Freezing jas-1 Read online

  ‘I noticed the precision of the cuts, too,’ Jayne said thoughtfully. ‘You wouldn’t try AFIS anyway?’

  ‘You know that fingerprint matching only works when the victim’s fingerprints are already on the system for another reason, like a criminal record, right? I would try it but the Bureau would be on me like a fly on shit if I started accessing AFIS for a case I’ve been told isn’t the Bureau’s. So AFIS has to be initiated by the coroner when he gets the case.’

  ‘Which will be when the bottom of their list makes its way to the top.’

  ‘Exactly. But I think your agency can help.’

  She looked at him and waited. They were sitting so close that she could see hazel flecks in the green of his irises. The proximity was seriously testing her long-held resolve to remain platonic with the most attractive man she’d ever met until she could figure out how to make herself ‘whole’ and thus available to him.

  He was standing up. ‘Let’s go over here.’

  Curious, Jayne followed him across to the metal railing that overlooked Bunker Hill, glancing down the grassy slope at its homeless habitués lying on the lawn in clusters of two and three, making her think of a Manet scene. She’d never stood at this exposed railing without having a breeze whistle in her ears, so she leaned toward Scott to hear him better, bumping into him, for only an instant, but his shoulder left a warm memory on hers.

  ‘My theory is that those body parts have been held a long time, maybe years. They seemed to be freezer-burnt, not just frozen, so I’m betting there aren’t any active investigations into those victims as missing persons. That’s if there were any in the first place. I think that if those vics have family looking for them, they’ll either have been to your agency, or they will be.’

  ‘You want us to check our database?’ Jayne asked. ‘That’s no problem. Just give us the autopsy or anthro report when it’s ready.’

  ‘I was thinking that maybe you could do an anthropology exam yourself and then check it against your files.’

  Jayne looked back at him in surprise. ‘But the coroner’s going to want to do an autopsy. You can’t precede that with anthro. And Steelie and I don’t work for LA County.’

  ‘What if you did an external, non-invasive sort of . . . preliminary exam?’

  ‘Wait a minute, Scott. What is this?’ When he looked away, she continued, ‘You know, ever since Eric said that solving this case had become your Holy Grail, I’ve been trying to work out why you never mentioned it to me. We must’ve talked tons of times while—’

  ‘I couldn’t.’

  She exclaimed. ‘I do know the meaning of sub judice, you know. I wouldn’t compromise a case. But, whatever.’

  ‘No, Jayne, I meant I literally could not tell you. After certain . . . things happened with the case, Eric and I decided our phones weren’t safe. We communicated in person or by private messaging between our BlackBerrys. Plus, we had to fly under the radar so our boss couldn’t see the number of hours we were putting in on leads he considered dead ends. There were only two other agents in the office we could trust with what we were doing and I didn’t talk to anyone by phone on this. Not anyone, OK?’

  She took in his expression: earnest, concerned. She wanted to ask him what those ‘things’ were that ‘happened’ but that could wait. ‘OK, so tell me about the situation here. Do you have the same constraints you had in Georgia?’

  ‘Theoretically? No. New office, new supervisor. But if the body parts we saw this morning are related to the case in Georgia, we need to know ASAP. Has a Georgia serial killer gone mobile? Does California need to be on alert? Are there any clues on the Ventura Freeway that will help us solve the cases in Georgia? To get leads to answer those questions, we need ID’s for the body parts.’

  ‘It sounds like you want us to do this external exam just because you don’t want to wait for the coroner’s office. Or is there something more?’

  ‘Listen, superficially, those body parts have characteristics that look like one of my cases, so I think of them as part of my case; doesn’t matter that they turned up in LA not Atlanta. I’m ready to ID them, then the Bureau takes it out of my hands and gives it to people who’ve got so many bodies to ID, they’ve become statistics.’ He tilted his head back and forth as though getting a kink out of his neck. ‘Maybe I don’t like that so much.’

  She almost laughed. ‘That doesn’t sound like “maybe”.’

