Like a lot of residences in the area, the cottage had been gutted and was now in a chaotic state of renovation. Paint cans and drop cloths littered the living room floor, and Sarah could smell varnish, sawdust—and another scent that didn’t belong there.
Sulphur.
Her stomach jolted as the metallic taste of fear coated her tongue. Sean hadn’t told her where the body was, but she knew. Maybe it was the muted voices echoing down the stairwell or the swish of shoe covers in the hallway above her. Or maybe she had innate radar when it came to death and violence.
Sean handed her a pair of plastic booties and she slipped them over her shoes. He put his hand on her elbow, guiding her toward the stairs. Sarah wished she could grab the banister to steady herself, but she remembered his warning not to touch anything.
“Who owns this place?” she asked, trying not to think about what waited for her upstairs.
“Alain and Juliette Fontenot. They started the renovations just before Christmas and were hoping to move in by spring. I have a feeling this is going to put a damper on their enthusiasm.”
“Were they the ones who found the body?”
“No, one of the workmen did. They shut down the job on Friday for the weekend, and then when the ice storm hit early this morning—yesterday morning now—the foreman called and gave the crew an extra day off. This guy says he came by to pick up some tools he left here.”
“At this hour? How did he get in?”
“He has a key, but he claims the back door was open. He didn’t think anything of it at first, just figured someone had forgotten to lock up on Friday. Then he found a broken window and decided to have a look around to see if any of the tools and equipment had been stolen. That’s when he discovered the body. He called 911 from his cell phone.”
“You think he’s telling the truth?” They were almost at the top step now. Sarah paused, paralyzed for a moment by the unknown.
“First door on the right,” Sean said behind her. “To answer your question, I don’t think he’s our perp. But I also doubt that the tools he came by for tonight were his.”
“At least he called the police.”
The wooden stairs creaked beneath their feet, and as they stepped onto the landing, two men talking in the doorway glanced over their shoulders. One of them was Danny LeJeune, Sean’s partner. The other man was tall, slender, ridiculously handsome with dark hair and eyes the color of good jade. Sarah recognized him from a party she’d gone to once with Sean. He was Tony Vincent from the coroner’s office.
He’d been a big hit at that party, she recalled. In spite of his reserved nature, his looks had attracted most of the single women in the room and at least half the wives. Sarah had watched from a distance, amused by the outrageous flirting, a bit smug in the knowledge that one Sean Kelton was probably worth a dozen Tony Vincents. Now she would have to reevaluate that assessment.
“We’re ready to get her bagged whenever you’re done,” Vincent said.
Sean nodded. “Give us a minute. I’ve brought in someone to have a look at the tattoos.”
Vincent’s gaze flicked briefly over Sarah as he headed for the stairs. “No problem. Just holler when you’re ready.”
After he was gone, Danny LeJeune came over and gave Sarah a quick hug. “Hey, gorgeous. Long time, no see.”
“How are you, Danny?”
“Can’t complain.” He gave her a weary smile. “No offense, hon, but you’re just about the last person I wanted to see walk up those stairs. I was hoping you’d finally wise up and tell this guy to go to hell.”
“Easy,” Sean warned, and Sarah was surprised by the tension in his voice. She’d never known him to be at odds with his partner. They’d always been close.
Danny shrugged. “She’s got no business being here, and you damn well know it. I wouldn’t let a dog of mine go near that room, much less...” He trailed off, obviously not knowing what to call Sarah these days.
She flinched and she felt Sean stiffen beside her.
“Lapierre is going to shit a brick when she hears about this,” Danny said.
Sean shrugged. “Who says she has to know? If anyone asks, we brought in an expert consultant.”
“Oh, yeah, that’s convincing.”
“If there’s trouble, I’ll make sure it doesn’t touch you,” Sean said. “This is on me.”
“You’re damn straight, it’s on you. But that’s not my only concern here.” Danny glanced down at Sarah and his voice softened. “You don’t have to do this. Just turn around and head back down those stairs. Walk out the front door and keep going.”
