Mercy Blade

CHAPTER 12 Katie Ate Dead Meat

An hour before dawn, Peter Richoux had a preliminary ruling on cause of death and it wasn’t what any of us expected. He entered the security room, where we were going over more digital camera footage, this time from Derek’s low-light cameras, where we were trying to trace the movements of the grindy, who seemed to appear and disappear on different floors like magic. So far as we knew, teleportation wasn’t possible, so that left speed, and the grindy had that in spades. Derek froze the footage and we turned our attention to Peter.

He looked as tired as the rest of us, with dark circles under his eyes and his hair mussed, as if he’d rubbed his hands through his hair and not smoothed it back down. As if to prove the point, he ran one hand from his nape, over his skull, and with the other hand, pinched his temples between thumb and fingers. When he dropped his hands, he leaned forward and placed his fingertips on the table like ten body stabilizers and focused on Jodi. “I’ve done as much as I can here. We’ll move the body to the morgue where I’ll do a full PM, though not until after I’ve had some sleep. For now—”

“No,” Kemnebi said. “There will be no postmortem, no desecration of the body. Such is not permitted by my people or by our religion.”

“Sorry, sir, but the police department will require a forensic autopsy to pursue a murder investigation. The Department of State isn’t likely to disagree,” Peter said. “And justice can’t be done without one.” When he spoke, I felt the pull of weak magic. Peter Richoux was not a sorcerer, but he had natural gifts of persuasion that were all his own.

“No,” Kemnebi said, implacable. And then I got it. Scientists had been trying to get their hands on a dead vamp to dissect for years. Marilyn Monroe’s body had mysteriously disappeared prior to hers, and no other research-based autopsy had ever been accomplished. The bodies of supernats always disappear before a single scalpel can be applied.

“Sir,” Peter said respectfully, casting his cousin a hooded glance that I wasn’t able to interpret, “I’ll have to leave that decision between you and DS. For now, I’ve collected a few samples from the bod—the scene, and we’ll get preliminary results back in a few days. Final results when all the tox screens are done. This isn’t TV, so we’re talking a couple of weeks. But I can give you a preliminary, presumptive COD now.”

Jodi pushed a rolling desk chair to him with her foot. He sat hard, and the chair cushion sighed, faster and harder than the matching sigh of exhaustion that Peter gave. “Anyone got coffee? I smell coffee.” Jodi signaled; a guy in technician blues went to a coffeepot in the corner and poured a cup of the three-hour-old brew. It smelled scorched and toxic, but it wasn’t my stomach. I watched as the man poured, something in his obsequious demeanor that drew my attention and repelled it at the same time.

Peter spoke and it pulled my eyes back to him. “The victim took two wounds and each appear to be equally mortal.” He lifted a finger. “One. A single bullet wound to the left front chest, midclavicular, ascending between the third and fourth intercostals. May be a nine mil or .385. The trajectory suggests that she was in the air or her attacker was kneeling. The bullet nicked either the ascending aorta or the subclavian artery. I won’t know until or if I get to open her up,” he glanced at Kemmy and back to Jodi.

“Though there should be an exit wound, there isn’t.” He took a sip of coffee, nodded gratefully to the man who brought the cup. “And so we should be able to get the bullet for comparison.” He lifted a second finger. “Two. Triple parallel wounds—maybe a blade, maybe a claw, severed her carotid arteries, external jugulars, her trachea, and esophagus, delivered from left to right, the killing strike likely delivered with the attacker behind her, though I may change that when I get a better look. It’s also possible that she was on her hands and knees and the attacker was over her.”

I instantly pictured a shape-changer trying to change forms, as if after a nearly mortal wound. Safia, in my imagination, had been shot and was bent over, kneeling on the floor as she tried to force a change to save her life. Kemnebi closed his eyes, his dark face ashen. His breath was slow, uneven; he shouldn’t have to hear this, but I could think of no way to exclude him.

“Barring anything on further analysis,” Peter said, “COD is likely to be from exsanguination from the throat wound. She probably bled out in a matter of seconds. Prior to that, she fought an attacker and displays several premortem defensive wounds and abrasions. Postmortem, she was mauled in what looks like an animal attack, similar to a scavenger. But I’ll have to verify all this back at the morgue. Again assuming I get the chance,” he said. I thought of Katie and the fresh blood that had fallen on her chest. Crap. Katie ate dead meat. Would that make her nutso longer?

