Chapter Five #4
Chris took two of the eyes out of one skull, using the ones that were identical in color, shape, and size. Eyes always matched. Unless someone was sick, orb size was identical.
“I have to sacrifice one of these eyes,” he said. “BEN! Tray and kit!”
When the man came back in, he was holding both.
“What do you mean ‘sacrifice’?” Tora asked, moving closer out of curiosity.
All of this was fascinating.
She didn’t understand why all the Feds seemed annoyed to be working a case like this. Honestly, this was the coolest thing that had ever happened to her, and Mac.
Before answering, Chris placed one eye in an evidence bag, and one on the tray. Then, and only then, he picked up a scalpel.
“I’m going to dissect it.”
Yeah, hell, no.
Elizabeth was squeamish with eyes.
There was no way she was watching that go down. It wasn’t the first time she’d seen him do that, but it wasn’t going to be a common occurrence.
A spleen?
Okay.
A brain?
Sure.
An eyeball?
Hell to the absofuckinglutely not.
“I’m going to focus on Tony. Do your worst, Doc,” she said, refusing to see whatever was going to go down. There was no doubt she’d get a play-by-play when someone told her the end result.
Know who wanted to see what kind of cuckoo was going down?
The two detectives.
They were all over Chris as he played poke the eyeball with the sharp scalpel.
PASS.
As she focused on anything else but what was going down behind her, Chris cut into the eye, and then picked it up.
Then, he sniffed it.
“Jesus, Doc. That’s a little too close to your face,” Gene said. “We kiss that face. Can we not?”
He laughed.
Mostly at the look on Elizabeth’s face when she heard what the man said.
He explained.
“Someone had to smell it. I know one thing,” he said, showing the two detectives, and letting them smell it too.
Weirdly, they wanted to.
That was gross.
PERIOD.
“It’s chemical-y,” Tora said.
Mac agreed.
Chris put the eyeball down, and headed toward Elizabeth and where she was standing. Then, he opened a jar from the shelf and sniffed it.
She was aghast.
“Christopher. Really? Why do I feel like you and Tony switched brains or had a joint lobotomy? We tell the kids not to sniff things, and here you are doing just that!”
That amused him.
The things he had to do in his job were seldom pleasant. No one liked sniffing eyeballs, but if investigators wanted answers, that meant someone had to do the dirty work.
That someone was him.
Oh, and it had been years of dirty work.
As for it being gross…
It was.
Oh, he was well aware of her eyeball aversion, and he completely understood it.
“Yes, it’s necessary because now, I can tell you part of the eyeballs’ journey,” he admitted.
Okay, well, for that, she’d overlook the ick. She was easy like that. For Elizabeth, the bottom line was to get as much information as possible so she could do her job.
“Hit me with it, Doc.”
So, he did.
“Their eyes were part of an embalmed person. The owner of the eyes was dead before they were removed, and I’m talking about dead-dead, because you don’t embalm a living person—not even accidentally,” he admitted.
That hung there.
Why?
Because if the person was embalmed, this lunatic might not have been killing anyone.
This collector could just be taking things from someone who had passed away.
That meant that this might not be her circus, and not her clowns. She dealt with serial killers, and the shit they did, not grave robbery.
That was theft, and body snatching parts wasn’t her game.
But it brought up one question.
Where did they get the bodies? If anything, she was a curious, curious cat, and now, she wanted to know.
“Are you sure?” she asked.
That was all he had to hear.
Chris didn’t take it personally. He knew his wife needed to make sure so that she could effectively work this case. A second opinion was always warranted when your life was on the line as you chased a killer.
Her surprise was noted.
And understood.
It was rare they had a case where a killer was not taking out the victims. He wasn’t sure if she was going to keep working it, or not. That was yet to be seen.
To get her a second opinion, Chris stuck his head out of the room, and got Alexi’s attention downstairs by calling his name.
“Can I see you a second?” he asked, wanting his help, and to test him.
He’d kill two birds with one stone.
The man headed his way.
“There’s an eyeball on the tray. Can you tell me something about it to help Elizabeth with the investigation?” he asked, setting the scene to see if he was as good as he hoped he was.
Their morgue was a learning morgue, along with being the best in the FBI. If he wanted to hire someone, they needed to be up to speed.
And that wasn’t easy since Elizabeth’s speed was maximum throttle while on a case.
Alexi headed over, and pulled on fresh gloves. Then, he picked up the opened eye, and held it in his fingers. It was when he sniffed it that Chris smiled.
