A/N: Thanks for the follows & reviews! Here's another chapter.. don't want to leave you hanging for too long. I'll try to upload one or two more today.. life and work keep getting in the way though. Doh!
Shortly after 2 p.m., Jane, Maura, and Frost were still glued to their seats at two desks in the BRIC at Boston Police Headquarters, desperately trying to figure out what kind of sick scheme someone had served them this morning with that mysterious first e-mail.
Frost sat behind a desk in the front of the room, typing away on his keyboard and diligently executing one application after another in an attempt to crack the anonymization algorithms that still made it impossible to determine the e-mail's origin.
At a desk behind the young whizkid detective, Jane had leaned back in her chair and was staring at the monitor of her computer, her hands resting on the keyboard, her mind racing through a routine catalog of questions. Who is behind this? What do they want? How much time do we still have? Why let the woman bleed to death and send us an untraceable e-mail asking us to save her? Her eyes focused on her screen with the photos of the bleeding woman and their provocative caption. SAVE ME. The two words echoed through Jane's mind. Save me. Save me. But how? The detective closed her eyes and rubbed the top of her nose.
Next to the brunette, Maura was browsing through a database of missing persons to check for any hints on the identity of the blonde woman in the photos on Jane's screen. A rather mundane task like this wouldn't normally be part of her responsibilities — she was the Chief Medical Examiner after all — but the morning in the morgue had been quiet and Senior Criminalist Chang had promised to notify her immediately in case of any urgent matters. Thus, Maura had gladly offered her help and joined the detectives in the BRIC. Her task wasn't very difficult — in fact, she felt rather unchallenged by it — but her presence allowed her to keep an eye on Jane. Over the past few weeks, her best friend had often appeared unusually quiet and something was clearly bugging her. But so far, Jane hadn't talked about it, and Maura knew it would be pointless to push her. Sooner or later, Jane would certainly confide in her, but until then, Maura could only wait and be there for her friend whenever Jane might need someone by her side.
As the medical examiner glanced over and noticed the detective massaging her head, she wondered if the effect of the aspirin she had given her had already begun to wear off, but before she could ask, Sergeant Korsak entered through the glass doors.
"Anything yet?" he asked.
Both women shook their heads.
"Maybe it was some kind of sick joke after all…," Korsak mused, more to himself than to the others.
Jane sighed. "It'd be one hell of a joke… Someone puts in this much effort to conceal their identity and to create such a realistic scene… I mean, they'd want some validation, right? Some sort of recognition…?"
"It could be a variation of the Munchhausen Syndrome by Proxy," Maura pointed out. "People suffering from this disorder deliberately harm others, often those entrusted to their care, and then attempt to direct attention to themselves when their victims get saved." She pointed at the photos' caption on Jane's screen. "This message — this plea to 'save me' — might not refer to this woman but to whomever did this to her."
Jane considered Maura's explanation, and even though she lacked the medical examiner's psychological expertise, she had dealt with enough emotionally unstable perpetrators during her years as a homicide detective to know that the world out there was full of crazies to whom even the most absurd logics would somehow make sense. Her experience and her gut instincts told her that this e-mail wasn't just a sick prank but something far more serious.
Her suspicion would be confirmed the very next minute when Frost turned around and sighed. "We got another e-mail."
Jane, Maura, and Korsak arched their eyebrows in unison, their faces signaling him to reveal whatever bad news had just arrived in his inbox. With a few mouse clicks, Frost brought the new message to the big screen on the wall and opened its attachment.
The photos were as gruesome as the first ones, except that this time, there were only two pictures and the woman looked even paler now, barely able to open her eyes, her blouse soaked in blood. Similar to the first message, this one also included a brief but poignant caption: TICK-TOCK.
Jane swallowed hard, while Maura instinctively covered her mouth with her hand. Frost and Korsak just shook their heads in disbelief.
"Wait, there's actually more," Frost uttered in surprise and scrolled down to reveal one additional line of text: FIND HER CAR & YOU'LL FIND HER.
"Find her car and you'll find her?" Jane read out aloud and frowned. "What's that supposed to mean?"
Korsak shrugged. "Maybe there's another hint in her car that'll lead us to her? Like some sick scavenger hunt…"
Jane nodded to her partner. "Frost, can you check our listings of recently missing or stolen cars? Also, see if any cars have been towed but not yet claimed!"
"Sure, hold on." Frost opened another application and mumbled to himself as he went through recent records of stolen vehicles. "Half a dozen reports last night… even more over the past week…"
Jane studied the photos of the blonde again. "She looks like a business woman, so focus on upscale cars and newer models. And ignore all minivans and SUVs… Since no one has reported her missing yet, she's probably living alone."
