Too Close to Home (The Forensic Files) Read online

  “What do you want from me?” she yelled in his masked face, her fear being replaced by defiance.

  He lowered the knife and ran the cool steel along her naked body, making circles around her hardening nipples down to her belly button. He then leaned over her, his face so close she could feel his hot breath on her neck as he breathed her in. She was unable to see the knife, but she felt it when it pierced her skin. She felt a sharp pain radiating through her body as the man repeatedly plunged the knife slowly into the soft flesh of her stomach. Her screams began to quiet as stomach acid and blood started to pool in her throat, which in turn caused her breathing to become even shallower. With one last gurgled gasp, she quickly stilled, leaving the ghost of her screams echoing through the hall.

  Chapter Two

  Carma pulled into the high school parking lot in Bayboro a little after seven in the morning and came to a stop behind a row of sheriff’s cars at the front entrance of the high school where the barricades began. Before getting out of her car, she looked around at the sight of the small developing crowd of curious bystanders scattered outside the school.

  She put a hand over her eyes and scoped out the scene. “It’s too early for this,” she mumbled to herself, knowing it wasn’t going to take long for word to get out in this small town. Soon the school grounds are going to be littered with a lot more people, mostly kids.

  “Detective Jones! Over here.” Carma turned at the sound of her name.

  She smiled and shook her head when she saw her new partner, Harold, motioning to her from beside his car. With his large, dark body shoved into his light brown pressed suit and a wide cheesy grin plastered on his face, he looked as excited as a kid in a candy store. This was probably the most excitement he had had since moving to Pamlico County. It probably even made him a little nostalgic for his home turf on the mean streets of New York City.

  “Harold, I know we have only been partners for a couple of weeks, but I told you to please call me Carma. Detective Jones is my father, or at least he was before he retired.”

  “You don’t look like a Carma, though. You got too much vanilla in you. Besides, I figured Detective Jones sounded more professional at a crime scene.”

  Carma laughed. “Like I said, my dad was Detective Jones before he retired. He is an old-fashioned southern man who highly believed in karma. That’s why he became a police officer, then later a detective.”

  Harold bent over laughing. “Oh my God, that’s a good one! I bet he is as much of a hardass as you are.”

  “Sometimes worse. And as far as the crime scene is concerned, look around. I grew up with most of these people. It’s Pamlico County, not New York. In fact, all these kids you see gathering around, I grew up with most of their parents. We follow yes and no with ma’am and sir, as well as using please and thank you, but that would be the extent of our formality. Just be glad I’m wearing this hot suit instead of my trusty blue jeans,” she told him with a smile.

  “See, now that’s why I love the South, all that southern hospitality,” Harold said smiling, using his best mock-southern accent.

  “So what, do New Yorker’s not believe in manners?”

  He shook his head.

  “How tragic for everyone,” she said. “Speaking of tragic, what do we have here?”

  Harold rubbed a hand over his smooth bald head. “A teacher came in early this morning and found a girl stabbed to death in one of the classrooms.”

  “Has she been identified yet?”

  “I don’t know. I haven’t gotten that far yet,” Harold answered.

  “Has the SBI been notified yet?” Carma asked.

  “Yes, they should be here within an hour or so.”

  “Coming from Raleigh during rush hour traffic, I wouldn’t hold my breath,” she told him.

  She walked back to her car and popped open her trunk and grabbed a black duffle bag from the back, then closed the trunk before placing the bag on the back of her car. She opened the bag, making sure she had all of the necessary equipment.

  “Well, let’s go see what we can find out. The sooner, the better. It’s too damned early, and to make things worse, I didn’t have time to make my coffee before I left.”

  Carma took off her black blazer, slinging it on the hood of Harold’s car. Even during the mornings in late August, it was too warm for it.

