Leopard's Prey by Christine Feehan

photographer’s photos were scattered across his desk along with those of his sister. He kept frowning at them, because they damn well didn’t add up. Saria was a pro. She didn’t make mistakes. She’d used her zoom lens to record each section of the crime scene. She’d been methodical, so much so that if he’d put the pictures together, they would form a very accurate and detailed replica of the crime scene. And that was the trouble.
    He sighed and ran both hands through his hair for the tenth time. Evidence bags lay on top of each of the pictures of an object that had been on the altar. A bag corresponded with each of the forensic photographs, but not with Saria’s. The difference was put down to Saria being an amateur at a crime scene, but he knew better. Nothing rattled Saria for long, and she was surrounded by her brothers and Drake, who were all methodical when it came to solving crimes. Her work was impeccable – which meant someone had added an object between the time Saria took the pictures and the forensic photographer had taken them.
    He studied the pictures of the altar as a whole. Rocks formed a rectangle on the ground. Not just any rocks. Each rock was somewhat flat, oval in shape, and had been placed precisely one inch from the next. He knew because he’d measured the distance several times. How could a killer be so absolutely precise? Did he carry a damned ruler along to the murder? Was he just that good that his measurements weren’t off at all, not by so much as a hair?
    The macabre hand of the dead man was soaked in oil and set upright in the exact middle of the altar, but in the front. Remy was certain, if the same held true from the last murders, they would find out the oil was baby oil. He even knew the brand. Trying to track that down had been a dead end. The murderer had chosen the most popular brand of baby oil. A black candle was tied to each of the fingers of the hand and had been burned.
    Three inches directly behind the hand and in the exact center of the altar was a bowl of the victim’s blood. The bowl was plastic – again, untraceable, although of course they’d try. Unfortunately, anyone could buy that particular brand of picnic supply at any store. The bowl was always filled with precisely one pint of blood. How did the killer get the amount so exact? Another big question.
    Behind the bowl, again three inches exactly, was the victim’s heart, offered up like some damned sacrifice. Scattered around the altar were objects clearly taken from the swamp. Spanish moss, a leaf from the hanged man’s tree, a shell, three different types of feathers as well as leaves from various plants, all objects found right there at the crime scene. None of it had been carried in by the killer and not one thing on the altar held a print.
    But there was the length of the candles in Saria’s picture. They had burned an inch, if he judged it correctly, and there was only the bowl of blood. In the forensic photographer’s photograph, the candles appeared to have burned a little longer, not that precise inch, although it was difficult to tell. A knotted string lying half in, half out of the bowl of blood was not in Saria’s picture. Not in the ones of the entire altar and not in the ones of just the bowl of blood that she had taken. There were close-ups. Perfectly clear pictures. Nowhere was that small seven-knotted string until the forensic photographer took the pictures several hours after her.
    How long had it taken Saria and Bijou to make their way back to the Inn and tell Drake? Drake had brought a generator and lights to the crime scene. He’d had to retrieve those items and make his way back. Had the killer been there all along? Had he watched Saria taking pictures of the crime scene and then finished his ceremony? Bijou had been there as well. How close to both women had he been?
    Saria and Bijou had to have interrupted the ritual ceremony the killer was compelled to conduct after each murder.