Chapter 69
SCI AND MCCORMICK used soft brushes to whisk away the last of the soil covering the corpse’s face. The victim’s chest and denim shirt were already exposed, revealing a bloom of dried blood and the exit hole of a bullet wound. He’d been shot through the heart from behind. He’d been in the ground at least five days and the smell on the downwind side of the grave was worse than the odor in Leona Casa Madre’s bathroom.
Justine crouched upwind, listening as the barking cadaver dogs were loaded back into a kennel truck and watching Kloppenberg and the FBI tech work, uncovering the dead man’s bloated features. For reasons she did not fully grasp, these things only served to throw her mind back to the attack in the jail cell. She saw Carla coming for her with that knife, that shiv.
Justine’s breath began to speed and so did her heart. Spots appeared before her eyes. Suddenly she wanted to be anywhere but by a grave.
Then she heard Sci say, “It’s Héctor, Héctor Ramón, the groundskeeper.”
The spots faded and she looked down at the grotesque mask the decomposition had crafted. “How can you know that?”
Kloppenberg gestured to a silver bolo tie around the victim’s neck. “I saw a picture of him in his quarters. He was wearing it.”
“We’ll run dental records to confirm,” McCormick said.
Much the way her mind had whirled back to the attack in the cell in Guadalajara, Justine’s thoughts now flew to the timeline of events she’d been carrying around in her head. Based on the surviving security camera footage, Jennifer Harlow had last been seen leaving the house on her evening run around eight. Justine would bet that Héctor Ramón was killed at roughly the same time, or shortly thereafter in that two-hour gap that Del Rio had discovered. But why kill the groundskeeper? Why not others?
“Are the dogs still searching?” she asked.
“Dissecting the estate on a grid pattern,” McCormick said.
Justine blinked, nodded, felt indescribably tired. She looked at Sci. “I’m not feeling that well, Seymour. Think I need to head back to L.A.”
“You okay?” he asked.
“Just a little light-headed,” she said. “And there’s not much more I can do here today anyway.”
Sci’s elastic face turned concerned. “I’ve never heard you trying to cut short your workday before, Justine. You want to see a doctor?”
“No, I just need to go home, get some sleep. I’ll be better tomorrow.”