Alex Kava Bundle - Alex Kava [263]
“Jesus Christ,” he gasped, staring in disbelief at the streaks, the smudges and handprints that smeared the entire wall and now glowed like fluorescent paint.
CHAPTER 41
Maggie stepped back, giving Keith room. It was worse than she expected. The smears stretched, reached, clawed and swiped with the undeniable motion of someone desperate and terrified. The handprints were small, almost child-size. She remembered Jessica Beckwith’s delicate hands holding out the pizza box for her.
“Jesus, I can’t believe this.”
She heard Tully’s voice again come out of the black. She knew he had believed they wouldn’t find a thing, that nothing had taken place here. There was no victory in proving him wrong. Instead, she found herself light-headed and nauseated. Suddenly it was too hot in the room. What the hell was the matter with her? She hadn’t been sick at crime scenes since the early days, those first years of initiation. Now for a second time in less than a week, her stomach attempted to revolt against her.
“Keith, what are the chances of this being a cleaning solution? The house is for sale. It still smells like someone has given it a recent scrubbing.”
“Oh, it’s been scrubbed all right. Someone was trying to get rid of this.”
“But luminol can be sensitive to bleach,” she continued. “Maybe a residential-cleaning company scrubbed down everything including the walls.” After a fitful, sleepless night of anticipating, of knowing what they’d discover, why did she not want to believe it? Why did she find herself wanting to believe the streaks and swipes in front of her were simply an overzealous maid?
“In the linen closet there’s a bunch of cleaning supplies. Mop, bucket, sponges and liquid cleaners. Smells like the same stuff that was used. None of it contains bleach,” Ganza countered. “I checked. Besides, no one cleans and leaves handprints like that.”
She forced herself to stare at the prints before they faded. The small fingers were elongated as they had grabbed and clawed and slid. She closed her eyes against the images her mind was trained to concoct. With little coaxing, she knew she could see it all in slow motion as if visualizing a scene from a movie, a horror movie.
“Ready, Maggie?” Keith’s voice made her jump. He was right beside her again as the room started to return to darkness. “Let’s get the floor from here to the bathroom.”
She felt her fingers shaking as she repositioned them on the spray bottles. Gratefully, neither Keith nor Tully could see them. She steadied herself and tried to remember exactly what direction and how far it was to the bathroom. Once she felt back in control, she began spritzing, keeping the mist away from her feet as she slowly walked sideways. Maggie hadn’t reached the bathroom door when the floor began lighting up like a runway, long skid marks following her.
“Oh my God!” She heard Tully mutter from his dark perch, and she wanted to tell him to shut up. His shock unnerved her and worse, reminded her of her own.
Ganza pointed the red dot to the floor, following the trail that had once been bloody feet dragged across the parquet floor. Maggie pushed back strands of hair and swiped at the perspiration on her forehead. Was Jessica unconscious by the time he got her to the bathroom? The girl would have lost a lot of blood putting up a fight like the one smeared on the wall. Maggie wondered if she was conscious when Stucky lifted her into the whirlpool bath. When he told her all the horrible things he would do to her. Was she dead or alive when he started cutting?
“Let’s take a break here,” Keith said. “Agent Tully, go ahead and switch the lights back on.”
Maggie blinked against the burst of light, relieved at the interruption of her mind’s descent into the depths of hell. If she tried, she would be able to hear Jessica’s screams, her pleas for help. Maggie’s memory bank seemed filled with audio clips of what sheer terror sounded like. It was something she’d never forget, no matter how many years went by.
“Agent O’Dell?”
Tully