Thankless in Death

liquidate.
    She walked back to the door, studied the locks. No sign of forced entry, as Roarke never left any. And no sign of any recent lock change she could see. They’d check on that.
    Did he give back his keys? What kind of idiot didn’t demand the return of keys at a breakup. But he might’ve copied them. Had she been so trusting or naive she hadn’t considered that?
    Maybe. Maybe.
    Roarke came back in, handed her the field kit.
    “I don’t think she let him in. I don’t see her doing that. And if he came banging on the door, or trying to wheedle his way in, Crabtree would have heard it.”
    “I’ll see if the locks have been compromised.”
    “Probably not. I don’t think he’s got those skills. But he could’ve had copies of her keys. He copied them when things got iffy between them—just a backup. He came in when she was out, nice and quiet. Maybe even—probably—when the neighbor was out. Maybe watched the building awhile. But he came in, and he waited for her. He had what he wanted to use. The cord, the tape. Not impulse or crazy rage, not on this.”
    She opened the kit, took out the Seal-It.
    “You couldn’t have stopped it.”
    “You can always stop it. Go left instead of right, forward instead of back, move ten minutes sooner or later. I didn’t stop him. And I didn’t see this in him. Not this calculation, not this need. He made her suffer.”

    She handed him the Seal-It, and took the kit through the colorful curtains.
    She stepped to the bed, took out her Identi-pad first.
    “Victim is identified as Lori Nuccio of this address. Age twenty-three. Lists her hair as brown. She must’ve changed it, not corrected the data as yet.” She leaned close. “A little dried blood.” Carefully, she tipped the head to the side. “Back of the head. He was waiting, and he struck her from behind, knocked her down, out. It gave him time to tie her up, gag her. Fucking coward.”
    She picked up a broken capsule with tweezers, sniffed.
    “To wake her up,” she said, and as Roarke offered an evidence bag, dropped it in. “You could go through her bag there, see if he took her wallet, check for her keys, her ’link.”
    Saying nothing, he picked up the handbag on the floor.
    “The cord’s tight,” Eve said. “It cut into her. He wanted that, wanted to give her pain as well as fear.”
    “No wallet,” he said. “No ’link or notebook, no PPC. Her key’s here.”
    “Took whatever money she had in there, electronics. Her ankles are tied together, no visible bruising on her thighs. I don’t think he raped her. He wasn’t interested, or he can’t get it up. No, wasn’t interested,” she decided, trying to see inside him.
    “If he’d thought about it, he’d have used something to rape her with. It just didn’t occur to him. He’s not especially sexual or doesn’t see rape or sex as a weapon of power. Not yet.”
    “Why remove her clothing?”
    “To humiliate, to terrify. She’s completely vulnerable. He whacked her hair for the same reason. It dehumanizes her.”
    Make her nothing, Eve thought. She knew the type who wanted to make someone nothing. Her father had been the same.

    “He punched her, hard, more than once—in the face, in the stomach. It’s more personal than his parents. Or maybe he just had more time and space. Experimenting?
    “She’d been shopping. So he dumped the new stuff, destroyed it.”
    With her gauge she measured time of death. “Nineteen-fifty-five. He took just over an hour with her. Risky, but he enjoyed it so much. Little cut here on her throat. Maybe he had a knife. Threatened her, scared her, but he didn’t really cut her. Strangulation’s more personal, and you get to watch them suffer and die, face-to-face.”
    “She’s very young,” Roarke said quietly.
    “She’s as old as she’ll ever be.”
    A cruel statement, Roarke thought, unless you knew his cop and heard the bitter anger under the words.
    “No jewelry,” Eve added. “I bet she was wearing some. Out with a girl pal, yeah, she had some on. He took it, whether it’s worth anything or not. She doesn’t get to keep it. Kick me out, bitch? You’re going to pay for that. Tell me to get a job, tell me to get the hell out? Fuck you.”
    “Why the shoes?”
    “Sexy. It’s a porn thing, right? Naked woman in high, sexy heels. Kind of slutty?”
    “Hmmm.”
    “She bought them today probably. Pissed him off. She’s so goddamn worried about the rent, about money, she whines