“I’ve collected physical evidence, including fibers, dust, hair, and saliva from her postmortem attacker, and particulate matter, all of which already went back to HQ. I figure the DS techs, if they bring any, will want some sent to Quantico, so I collected a matching set for them, everything in duplicate, where possible. Jodi, I know that the crime-scene techs will take a lot longer at the scene. When they’re done, I’d like the rugs from the area around the victim.”

Jodi drummed her fingers on the table. “I’ll see they’re sent to you once CSI has a chance to go over them. And we’ll keep the room sealed until further notice. Thanks, Peter.”

The coroner stood and left the room, his empty coffee cup on the table. I had a feeling the caffeine wouldn’t keep him awake once he got home. A CSI tech poked her head in the room and located Jodi, a big grin on her face. “We found a shell casing in the office. It might be a match for that other case we’ve been working on.” The two women held gazes and my radar perked up. I didn’t know about another case, but if it intersected with this one, I wanted to know. “And Detective? We found another way into and out of the office. A doorway hidden behind an armoire. It has an antiquated locking system—lever and bolt—and there’s blood on it.”

Jodi spun her chair to Leo and leaned forward, forearms on her knees, her head jutted forward and her expression totally focused. If she’d been a wolf, she would have been hunting. “Mr. Pellissier, you didn’t think it relevant to mention that there’s another exit from the room where a murder took place?”

“Many rooms in Mithran institutions and abodes contain additional, concealed egress. We have needed such for two thousand years, to protect us from Christians and from vampire hunters.” He slanted a glance my way but I didn’t react to the barb. I had wondered if the room had a second outlet when I first saw it. Leo turned back to Jodi, who looked like she was trying to digest something noxious. Maybe the coffee. Leo went on, “I will not allow you access based on diplomatic security considerations.”

“I’ll find a judge who will grant me access,” Jodi ground out. “And until then, you stay out of the office.” Leo just smiled at her order, showing a hint of teeth, but no fang. Unless Jodi left an armed guard on the place twenty-four/seven, Leo would go where he wanted when he wanted. And with his ability to mesmerize humans, even an armed guard might not keep him out.

Someone set a ceramic mug beside me and I drank, noticing that it was tea, green and smooth with a floral top note. Good tea. Helped me think. I was trying to arrange the threads of the case and make a coherent picture, but nothing was fitting together. Which might make sense if it was more than one case, overlapping in time but not really a part of one another. That wasn’t likely, but that didn’t make it impossible.

The last hour of the night went by quickly with nothing much accomplished in terms of apprehending a suspect. I did find a moment to pull Jodi to the side to ask a few questions, leading with, “Your people found a shell casing in the office. What other case are you working on?”

Jodi had no reason to answer; most cops don’t share information. However, Jodi had been agreeable about info sharing from the moment I met her. She nodded to the nearest hot coffee, this pot set up by the staff in a hallway, on a small, white-draped table. She poured one for herself and sipped. I was nursing a second cup of tea and I sipped with her, my movements a mirror image. “I don’t know how you live without this stuff,” she said.

“It’s nasty. I like tea.” I lifted my mug to her.

“I know. It’s weird to see the vamps cater to your tastes.”

“Yeah. I kill them for a living. You’d think it would make them less likely to serve me.”

“And why hire you? I mean, it doesn’t make any sense.”

“Either they think that since I can kill them I must be good, and they might as well use my talents, or they’re keeping me close to the chest.”

“Keep your friends close and your enemies closer?” Jodi asked. “Like that?”

I gave a could-be shrug. “So. What case?”

“Orleans County has some cold cases on file from the sixties that my unit has been looking into since an anonymous tip a few weeks back.”

The phrase “a few weeks back” echoed inside me. I’m not an adherent to the religion of coincidence. I wondered if the cold cases were related to the wolves’ evidence against Leo, evidence I hadn’t had a chance to investigate. Had the wolves called in the “tips”?

“The victims were chest shots, execution style, people who were close to the vamp population about the time they came out of the closet. The only evidence recovered from the kill sites were .385 rounds and shell casings, fired from the same semiautomatic weapon. The casings have the same set of prints on them, prints not listed in AFIS.”

AFIS—the nation’s Automated Fingerprint Identification System—stored and compared fingerprints and was responsible for matching up a lot of felons with crimes. I dipped my chin to show I was listening.

