy from beside the body. "Well, it's... not quite what we expected."
Miller read the note aloud. "'Nine-nineteen-twenty-four'? What the hell's that supposed to mean?"
"It means your killer is up to his old game again. He expects you to figure these clues out. At some level, he actually wants to be caught--otherwise he wouldn't leave these notes."
"Since when did you become a criminologist?"
Agnes laughed and patted Miller's hand. "Since when can't an old bitch learn new tricks?" She sobered and gave him a sympathetic look. "I was there last time too, remember? We got him then, we'll get him again."
* * *
The knocking at the door made Tess wince and yell, "Hey, I told you, go comb your hair and put your nice pants on!"
Tee and tee, that's what everyone called Tess and Tommy, her little brother. But her friends weren't going to call Tommy anything anymore, Tess swore, if he embarrassed her in front of this guy tonight!
"He's single, and he's got money," she said to herself. "That makes him a good idea."
She opened the door on a giant bouquet of flowers. Real flowers, all the way out here! Tommy had better put on his good pants.
"Tommy, Rick's here!" she called out, taking the flowers to the kitchen to put them in water. Scissors, I need scissors, she thought, and turned around to find that Rick had already brought some.
And by then it was already too late.