  ‘Yeah, well, Eric pointed out that it’s no coincidence that “bureaucracy” and “Bureau” share the same Latin root.’ He paused. ‘Look, we’ve been told to make the transfer as soon as possible. In my experience, that means we’ve got two days with the body parts in our custody. Can you do an exam and a report for me in that time?’

  ‘Could you provide X-ray facilities?’

  ‘Sure.’

  She thought about this. Then she asked, ‘How will this be cleared?’

  ‘Don’t have to clear it; the material’s in our custody.’

  ‘You’ve got cold storage?’

  He nodded. ‘Big enough for this case anyway.’

  Jayne was silent for another moment, looking into the distance toward the ivory bulk of County-USC Hospital and the summer-drawn smog blanket above East LA. She felt small against the spread of the city and the thought of how many millions of people it took to make that haze by driving cars, smoking cigarettes, manning factories, wielding leaf blowers. Living. Then she thought about the paupers’ graves the county funded to bury the overflow bodies that had never been identified. She thought about the body parts from the freeway ending up there, with only some taxpayer-funded strangers to say a few words for them.

  ‘OK, count us in,’ she said.

  FOUR

  Jayne knew she was the first one back at the Agency when Scott dropped her off because Carol’s ‘Out to Lunch’ sign was still hanging on the front door. The phone started to ring as she walked in. She picked it up at Carol’s desk.

  ‘This is Ron from A-One Electrics?’

  Jayne wondered if he was asking her or telling her. She sat down in Carol’s chair. ‘How can I help you?’

  ‘Yeah, I’m calling about the generator?’

  ‘The generator?’

  ‘Yeah!’ Chewing gum snapped and clicked. ‘I’ve got a . . . uh . . . two-stroke Give-All generator with shut-off switch to deliver and I just need to confirm your address.’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘Oh, if you’re worried about the installation, that’s all included.’ He sounded pleased.

  ‘That’s nice but I didn’t order a generator and neither has anyone else at this address, to my knowledge.’

  ‘Well, ma’am, I’ve got the receipt right here.’

  ‘So who ordered it?’

  ‘Let’s see –’ snap-snap-pop – ‘I don’t have a name on the requisition sheet but there’s a note about angles.’

  ‘ANGLES? Is it an acronym?’

  ‘Or, “angels”? “Angels flight”?’

  ‘What?’ Jayne stood up so abruptly she almost yanked the phone off the desk by its cord as she looked to see if Scott was still in the parking lot.

  ‘You still there, ma’am? It is all paid for.’

  She straightened the phone. ‘Ron. I’m going to put you on hold for a minute.’

  She punched the hold button and dialed out on another line.

  ‘Houston.’ He was on speakerphone and she could hear ambient noise in the background.

  ‘Scott, I’ve got a guy on the other line asking me where I want my new generator. You know anything about this?’

  ‘No-o-o.’

  ‘No?’ Jayne was incredulous and her words came out like bullets. ‘I find that very hard to believe because he just told me that it’s for “angels flight”. Now that’s too much coincidence in my book.’

  ‘Let’s say I do know something about it. Why are you so angry?’

  ‘You can’t just turn up here and start giving m
e gifts!’

  ‘Let me reassure you right now that I don’t think the way to a woman’s heart is through gas-powered machinery. It’s for the Agency.’

  Jayne was too hot under the collar to feel mortified. ‘I know that! What I meant was, you can’t just give me gifts for the Agency. We’re governed by five-oh-one C three regulations. And, dammit Scott, I can take care of this place myself!’

  ‘Well, that’s not what Steelie said to Eric in relation to this.’

  Jayne faltered. ‘Steelie?’

  ‘Yeah. She got to talking with Eric about the brownouts, mentioned your office needs a generator but doesn’t have the funds, and Eric decided to organize a donation to the Agency. All by the book.’

  Before Jayne could muster a response, Scott continued. ‘Plus, we don’t want your computers going down while you’re working on anything related to our discussion at Angels Flight.’