“There’s not a lot of evidence left after Katrina came through—all the paperwork was ruined in the storage units—and I know we may never make an arrest in the cold cases, but if we can tie the shell casings and bullets to a current murder, then we can at least close the old ones.” Jodi was watching me, gauging my reaction. This wasn’t idle chitchat or information sharing. This was leading me by the nose to some place she wanted me to go.

I said, “And the rounds?”

“The ones from the cold cases have a score mark along them, visible to the naked eye. Any gun leaving that kind of scoring would have been useless at any distance, but perfect for close-in work.”

“Like a lucky gun, kept around for special kills?”

“Exactly. We’re running the prints on the casing in the office to see if they match the old ones. As soon as we have a bullet to compare to, we’ll be able to open a new case file and merge all the old, cold ones in.”

“And who do you suspect in the old murders?” I asked. Knowing. Just knowing.

“George Dumas or Leo Pellissier.”

I hadn’t known I had feelings beyond desire for Bruiser until she said his name. And I hadn’t realized I felt protective about Leo either. Stupid. Just plain stupid to feel anything about either one of them, protective of the monster or ... whatever it was I felt for his blood meal. But there you have it. Feelings aren’t logical or sensible.

“You got any problems with that?” Jodi asked.

“No. No problems at all,” I lied with a straight face, hoping I was pulling it off. “Why haven’t you asked Bruiser and Leo to give prints for matching in the cold cases?”

“Politics,” Jodi spat, as if it were an ugly word. “After I get enough to make an arrest, and prove it beyond a reasonable doubt, then, maybe, I’ll get to haul them in and chat with them and hopefully fingerprint them.”

“Have you checked their clothes for GSR?”

“They’re bagged and on the way to the lab. There was just too much to work with here.”

“Okay,” I said, thinking of Leo’s clean clothes. Thinking that whistle-blowers in a vamp organization might get drained and dead instead of just fired. Thinking that Leo hadn’t left the ballroom while Safia was being killed. I pulled my cell and saw that it was after eight a.m. on Friday. “Jodi.” Staring at the face of the cell that Leo had provided, I said, “Leo changed clothes. And Bruiser has access to every locking system in the HQ.” She didn’t answer and I stared at the cell’s face, not wanting to look up. “I’m going home to bed. Call me if you need me.”

“Jane.”

I shifted my eyes to hers.

“Thanks. If he’s guilty then he should be behind bars.”

I didn’t know which he she was referring to. Jodi was a law-and-order, by-the-book kinda girl, so either man, if he looked guilty, would get the benefit of her legal teeth in his leg. She’d be like a rat terrier shaking a buffalo. “I know.” I turned and left the building, taking the stairs down from vamp central, into the morning, my dress swinging and swishing against my legs. As I walked, I called Rinaldo; he was in the Quarter, just finishing breakfast, and promised he’d be with me in ten minutes. I walked on, knowing moving would make me harder to find, but needing the push of heart and lungs, the feel of blood pumping and muscles stretching and contracting.

Rinaldo pulled up beside me shortly and idled his cab, keeping up with my pace as he looked me over. “You look a million bucks, yes? Janie-girl all dolled up, walking from direction of the bloodsucker’s biiiig pa’tay last night?” I ignored him and got in the front seat, closing the door after me. “You look good with knife in one hand, gun in the other. Sexy.” I looked at him, deadpan, and he said, “I work graveyard shift. We keep TV on all night. Saw you on the TV, I did. Some patay girl you are.”

I’d been outted to Rinaldo. If he didn’t know I was the vamp hunter before, he did now. I laid my head back on the seat and closed my eyes. “Yeah. I was there. Take me home, Rinaldo.”

“No trip to the nearest fast food place?”

“No. Thanks.” I kept my eyes closed for the rest of the drive and Rinaldo didn’t pester me, even when we drew up in front of my house. I paid my usual fee, got out, and went inside. The house was silent, chill, with the AC on full blast. I stripped, placed my weapons where I could reach them quickly, showered, and fell into bed. The last thing I did before I fell asleep was check my cell phone.

No call from Rick. No text. No nothing.

