“Anyone else around?”
“No, sir.”
“Okay. When your partner returns, start knocking on doors.”
“Yes, sir.”
Eve glanced up at the sign over the steel-gated entrance.
EXPLORATION STATION
“Pinsky, do you know this place?”
“Yes, sure, it’s a hands-on educational complex for kids. Toddlers to teens. Fun place. My kids like it.”
“Thanks.” Opening her field kit, she looked back at Roarke. “It’s Hobe.”
“Yes. And, in a way, another playground.”
She sealed up, and stepped to the body.
He’d laid his second victim out as he had his first. This time in the wide doorway. He’d styled the hair, made up the face much as he had the first, but Eve saw some subtle differences.
Different shades on the eyes, the lips.
He’d dressed her in a skirt—very short, denim, with flowers running down one side. Low on the waist again, Eve noted, to show off the bright red ball in her navel. The shirt—also red—left her shoulders bare and ended just under her breasts.
He’d gone for heels again, red ones this time, with pointed, open toes. He’d chosen a dark blue—nearly black—for the polish.
He’d printed his message in red crayon on white construction paper.
Bad Mommy!
She heard Peabody’s fast walking and McNab’s quick bounce down the sidewalk, and Roarke’s greeting to them.
Eve crouched down, took out her Identi-pad to take the print and officially make the ID.
“Victim is Hobe, Anna. Female, Caucasian, age twenty-four. Reported missing on June one.” Peabody crouched behind her. “Seal up, Peabody.”
“I did.”
Eve bagged the sign.
“Check under the neck ribbon.” Eve got out her gauges.
“Throat slit, and sewed. Precise stitches. It looks like the same thread, same type of ribbon used on Elder. Lab to confirm.”
With flat voices, efficient moves, they did the work.
“TOD, twenty-forty-six. Contusions and lacerations, right wrist and left ankle, indicate the victim was restrained.” She leaned down close. “Perfume. Same scent he used on Elder.”
Though sure of it, she took a sample.
“Navel piercing, the multiple ear piercings, the same as Elder. The body’s clean. No signs of other offensive or defensive wounds.
“Let’s roll her, Peabody.”
When they had, Eve studied the butterfly, wings spread over the small of the back. “Same tat, same precise work, but…”
She ran a sealed finger over the image. “It’s still a little, what, scabby. Not as much healing time as Elder’s.”
She shifted to take a look at the neck wound herself.
“Angle’s different. You see that? The angle’s … From behind.” Eve took a fistful of Peabody’s hair, pulled her head back, mimed slitting her throat with the other hand.
“Not an impulse this time, if the first one was. But this wasn’t. Planned. From behind. See how it goes up at this end?”
“I do now.”
“Not arguing, not face-to-face. Come up from behind, yank her head up to give you a clear target. Swipe. He was done with her. Knew he was done with her. He’s either grabbed another we don’t know about yet, or Covino’s working out so far. Maybe both.”
“I think there’s more bruising, deeper lacerations on her wrist than on Elder.”
“Yes, there is. Why do you think?”
“Maybe she struggled more. I think…” Peabody took microgoggles out of her field bag. “It looks to me like the more are fresher. Like she started struggling more in the last day or so.”
“Why do you think?”
Peabody sat back on her heels. “She might’ve figured out she wasn’t getting out alive unless she got herself out.”
“That, or she and Covino figured how to communicate. Hope tends to make you fight harder. Or she saw some way to get out. Could be any or all of that.”
“Should I contact the morgue, the sweepers?”
“I did on the way here. Gave Morris the heads-up. See this? The skirt, the shoes? Just a little big on her, where the jeans and the shoes were a little snug on Elder. He gets close though. He gets close.
“Stay with her. I need to go have a word with the mother of the nine-one-one caller. Lives right down there.”
“Okay. His mother?”
“He’s about sixteen, snuck out to have a bang-o-rama with his girlfriend. But he called it in and stayed with her, so I’m going to have a word with his mother.”