Yeah, he was a well-trained ME.
All of the best ones weren’t afraid to get up in an eyeball’s business—nose first.
At his grin, Elizabeth elbowed him.
“You look like a lunatic,” she said, amused. “Next, you’ll be writing him sonnets.”
Oh, Chris was having a damn good day, and he couldn’t wait to get this man back to the morgue and watch him autopsy a dead guy.
That would tell him all he needed to know about him being on their team.
As for Alexi, it didn’t take him long.
“These eyes have a chemical smell, which likely means that there has been an embalming process at some point.”
And there it was.
Chris focused on his wife.
“That’s your second opinion. Whomever owns that eye, and likely the rest of them, were dead before they were removed from their bodies. Your ‘killer’ isn’t using fresh bodies.”
This wasn’t her first rodeo.
She knew killers were seven days past sane, and she wanted to make sure she covered every angle, so this didn’t bite her in the ass.
Elizabeth pointed at the jars.
“What’s the solution they’re stored in? Is it embalming fluid? Or is it something different?”
To give her an answer, Chris opened the lid, and he held it out to her. The whole time, she looked horrified beyond belief that he assumed she wanted a hands-on experience with a jar full of cuckoo.
Yeah, someone lost his nut if he thought she was going to smell that vat of nastiness.
“Pass.”
Alexi took a shot.
He sniffed it, and he knew exactly what it was.
“That’s an alcohol solution. The eyes are being pickled in it, or preserved. Someone knows their way around a lab, or knows how to Google things on the internet,” he admitted, covering all the bases.
Yes, yes, they did.
“So what you’re telling me is those eyes were in someone’s head, already embalmed, and then this person decided to put them back in skulls, some of them out of order like a wackadoo?”
Alexi beat Chris to it.
“I mean, we just give you the facts. Is Wackadoo a term you like us to use?”
Chris was in his glory.
He found an ME that didn’t speculate, and could pick through the Elizabethisms to deal with that crazy.
Yep, this was his lucky day, and he’d won the ‘I have to staff the office’ lottery.
He was about to get him a backup ME.
The younger version of himself.
“Yes, Elizabeth. I’m telling you that the eyes don’t match the skulls. I’m telling you that someone is collecting dead people’s eyes, and then playing with them. By that alone, you can say they are most definitely ‘wackadoo’,” he admitted.
Holy.
Shit.
That was disgusting, even for their work.
Corbin was curious.
“Where would they get embalmed eyeballs from?” he asked. “I’m sure no one is selling them embalmed on the black market. Maybe a fresh set, but a pickled eyeball? That’s gotta be niche.”
Tora raised her hand.
As she’d been listening, something came to mind that might be pertinent.
“Uh, not that long ago, Holladay had a rash of someone digging up graves. We thought they were to steal jewelry, and nothing else.”
Gene sighed.
And there it was.
He knew that there was no way that would be a coincidence. All of their cases were ass-backward, and full of nuttery. He’d bet big money that this was tied together.
“Well, this just got weird, and it’s not even Halloween yet. We’ve got a whole lot of cuckoo on this one.”
Yes.
Yes, they did.
Elizabeth was curious.
“What was taken?” she asked, wanting more on the cases that Tora was talking about.
Mac pulled out his phone, and found the reports that had been filed by another detective.
“One was missing his watch, and one was missing his gold fillings. This was about two years ago.”
Tora was honest.
“It was before I came here, so I only know about the information from listening to the detectives bring it up in the bullpen.”
Elizabeth was curious.
“Tell me more.”
Mac kept reading, and found another report.
“Actually, it was three graves. Apparently, the first had nothing missing from the man’s body, the second was the watch, and the third were gold fillings.”
Wait.
What?
Who had gold fillings?
Oh, never mind.
She lived in a gold baron’s haunted hellhole. Back in the day, he likely had gold fillings. What was she thinking? Apparently, that was a thing around here back then.
“And then nothing?”
Mac nodded.
“The grave robberies ended, but the media made a spectacle,” he admitted. “I remember that part of it.”
Ethan spoke up.
“He, again, only to make it easier to discuss, likely was practicing. If the first one was to see if they could do it, and the next two took longer to see if he could take a prize, that meant our killer was learning. They’re probably going to be tied to this, or that’s my opinion if I was taking a stab at it. ”
Jesus.
A collector perfecting his or her skill?
That was always bad.
Once they were learning, they were doing some crazy shit.
Mac continued.