I half woke to three quick taps on the front door, rolled over, and pulled the covers over my head. But whoever it was didn’t go away; he kept knocking in three-burst rounds like a machine gun on the wood door. It was 2:22 Friday afternoon when I came awake, with a rush, thinking, Rick! I rolled out of bed and picked up my robe in a single motion, flung my hair out of the way and raced to the door, shoving my arms into the sleeves. I looked out through a clear pane in the stained-glass door window. And saw Bruiser, still knocking.

All the eagerness went out of me and I closed my eyes, leaned my head against the wall beside the door, and blew out a breath. Anger started to build in a quiet, still part of my soul, anger at Rick. He could have called. Even deep undercover, he could have found a way to call. One lousy freaking phone call.

I finished tying the robe’s belt with a yank and opened the door. “You’re lucky the house wards weren’t up, or you’d have singed your knuckles.”

Bruiser met my eyes, his dark with exhaustion, black rings under them. The skin on his face and jaw looked worn and slack, as if he’d aged in the last few hours. His clothes showed the fine wrinkles and relaxed hand of high humidity. I looked at the street. There was no car in sight. And there was a large suitcase at his feet. “May I come in?” he asked, his voice weary.

I stared at the suitcase as myriad thoughts and possibilities fluttered through me like ravens’ wings, none of them happy ones. On their heels came a workable answer. “The cops found a reason to get prints from you. It was your prints on the shell casing in the office and on the cold case brass.” My eyes narrowed. “Leo kicked you out.”

“Yes,” he said, his fatigue more pronounced. “My lawyer and I spent two hours with them, fending off thinly veiled accusations and allegations posed as questions. When they let me go, a police acquaintance slipped me word that the press is staking out my residence.” He seemed to slump as he stood in the muggy heat, and put a hand on the door jamb as if to support himself. “I went to the clan home to find my suitcase packed and waiting for me at the front door. Tyler suggested that I come here. It seemed like a good idea. At the time.”

I stared at the suitcase. It was a big one, the kind on wheels with a handle. It would hold a lot of clothes. “You want to stay here?” My voice didn’t squeak, but it was a near thing. And I was suddenly aware that I was naked under my robe. I pulled my lapels together. “You can’t stay at a hotel?”

“They’ll find me. No one will look here for a day or so.” He closed his eyes as he said the next word. “Please.”

It was the “please” that did it. It was one of those forlorn words that a man asks when he’s down and out and been kicked around a bit. “Did you kill Safia?”

He met my eyes, so I could read the truth in them. “No. But I may not be able to prove it. The tapes indicate that I was away from the ballroom when Safia first disappeared. There isn’t enough evidence just now to charge me.”

“Did you kill the people in the cold case files?”

“I don’t know. There was a time ...” He stopped and swallowed, wavering slightly. I could smell his sweat and his fatigue. Beast was awake and watching through my eyes. “There was a time, decades really, after my mother died, when my anger was so great that I killed anyone Leo wanted dead.” His voice was flat, and he closed his eyes again, hiding the bleak darkness in them. “Some of the locations in the photographs they showed me looked familiar. I would need access to more in the police files to know if I was ... responsible.” He opened his eyes and held mine, a wry honesty in them. “However, even at my most angry, I have never been stupid enough to leave my spent brass beside a body.”

Which sounded like the truth. Not knowing why, I pushed the door open and stood to the side. A grudging tone in my voice, I said, “Guest rooms are upstairs. Evangelina is in one. If you take a room across the hall, you can have your own bath. Sheets are in the linen closet.”

A faint smile tugged his lips as he stepped over the threshold and pulled his suitcase after with two bass wheel-thumps. “I can’t share your bed?”

Unexpected heat ignited in my belly and began to grow. Beast wrinkled her lips, showing teeth, interested. I gripped my lapels tighter, shoving her away. “No.”

“Why not?”

“I have a boyfriend.”

Beast sent me a mental picture of her claw raking the rump of a mate who displeased her. I knew she meant Rick, for not calling. Big-cats do not mate for life, she thought at me. I drew in a slow breath.

“A boy friend,” Bruiser said, making it two words. His smile widened and his eyes warmed slightly with amusement. “A child in the art of lovemaking.”

I breathed past the warmth and crushed down a laugh that was burbling in my chest, let my eyebrows rise, and managed an unsympathetic, half-bored expression. “Upstairs, Romeo. And if you try to move in to my bed, I’ll toss you to the curb.”

“Yes, ma’am. I’ll be the soul of propriety. But you’ll regret that decision.”

