Middle Of Nowhere

   Boldt's only mental image was of the other case— little Leanne Carmichael, thirteen years old, the crotch of her pants cut away, her legs tied open. A dark basement. "I worked a rape-kidnapping earlier in the week. He tied up the girl with shoelaces."

   "Carmichael," she said. The case remained open; continued to make a lot of noise.

   "We'll want the SID lab to make comparisons. The same knots? Anything connecting the two crimes?"

   "The lab, sure," she agreed, "but not the media. So make the request that they do it quietly."

   He said, "True enough."

   Someone must have finally been moving the SID van, for headlights spread across the wet backyard. Boldt didn't like what he saw there.

   "I'm going outside to look around," Boldt said.

   "It's nasty out there," the SID tech cautioned from the bathroom.

   "Check her boots and meet me outside," he told Gaynes. She cupped her hands to the window, peering into the backyard. She knew Boldt well.

   "Now," he reminded, his voice urgent.

   "Got it," she said.

* * *

"Nasty." Gaynes tugged the GORE-TEX hood over her head. Boldt made a similar move with the collar of his green oilskin. He switched on a flashlight borrowed from a patrolman—one of the ones with six D-cell batteries inside—enough weight to club a skull to pulp, the flashlight's second function. Hunched over, he and Gaynes approached a disturbed area of mud in the backyard. They walked single file, electing to avoid the well-worn route leading from the separate garage to the house's back door.

   "This is where he intercepted her?" Gaynes suggested, dropping to one knee.

   "Looks like a possibility," Boldt said. "But there's no sign of dragging."

   "Her shoes show mud. The tech bagged them. Black leather jacket, presumably hers, had a partial shoe print on the chest. A set of keys and a garage clicker in the pockets." She added, "And yes, I'll have the shoe print typed, if possible," anticipating the request.

   Gaynes poked a raised rib of mud and grass with her gloved finger. "It's recent enough."

   Boldt kneeled beside her, the flashlight illuminating the disturbance. The grass looked like a rug scrunched up on a hardwood floor. Boldt tore some grass loose and sealed it into an evidence bag for lab comparison. He lived for such work—his lifeblood. He heard more chaos around in front of the house. More press. More pressure.

   Gaynes said, "I can see Sanchez stumbling upon him unexpectedly, surprising him, a struggle and she goes down."

   From behind them, Daphne spoke. "At first it's a matter of survival for him: get her to shut up and get the hell out of here. But then there's a change. Something primitive takes over. Primal. It's about dominance now, about her struggling and him overpowering her. He finds he gets off on it. He wants more than to simply subdue her. He has to possess her."

   "You're buying the burglary?" Boldt asked, peering up at her into the rain, the flashlight following. Even in the rain, Daphne Matthews looked good.

   "Help me out," Daphne said.

   "Shoelaces on both wrists. Same as Carmichael, my thirteen-year-old rape victim."

   "But not the ankles," Gaynes said.

   "Not the ankles," Boldt agreed, meaning it for Daphne. This was a jigsaw, with three players picking at pieces.

   "The burglary is intended to mislead us?" Daphne asked.

   "We've got a crime scene with two MOs," Boldt said. "A burglar. A rapist. Neither fits perfectly. Why?"

   Gaynes announced, "We've either got ourselves a twisted burglar, or a greedy rapist." She tugged on her hood. A trickle of water slid down her cheek and dripped off her chin. Knowing full well it would be his next request, she asked, "You want SID to work this site?"

   "It's a start," Boldt agreed.

   Daphne said, "Leanne Carmichael was raped. There's no medical evidence yet that Sanchez was."

   "And if she wasn't, then you've got yourself a couple of contradictions," Boldt suggested.

   "I don't want contradictions. I want a suspect. I want to clear this before it gets out of control." Daphne sounded unusually nervous. She wasn't used to leading a high-profile case. The Flu had caught up to her as well.

   Boldt shined the light over toward the garage. "She parked in the garage and headed for the back door. She either ran into this guy—"

   "Or he was out here waiting," Daphne interrupted.

   "I want to assign a guard outside her hospital room," he said.

   "L.T. . . . You're right, but who we gonna get to do it?" a frustrated Gaynes asked. The Blue Flu had taken four out of every five officers off the force.

   "Notify hospital security. Let's move her to a private room away from a stair entrance. We'll require checkin at the nurse's desk. Some guy realizes he hit a woman cop, and maybe he decides he doesn't want any witnesses. Or maybe it's a boyfriend, and the same thing goes. I want her under protection."

   "Got it."

   Boldt felt the pressure of the investigation then—a sixth sense for a black hole and a case that wouldn't clear. He knew from the look in her eye that Daphne sensed this as well. "Contradictions," he said.