The killer entered somehow, came up behind Simone while she was seated, covering her mouth and plunging the knife in. He worked it around in the wound, holding her tight until she bled out. There would have been blood all over her and most likely all over him. He must have stripped her while she was seated, then tilted the chair back to the ground before getting on top of her. Then he did the mutilation game, first in front and then on her back, probably rolling her away from the chair.
I think Bascombe was wrong when he suggested she was dragged to the pool’s edge while seated. That would explain how the chair ended up at the bottom, but I can’t make sense of the action. He probably threw the chair in after her because it was filthy with blood. The crime scene techs did fish it out and check for prints, but there was nothing.
Once he’d finished his game and thrown her body and the chair into the lap pool, he used towels and possibly Simone’s clothing to wipe up the blood, rinsing everything in the water. When he left, he took all of it with him, along with her laptop and phone. He left the ashtray on the table with her cigarette inserted into a notch. All the butts in the ashtray were bagged for testing, but the results will no doubt be long in coming.
His second-to-last gesture, I think, was to pull her out of the water and pose the body. By the time he departed, he’d done a thorough job cleaning up after himself. Thanks to Luminol, recreating the spatter at the scene proved straightforward-the report, neatly wrapped in a binder by a tech named Edgar Castro, sits proudly on my desk, a reproach to the missing fingerprint results-so there’s not much doubt that the attack took place under the pergola.
According to Dr. Hill, the furniture had been rearranged slightly. That’s because of what his final move must have been. With everything he was taking packed away, probably in a bag brought to the scene for that purpose, he went to the far end of the pool and crouched down, just where Bascombe and I perched ourselves, and made sure that the image he was leaving behind matched the one in his mind.
Only one thing troubles me. With this much planning and this much method behind the killing, there’s no way it happened on impulse. The killer I’m looking for is organized, a details man, a mechanically inclined problem solver. There was a rage driving him, sure, a dark mania, but on top of it was a ruling and rational template.
Is that Jason Young? So many things point to him, but I just don’t know. Like Bascombe said yesterday, what I need is physical evidence. The blood from Young’s shirt. The results of the fingerprint analysis. None of which I’m likely to get fast.
Aguilar comes into my cubicle, nudging my chair. “The lieutenant said you were gonna look at the video from yesterday. Mind if I sit in?”
I shake my head. “I need some coffee first. Get it cued up and I’ll be there in a second. Want me to bring you anything?”
“I’m good.”
In the break room, as I’m searching the drawers for something other than nondairy creamer, afraid that the unadulterated brew might prove toxic, my phone starts buzzing. I dig it out of my pocket and see Templeton’s name on the screen. I’m tempted to let him go to voicemail, but it’s always possible he checked his correspondence and found a letter from Jason Young.
“Hello?”
“I’ve got something for you.” The delight in his voice is unmistakable, which gets my hopes up. “First thing this morning I read the news stories about your case. There was something you forgot to mention, wasn’t there?”
“I told you what I could.”
“But you didn’t tell me that your murder victim was living with Joy Hill.”
“You seemed to know already.”
“I knew it was in West U., but not that the dead girl was found in Joy’s house. That is too much of a coincidence, don’t you think?”
“In what way, Brad?”
“Dr. Joy Hill,” he says.
“And?”
“You don’t know about her? A couple of years ago, the parents of one of her female students brought a civil suit. For sexual harassment.” He chuckles over the line. “It was withdrawn, probably settled out of court, but at the time there was some talk about her tenure being in jeopardy.”
“In this day and age? Professors and students hooking up isn’t exactly a new phenomenon.”
“Well, her husband obviously thought it was a big deal. He said sayonara tout suite, even though it cost him. She got the house and a nice chunk of change.”
“According to her, she took in a tenant to help make ends meet.”
Templeton laughs. “You might want to check her bank balance just in case. I can think of other reasons why she’d want to have a pretty young girl at her beck and call. And if that girl wasn’t so amenable, well, people get killed over things like that.”
“Is that all you’ve got for me?”
“Isn’t it enough?”
“Go back through your correspondence file and make sure you haven’t gotten any crank letters that fit the profile I gave you.”
“What about Joy Hill? Did you go through her bookshelves?”
“Brad, has she ever written you a letter?”
“Not that I know of.”
“Then why don’t you check. Goodbye.”
I gulp some coffee down without any creamer, which only gives me something else to worry about. My first conversation with Joy Hill replays in my mind, from the time she snatched my Filofax to her last-minute tribute to Simone. Self-absorbed, calculating, condescending-all characteristics of methodical killers, though the qualities are not exclusive to them. Unless she’s stronger than she looked, it is hard to imagine Dr. Hill committing such a physical crime. But then, I hardly know anything about her. If she was lying about her relationship with Simone, that’s something I need to find out. A liaison between them would give her a motive.
And if he discovered something like this, given his religious convictions, how would Jason Young have reacted? If what Templeton says is true, it might give him a very compelling reason to lash out.
When I get to the monitoring room, Aguilar isn’t alone. Mack Ordway leans against a filing cabinet with a plastic evidence bag dangling from his hand. Inside is the promotional card from the strip club we found in Young’s back pocket.
“You boys are gonna watch a video?” he says. “That sounds nice. But I’m thinking we ought to run out to this place and take a look around.”
I pluck the envelope out of his hand, then drop into the chair next to Aguilar.
“Hit play.”
After a lingering glance at the card, during which Ordway exits in a huff, he leans forward and mashes the button.
CHAPTER 6
MONDAY, DECEMBER 7 — 10:24 A.M.
Driving south from Bush Intercontinental Airport, half the billboards on I-45 advertise places like the Silk Cut, the upscale establishments catering to the affluent business set. Unlike the seedy roadside joints with neon signs and gravel parking lots full of dusty pickups, these gentlemen’s clubs offer up their vice in a polished, sanitized form complete with a buffet.
The Silk Cut is screened from the surrounding chain restaurants and hotels by a line of sickly brown palm trees. A pink stucco building. A circular drive leading up to the covered entrance with a tail of asphalt wrapping around back. Rectangular brickwork to suggest the outline of absent windows. The landscaping up front is in worse shape than the trees, and the walls could use a good power wash. Business must be down.
Inside, the place is empty. Ordway would have been disappointed. The manager greets me and Aguilar at the front door, ushering us past an empty bar and an unlit stage into a back office where stored boxes of liquor compete with a cramped desk and a bank of video monitors. He’s a clean-cut kid in his late twenties in designer denim and a tight-fitting T-shirt with a chain hooked to the fat wallet stuffed in his hip pocket. He gives us the two available chairs and sits on the edge of the desk.