Deliberately misunderstanding him I said, “I agree that you’ll be a pain in the butt. But go on up anyway. You look like you’re about to fall asleep on your feet.”

“Thank you, Jane. A nap would be appreciated.”

“Yeah, well, you ruined mine,” I said ungraciously, closing the door behind him. “You do your own laundry, your own sheets, and clean your own bathroom. Food is by our resident three-star chef. Dinner is at seven, usually, breakfast between seven and eight on the days she has time to fix any. Cold cereal whenever you want it on the days she doesn’t. Lunch is whatever you want to fix. I don’t cook for you.”

“Right now, just a bed,” he said, climbing the stairs, the suitcase bumping along after him. He was halfway up the stairs when I went back to my bed, threw myself on top of the sheets and lay there, looking up at the ceiling. For a gal who didn’t have a family and liked her privacy, I had an awful lot of people in my life and depending on me, lately.

I checked my cell again and found a voice mail from Deon wanting to know all the gossip from the party. I called him back and got his voice mail. Communications, twenty-first-century style. I tried to find sleep but it eluded me, energy racing under my skin like ants on the prowl, seeing again the teasing look in Bruiser’s tired eyes. He had been teasing. I was sure of it. Sorta sure of it. But then there was that heat that stirred between us, like electric sparks melded with taffy, heating and stinging, a tugging, pulling sweetness. And Rick still hadn’t called.

When I couldn’t keep my eyes closed, I rose and dressed, braided my hair and pulled out my notes. I came across Girrard DiMercy’s calling card. Not a business card, but a heavy linen, embossed, gilt-edged calling card. I held it to my nose and caught his scent, jasmine and pine. And realized that I had smelled it today already. At vamp HQ. I drew in the scent, remembering it mixed with the bouquets. Gee had been the guy who served me tea. He had been around a few other times too, a glamour hiding him, or making him seem unimportant, socially invisible.

I cursed once and pulled my cell, dialing the number under his name. I was shunted directly to voice mail and greeted by a mechanical voice. When the beep sounded, I said, “You spelled me again, spelled us all, and hung around for the police investigation. Call me, you little creep.” I hung up, checked again for a call from Rick and snapped the cell down with more force than the action warranted. Men ...

Anger scoring the sides of my mind, I dialed Rick’s number. I was shunted directly to voice mail and hung up without leaving a message. He knew my number. He’d call if he wanted to. Madder than I’d been in a long time, I left the house, hopped on Bitsa, tearing out of the Quarter and to the firing range where I blew off a head of steam, shooting my way through three boxes of shells and shredding four man-shaped targets before I quit, one target for each man I was mad at: Bruiser, Leo, Gee, and Rick. I put most of the bullets into the target called Rick, thinking, call me, call me, with every shot.

When I was done I stripped and cleaned my weapons at the counter, a nice pile of discarded brass at my feet, bright on the dark-painted floor; solvents, lubricants, and spent gunpowder stung my nose, my eyes unfocused, hands moving through the necessary procedures by memory and feel. One spent cartridge near my boot rocked slightly, catching my attention. I studied the shiny brass as I cleaned, my mind empty and quiet in the aftermath of preparatory and nonlethal violence. My casings were the only ones, the floor having been thoroughly cleaned since any previous shooters.

If someone wanted to frame me, all he would need was my spent brass, with my fingerprints all over them, and my gun. Gather the brass, steal the gun, shoot a few people, police the brass used to make the kill, and toss down the ones with my prints on them. And in Bruiser’s case, any blood-servant or blood-slave who had been around for fifty years or more could have set the thing up. Bruiser had to know this. And like he’d said, he wasn’t stupid enough to leave his spent brass at a crime scene.

I was packing up my weapons when my cell rang. Once again, hope shot through me like wildfire and died just as quickly. Not Rick. Gee’s number. I didn’t bother to say hello. “Did you kill Safia?”

“No. I did not.”

“Then why were you hanging around the party and the investigation?”

“I followed the werewolves when they entered the compound. I saw the envoy and his small entourage arrive, with the little grindylow. I have not seen one here in ... quite some time. And never so far from Britain. And never, ever, away from a cold lake, stream, or river. They like cool temperatures. I was curious.” He chuckled, the sound as musical as flute notes. “So I invited myself to the party.”

