"Hey O'Shea, what have we got?" Kaile asked as she approached the uniformed street cop who stood next to the crime scene tape that he had presumably strung up upon his arrival.
"Little Flack! It's a bad one, see for yourself." Kaile was thankful for her sunglasses because it kept the older man from seeing her eyeroll. Veterans who had known her father when he still worked the streets tended to refer to her in that manner. But she knew that where it mattered O'Shea respected her and would follow her orders if need be. He was just annoying the rest of the time.
But he wasn't kidding about it being a bad one. After ducking under the yellow tape she followed the stench to the body near the alley wall, covered mostly in black plastic garbage bags. Her body could only be seen from the chest up, but that was enough. The sick bastard responsible for this crime had cut off the poor girl's ears. She would have to ask that the coroners made sure to use her hair to cover up the missing appendages for at least one picture so that Kaile would have something to show people that wouldn't make them sick.
"Any signs of ID or a murder weapon, O'Shea?" she asked as she rose and came back out to the street.
"No, and I knew well enough to not move the bags before the science dudes got here to do their thing." O'Shea was a bit of a remnant of the old guard. Kaile doubted he had ever used the word "forensics." But she didn't care what he called it as long as he respected how it worked and the benefit it had for catching criminals. She had learned to let the little things in the job slide. People like O'Shea would always be around and being annoyed at them or correcting them constantly would just give her an ulcer and do nothing to actually solve the situation.
"I've got my rookie askin' some questions, see if there's anybody worth it for you to talk to." Officer O'Shea leaned back against the brick of the building. "And here he comes now. Billings, did you learn anything for the detective here?"
"Not really, sir. Most of these people just seem to want to know what's going on, but I didn't tell them anything."
"Good. Billings, this here is Detective Flack. Kaile Flack, this is my rookie, Karl Billings." Kaile shook the younger man's hand. "Kaile here is NYPD royalty, just so you know."
Kaile groaned. "Are we really going to get into that right now, O'Shea? I've got a homicide to investigate."
"What, I'm just letting the kid in on some things he needs to know." The older cop straightened a little. "Her dad is one of the brass up at One Police Plaza, Assistant to the Chief of Ds himself. And your mom was a detective, right, Flack?"
"Yeah, she was," Kaile confirmed, not really paying attention as she had started recording the case's initial information into her palm pilot.
"She died during a robbery, right? I was just a rookie back then myself, but I remember it being a big thing."
Kaile sighed. "Yeah, she was shot during a robbery. Look, I'm going to go interview some people before the CSIs get here, okay?"
"Sure. Say, how old were you when your mom died?"
She resisted the urge to flip him off and ignore the question. "She lived long enough to give birth to me, so I was a few minutes old when she died. Now if you'll excuse me." She quickly walked away before O'Shea could draw her back in. The man was worse than Scagnetti, and that was saying something.
It wasn't that she didn't want to talk about her mother. She was happy to discuss Kaile Maka with anyone who had known her and learn something new about the mother she had never met. But she hated discussing the story of her birth and have people give her that pitying look. Her life hadn't been that bad. In fact, it had been great. She had an amazing father and a great extended family that filled in wherever needed. Sure, she would have liked to have known her mom, but she didn't dwell on what her life could have been like. Well, maybe she did think about it when she thought about the scum responsible for her mother's death who were rotting in prison rather than in the ground where they belonged.
She mentally pushed such thoughts to the back of her mind. That poor girl in the alley deserved her full attention right now. Kaile had hours of interviews and grunt work ahead of her, but that was the nature of the job and she was eager to start it if only to get that much closer to the time when she could bring a suspect in and bring justice to that young woman who had been degraded multiple ways. But she could already feel the headache coming on that canvassing a neighborhood usually brought. That was what the aspirin in her car and in her desk was for.
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Dominic sighed in relief as he finally pushed open the door to his apartment. Today had been a long one. His night game had gone into extra innings and that was always draining. At least they had won. But he had been a little tired before the game even started after spending the day at the Center for the Deaf.
He loved volunteering there, spending time with the kids by helping them with their homework during the school year or playing catch or whatever. But today the kids had seemed especially restless and rambunctious and it was all the staff could do to keep up with them.
Add to that how excited the kids were to see him and he had been hounded his whole time there. He didn't mind the attention, but it was a bit draining. However, it was only to be expected. He hadn't been around in a few weeks due to schedule conflicts. But the kids' excitedness coupled with his signing skills having gone rusty out of disuse and he had developed a monster headache.
Jimmy would just laugh and have no sympathy for Dominic if he were there. Jim Munson was the whole reason Dom knew how to sign and he had no sympathy for Dom's issues with catching on to ASL and getting a headache from it since he himself had often developed headaches from having to watch everyone's lips so closely just to stay abreast of what was happening around him.
Jimmy and Dominic had come up through the minor league system together. Some crass people thought Jimmy's place on the team was just another crazy publicity stunt from a minor league baseball team, but Dom knew different the first time he saw Jimmy pitch. The guy had amazing stuff. It was almost like not being able to hear helped him to focus in on the strike zone and put every pitch exactly where he wanted it. Not to mention that his fastball topped out at 98 mph.