"Wait!" Frost cut her off. "I think I got it." He let his fingers fly over the keyboard again while everybody watched him in expectation. "We received a notification about an abandoned car in a parking lot down in Chestnut Hill… A white compact car deserted in front of a convenience store… The store owner found it this morning with a bag of groceries and someone's purse on the ground nearby."
With two mouse clicks, the young detective opened a file and sent it to the big screen on the wall. "The car belongs to this woman."
There was no need for any further explanation as everybody immediately recognized the blonde woman from the photos in the e-mail.
"The woman's name is Karen Newman…," Frost began to read from his screen. "A bank manager from Brookline… You were right — no husband or kids. Also no criminal record, no history of abuse or anything like that. Not even a parking violation on file."
"What about her parents? Relatives?" Korsak asked and leaned over Frost's desk.
Frost pulled up a newspaper article on the flat screen on the wall for everybody to see. A larger-than-usual photo depicted a ceremony for an elderly man in suit and tie receiving flowers from a yuppie grinning into the camera. The headline of the associated article read: AFTER 40 YEARS, BANK BIDS GOODBYE TO BELOVED MANAGER.
"Her father was a successful bank manager," Frost summarized from the article's text. "Looks like she followed in his footsteps and has been slowly working her way up. Maybe someone is after her old man's retirement funds?"
"Hmm…," Jane leaned back and frowned, her mind already racing through all the possible reasons for the woman's kidnapping. "This doesn't feel like an ordinary ransom scheme."
Maura studied the photos on Jane's screen again. "An injury like that does add a certain urgency to a ransom request."
"Yeah, except that whoever is behind this hasn't really requested anything yet," Jane objected but then noticed the worry etched over the medical examiner's face as she absentmindedly stared at the photos. "How much time do you think we still have?"
Maura uncomfortably wiggled on her chair. "I can't possibly tell from just a photo."
Jane rolled her eyes at the blonde's usual hesitation to speculate. "Fine. Hypothetically speaking then, let's say a young, healthy woman gets stabbed in her stomach, like this…," she pointed at the photos. "How long would it take for her to bleed out if she doesn't get medical treatment in time?"
The medical examiner heaved a sigh. "Assuming that only a small venous blood vessel has been cut, anywhere between four to maybe ten hours, depending on her health, the exact position and severity of the wound, and—"
"Okay, okay, I get it. You can't tell." Jane gave up and buried her pounding head in her hands. And this time, no aspirin would make the pain go away. She loved her job, but in moments like this, she often wondered whether her work made any difference at all. Sure, she had brought many criminals to justice, but no matter how many years the perps would serve, their victims would still be gone. Dead and forgotten. When Jane felt everybody else's eyes rest on her, she pushed those nagging doubts back into her subconscious. It's not too late yet. This woman might still be alive. I can save her. She took a deep breath and straightened up. "Alright, let's ask them what they want."
Korsak rubbed his chin. "Are you sure?"
"Yeah, the ball's in our half. We gotta do something," she declared with a fierce and determined look on her face. When Maura, Frost, and Korsak nodded in agreement, she reached for her keyboard and opened her e-mail client.
The man stared at the unsigned e-mail from Boston Police Department that had just popped up on his screen.
What do you want? it asked in bare letters.
He pondered the question and went over his plan again. Everything had seemed very clear just a few hours ago, but now that someone actually asked him, he realized that he wasn't as sure as he had thought. Four little words — What do you want? — brought back those quiet nagging doubts in the sane part of his brain that he had successfully suppressed over the past few months.
I want Darlene back, he wished. In the midst of the flurry of doubt seizing his mind, this was the one thing he knew for sure. I want her back. I need her back!
As the man sat there and the tormenting images of Darlene bleeding to death flashed up in his mind's eye again, the other blonde woman in the dark corner nearby let her head sink to her chest and slumped down.
The thudding sound of her head hitting the floor pulled him from his thoughts and he looked up. The woman didn't move anymore, and the puddle of blood next to her legs was now covering almost as much space on the ground as her limp body.
The man dragged himself from his chair and took one step towards the woman. Then another. And another.
I did it.
He reached his victim and bent down. He touched her neck, almost gently in comparison to the way he had choked her before, and searched for her pulse. There was none.
She's gone.
He studied her ghostly white body for a few minutes and just cowered there with her in the dark, somehow feeling deep down inside that he should pay her his last respect.
Eventually, he got up again, inhaled a deep breath of the dusty air, and went back to the table, every fiber of his body filled with that strange, frightening calm again.
He picked up his camera, focused on the dead woman, and took another series of pictures. Click, click, click. The monotony of his actions matched the monotony of the thoughts gripping his mind.
I have to try again. I have to try again. I have to try again.
