Unsympathetic Magic - Laura Resnick [20]
The peculiar tone of his voice made me take a closer look at the small, inert object lying in the dark shadows. I leaned over, trying to see it better.
He stepped forward. “No, don’t.”
The instant I recognized the object, I screamed.
Lopez pulled me away from the sight of Darius’ severed hand, mangled by carrion feeders, lying on the sidewalk. He pressed my face against his shoulder as he turned his head and shouted, “Thompson! Over here! And bring a flashlight.”
Shuddering with revulsion, I tried to get control of my frantic breathing as I heard footsteps approach us.
“Find something, detective?” It was Thompson’s voice.
“Look.” Lopez tightened his hold on me and added, “Not you,” as I reflexively moved to look again at the thing lying on the sidewalk.
I squeezed my eyes shut and kept my face pressed against his shoulder as one of the cops drew in a sharp breath and the other let out a startled exclamation.
Lopez said coldly to them, “You’re the ones who searched this area?”
“Uh . . .”
“Um.”
“Nice job, officers,” Lopez said.
“Hey, detective,” Thompson protested, “we were looking for a body. Or an injured guy.”
“And that makes it okay that you overlooked a severed hand lying on the sidewalk?” Lopez said.
“Well, er—”
“A severed hand that I believe Miss Diamond mentioned in the statement that she gave after being arrested for trying to get help for the victim?”
Even I winced at his tone now.
“Look, detective, we . . . um . . .”
“Call it in,” Lopez snapped. “And you can thank your lucky stars that Miss Diamond isn’t going to make your precinct’s mess any bigger by filing a complaint about tonight.”
“I’m not?” I said against his shoulder.
He goosed me to make me shut up. “I’m taking her back to Lexington to find a cab.”
I lifted my head. “I can’t take a cab. I don’t have any money.”
Thompson said, “We can call another squad car to take her home.”
The chubby cop said, “So do we need to search the area again for the dead guy? Um, the injured guy, I mean?”
“Everyone shut up,” Lopez said.
We all felt silent. Pressed up against his body, I felt him take a deep breath as he struggled to control his temper.
“You’re not looking for an injured man,” Lopez said with forced patience.
“We’re not?”
“Take a good look at that hand. It wasn’t recently attached to anyone living.”
“Oh?” Thompson said.
I looked up to see the young cop bending over the hand, studying it curiously as he trained his flashlight on it.
His partner stood a few feet away and squinted at the appendage, clearly reluctant to get any closer to it. I suspected that squeamishness was a bit of a handicap in his profession.
Lopez continued, “And if a hand had been torn off someone’s arm here, there would be blood. Plenty of it.”
“Oh. Right,” said the chubby cop. “I knew that.”
Thompson squatted down to get an even better look at the hand. “So you’re saying this came off a corpse?”
“Yes,” Lopez said.
“Hmm. Any idea how old?”
“Probably a few days. Less than a few weeks.”
“How can you tell?” Thompson asked curiously. “Especially now that it’s partly eaten?”
The other cop made a sound.
“No decomposition,” Lopez said. “It looks fresh, and it doesn’t stink.”
I swallowed my revulsion.
Still absorbed in his study of the mangled body part, Thompson said, “But what if—”
“Call it in,” Lopez ordered again. “I’m going to put Miss Diamond in a cab, and then I’ll be back.” He added, “Right back.”
The chubby cop said, “But we might need her statement.”
“You’ve got her statement,” Lopez said tersely, turning me away from the scene. “Let’s go.”
As soon as we were out of earshot, I said to him, “So I did see . . . see . . . Uh, what did I see?”
With his arm around me as he hustled me toward Lexington Avenue, he said, “You saw exactly what we talked about. Only whoever pulled this stunt went way too far.”
“Well, yeah,” I said. “They stole my purse!”
“They also desecrated a corpse.”
“Desecrated . . . Oh!” I realized what he was saying. “That hand! It was real. And it was from .