Sarah knew there was a double meaning in his advice. He was warning her to stay away from Sean.
She appreciated the sentiment. Danny was a good guy and she liked him. She’d even found herself wishing at times that she’d met him first.
He was a couple of inches shorter than Sean, but wider in the shoulders and broader in the chest. After a few drinks, he liked to reminisce about his glory days as a linebacker for the LSU Tigers. Sarah thought that he probably hadn’t changed much since then. In spite of his wife’s efforts to keep him on the straight and narrow, he could still party with the best of them. He’d just become more adept at hiding that part of his life.
Sarah put her hand on his arm. “I’m okay with this, Danny. I want to help if I can.”
“You’re both nuts if you ask me.” But he fished a jar of Vicks from his pocket and opened the lid. “Smell’s not as bad as some. The cold helps, but you might want a dab of this just the same.”
Sarah smoothed some underneath her nostrils as Sean took her elbow. She walked ahead of him, pausing only briefly at the threshold before she entered.
She tried not to look at the victim, but she saw immediately that the woman was Caucasian with light brown hair and a slim build. She was lying facedown on the floor, so it was difficult to judge her age. Sarah had the impression that the victim was young, though.
She tried to keep her eyes averted, but it was impossible to ignore the blood. Large puddles near the body. Arterial spurts on the walls. It was as if the poor woman had been bled dry.
Sarah couldn’t see any wounds. The damage was hidden by the position of the body, and she was suddenly very glad that the victim hadn’t been turned over.
She put a hand to her mouth. “What did he do to her?”
“It’s probably best if you don’t know,” Sean said.
Sarah forced herself to take a deep breath and the vapor made her eyes water. She glanced around the room. It was large with high ceilings and ornate molding that had recently been restored. Two long windows faced the neighboring house, but the glass had been covered with cardboard and taped securely at the edges, allowing no light to show through to the outside.
Sean hadn’t been exaggerating earlier. The udjats were everywhere, even staring down at them from the ceiling.
“Did he use her blood to draw them?”
“We don’t know that yet, but I’d say it’s a pretty safe bet.” He paused, gesturing with a gloved hand. “Have you ever seen anything like this?”
She had. A long time ago.
A full-length mirror had been propped against the wall opposite the doorway and positioned so that the body could be viewed from certain angles. But Sarah’s gaze was riveted, not on the reflection of the victim, but on the wall behind her.
She glanced over her shoulder at the words that had been scrawled backward in blood.
uoy ma I.
She turned back to the mirror and read them again in the reflection.
I am you.
A rush of panic blindsided her, and she took an involuntary step back, right into Sean. His hands gripped her arms to steady her. “You okay?”
“Yeah, I just... I don’t know. That message on the wall kind of threw me.” She nodded toward the mirror. “Was that already here?”
“Not according to the workman. He said this room was empty when they knocked off work on Friday.”
“Why would the killer bring such a large mirror with him? Just so you’d be able to read his message?”
“I don’t think so,” Sean muttered. “I think the son of a bitch wanted to watch himself.”
Sarah moved toward the mirror, catching a glimpse of her own reflection. Dark, sober eyes stared back at her. Black hair tangled from the wind. Pale skin. Dry lips. No wonder Sean had commented on her appearance. She did look like hell.
From where she stood now, she could still see the strange message on the wall behind her reflection. I am you.
“Maybe I was wrong earlier when I said he wants you to know he’s watching. Maybe he’s trying to tell you that someone is watching him.” Sarah could see her lips move in the mirror, but it seemed as if someone else had spoken. She felt an odd detachment from her own reflection.
“What are you talking about?”
She shook her head, not really understanding her own thoughts. “Maybe I should just look at the tattoos.”
Sean took her arm and circled her around to the other side of the body, careful to avoid the blood on the floor. The victim’s pale, waxy skin provided a macabre canvas for the ink on her arms and legs.
