Redemption is Here (An FBI/Romance Thriller Book 9) (20 page)

Carefully,
Zane made the cuts needed. When he had enough room, he reached in and pulled the object out.

There was a gasp from Doctor Armstrong who then
excitedly stepped forward. “That’s a canopic jar!”

Elizabeth looked over at her. “You mean like in ancient Egypt
and the dead pharaohs?”

She n
odded, pulling on gloves. “May I?” she asked, holding out her hands.

When Tony nodded at Zane, the man handed it over.

Gently, Jaxon laid it on a table to examine it as a tech began snapping pictures.

Zane
went back to the victim. Staring down into the gaping wound, he already knew what wasn’t there. “She’s missing her heart.”

“It’ll be in the jar,” Tony said, moving closer to Jaxon. “You can open it,” he offered, handing her a scalpel to cut through the seal. It appeared to have some wa
x around the lip.

“Thank you, Doctor,” she offered.

To say he wasn’t pleased by her using his title was an understatement. In fact, it put him right on edge.

Elizabeth watched
the two anthropologists curiously. It wasn’t her imagination. There was something going on. “So, you’re thinking the killer shoved her heart in that jar, and then stuffed it back in her chest?” she asked.

“Yes,” Tony answered.

Elizabeth pointed at her ME. “I know this isn't customary, but is there any way you can open the other victims right now? If one has a jar, the others might too.”

Zane
hesitated. There were procedures for a reason. If they jumped around, they risked mixing evidence and trace. “That’s not how the FBI likes it done.”

She was well aware.
“Doctor, I need to get out in the field. I don’t have another day to wait. I’m asking you as a favor to this investigation.”

He handed Tony a pair of
scissors and pointed. “You get those two but don’t forget to save the wrappings.”

“Thank you,”
Elizabeth replied.

“Are you okay with that, Jax?” Tony asked, refusing to
be chilly toward her. Whatever he’d done, whether it was kissing her or who knew what, he wasn’t going to give up.

“It’s sealed fairly well. I’ll need to work at it a little bit
, so feel free,” she replied, focusing on the job at hand.

Tony and Zane got to work.

It didn't take long for them to remove all the bindings from the bodies. Just as Doctor Legend finished the last victim, he glanced up and his expression said it all.

“What?” Elizabeth asked, hopping down off a counter. “You look horrified, and that’s saying a lot since you dig in bodies all day.”

“We have a sick individual doing this,” he stated.

When Callen got closer he got the willies.
“Holy shit! Please tell me we don’t have another body without a penis,” he stated. It made him think back to his first assignment with the FBI. It never got less startling to see a victim missing genitalia. “Jesus,” he muttered.

Elizabeth moved from body to body, gauging her need to be worried.
With all the cases she’d worked, Elizabeth had seen so many different crimes. Yet, just by looking at this one, she could tell it was going to be ugly.

Someone had lost their damn mind.

She didn't need Ethan to tell her that. It was quite obvious.

“We have one with
a severed penis,” stated Doctor Legend. “Where it would be on the body, he’s placed a canopic jar.”

Elizabeth scanned the victim. “Yeah, he nestled it all nice and snug between his legs.”

All the men cringed.

They moved to the next body.

“Our first unwrapped mummy is missing her heart,” he continued, moving to victim number three. “This woman has no external genitalia. He hacked the hell out of her too.”

Elizabeth stared down at the mess the killer had made. “Yeah, the crazy train has just pulled in,” she stated
, as they moved to the forth victim.

There was a jar beside his head. “From first look, nothing is cut off.”

She already knew. “Well, since I’ve been to this rodeo before, I can tell that our victim isn't missing his eyes. There’s no indentation,” she stated. “So, I’ll guess that his tongue was cut out.”

Zane
pried his mouth open. Rigor had relaxed, and he was able to get a good look inside. “Yeah, it’s gone.”

Callen was confused. “What do male and female genitalia, a heart and tongue have in common?”

She had no idea.

“Uh, Directors?” called Jaxon. She’d gotten the lid off. “You’re not going to believe what’s in the jar,” she stated.

“The heart?” they all said together.

“Uh, other than that. M
ay I, Doctor?” she asked the ME, hoping he’d let her do the honors. Already, she was fascinated.

He motioned for her to have at it.

“We indeed have the heart,” she said, sliding it out onto a tray. “But, we also have a driver’s license.”

That piqued Elizabeth’s attention.
“Seriously? I couldn’t get this damn lucky if I tried.”

Jaxon continued, “The ID looks like your victim
. I think your killer just made the identifying part of this job so much easier,” she said, holding up a bloody bag.

This was a first for all of them.

This was more proof they were working with a nutjob. A killer generally wanted to keep the FBI from finding out the victim’s name. This one was doing the exact opposite.

Now, she needed to know why.

Elizabeth slipped on a pair of gloves and waited until the woman opened the bag. With a pair of tongs, she reached in and pulled the license out. Placing it in the tray, which Callen held, she stared at the woman.

“We have Emelia Southland. She’s
thirty years old and according to the address on her ID, she’s a resident of Devil’s Lake. We need to get those other jars open.”

None of the men looked happy to be handed the jar with the penis in it.

“I’ll take it,” Jaxon offered. “Trust me, I’ve seen quite a few lopped off ones in the field.”

That one sentence managed to gross out three men
.

Elizabeth almost wanted to laugh. The look
s on their faces were comical, including her straight-laced ME. “Thank you, Doctor Armstrong,” she stated, watching the three doctors begin.

