Lethal Legacy

Murder spawned a stench all its own.

Dr. Amy Prescott flipped a switch, casting the murky kitchen into stark relief and
gasped.
Blood ! Blood everywhere+obscene sprays, spatters and splotches.

Mai Nguyen's blood.

Mai, wife of Dr. Cam Nguyen, Amy's colleague, her trusted friend.

Amy sagged against the doorjamb. “Poor little Mai."

Wind moaned a dirge through the house. Somewhere in the distance, Amy fancied she heard a
woman sobbing.

Dr. B.J. Prescott put his arm around his daughter. “You sure you want to be in on
this?"

Amy sighed wearily, then glared at Sheriff Fred Boyce, who had wedged his stocky body in
the doorway. “Cam didn't kill her and I intend to prove it."

Boyce narrowed his eyes and thrust out his beefy chin. “Nguyen's in jail and he's gonna
stay there. The man was covered with her blood. What more do ya want?"

B.J. ran the heel of his hand over the strip of gray hair fringing his bald pate and said
in a controlled voice, “He's an M.D. There's no way you can treat a bleeding patient
without getting some on you."

“Might a known you doctors would stick together.” Boyce leaned on a counter, putting his
hands behind him to grip the edge.

Amy, stooping to slip white paper booties over her shoes, caught his movement. “Don't
touch that,” she said sharply.

Boyce straightened and dropped his arms, his face turning red. “Where the hell do you get
off telling me what to do?"

Amy, her voluminous white coveralls a contrast to the blood-spattered room, faced him
squarely. “We're here to investigate a murder. Or have you forgotten that?"

B.J. put his hand on his daughter's arm in a calming gesture, then stepped out onto the
back porch and retrieved his and Amy's forensic kits. “We'll need a copy of your prints
and those of your deputy and the paramedics.” Then he sat down on the edge of a chair,
bending over his midriff to tug on his shoe covers.

Sheriff Boyce grunted and shifted his feet. “No need of those paramedics even being here.
The woman was dead."

Amy lifted her gaze from the viewfinder of her camera. “Cam's attorney told me she was
conscious when Cam found her."

“That's what
Nguyen
says. I figure he started battin' her around and she fought
back. He grabbed a knife out of that rack over there,” he gestured toward a slotted
wooden block, “killed her, dragged her into the bedroom, then called the paramedics to
make it look as if he'd just come home and found her that way."

B.J. took a box of tacks and a ball of string from the pocket of his white coveralls.
“Did you find the weapon?"

Boyce hooked his thumbs over the belt of his khaki-colored pants and rocked on his heels.
“The way I see it, he washed the knife and stuck it back where it come from. I took all
of ‘em in as evidence."

Heaving an exasperated sigh, Amy raked her fingers through her short-cut brown hair. “So
now your prints are all over the knife rack."

“Watch it, girl.” The sheriff pointed a stubby finger at her. “I've about had it with
you."

B.J. caught his daughter's eye. “Let's divide the kitchen into quadrants. We've got a
whopper of a job ahead of us.” He swung around to Boyce. “I assume you took pictures of
the body before you let them move her."

“Pictures! When the hell was I gonna take pictures? Christ, Nguyen had a holt of her and
wouldn't let go. Had to pry him loose.” The man folded his arms obstinately. “Ain't got
a camera, anyway. Wheeler ain't full a rich folks like you got in Ursa Bay."

B.J. didn't bother to respond. He fastened a loop of string around a tack, pushed it into
the baseboard, and tossed the ball of string to Amy.

“Well,” said the sheriff. “I guess I'll let you two get on with whatever it is you do.”
He let out a short, derisive laugh, turned, and left the house.

“Thank, God,” Amy breathed. Edging around the room, she knelt, stretched the line her
father had thrown her taut, and fastened it at the base of a cabinet.

Having gone through the procedure many times before, B.J. and Amy worked with practiced
precision. As soon as they finished, B.J. plugged in a small evidence vacuum and started
cleaning the floor.

Meanwhile, Amy took pictures of bloodstain patterns on the cabinets and floor, following
the tracks where Mai's slender fingers had slid down the white wall, the dark trails on
the gleaming blue vinyl floor-covering.

Visions of the murderer dragging Mai feet first, her long, black, blood-wet hair
streaming out behind her, rose in Amy's mind. The room tilted, started to spin. She
staggered to a chair and put her head down between her knees.

B.J. switched off the vacuum. “You okay?"

Amy shook her head. “Lord, I'm nearly four months along. I thought I'd be over it by
now."

B.J.'s eyes turned a frosty blue and his lips thinned. “You wanted to be a mother."

Amy jerked upright and glared at him. Did he have to start in on her now, of all times?
Always, the same old theme. She'd been hearing it ever since she'd told him she was
pregnant with Nathan Blackthorn's child. “Skip it, Dad. I'm not in the mood."

B.J. shook his head, then turned on the vacuum and went back to his task of collecting,
packaging, and labeling a filter disk for each quadrant.