Her head was turned to the side, but her blood-matted hair concealed her face. All Sarah could see was one eye, open and staring. Like the painted udjats on the walls and ceiling, it seemed to follow her as she knelt on the floor beside the body.
“Do you know who she is?”
“No, not yet. We’re checking with the neighbors, but so far no luck.”
“When did it happen?”
“According to the coroner, she’s been here at least forty-eight hours.”
It had probably happened on Saturday night, then, only a few blocks from Sarah’s house. She found herself wondering what she had been doing at the exact moment of the woman’s death. Had she experienced any kind of premonition, some inexplicable sign that evil had been that near?
She bent her head and tried to concentrate on the tattoos. Skulls, dragons, serpent-entwined crosses. Nothing creative or unique about any of them. The designs were typical of the flash found on the walls of tattoo parlors all over the city.
But the red-and-black symbol on the victim’s back...that was unusual. And it was fresh. Scattered on the floor beside the body was the familiar paraphernalia of Sarah’s art—thimble-sized ink cups, Vaseline, soiled paper towels. The killer had tattooed his victim at the murder scene. And he’d taken care to do it right.
That explained the barricaded windows, Sarah thought. He knew he’d be a while and didn’t want to worry about discovery.
She leaned forward, studying the blood that had oozed from the needle stippling and dried on the woman’s skin.
Behind her, Sean said, “She was still alive when he did that one.”
“Looks like it bled quite a bit. She may have been drinking before he brought her here.” The danger of excessive bleeding was why they never tattooed drunks at the shop. That and the morning-after regrets.
“We’ll find out when we get the toxicology report.”
Sarah paused, struck by something he’d just said. “What did you mean, she was alive when he did that one? The tattoos on her arms and legs are old. You can tell by how badly most of them are faded.”
“I was talking about the pentagram in her right palm. See here? Ink smears, but almost no blood.”
Sarah stared at the tattoo for a moment. Sean had called it a pentagram, but he was wrong. She started to correct him, but his attention was still focused on the victim’s back.
“That’s a pretty big tat. How long would it take to apply a design like that?”
Sarah shrugged. “Several hours, depending on the artist. But this guy’s no scratcher. He knows what he’s doing. Look how clean and sharp the edges are.”
“What about the ones on her arms and legs? Any chance you recognize the artist?”
She shook her head. “Nothing stands out about the style, and the designs are pretty run-of-the-mill. And like I said, they’re old. She’s had most of them for years.”
The creak of a footstep made them both turn. Danny came into the room and stood looking down at the body. He cocked his head, studying the strange design on the victim’s back. “Hey, I never noticed before, but from this angle, it looks like a pair of nak*d women.” He tilted his head the other way. “With really big br**sts.”
“Very helpful,” Sean said. “It doesn’t look like much of anything to me.”
“That’s because you’ve got no imagination.” Danny squatted at the dead woman’s feet. “You know what it reminds me of? No, seriously. It looks like one of those inkblots that shrinks use to analyze their patients.”
Sean started to say something, but Sarah turned excitedly. “No, he’s right. That’s exactly what it looks like. A Rorschach inkblot.”
“What does it mean?”
“It means something different to everyone who looks at it. That’s the whole point. A patient’s spontaneous response is supposed to reveal deep secrets or significant information that can be used in a psychological evaluation.” Sarah turned back to the body. “There are only ten true Rorschach inkblots. Five black-and-white, two red-and-black and three multicoloreds. They’re kept secret to protect the integrity of the test. The inkblot cards you see on TV and in movies are most likely fakes.”
“What about this one?”
“I can’t say for sure. You’d need to show it to someone who’s an expert in Rorschach inkblot therapy, but that might be difficult. The cards aren’t used much anymore.”
“How is it you know so much about these inkblots?” Sean’s voice was deliberately casual.
Sarah met his gaze. You already know the answer to that. Aloud she said, “I read a lot.”