Search - Angel of Truth

The smell told them that death was nearby. Angelo pulled a pair of latex gloves out of her pocket and slid her hands into them. There was blood everywhere. Squatting down to get a better look, she lifted the cardboard that covered the corpse’s face. His eyes were wide open; the rats had not gotten that far yet.

“Well?” her partner asked, holding his nose and standing a few paces behind her.

“He’s not going to bite you.”

O’Malley did not reply.

“It’s definitely Mr. Robbins,” she said, poking him in the chest with her pen. “His body has been here a little over forty-eight hours, but no more than seventy-two.”

“Jesus, how could you tell? It’s November and cold as a witch’s tit out here. That smell means he’s been in decomp for a while.”

“You have a way with words, O’Malley.”

“Do you think his neutering killed him?”

She lifted his shirt and looked at his chest. “The stab wound to the heart did it. The castration was done post mortem.”

“Do you dream blood and guts too?”

“All the time. Keeps me from thinking about you naked,” she joked.

“Cute. Really cute.”

Ignoring him, Angelo pulled a mini recorder from her pocket and pressed the record button. She studied the body. He was on his back, staring into an unknown void. He was bloated from expelled gases and his skin was turning black from the pooling of blood due to gravity.

“Body’s gone soft,” she said into the recorder. “Rigor has come and gone. Lividity pooling in his back suggests he died here. The mutilation was done post mortem. A stab wound to the chest was the most likely cause of death. We’ll have to confirm it with the medical examiner. Whoever did this was fast. Very fast. Justin was caught off guard. He wasn’t the type who kept close friends. However, he knew his killer.”