  ‘I see. Well, in that case, thank you. We’ll send you a donation receipt. Or send it to Eric . . .’ She petered out.

  ‘Take your time, Hall.’ He sounded amused. ‘Ten-four.’

  Jayne reflected on Scott’s mellow response to the fact that she’d completely jumped the gun before she remembered gum-chewing Ron on Line 1. She pressed the button to retrieve him and politely organized the delivery of the generator for Wednesday.

  She’d only been back at her desk for a few minutes when she heard Carol and Steelie enter the building. Jayne walked out her side door to meet them in the hall.

  Steelie asked, ‘Good lunch?’

  Jayne followed them into the small kitchen where they were putting leftovers in the fridge. ‘We need to be at the FBI’s Wilshire office tomorrow at eleven.’

  She explained Scott’s theory about the body parts and his desire for a preliminary report.

  Steelie sounded doubtful. ‘And the coroner’s office isn’t going to have a problem with this?’

  ‘Apparently not.’

  Carol looked at the two anthropologists. ‘If Scott’s got it cleared on his end and you’re not compromising a future autopsy, you won’t be interfering with the wheels of justice turning down at the coroner’s office. Maybe you’ll even grease them a little. That fits into the Agency’s mission, in my view.’

  The bells on the front door rang out. Carol said, ‘I’ll go.’

  As she padded away, Jayne addressed Steelie. ‘Your loose lips have won us a generator.’

  ‘No way.’

  ‘Yeah. Eric and Scott have ordered one for the Agency.’

  ‘Wow.’ Steelie’s broad smile collapsed when she caught Jayne’s expression. ‘Don’t tell me you did one of your don’t-think-me-ungrateful-but-we-can-do-it-ourselves numbers on them? Oh, you didn’t!’ Steelie threw up her hands. ‘Y’know, not everyone is paternalistic or even chauvinistic—’

  She broke off when the sound of a sob traveled back from the front of the building and then motioned with her head that she’d be in the lab. Jayne went into her office through the hall door and was relieved that the double French doors to Reception were closed; Carol’s doing, no doubt. She didn’t want to interrupt what the doors’ mottled glass panels allowed her to make out. Carol, in full grief-counselor mode, had sat down next to the visitor. The crying, which had started as though a dam had burst, was subsiding, but Jayne sensed that the force of the tears had been only dammed up again, not spent. And was it ever?

  It was possible that the visitor wouldn’t stay for an interview on the first visit. Sometimes it was enough for family members to come in the front door and deal with what that represented. They’d reached the stage where they were considering the possibility that their missing relative had been found, but found dead. They returned when they felt stronger.

  A darkening across the room made her look up. The visitor was leaving. A knock on the door a moment later was Carol.

  ‘That was Solana,’ she said, sitting in the chair opposite the desk. ‘Here about her son Roberto, missing for six months. She was referred by the Alstons in Pasadena.’

  ‘Some referral. We haven’t been able to find their daughter.’

  ‘Well, you’ll be interested in what Solana said, then. She started working for the Alstons as a housekeeper a few months ago. At some point, they asked her to live in. She said she couldn’t and then broke down. They were busy reassuring her that she wouldn’t lose her job but then she explained about Roberto and how she didn’t want to be away from home for any twenty-four hour period in case he came back and she wasn’t there.’

  Jayne nodded.

  ‘That’s when they told her about how Kate had disappeared and how the Agency had helped them focus their energies and given them hope of some sort of answer. She agreed to pay us a visit but, as you would have heard, it took a lot out of her.’

  ‘Do you think she’ll come back?’

  Carol considered this as she stood up. ‘I don’t know. It’s taken her weeks just to come inside, having driven past a few times. But I gave her one of our brochures to take home.’

  Jayne could hear her humming quietly as she returned to her desk.

