Chapter II

They shall lie down alike in the dust

and the worms shall cover them.

Job 21:26

8. Wait for me, October 2009

Stella's beeper vibrated against her hip, the soft sound audible in the quiet room. Without releasing Mac's hand, she reached for the offending item to read the display. It was Danny, requesting her to call him back immediately. She bit her lip and dropped her head. Her job was calling and she couldn't shirk from the obligation, as lives depended on her and she had to do right by them.

She leaned close to the bed. "I have to go now. Work is calling. I'm sorry, but I can't ignore this. I can't run on work alone anymore, like I used too, but I can't live without it either. I'll be back as soon as I can; you just have to wait for me." Stella squeezed his hand a last time, before she put her shoes back on and grabbed her bag and coat.

9. Fishing Men, March 2006

The river was weaving its way through the city like a giant band of steel, the water a dirty mixture of blue and grey, flowing high and wild after the heavy rains in recent weeks.

A uniformed officer offered Stella a hand as she carefully climbed down the slope to the waterline, kit in one hand, and the other one extended to keep her balance. It was early in the morning and the sun was just coming up on a clouded sky. Spring seemed to be far off that morning as Stella was wrapped in her winter jacket, more sliding than walking towards her colleagues standing down at the shore.

Mac and Hawks were both standing over the body-du-jour when she reached them. The characteristic smell of flesh rotting in water reached her before she saw what had been fished out of the river. Suicides, homicides, accidents - with a depressing regularity, a corpse would float to the surface or be caught be by some unsuspecting fisher.

"God. Is that what I think it is?" Stella stared at the mostly skeletonized body, a few shreds of discoloured flesh still clinging to the bones and covered by dirt from the riverbed. Approximately from the knees downwards the body seemed to have been encased in a block of concrete.

"There is no limit to the human imagination, Stella," Mac commented, busy examining the concrete block around the lower legs of the victim.

"Old style. The first one I have seen," Hawkes said. "The heavy flooding dragged up all kinds of things, including our friend here. From the looks of it, he has been in the water for at least eight to fourteen weeks."

"He was alive when he was thrown in," Mac said. "The concrete wasn't poured around the bones. It was poured around the body when the flesh was still there." Mac indicated the shape of the holes in the concrete block.

"I'd say classic mob execution, but it seems inefficient when you can just shoot someone instead," Stella thought out loud, looking over the body, "because I can't see a bullet hole."

"You are right. At least from what I have seen now, there is none. He probably drowned alive, dragged down by the cement," Hawks explained.

"It's psychological. Put one man in cement shoes and make him disappear forever, everyone else gets the message - take care or you will disappear too."

10. Swimming by Moonlight, October 2009

The air had been washed clean by the rain. Right now, the only thing Stella could smell was fresh earth and plants as she climbed out of her car at the edge of Roland Park. Judging by the commotion at the park's entrance, the team had dug up something significant despite the heavy rain. Working her way through the mass of people, Stella spotted several police vehicles, a van from the fire department and the transporter of the canine unit of the NYPD.

Finally inside the park's fence, Stella walked over to the first familiar face she saw, Detective Donovan from the Crimes Against Children Task Force. The middle-aged detective was soaking wet and not pleased about it.

"Detective Donovan, what's the entire circus here about?" Stella asked her, knowing that she would get a no-nonsense answer.

"One of your guys found boys' clothes in a pond. Says they are fresh, but we don't know if they are from the missing boy. Everyone is turning the park upside down for the second time now," Donovan answered. "There was something about interviewing witnesses in the radio call, but I don't see any witnesses here, aside from the press vampires." Donovan had been out in the rain too long.

"Well, I'll find my team then," Stella said lightly and headed off into the park. She was feeling out of touch lately and this was just another one of those occasions where she didn't really seem needed. By the time she arrived, the work was already done.

