Page 7 of Thankless in Death

“Keep the wit handy.” Eve pulled a can of Seal-It from her bag. “And stand by.” She switched on her recorder.

With their hands and boots sealed, Eve and Peabody went inside.

Rough was one word for it, Eve thought. The living area remained tidy. Sofa pillows plumped, floors whistle clean, magazine discs neatly arranged on a coffee table. It made an eerie contrast to the smell of death—far from fresh.

A few steps in the room jogged slightly to the right where a table served as a demarcation between living area and kitchen.

And where the line between tidy life and ugly death dug in deep.

The man lay beside the table, his head, shoulders, and one outstretched arm under it. In death he was a bloody, broken mass in what had been a dark blue suit. Blood spatter and gray matter bloomed and smeared the walls, the kitchen cabinets—and the baseball bat that lay in the congealed river of blood beside him.

The woman lay facedown on the floor between the opposite side of the table and a refrigerator. Blood soaked through her shirt and pants so their true color had become indiscernible. Both were ripped and shredded, most probably by the kitchen knife driven through her back to the hilt.

“They’ve been slaughtered,” Peabody stated.

“Yeah. A lot of rage here. Take the woman,” Eve ordered, and crouching by the man, opened her kit.

She let the pity come, then let it go. And got to work.

“VICTIM IDENTIFIED AS REINHOLD, CARL JAMES. Caucasian male, age fifty-six.” Eve scanned her Identi-pad. “Married to Reinhold, Barbara, nee Myers, age fifty-four.” She glanced over at Peabody.

“Yeah, female ID confirmed.”

“One offspring, male, Reinhold, Jerald, age twenty-six, address listed on West Houston.”

Carl Reinhold still had both parents, she noted, who’d migrated to Florida, and a brother with a Hoboken address. The data listed the victim’s employer as Beven and Son’s Flooring, with offices and showroom just a handful of blocks away.

“Victim was beaten severely, head, face, shoulders, chest, extremities. Injuries are consistent with the baseball bat handily left on scene, and coated with blood and gray matter. Erased his face. That’s personal.”

“I can’t count the stab wounds on the female, Dallas. She’s been hacked to pieces.”

“I’d say we’ve got the cause of death. Let’s get the time.”

Eve pulled out her gauge. “He’s been dead for about sixty-two hours. That puts it at Friday evening. Around six-thirty.”

“She has almost six hours on him. TOD Friday, twelve-hundred-forty.”

“Nearly six hours between kills.” Eve sat back on her heels. “Kills the woman in the afternoon, then what, waits around for the man? No sign of struggle in the living area. No sign of break-in.”

She pushed up. “Go ahead and call for the morgue and the sweepers.”

Solid middle-class couple from the looks of it, Eve thought as she began to wander the apartment. The woman lets someone in, middle of the day? No struggle. Both killed in the kitchen.

She set that train of thought aside once she stepped into what appeared to be the main bedroom.

“Somebody tossed the bedroom,” she called out.

“It’s pretty strange and vicious for a burglary,” Peabody began, and stopped, frowning into the bedroom. “It looks pretty tidy.”

“Pretty tidy, not perfectly tidy like the living area. Things are out of place here. The bedcovers aren’t smooth, the closet doors open, some clothes on the floor in there. That desk there—one of the drawers isn’t closed all the way, and where’s the comp? No comp or tablet on the desk.”

Eve pulled open a drawer on the bureau. “Everything’s jumbled in here. No, she kept a neat and clean house in a neat and clean building. Whoever did this was looking for something. I bet the wit’s been in here, and would know if anything’s missing.”

“You want her to walk through.”

“Yeah, after they take the bodies.” She walked out. “Second bedroom, not so tidy either. Rug’s askew. Furniture’s got some dust on it. Why didn’t she clean in here? Closet’s empty,” she added, after pulling it open. “Who has an empty closet?”

“Not me. If you have storage, you end up using it.”