  Watching her, Harold couldn’t help but admire her long lean body that was even evident through her dark pant suit. Her white short-sleeved buttoned up blouse fit snugly over her firm round breasts. That, Harold noticed, had resulted in the larger than normal gaps between the buttons, gaps which could burst open if she so much as breathed too deeply, leading to the exposure of the solid white bra underneath. Her usual appearance always seemed to be the cause of his eyes having a mind of their own whenever they were in close proximity. His gaze trailed down her body, stopping at her shoes, where he tilted his head to the side and studied them curiously.

  “I sure hope we don’t have to do any running today,” Harold said to her.

  “Why’s that? You get winded easily?” she asked him.

  “Nah, but you may break your ankle running in those things,” he said, pointing to her shoes. “What are they, four inches?”

  “I can outrun anyone, anytime, anywhere in my heels,” she stated.

  “Damn, Carma! You are a hardass, but a damned hot one.”

  She rolled her eyes before lifting the yellow caution tape up and crawled under, then followed the trail of people scattered along the way into the building.

  “Hey Carma, the body’s in here,” Deputy Mike Jenkins said as soon as he spotted her rounding the corner into the science wing.

  Carma stared at him longingly, hidden desires radiating through her wide green eyes at the sight of him. Even at the ripe age of thirty-six, he still looked exactly the same as he did when they were teenagers. He still had the same dark brown hair, which unlike a lot of men his age, had been left untouched by gray. Most importantly, he still had those youthful brown eyes that, when he smiled with his thin sharp lips, sparkled with flecks of gold.

  “Hey Mike! How’ve you been? It’s been a while,” she said.

  “I’ve had better days.”

  “I bet. What do we know so far?”

  “Melissa Cooley.”

  “Why does that name sound familiar?” Carma asked him.

  “She is or was a senior here. Most people know her as Missy. All around popular girl, head cheerleader, junior prom queen, dates the quarterback. Typical important things to a high school girl,” Mike told her.

  “Wow! That’s a lot of information from one dead girl.”

  Mike looked at her sadly, breaking his tough cop persona, causing her heart to melt. “She’s Kristen’s best friend. They were like sisters. Jesus, I’ve known the girl since before she was even born,” he confessed.

  “Oh, I’m sorry. How’s Kristen taking it?”

  He looked in the classroom and skimmed a glance at Missy’s body draped on the desk. “I haven’t had the heart to tell her yet.”

  Carma looked at her watch. “It’s almost seven-thirty, Mike. All of the kids will be here by eight. The parking lot is already filling up and will be full of curious kids in a few more minutes, including Kristen. You might want to be there for her when she hears, if she hasn’t already.”

  “I know,” Mike said, as he pulled out his cell phone and walked away, allowing Carma the opportunity to finally relax and turn her focus on the job at hand without the distraction of his presence.

  Carma and Harold walked into the classroom, stood in front of the desk and examined the scene. Carma looked down at the almost completely naked young girl laying there, her face serene, as if asleep. She looked the body up and down, doing an external exam. The only visible wounds were deep cuts in her stomach. The blood flow, having already subsided, had dripped down the desk onto the tile floor below and left a pool of crimson all around her, turning her once beautiful blonde hair a horrib
le rusty red color.

  “Such a shame! Pretty girl. Talented. I’ve seen her cheer at a number of home games throughout the past few years,” Carma told Harold, not taking her eyes off of Melissa’s still face.

  Harold cocked a thick black eye brow at her. “You got kids?”

  “No, it’s a small county, so going to the home football games is almost mandatory. You should come sometime. It’s actually a pretty good time, especially when they play New Bern High School. The teams had been rivals for as long as I can remember, although I don’t know how this is going to affect the team now.”

  “I haven’t been to a high school football game since I was in high school myself, and that was a long time ago. Although if it’s as much fun as you say it is, then I may have to check it out.” He looked back at the girl and shook his head. “The first deputy to respond said this is the worst thing he’s ever seen.” Harold looked around the classroom. “I guess it’s not that hard to believe. For a little podunk county like this, I guess it is pretty gruesome. He should try living in New York, or any other big city for that matter, for a month. After a month, you almost get used to it, or you at least become a lot less sensitive.”