She walked down the gravel path, not sure where she was actually going. Roland Park wasn't a very big park, but still big enough to get lost. She passed a metal sculpture, which seemed familiar from somewhere. The path rose and a minute later, Stella stood in a parking lot for the parks department's vehicles, and obviously an after-hours hangout, judging by beer bottles and cigarette butts littered around.

Damn, she muttered. She was really off her game. It just wasn't working lately, her mind wasn't on the job anymore and afterwards she felt guilty about it. It had been almost four years and deep down she knew that her own downfall had begun at the same time. But the difference was that she could save herself. She couldn't save him and the weight of knowing that was slowly crushing her.

11. That's how some people say good-bye, August 2006

The artificial lighting never made it possible to tell the time inside the lab. It was a never-ending over-bright day, filled with never-ending work, Stella thought as she walked back to the main lab, the sheets with the DNA results in hand. Even DNA, the key to modern forensic science, had failed to bring light into her case: a series of three robberies, the last resulting in attempted murder of the owner when he had returned early from a business trip. But there were no DNA matches on all three suspects. Back to square one. Another case was already demanding her attention—an assault in a downtown bar. In a few hours, the robbery would be pushed to the far end of the bench. Low priority. Unless new evidence happened to come to light, she wouldn't pursue the matter any further.

"Got a minute?"

Stella looked up. Mac was standing in the corridor, dressed to leave.

"Sure, my case was just reduced to zero." Stella couldn't hide her disappointment. She knew that Mac didn't believe in the unsolvable case. He thought the doers always left evidence of their presence behind. Everyone knew about the collection of files on his desk

"NYPD put an interesting call through to me today. A woman called in information about an old case we worked together—a John Doe who washed up on the East River last March," Mac said.

"I recall that case. Cement shoes. Went cold from day one," Stella recalled.

"Jackson did a face reconstruction; the papers ran it and it went on-line. A few tips came in, nothing panned out," Mac said, refreshing her memory.

Stella realised that he had to have taken the time to check them out himself after the case had gone cold. Part of her admired his dedication; part of her didn't understand how Mac could be satisfied with living for his job. She knew she never would be capable of the same.

"How do you know this tip is solid?" she asked.

"The caller refused to give her name, but she identified our John Doe as Octavian Radu, a Romanian immigrant. He has only been in the country for the last ten years. We know from the heavy metals in his bones that John Doe grew up in the region. Organised Crime was investigating Radu in connection with an extortion scheme when he suddenly disappeared on New Year's Eve last year."

Stella nodded. "Timeframe fits. Who was Radu working for?"

"Allegedly for Darien Markov, who owned an import-export business in the city. He disappeared around the same time as Radu, along with everything that was in his warehouse in the Bronx."

"Looks like we finally got a lead. Have you called Detective White?" Stella asked.

"First thing tomorrow morning," Mac replied. "Don't stay here all night."

Before Stella had a chance to reply, he was gone. For a moment, she had seen something in his eyes that had reminded her of a very different Mac she hadn't seen in a long time. She was glad for him.

12. Jack be nimble, Jack be quick, October 2009

The cold, humid air had settled over her in the moonless night. Light from the busy city gleamed in the distance, faintly illuminating the autumn night. Stella was leaning against the wall of the wooden parks department shed, and took a deep breath of fresh air. It was getting harder to see him and she knew the reason why. Maybe it was a trick of her oversensitive mind, but she could see his features soften unnaturally as he drifted further and further away from the world, a world that she lived in every day.

The ringing of her cell phone disturbed the night. Stella opened it to answer.

"Bonasera."

"Where the hell are you?" A male voice came over the line. Stella heard concern tinged with a hint of anger.

"Danny? Is that you?" she asked, pretty sure that she recognised the voice.

"Of course it's me. Everyone else is already back at the lab. I couldn't find you, so I thought I'd call and check on you."

"Oh, sorry, I sort of got lost." Even to her it sounded stupid. "What did you find?"