They had ended up being assigned to room together on their away trips and Dom had asked Jimmy to teach him American Sign Language. They had plenty of time on their hands since they didn't go out and get drunk like some of the other guys. It wasn't that they didn't like to party, they just preferred to not do it when they knew if they did they would still be hungover for the next day's game.
It got to the point where Dom was completely comfortable with ASL and they started signing during games. A couple of times they had actually caught opposing players off first base because they would be having a conversation using sign language and the runner would have no clue that Dom was telling Jimmy about the guy behind him who was too far off the bag.
They were lucky enough to get to move up through the minors together and play a few years as teammates on the Cubs before Jimmy was traded to the Arizona Diamondbacks. But now Jimmy was in New York playing for the Yankees and Dom was looking forward to seeing him when he was in town for the All Star Game. Jimmy might get to play, he was certainly good enough, but the process for pitchers was different than that for position players and it all depended on who the managers picked and whether Jimmy pitched right before the All Star Game or was needed right after it. Dom hoped that he would play because then he could sign for the national anthem. Dominic was happy to do it when he was asked, but it always made him nervous because he didn't want to make a mistake. It was worse for him than hitting with two outs in the bottom of the ninth. That was why Dominic agreed to do it for special Cubs games like Opening Day or during Deaf Awareness Week, but he shied away from doing it all the time, especially when someone like Jimmy was available. He had been happy when the Cubs organization, like many teams in the league after Jimmy became such a popular player, hired their own ASL interpreter for the national anthem and for optional TV broadcasts that people could tune into. Even if Jimmy didn't play he could probably sign for the anthem since the game was in New York and he wouldn't have to travel unnecessarily to be there.
For now Dominic kept up his ASL skills by volunteering at the Center. It was intensely rewarding and he really enjoyed it, but right now he just wanted to fall onto his bed and sleep till he had to get up for work the next day.
And then the phone rang. Groaning, he went to answer it until he noticed the number on the caller ID screen. Kaile. He was so not in the right frame of mind for talking to her at the moment. He went back and forth with himself about whether to answer, but he vacillated too long and the phone clicked over to the answering machine.
"This is Dominic Messer. If you want a statement, please call my agent or the Cubs organization. Anyone else, leave a message and I'll get back to you when I can." BEEP. There was a pause before her voice finally came over the machine. "I know you're home, Dominic. You always get home about the same time after a night game if you're playing a day game the next day." She paused again. "Fine, if you don't want to talk to me, then talk to your sister, she's the one-" He cut her off as he picked up the phone.
"What's wrong with one of my sisters? Is everything okay?" He winced at the dead silence on the other end of the line. Picking up the phone might not have been the smart move, but after Ella's shooting he was a little on edge about his family.
"Hello to you, too."
"Kaile-"
"No, forget it. Look, Ella wants you to get an extra ticket to the All Star game so that Deveraux can go, but she doesn't want you or your parents to act all weird about it because she and him aren't really a thing at this point, okay? So just get the ticket and send it to her."
"I can do that. And Kaile, I'm sorry for not picking up. I'm just really tired, it's been a long day."
"And you don't think maybe I've had a long day? I'm in the middle of a double shift working a gruesome homicide and you have the audacity to whine at me about your day?"
She had a point and he had been in the wrong in the first place, but people acting like his job was a piece of cake that didn't require any work was something that had always irked him, so he didn't respond well to her insinuation, intentional or not. "That job was your choice, Kaile, don't whine at me if you can't handle it." He regretted the words as soon as he said them. He was completely right when he thought that he wasn't in the right frame of mind to talk to her. He was about to apologize to her when she spoke.
"Screw you, Dominic Messer." She didn't give him a chance to respond before she hung up.
"Damn it!" he burst out, tossing the phone across the room where it thankfully hit the couch and didn't break. He needed to see her face to face, this had gone on long enough. Unfortunately, that would have to wait awhile. He likely wouldn't be able to make it to New York City before the All Star game.
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Sheldon rubbed his eyes. He really didn't have it in him to work these kinds of nights anymore, but they had gotten slammed recently and he was trying to catch up a bit. He would probably head home soon though before his wife sent somebody looking for him.
Glancing over one last report, something caught his eye. The autopsy drawing showed that in addition to being stabbed repeatedly, the victim's ears had been cut off. Why did that ring a bell? He mentally went through other cases he had looked at recently and finally hit on it. Going through the stack of reports he had finished, he finally found it.
Two days before a young woman had come in with stab wounds. Two cases where the cause of death was stabbing wasn't a big deal. Trauma to the ears was. The first victim's ears hadn't been cut off, but they had been mutilated. It could be coincidence, but Hawkes had learned to trust his gut and something told him these cases were connected. Going back to the second victim's file he saw that it had been noted that she had not been identified yet. That was even more uncommon these days than it had been when he started in the OCME, what with all the technology available to find out a person's name through several means.
Flipping to a different page, he noted that the detective on that case was his very own niece. Looking at the other case he saw that the detectives working the first ear trauma victim were none other than Scagnetti and Deveraux. Well, that would be interesting. But Sheldon decided to hold off until the morning. He could barely keep his eyes open at this point and he would rather have a chance to check his gut in the morning with fresh eyes to make sure the possible connection between the cases wasn't just a product of his sleep-deprived imagination.