Richard Montanari by The Echo Man

the man's head. It appeared to be sealed with red sealing
wax. The right side had another smear of blood, which looked to be in the shape
of a figure eight.
        But
that wasn't the worst of it.
        The
victim's body was completely nude. It appeared to have been shaved clean, head
to toe. Pubic hair, chest hair, arm hair, leg hair - gone. The body's scraped
and abraded skin indicated that it had been shaved roughly, violently, perhaps
in the past day or so. There appeared to be no new growth.
        The
sight was so grotesque that it took Jessica a moment to take it all in. She had
seen quite a bit. Never anything like this. The indignities of homicide were
legion, but there was something about the final degradation of being left naked
that made it all worse, a communique from the killer to the rest of the world
that the humiliation of violent death was not the last word. For the most part,
you didn't just die in this life. You were found dead.
        Jessica
took the lead, more out of instinct than from any sense of duty. Hers was a
boys' world and the sooner you peed in the corners, the better. She had long
since turned the word bitch from an epithet to a badge, an emblem as
golden as her shield.
        Stansfield
cleared his throat. 'I'll, uh, get started on a canvass,' he said, and quickly
took his leave.
        There
were some homicide detectives who liked the idea of being a homicide
detective - the prestige, the pay, the cachet of being one of the chosen - but
couldn't stand being at a crime scene. Apparently, Stansfield was just such a
detective. Just as well, Jessica thought.
        She
crouched next to the victim, placed two fingers on his neck, checking for a
pulse. She found none. She examined the front of the body, looking for some
sort of entrance or exit wound. No holes, no blood.
        She
heard voices outside. She looked up to see Tom Weyrich coming down the steps,
his gear in his hand, his photographer in tow. Weyrich was an investigator for
the medical examiner's office with almost twenty years on the job.
        'Top
of the morning, Tom.'
        Weyrich
was in his early fifties, with a dry wit and a reputation as a thorough and
exacting investigator. When Jessica had met him five years earlier he had been
a meticulous and classically attired man. Now his mustache was irregularly
trimmed, his eyes red and tired. Jessica knew that Weyrich's wife had recently
died after a long fight with cancer. Tom Weyrich had taken it hard. Today he
appeared to be running on fumes. His slacks were pressed, but Jessica noted
that his shirt had probably been slept in.
        'Had
that double up in Torresdale,' Weyrich said, running his hands over his face,
trying to wring out the exhaustion. 'Got out of there about two hours ago.'
        'No
rest for the righteous.'
        'I
wouldn't know.'
        Weyrich
stepped fully inside, saw the body. 'Good God.' Somewhere beneath the trash and
shredded cardboard an animal scurried. 'Give me a good old execution-style two
taps to the back of the head any day,' he added. 'I never thought I'd miss the
crack wars.'
        'Yeah,'
Jessica said. 'Good times.'
        Weyrich
tucked his tie into his shirt, buttoned his suit coat, snapped on a pair of
gloves. He went about his business. Jessica watched him, wondering how many
times he had done this, how many times he had placed his hands on the cold
flesh of the dead. She wondered what it was like for him, sleeping alone these
days, and how he, more than anyone, needed to sense the warm flesh of the
living. When Jessica and Vincent had been temporarily separated a few years
earlier, it had been the thing she'd missed the most, the daily intimate
contact with the warmth of another human being.
        Jessica
stepped outside, waited. She saw David Albrecht across the street, getting
exterior shots of the building. Behind him, Jessica saw his sparkling new van,
which had his website address painted on the