"Not much. Some soaked boys' clothes in a pond, but no blood, no tears, no nothing. Probably no DNA either. But we'll test them anyways." He paused. "Stella, are you all right?"

"Yeah, it's just been a long day," Stella replied evasively.

"You know if you want to talk, I'm not scared of a three a.m. phone call."

"I appreciate it, Danny. You know that. Bye." Stella shut her phone and pocketed it. If only things were as easy as she had claimed and a good night's sleep could fix her.

Stella shoved her hands into the pockets of her jacket and made her way across the parking lot back to the path down the park. She felt the urge to make up for her visit cut short. Even as Mac was fading from Stella's world, he had become more present in her life. With every day she had visited him, first at the hospital, and then at the long-term care facility, her ties to him strengthened. It had never been a question for her that she would be there for him after what had happened. The question of making this commitment to a man who would never know about it had never occurred to her. It was what you did for family

Stella was passing the metal sculpture when a chilly drizzle broke from the dark sky. Her hair and clothes were already wet from the heavy rain earlier in the evening, and she didn't relish being drenched in cold water once again.

As she glanced at the dark sky, in a futile effort to scan the clouds for any signs of worsening rain in the future, she realised what she had just seen at the parking lot. Between the various bottles of alcoholic beverages, cigarette butts and general trash all around the lot, she hadn't taken conscious notice, but the rain had jogged her memory. At the parks department shed, there had been a cigarette butt that wasn't wet.

She turned around into the direction of the parking lot. In rapid strides, she walked back, stopping short of the open ground. Three vehicles from the parks department were in the lot, and there were two more empty spaces and to their right was the wooden shed. Detecting no movement or presence, Stella walked across the lawn to the back of the shed, avoiding the parking lot, just in case there was someone watching after all.

She listened into the silence, but above the rain and distant sounds of the big city, she could hear no sound from inside. Not quite ready to dismiss her gut feelings, she went around front.

More cigarette butts and beer bottles were up front. Stella didn't need a flashlight to see that the simple lock of the door had been brutally forced open.

13. Blood in the Sky, August 2006

The sky was faintly in the remnants of a summer sunset when Stella walked out onto the parking lot. The parked cars still radiated a fraction of the day's heat, but the air had started to cool down to a more bearable temperature. Stella's thoughts were occupied with thoughts of the dire state of her fridge as she weaved her way through the maze of parked vehicles.

The familiar odour was mingled together with exhaust fumes, wet grass and motor oil, but she recognized the smell of gunpowder and blood immediately. She instinctively reached for her weapon and ducked behind the nearest car. When she was sure that she could hear no movement, she slowly moved out from behind the car, systematically checking the area. Calling for back-up would risk drawing the shooter's attention if he was still here.

Mac was on the ground, crumpled over onto his left side. The small pool of blood at the left of his head was still the wet coloured crimson of fresh blood.

Long practised skills and frantic emotions pushed her into immediate action, and she was on her knees next to him a split second later.

"Mac! Mac! Come on, answer me!" Stella called his name, hoping against hope that Mac was all right. But the blood clinging to the left side of his face, the blood accumulating on the ground and the clammy skin under her searching fingers were speaking another language.

"Thank God." She felt a faint throb under her fingers, slow but holding steady. Maybe it wasn't as bad as it looked. But all the blood on his face and around his head...it was sticking to her fingers from where she had touched him, but she didn't even notice.

The body can lose a maximum of two quarts of blood. The pool of blood on the pavement seemed to be expanding rapidly. Stella knew she had to do something about the bleeding. For a moment she hesitated. She couldn't see where exactly the injury was; all she could see was a lot of blood. What if he had been hit in the neck? She didn't want to risk moving him. At the worst, she'd risk paralyzing him for life. If he survived.

With jittery hands, she reached for the cell phone in her pocket, her eyes never leaving the man on the ground.

The End of Part 2