Zane
took the jar with the woman’s mutilated genitalia. When he cracked it open, out slid the flesh and a plastic baggie. It too held a driver’s license.

“Why would the killer do this?” he asked, holding it
up.

Jaxon and Tony
went to reply at the same time. Then, he realized she was supposed to be getting the field experience. “Go ahead, Jaxon,” he offered, letting her run with it. If she screwed up, he’d step in and help her out.

“Thank you,
Doctor,” she offered. “I think your killer is doing this for one very specific reason. In ancient Egypt, they’d bury someone with identifiers, so when they were found centuries later, they’d have a name. Your killer is hoping these victims would be unearthed one day, and they’d know who they were.”

Elizabeth reached into Zane’s bag
to pull out the driver’s license. “We have Kaylee Bain.” She did the math. “She was twenty three and also from Devil’s Lake.”

Tony dumped out
the contents of his jar next. “We indeed have a tongue. Whoever did this butchered it. This wasn’t done delicately or with any precision,” he offered. Then, he pulled out the baggie and opened it for Elizabeth to extract the card.

“We
have an Allen Payne. From the dates on the license, he was fifty four,” she stated, resting it beside the other two. “Well, now it’s time for jar number four,” she stated.

Jax opened it and dumped
out the contents. A slippery dismembered penis slid onto the tray.

From the audible hiss, a
ll three men were obviously grossed out.

“Seriously? You’re the ME,”
Elizabeth said, laughing.

“That’s not a body part any man is going to be okay seeing lying on a tray, Director.  Trust me, I have a strong stomach and that is probably my one
big creep out.”

She couldn’t blame him. After all, she hated dead eyes.

Jaxon opened the bag for her.

Carefully, she pulled out the last card. “We have a Walter Dennison. From the license, he was thirty five.” Once on the tray
, she glanced over at Callen. “Pull out our missing person reports,” she stated. “I want to see if these four are on there.”

He got to work and as far from the dismembered penis as possible.

“Callen, can you also text our two agents? They’re going to be doing some additional paperwork. I want to know everything about these four people.”

Zane
returned to the first body to get the autopsy started.

“I need TOD and COD, Doctor,” she said.

He glanced up. “I’ll be able to give you cause of death as soon as I finish today. As for their time of death, the oil and time in the earth has skewed that. I’m not going to be able to get you an accurate time.”

Jaxon raised her hand. “Can I say something?”

Elizabeth glanced over at her. “Yes, Doctor, feel free.”

“I can tell you the order of their deaths just by looking at them.”

Now, the woman had her attention. “How exactly? Before you share, I’ll also need a frame of reference for your expertise.”

Tony moved to her side. “I’ll vouch for her,” he offered, placing his hand on her shoulder. He didn't want the woman to have to tell a room full of people her biggest emotional hurdle
in life. The least he could do was protect her.

Elizabeth
measured the situation. This had to be a first in her book. As she stared into Tony’s eyes, she could see the need to have her trust on this one. “Very well,” Elizabeth offered. “Have at it.”

Despite hating to look at bodies with flesh,
she moved from corpse to corpse. With a piece of paper, she made notes at each victim. Then on separate sheets, she drew the numbers one through four.

“Here’s your first victim,” she stated,
dropping a paper with the number one on it by his feet. “Walter Dennison died first. I can tell by the way his skin has reacted to the frankincense. Already, it’s beginning to pucker and discolor.”

“Can you tell me how long he
’s been dead?” Elizabeth asked, noticing her ME didn't look happy about the guessing. Yeah, he was definitely like Chris Leonard in some respects.

“
I’m going to say that it’s over two weeks but less than three.”

Again, Zane made some
disgruntled sound.

“Doctor?”

“It’s not really our policy to guess.”

Tony started to say something but was cut off by Elizabeth. “Well, Doctor Legend, we sometimes need to think outside the box. While I appreciate that you and Doctor Leonard are fastidious with giving one hundred percent backed scientific fact, sometimes, we need to
run with other methods.”

Doctor Armstrong glanced over. “There’s one way you can prove me wrong or right,” she stated.

Elizabeth waited to hear this.

She grabbed the tray with the severed penis on it and held it out him. “There’s no frankincense on his dick. Feel free to test it
all you want.”

When she held it out to the man, Elizabeth started laughing. “I do declare
that our female anthro has claws. I like that in an employee.”

She took the rest of the numbers and laid them out. Number two was Allen Payne, three was Kaylee Bain, and last was Emelia Southland. When she was finished
, she pulled her gloves off and tossed them in the trash.

“If you’ll excuse me,” she said, heading out. When she hit the door, it swung shut behind her. No one said a word, until Zane finally spoke.

“I wasn’t saying she was wrong. It’s just not how we work,” he offered. “I didn't mean to hurt her feelings.”

Tony wan
ted desperately to go after her, but he knew better. One person storming out of the room was enough to stir up the boss. For now, he’d give Jaxon time to calm down.

Elizabeth wasn’t accustomed to people just leaving without her giving them permission. Staring over at her anthropologist, she waited for him to look at her.

“Later, you and I need to have a talk.”

Well shit.
He was in trouble now too.

“I mean it. Find me,” she said. “We’re going to be upstairs working in the conference room. I want to know what you know by the end of the day,” she
stated to her team. “Am I clear?”

Both men nodded.

“Go find your trainee,” Elizabeth suggested. “When you locate her, please explain to the doctor why leaving before her boss is done is a bad thing. Then, you can tell Jaxon that I’m giving her leeway on this one, only because I’m not in a bad mood. If it happens again, I can’t promise I won’t chew her face off and have an anthropologist for breakfast.”