For a moment, Xhex blinked and saw another rolling cart. One full of tangled, unmoving limbs, the legs and arms of the dead bodies overlapping like kindling.
She rubbed her eyes. Okay, she had gotten over what had happened…as long as she wasn’t in a clinic or a hospital.
Jesus Christ…she had to get the fuck out of here.
“You okay to do this?” de la Cruz asked from right next to her.
She swallowed hard, and manned up, doubting the guy would understand that what was spooking her was a pile of sheets on a ride, not the corpse she was about to see. “Yup. Can we go in now?”
He stared at her for a moment. “Listen, you want to take a minute? Have some coffee?”
“Nope.” When he didn’t move, she headed to the door marked PRIVATE VIEWING herself.
De la Cruz scooted in front of her and opened the way. The anteroom beyond had three black plastic chairs and two doors and it smelled like chemical strawberries, the result of formaldehyde mixing with a Glade PlugIn. Over in the corner, away from the seats, there was a short table with a pair of paper cups half-filled with what looked like mud-puddle coffee.
Apparently, you had pacers and sitters, and if you were a sitter, you were expected to balance your vending-machine caffeine on your knee.
As she looked around, the emotions that had been felt in the space lingered, like mold left after fetid water. Bad things happened here for people who walked through that door. Hearts were broken. Lives were shattered. Worlds were never the same.
Coffee was not what you should feed these folks before they did what they’d come here to do, she thought. They were nervous enough.
“This way.”
De la Cruz took her into a narrow room that was wallpapered in flocked claustrophobia as far as she was concerned: The thing was pint-size with almost no ventilation, had fluorescent lights that hiccuped and flickered, and its one window hardly looked out over a meadow of wildflowers.
The curtain hanging on the far side of the glass was pulled across, blocking the view.
“You okay?” the detective asked again.
“Can we just do this.”
De la Cruz leaned to the left and hit a doorbell button. At the sound of the buzz, the drapes parted down the middle in a slow swish, revealing a body that was covered by the same kind of white sheet that had been in the laundry bin. A human male in pale green scrubs stood at the head, and when the detective nodded, the man reached forward and folded the shroud back.
Chrissy Andrews’s eyes were closed, her lashes down on cheeks that were the pale gray of December’s clouds. She did not look peaceful in her perma-repose. Her mouth was a slash of blue, her lips cracked from what might have been a fist or a frying pan or a doorjamb.
The folds of the sheet resting on her throat mostly hid the strangulation marks.
“I know who did this,” Xhex said.
“Just so we’re clear, you are identifying her to be Chrissy Andrews?”
“Yup. And I know who did this.”
The detective nodded at the clinician, who covered Chrissy’s face and closed the drapes. “The boyfriend?”
“Yup.”
“Long history of domestic violence calls.”
“Too long. Course, that’s over now. Motherfucker finally got the job done, didn’t he.”
Xhex went out the door and into the anteroom, and the detective had to hustle to keep up with her.
“Hold up-”
“I have to go back to work.”
As they burst out into the basement corridor, the detective forced her to a stop. “I want you to know that the CPD is conducting a proper murder investigation, and we’ll be handling any suspects in an appropriate, legal manner.”
“I’m sure you will.”
“And you’ve done your part. Now you have to let us take care of her and see this thing through. Let us find him, okay? I don’t want you pulling a vigilante move.”
The image of Chrissy’s hair came to mind. The woman had been fussy about the stuff, always backbrushing it, then smoothing the top layer out and spraying it in place till it was like the top on a chess pawn.
Total Melrose Place rerun, Heather Locklear golden-helmet time.
The hair under that shroud had been flat as a cutting board, mashed in on both sides, no doubt from the body bag she’d been transported in.
“You’ve done your part,” de la Cruz said.
Not yet she hadn’t.
“Have a good evening, Officer. And good luck finding Grady.”
He frowned, then seemed to buy the I’ll-be-a-good-girl act. “Do you need a ride back?”
“No, thanks. And really, don’t worry about me.” She smiled tightly. “I won’t do anything stupid.”
On the contrary, she was a very smart assassin. Trained by the best.