Read Online First Murder by Fred Limberg - Free Book Online

teams. It would save a lot of time and mess.
    “Nope. I want ’em inked.” Ray watched Tony try to work out for himself why he’d want to use the old fashioned method.
    “Intimidation?” Tony guessed that it was a sort of a test, that there was, as usual, a reason for everything with Ray Bankston.
    “Mm-Hm.”
    “Okay. I get it. What did the coroner have to say?” Ray had been on the phone for a while. Maybe they could skip going to the morgue to watch the coroner perform the autopsy. Tony had seen blood and trauma in all its horrid forms—car wrecks, gun-shot wounds, knifings and slashings, even the aftermath of a hatchet fight one time—but he wasn’t at all anxious to see what happened on the table in the morgue. Not yet.
CSI
on television was one thing.
    “Cause of death was, as expected, the knife to the heart.” Ray looked down at his notes. “No recent sexual activity. Stomach contents were barely digested. Some cereal, raisins, some orange juice.”
    “No coffee?” Tony remembered the cup and the half full carafe.
    “Nope.”
    “There was a coffee cup in the sink.”
    “Mm-hm.” Ray nodded. “Why don’t you run down and grab those print kits now. I’ve got to work on my notes and the others should be back soon. We need to see where we are.”
    “Grab you anything on the way back up?” Tony was already out of his chair and halfway to the door.
    “No thanks. Not right now.” Tony left and Ray dropped the notes from his hand. He had no stomach for anything right at the moment.
    Tony would miss the trip to the morgue for his first murder; miss the first-hand relay of information, an experience that would probably stay with him the rest of his life. Ray wouldn’t miss it. He wouldn’t miss seeing the gray naked woman on the table, splayed open, chest split with a saw, the top of her head gone so they could weigh the brain, organs laid aside after their inspection. He wouldn’t miss the smell of rot, of decomposition, body gasses and eau de antiseptic. No, Ray wouldn’t have the stomach for much of anything for a while. He might miss it this time but so many others haunted him…so many others.
    “I think we can narrow the time of death,” Tony said as he dumped the fingerprint kits on an unused desk. “Maybe even fix it.” Ray swiveled his chair toward Tony’s. He’d been thinking about it too.
    “Tell me.”
    Tony hitched himself upon his desk top and set down a coffee cup. “Early Monday morning. She’s dressed to go out, just eaten breakfast; cereal and OJ. You don’t eat that for dinner. Plus it hasn’t been digested. The appointment book said she had a 9:30, we can guess it was something at Children’s Hospital. I’m going back over there to check the alarm clock by the bed.”
    “6:45” Ray shrugged when Tony frowned a question at him. “I checked.”
    “Okay. She hits the snooze once or twice, gets up, showers, makes the bed, dresses, fixes some cereal, what…an hour?” Tony raised his eyebrows and turned the corners of his mouth down, waiting for Ray to argue with his timeline, hoping for an
attaboy
.
    “And on the back end, the trip to Children’s in rush hour from Highland is twenty minutes. Ten to park. Fifteen to chat and say hi.” Ray apparently agreed with him and took it a step further. Tony felt like they were on the same page.
    “So she was killed between 7:45 and 8:45 Monday morning,” Tony said with some finality.
    “You sure this is your first murder?” Ray chuckled. He was pleased that Tony had figured this out, and pretty much on his own. Granted it wasn’t that big a leap once the stomach contents were known, but the young detective was thinking, keeping his head in the details.
    “So did the murderer know her schedule? Know she’d be home then? Or did they just take a chance?” Tony seemed to be asking the questions of himself. Ray noticed he was turned away, looking up at the flickering fluorescents, half lost in thought.
    Ray brought him