“Where you hung around in the ceiling.” I propped on the counter at the back of the shooting gallery, my gear beside me, thinking. There was no scaffolding. Nothing to hold on to in the ceiling. “Glamoured, right? So we wouldn’t see you if we looked up.”

“I am clever.”

I remembered Bruiser’s eyes on my front porch, haunted. Yeah. That was the word. He’d looked haunted. It was a look that made me want to help, to prove him innocent, and that was not part of my job, not part of my contract, not something that would earn me one red cent. But I was going to do it anyway. “Did you see where Bruiser went when he left the ballroom?” I asked. “Can you prove he didn’t kill the girl? Were-cat. Whatever. Did you see who killed Safia?”

“I saw many things last night but little that will help you.”

That stopped me. “Why are you here, Gee? What do you want?”

“Good-bye, little goddess.” He ended the call with a faint click, and when I called him back, it went directly to voice mail again.

I hung up, irritated and confused; stuck the cell into an ammo pouch in my gear. There were too many things going on to get a handle on it, to see any kind of big picture. “Goddess, my vamp-kicking butt. Give me a straight-out hunt with fanged prey and blood anytime,” I grumbled.

“Me too, sister,” a voice said. It came from a guy coming in the door of the indoor range, a mean looking little guy with a gun case big enough to hold a cannon. Penis envy? I was nearly mad enough to say it aloud but managed to hold it in. I grabbed the broom and swept up my brass, dumping it into the half-full brass barrel in the corner. Then I stirred my casings into the mix, losing them in the discards of others, very aware of the little guy’s eyes on me. Paranoid? Me? Starting to be.

Outside, I kicked Bitsa on and eased into traffic, the air like a hot wet blanket against me.

I made a stop by the main offices of NOPD, telling myself that it wasn’t to see Rick, but to look at some files in the woo-woo room. And I believed it, sorta. The guard at the desk was one I had seen before and he slid the sign-in pad to me, tossed me a temp ID badge, and waved me on through. It was shoddy security, but I wasn’t about to complain. I made my way up the stairs, Rick’s desk drawing me like a magnet. It was vacant. No papers on the surface, no old coffee cup, even the computer was off. There was a layer of dust on top of everything. The layer of dust told me clearer than words that he was, indeed, undercover. Again.

Relief warred with anger. He could have told me. I swerved away and made my way through the room, ignored by everyone and returning the favor, to Jodi’s office. I knew where it was, though I’d never been invited in. Which might be a good thing. Jodi and her right-hand man, Sloan Rosen, were bent over reports, Jodi sounding tired, angry, and slightly hoarse. And she was still wearing the same clothes she had worn the night before. I tapped on the door and she looked up, irritation creasing the skin beside her eyes. “What do you want?”

I started to be cute, but instead said, “I’d like to get at the files in the woo-woo room.” I felt weird saying the words, as if my own subconscious was surprised. But it faded instantly. “If it’s okay.”

“Sure.” She tossed me a set of three keys and I caught them. Nodded my head and backed away. “Jane,” she called. I stopped. “I hear George Dumas is staying in your house.” I wasn’t quite sure what to make of her tone so I just nodded. “He’s a person of interest,” she said, “in the death of the diplomatic assistant.”

I nodded again. “I just came from the shooting range, where I left a lot of spent brass on the floor. Every single casing had my fingerprints on them. If someone stole my gun and swept up my brass, they could frame me easily.” I tossed the keys lightly and caught them. “I’ll have these back in an hour.” I turned and left the office, feeling Jodi’s eyes boring a hole in my back. I wondered if I had a target painted on it. I had lost the chance to hear anything about the case, but I had also lost the chance to be questioned by my friend or asked to spy on another friend and houseguest. I figured I had won.

The woo-woo room had changed since I first saw it, from a utilitarian storage room containing paper copies of all the city’s paranormal case files to a storage room with a computer, a dry board, a copier-scanner combo, a table, and more comfortable chairs. I eyed the computer, thinking about trying to log on, but passwords were surely not something I could guess at, and getting caught spying was a surefire way to get kicked out of the room forever. I turned to the hard-copy files and started digging.

I stayed in the woo-woo room for nearly an hour and photocopied a dozen files, most without taking the time to read thoroughly, and carried them back out with me when I left. Jodi wasn’t in her office, and I didn’t look for her, leaving her keys on a blotter in plain sight. I had a feeling that this case might put a lot of stress on a relationship that wasn’t that strong to begin with.