  “Almost makes me wish I had taken that job down in New Orleans.”

  “You trying to leave, Carma?”

  “Sometimes. It’s an open invite and I haven’t decided yet. There’s no place like home, and all that.”

  “New Orleans is my kind of town. It’d be mighty damned tempting. Have you ever been there? Bourbon Street, now that’s a good time.”

  “No. I’ve always wanted to, though, but I never seem to find the time. But I bet at times like these, if I went, it would make it almost tempting to stay.” She turned to a paramedic she had never seen before standing by the door, who according to her name tag was named Rhonda. “Did you see any signs of rape?”

  Rhonda walked further into the room, “There are no obvious external signs of rape that I can tell, but that is completely off the record. The medical examiner will be able to check for any internal abrasions and see if the killer left any fluids. But again, off the record, at a quick glance it doesn’t look like she was raped.”

  “I take it the medical examiner’s office has been informed?” Carma asked.

  “Yeah, we called her when we got the call. We’ll take her to Craven Regional Medical Center for today and put her on ice, then transport her tomorrow to Raleigh,” Rhonda said.

  Harold took out his pocket notebook and made a note of the conversation and asked Rhonda, “Were you able to figure out an estimated time of death?”

  Rhonda walked up to the body. “It’s only a guess, but I’m thinking between six and ten o’clock last night, but again, the M.E. will know more once she gets the body on the table.”

  Carma turned from Rhonda to face Harold. “If there was no rape, then where are her clothes?”

  “Beats me. Teenagers are strange creatures,” he said back.

  Carma took a pair of white latex gloves out of the duffle bag and put them on before pressing on Melissa’s stomach close to the stab wounds. She leaned in close and pulled one of the puncture wounds apart examining it. “These cuts are deep and clean, not at all angry or even hesitant.”

  She dug in the bag again and retrieved a digital camera and a small ruler. She pulled the wound apart again and placed the ruler beside it and took a picture.

  “Hmm… seems to be about an inch long.” She counted aloud, “Twelve puncture wounds.” She then lifted the side of the once white lab coat, examining it for holes. “No punctures in the coat.”

  Harold made a note of it in his notebook. “What is she doing here after hours?”

  Carma looked at the girl’s face. “The first game of the season is Friday night. She was probably practicing cheers. We should check with the other girls on the squad to confirm though.”

  “But why is she in a classroom if she was practicing cheers?” Harold looked around the cluttered room. “There’s no room with all these rows of tables and why is she naked?”

  “Good question. Most likely she was practicing in the gym or on the football field behind it.”

  Walking around the desk, Carma closely examined every angle of the spot where the victim had been mercilessly stabbed to death. She made her way around the desk, taking extra care not to disturb any evidence, including the pools of blood on both the desk and floor, when something caught her eye. There seemed to be something tucked under the desk, so she bent over and gently pulled it out from under the desk and as she was pulling it free she realized that it was a bath towel saturated with blood.

  “It didn’t start here,” she said, feeling the white part of the towel through her gloves. “Still damp.”

  “What?” asked Harold.

  “If she was here after hours practicing cheers, she probably wanted a shower afterwards to wash the sweat off, hence the reason she has no clothes on and a damp towel is by her on the floor.”

  “Damn, I didn’t even see that,” Harold said.

  “It’s saturated in blood, Harold. It is very well camouflaged, so in all honesty, I’m a little surprised that I saw it as quickly as I did,” Carma replied. Deciding that changing the subject would probably have the best results, Carma turned to Harold with a devilish glint in her eyes and asked him, “So have you ever been in a girl’s locker room before?”

  “Only in my dreams,” Harold said with a sly smile.