  Scott walked into the office he and Eric shared on the fourth floor of the FBI building and saw his partner on the phone. He wondered if information was coming in from a law enforcement officer who’d seen their Be On the Look Out notice for a van matching the description of the one hit by the drunk on the 101 Freeway. He set one of the cups he was carrying down on Eric’s desk.

  Eric hung up the phone and turned to face him. ‘That was Detective Schrader over in LAPD Robbery Homicide.’

  ‘He call you?’ Scott winced as he scalded the roof of his mouth on the coffee.

  ‘She, and I called ’cause I got to thinking: we’ve got the BOLO out for the van but if the perp’s decided to stop so he can disguise it, we don’t just have to wait for a hit on the BOLO. We can go out and track him down.’

  ‘Body shops?’

  ‘The right body shops.’

  ‘Did the D give you their watch list?’

  ‘Yeah. She gave me eighteen shops that have come to their attention for handling stolen vehicles.’

  ‘What radius from the body parts?’

  ‘I asked for a five-mile radius from the nearest freeway exit to the north, which was . . . uh, Van Nuys Boulevard. We can expand it if we have to.’

  ‘Chances are the perp wasn’t driving too far once he realized he lost his load out the back door.’ Scott was already getting up and he grinned at Eric, who was trying to get some coffee down and fast. ‘You ready?’

  Eric swallowed. ‘Just remember whose brilliant idea this was.’

  ‘You want a gold star? I’ll give you one if we get a lead on the van.’

  ‘Yeah, I’ve heard that before,’ Eric grumbled but he was getting up with alacrity and the two agents left the office.

  Steelie didn’t leave the lab all afternoon. Carol did crossword puzzles at her desk until 4 p.m. when she watered Fitzgerald and then made tea for everyone else. Jayne pulled together the material they’d take to the FBI office: biometric forms, sliding calipers, rulers. Then she checked the Agency email account.

  There were seven new messages in the Inbox since she’d last checked: three were spam, two were lurid spam, one was from the server warning account-holders that old messages would be deleted, and one was from a family looking for a missing relative they believed was alive.

  The last email was of a type that the Agency received with regularity: relatives of missing persons had learned about 32/1’s forensic profiles, saw no point in having coroners’ freezers scoured for their relatives, but still got in contact for any scrap of information that might lead them down a new path to find that relative.

  The standard Agency response would include a list of resources and links for organizations like People Search and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. No mention would be made of the Doe Network or coroners’ Internet bulletin boards with photos of unidentified bodies. Jayne type
d the response, thinking that it was time to simply write a template for responses sent to these particular inquiries. She pulled a 32/1 brochure from a drawer and drew a couple of phrases from it for the conclusion of the message.

  If you don’t find the answers you’re looking for at any of these sources, don’t forget there are other places you can look. Agency 32/1 exists to help identify all unidentified people, including living people who can’t identify themselves due to trauma or disease. A visit to the Agency means a chance for you to talk about your daughter as you know her: a vibrant, living person. We do the rest. If she has been found, she will be counting on you to tell her story.

  Carol came to the doorway. ‘It’s just going on five, so I’ll take your cup and then I’ll be going.’

  ‘Thanks, Carol. See you tomorrow.’

  Jayne did a quick Internet news search about the missing girl’s case before she hit Send. There were five articles from The Birch Herald, the paper local to the girl’s neighborhood in Wisconsin. The first three were dated just after she disappeared while walking home from her summer job at the Dairy Queen. She was fifteen and her name was Amy Ledbetter. One quote from her mother read, ‘If she’d worked at that Golden Clog Tourist Center on the highway, I might have been worried. But this was right here in town.’ The other two articles were dated a year apart, one for each anniversary of the girl’s disappearance. It looked like the Herald was about due for a third one. Jayne sent the message to the Ledbetters and the Inbox refreshed.

  There was a new message and she smiled as she read it. She went to the lab where she found Steelie hunched over her keyboard.

  ‘You won’t believe who just sent us an email.’

  Steelie’s eyes didn’t leave the screen. ‘Who?’

  ‘Gene.’