LITMIR.BIZ

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heart slammed against his rib cage. “And why is that?”

      “It’s the girl in the picture.”

       Chapter Five

      The blood rushed to Elise’s head and she gripped the edge of the table as the room spun. She had a picture of a dead woman on her phone.

      He’d killed her. He abducted her, took her picture and murdered her. And he sent that picture to her.

      “How do you know it’s the same person?” Detective Brody had straightened up to his full height and his body seemed coiled for action. The waves of his tension reverberated off the walls of the small room.

      The cop who’d delivered the news gripped the doorknob. “As soon as you forwarded the picture to us, we sent it out to patrol. When the unit discovered the body, they checked the picture. It’s a match.”

      “Do you have any details, Curtis? Cause of death?”

      “Not yet, but she didn’t drown even though the fishermen found the body at the edge of the bay.”

      “The bay? Her body was found in the bay?” Detective Brody shot Elise a quick glance.

      “Not in the bay, at the edge. Right over that small incline that borders the parking lot for the Golden Gate. That’s why we know she didn’t drown unless it was recent.” His eyes shifted between Elise and the sketch artist, and he cleared his throat. “No bloating.”

      Elise covered her mouth and clenched her teeth.

      Detective Brody stepped in front of her as if to shield her from the other detective’s words and the image they’d already created in her head.

      “We’ll discuss the rest of this on the way.”

      Sergeant Curtis dipped his head. “Sorry, Ms. Duran. I’ll ride with you, Brody.”

      “Are you going to be okay?” Detective Brody made a half turn toward her.

      “I’m fine.” Elise held up her hands. “I’m going straight to my friend’s house after this.”

      “How will I reach you? We have to keep your phone.”

      “I should hope so.” She shivered and rubbed her arms. “I’ll pick up another phone today and contact you with the new number.”

      “Make sure you do. And Elise—” he pinned her with his dark gaze “—don’t go back to your house.”

      She drew a cross over her heart. “I promise.”

      And that’s the only thing she’d promise him right now.

      Fifteen minutes later Elise sat in her car, her hands clutching the steering wheel. She could do this. She needed to know more, had a right to know more.

      She rolled out of the parking garage and hung a left. She knew better than to follow Detective Brody’s car. The guy seemed to be on high alert at all times. He’d notice one small hybrid following him to a crime scene.

      Besides, she already knew the way. Hadn’t her life almost ended in the exact same spot?

      When she pulled into the parking lot for the bridge, she didn’t have to worry about standing out. The tourist season was in high gear, and a trip to the Golden Gate Bridge was high on everyone’s list.

      A crowd of people had already formed at the edge of the lot where it led down to the gravel by the water. She stumbled from her car, and a brisk breeze cut her to the bone. She fished a sweater out of her backseat and put it on over her bulky cable knit. You could never have too many layers in San Francisco.

      She scrambled from the car and tugged the sweater around her tighter, unrolling the sleeves so they hung over her hands. She shuffled up to the fringes of the crowd.

      “What happened?” Elise stood on her tiptoes, not knowing what she hoped she would or wouldn’t see.

      A man looked over his shoulder. “There’s a dead body down there.”

      The woman standing to her right clicked her tongue. “Is it a jumper?”

      That’s what the city workers had thought of her. Is that what this killer wanted everyone to believe? No. He wanted to shout his deeds from the rooftops. He wanted the distinction of impressing everyone with his cleverness or he never would’ve left that note for Brody.

      The tall man in front of her snorted. “That’s not a jumper this close to the shore. The current’s too fast out there.”

      Elise ducked and shimmied between two of the curious onlookers. She zeroed in on Detective Brody’s unmistakable form, his arm raised as if directing traffic.

      Someone had covered the body with a sheet, securing the four corners against the wind that snatched at its edges. Frustrated in its efforts to pluck the sheet from the dead body, the wind found another outlet, puffing up the sheet so that it looked like a sail at full speed ahead.

      But that girl wasn’t going anywhere—ever.

      Elise didn’t know what she’d hoped to discover out here, but as soon as the other detective had burst into the interrogation room, she knew she had to see the crime scene for herself.

      Had the killer intended this little patch of desolate shore as her final resting place? She turned her face to the right and gazed at the beach a short distance away where she’d scrambled into the water to save her life.

      Had he killed this woman here or was this just his dumping ground?

      She asked no one in particular. “Wh-who found her?”

      The man with the broad shoulders turned sharply, bumping Elise’s arm. “It’s a woman? Who told you it was a woman?”

      Elise grabbed the ponytail that whipped across her face. “Oh! I don’t know. I guess I just assumed...”

      The woman beside her grunted, “It’s a woman. Count on it. Unless it’s some drug hit or something. The cowards always go after the women.”

      The wail of a siren drew closer, causing the clutch of people to shift and sway.

      Would they take her away now? Away from the prying eyes of this nosy group of people?

      Elise felt protective toward the woman, and maybe that protectiveness sprang from guilt. Had this woman taken her place?

      Detective Brody had pointed out that the killer could’ve taken that picture at any time. He was right. Chances are the killer hadn’t found another victim after two in the morning when Elise had escaped.

      Sergeant Curtis crunched across the gravel and faced the crowd. “Did anyone else see anything out here?”

      Elise dropped her head and pulled the sweater up to her chin, not that he’d notice her after their brief encounter in the interrogation room.

      People murmured and mumbled, but nobody stepped forward with any information.

      Undeterred, Sergeant Curtis continued. “If anyone was here earlier, if anyone was taking any pictures, give us a call.”

      A few people began peeling away from the group as the cops continued to scour the ground. A coroner’s van had pulled up on the gravel, but still nobody made a move to retrieve the body.

      They might be here all afternoon.

      Elise spun away from the scene, her stomach rolling. Her presence here had served no purpose except to confirm how close her own brush with death had occurred to an actual death.

      She reached into her purse for her cell phone before she remembered that her phone was in the possession of the SFPD with a picture of the dead woman below on it.

      She meant what she told Brody. She wouldn’t return to her house, not yet, especially with Oscar still out of town.

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