  Carma rolled her eyes and put the heavy towel in an evidence bag.

  “Rhonda, I think we are done here if you want to go ahead and take her. You can grab Deputy Pete over there and take him with you for the sign-in.”

  Rhonda nodded her head and waved the deputy over.

  Carma walked out of the classroom and down the hall with Harold at her side. She made a left at the fork which led into the recreation wing of the school.

  “You went to school here when you were younger, Carma?” Harold asked her suddenly.

  “Yep, a million years ago, but sometimes it seems like only yesterday. A lot has changed since then.”

  “Yeah right, a million years! What are you, like thirty-ish?” he asked.

  “Thirty-six next month, thank you very much.”

  “Hell girl, I’ve got shoes older than you.”

  They walked through the gym. The sound of Carma’s high heel shoes bounced off the polished wooden floor and echoed off the brick walls surrounding them. The smell of years of built up teenage sweat and must lingered in the air until they reached the girls’ locker room where the scent was a bit fresher. As soon as they walked in, they stopped in the center of the room and stared at five rows of old beat-up lockers and benches in between.

  “Damn, which one you reckon is hers?” Harold asked, looking around.

  “When I went to school here, locker selection was random. Some girls had their favorites, in which case, they’d put a padlock on it to keep it for themselves. So there is no way of telling unless we go through them all. If I were a betting woman, I would bet that she is the type of girl with her own locker.”

  Harold surveyed all of the lockers and put a hand on his shiny, bald brown head. “That sounds like it’s going to be a pain in the ass to figure out.”

  “I agree. That’s why one of those nice deputies out there is going to do it for us,” she said before waving a deputy over.

  “Damn, Carma! That’s cold!”

  “What’s up, Carma?” the deputy asked.

  “I want these lockers checked to see which one is our vic’s.”

  He looked around at all the lockers. “But some of them are padlocked.”

  “So, cut them,” she told him.

  The deputy grunted, but did as he was told.

  Once the deputy dutifully walked away, she turned back to her partner, “Stick with me, Harold, and you’ll learn quickly what everyone’s role is. Come on, one thing we know for sure is she took a shower in here before she was killed. The stalls are through her
e in the back.”

  Harold walked behind Carma as she led him to a large open room with sinks and mirrors on one side, toilet stalls on another, and the open shower stalls tucked away in the back.

  “I wonder why the toilet stalls have doors but the shower stalls don’t?” Harold asked curiously.

  “Beats me! A man probably came up with that concept,” she replied, emphasizing the word man.

  “You are probably right,” Harold admitted with a slight sigh. “Hey! Look!” while pointing at a pair of black panties lying on the floor.

  “Looks like we found our spot,” Carma said, bending down to retrieve the black panties, still wearing her latex gloves. After retrieving the panties off the floor, she sealed them up in an evidence bag. Carma, handing off the bag to an awaiting deputy, told him, “Make sure this goes along with the other evidence collected to have it analyzed by the SBI, who will actually be here very soon to assist with collecting the evidence, as well as doing some forensic investigating.” She continued walking around the locker room, looking for a clue, any clue, that would help her in finding out exactly what had transpired there. Much to her dismay, other than the panties, she found nothing out of the ordinary. “Okay. It’s obvious that she was here, but how does she go from taking a shower in the locker room, to being stabbed on top of a teacher’s desk located in a classroom off the science hall? None of this is making any sense.”

  “Maybe she was taken off-guard by the perp in here or out there in the locker room and ran before she had a chance to get dressed,” Harold suggested.

  “That’s a definite possibility,” Carma replied. “Harold, doesn’t this sound like some perfect timing or someone who knew she’d be here?”

  “Hey, Carma, I found something.” Carma turned her head to see the deputy she put in charge of locker inspection standing by the entry way. She stood up and followed him back toward the lockers where he continued, “This notebook is here on the bench along with a couple of school books. Evidently these books belonged to our girl.”