Amy gritted her teeth. Lectures and looks, she'd had her fill of them. Good God, a woman
over thirty ought to know what was right for her. She snatched up the ball of twine.
“I'm going to start on the living room,” she said, gesturing to him over the hum of the
vacuum.

Amy moved through the doorway and assessed the scene, letting her mind absorb each
detail. One drape dangled from a twisted rod, letting in a slice of bleary light and the
rata-tat-tat
of wind-driven rain on the glass. On bare flooring, a porcelain
table lamp lay in a fragmented starburst of opalescent blue. Nearby, a white satin chair
had been pushed over on its side. By the front door, an askew Oriental carpet, blue and
white in squared lineal patterns. Each article a reminder of Mai and her impeccable
taste.

Amy shook herself and began to section off the space. She had to keep her wits about her
today. Had to stay in control of her emotions.

Slowly, painstakingly, Amy and her father worked their way through the rambling one-story
house. According to forensic theorists, a murderer always brings something to a crime
scene, even though it may be microscopic in size, and takes something away. At this
scene, they were at a disadvantage. No documentation had been done at the time of
discovery and too many people had been allowed to come and go since the murder.

It was after one o'clock when B.J. peered into the master bedroom. “What do you make of
all those archaeology books in the study? They sure look technical."

Amy shut off the vacuum. “I have no idea. Cam never mentioned any interest in archaeology
during our residency together.” She rose, stepped over the twine she'd strung, and set
the vacuum down in the hall. “Maybe they belonged to Mai's father. This used to be his
house.” She frowned and chewed the edge of her lip.

“Does Mai's father still live in Wheeler?"

Amy looked up in surprise. “Didn't I tell you? He was killed in a hit-and-run last June.
They never did find the driver."

“Hmmm, I don't remember hearing about it,” B.J. said. “What was his name?"

“Chantou Pran. Intelligent man. I met him at Mai and Cam's wedding."

“Mai have any other family?"

Amy shook her head. “Her mother died in Cambodia shortly after Mai was born."

B.J. inspected a white oak highboy. Cam's shorts, T-shirts, socks, and sweaters dangled
from half-open drawers and littered the floor below. He moved on to a mirrored dresser.
A cultured pearl necklace and a tangle of gold chains spilled over the edge of a teak
wood box. “He went through everything, but didn't take the expensive stuff. Why would he
do that?"

“There's also no sign of forced entry."

B.J. stroked his graying mustache and Vandyke beard. “Do you think she let him in?"

“Might have. Country folks aren't as suspicious of strangers as city folks."

“He might not have been a stranger."

“Possible.” Amy removed her glasses, rubbed her weary eyes, and pointed to a dent in one
of the bed pillows. “Looks like Mai was in bed. She must have gotten up to answer the
doorbell."

“Right. There's a peephole in both doors. So, it's likely she did know the guy."

Anguish twisted Amy's features. “Unless she got up when Cam let himself in."

B.J.'s eyes softened with compassion. “Have to consider the possibility, kitten."

“I know, I know,” she said softly.

B.J. blew several puffs of breath along the dresser's gleaming top. “Got some weak prints
here. Let's fume it.” He readjusted his respirator.

Amy donned a self-contained breathing apparatus. Since learning she was pregnant, she'd
taken more care than usual not to inhale the various elements they handled on the
job.

B.J. wrapped his hand around the glass fumer to heat the silver iodine crystals, while
Amy readied the Folmer-Graflex print camera. “All set?” he asked. When she nodded, B.J.
squeezed the fumer's air bulb. Purple smoke floated out of the glass tube and spread
across the dresser top. Brown latents popped up all over the polished surface.

After taking the views she needed, Amy laid a flexible sheet of silver over the latents,
iodine reacted with the silver, creating near perfect prints. Buoyed by their success,
she turned to another area of the room. When she tired, she sat back on her heels and
watched her father.

With practiced ease, B.J. dusted night stands and louvered closet doors with bichromatic
powder. Using hinged, transparent lifters, he transferred prints to three-by-five-inch
index cards. When he glanced up and saw her observing him, he smiled. “About done?"

“Getting there.” Amy groaned, caught hold of a chair, and pulled herself up. Her back
ached, her feet hurt, and she had a catch in her left side, but she wasn't finished
yet.

A tired sigh escaped her lips as she hooked the strap of her 35-millimeter camera around
her neck. Better get on with it. She labeled a paper evidence bag and put on a pair of
latex gloves. In a corner, she picked up Mai's wadded night-gown and dropped it into the
prepared sack.

As the green satin gown slithered through her fingers, images of a man repeatedly
stabbing Mai flashed through her mind. Goose bumps skittered along her arms and she
shuddered.

Despite the room's spring-like decor of pale peach and willow green, an evil aura
pervaded the atmosphere. She could smell the fear, feel the terror, the terrible
pain.

With an effort, Amy pulled her thoughts together. First, she snapped pictures of marks
where Mai's blood-soaked nightgown had struck the wall and slid down, then she focused
on dark encrusted pools of blood on the parquet floor.