Rocky Mountain Mystery

Halogen police lights illuminated the area near the lake, turning dusk into harsh daylight. Yellow crime-scene tape draped over leafy shrubs. The hum of tense conversation mingled with static from police radios.

David slipped around the edge of the police cordon where uniforms and other forensic investigators converged on the body. He caught a glimpse of her delicate white feet, tied with cord at the ankles.

Impotent rage crashed against his forehead with the impact of a jackhammer. This couldn’t be happening again. His muscles clenched. Please, God, not again.

SWIMMING LAPS was a form of therapeutic exercise for Blair Weston. In the accident, she’d shattered her wrist. Her right leg had been broken in four places, including a compound fracture of the right tibia and fibula. For a long time, the only place she’d been able to move without pain was in the pool.

Now, five years later, she was mostly recuperated, but she still swam a hundred laps a day in the seventy-five-foot-long pool in the garden level of her high-rise condo building. The pale-turquoise water—a color that someone once told Blair matched her greenish-blue eyes—felt like a cool liquid caress, gently embracing her body as she stroked back and forth. An excellent morning workout. The exertion got her blood circulating and her heart pumping. Not unlike sex.

What a pleasant idea! Sex! Blair could hardly remember the last time she’d been to bed with a man. Was five years ago long enough to recertify her as a virgin at age thirty-four? Rather a depressing thought.

At the deep end, she rolled under the water and pushed away from the edge, gliding half the length of the pool underwater. Silence surrounded her. Through her goggles, she gazed at the flowing pattern of light and shadow in soothing ripples. When she broke the surface and caught a breath, she heard her name being called.

“Hey, Blair!”

Her first instinct was to dive, to ignore the intrusion. She preferred to keep swimming in lithe contemplation. But she paddled to the shallow end and looked up at the two men who awaited her. One was Adam Briggs, the head of Colorado Crime Consultants. Good! Adam was probably bringing her a project—something more to occupy her mind than contemplation of her status as a re-born virgin.

Before the accident, Dr. Blair Weston had been a medical examiner in the Denver Coroner’s Office. She still wasn’t able to go back to full-time work—didn’t have the stamina to stand for a long time without moving. Also, her head injuries caused uncontrollable dizzy spells. And her wrist, though healed, was still too shaky for detail work. Doing part-time consultation on medical forensics for CCC was all she could handle in spite of an ever-increasing need to bring in more income than she received from insurance disability.

When she glanced toward the other man, she felt a pleasant spark of recognition. She peeled off her goggles and grinned. “David.”

The last time she’d seen David Crawford was over a year ago when they’d bumped into each other in the grocery store. They’d exchanged phone numbers. He’d never called, and she’d assumed there was nothing more to talk about.

He squatted at the edge of the pool. “How’re you doing, Blair?”

“I’m fine.” If he really cared, he would have telephoned her the last time they met. Therefore she assumed David was here for another reason. “What can I do for you?”

“You look great,” he said.

Pushing away from the edge of the pool, she ducked her head under the water so her bangs would plaster over her forehead, covering the scar near her hairline. She assumed that David would revise his opinion of how “great” she looked if he could see the Frankenstein scars on her right leg.

“You’re the one who’s looking good,” she said. He’d aged well. The hint of silver in his thick, black hair added a touch of mature elegance. Though he was smiling, his grin was incomplete—lifting only on the left side in a way that made his face seem asymmetrical and interesting. She wondered if he had ever truly smiled after the death of his sister. “I saw you on TV. Some program about serial murders in Texas.”

Her voice echoed in the tiled pool room, giving this meeting a surreal, dreamlike quality—as if she were imagining these two men at the edge of the pool.

Adam didn’t stoop to talk to her. Though he’d left the military years ago, he maintained a rigid posture. He said, “Blair, I have a project for you.”

“Go ahead.”

“It’s about the Fisherman.”

She bobbed under the water again. I don’t want to hear this! Five years ago, before her life came undone, the Fisherman serial murders had been her case. She’d autopsied all six of the victims. “I really don’t think I want to—”

“Get out of the damn pool,” Adam said. “We can’t have a sensible conversation while you’re splashing around like a dolphin.”

She looked away from Adam, turning her attention toward David. If she left the sheltering waters, he’d see her poor, battered leg. He’d notice her clumsy stride; he was a reporter and noticed everything.

“Blair.” Adam repeated her name as if she should snap to attention. “This consultation has important ramifications.”

“Like what?”

“There was a murder last night in City Park. Some of the particulars resemble the Fisherman crimes.”

She shuddered. Though she’d heard a news flash on the radio, she had no idea about the connection. “But it can’t be the Fisherman. He’s in jail.”

“Maybe not,” David said. “What if the wrong guy was convicted?”

“No way.” She couldn’t accept that possibility; it was too scary. During the earlier investigation, there had been threats aimed directly at her. The Fisherman knew who she was, knew her preferences and habits. “Eddy Adderly was convicted. After he was put in jail, there were no more murders.”

“Until now,” David said.

“That doesn’t fit any kind of psychological profile. Serial killers don’t take five years off before striking again.”

“Out of the pool,” Adam ordered. He held her towel. “Come on, Blair.”

“What’s the big rush?”

“I’ve arranged for you to observe the autopsy on this victim. This afternoon at 1530.”

“What time is that in civilian terms?”

Adam rolled his eyes. “Three-thirty this afternoon. At the Coroner’s Office.”

An autopsy? At her old office? A bevy of emotions charged through her brain: excitement at once again being part of a complex forensic investigation; satisfaction at the idea that she might be able to help; fear of plunging back into the fray.

“Let’s go,” Adam snapped.

Here came another emotion. She felt intensely self-conscious about climbing out of the pool. Don’t be silly! She wasn’t a giddy teenager who fretted about her body image. Blair was a grown woman, an adult. It shouldn’t matter to her what David thought.

Her thigh muscles flexed, and she stood up in the shallow water. A veil of droplets slid off her electric-blue, one-piece swimsuit with the French-cut legs that always seemed too high. She strode through the water and hoisted herself onto the concrete ledge.

Her first instinct was to grab the towel from Adam and cover the grotesque scarring on her leg, but she forced herself to follow her regular routine. She rubbed the moisture from her short brown hair, draped the towel over her shoulders and stood, revealing all five feet, eight inches of her body. Her angular shoulders. Her jutting hipbones. Her minimal breasts. And her right leg that was seven-eighths of an inch shorter than the left.

She felt David’s gaze upon her and avoided looking back at him, embarrassed by what she might read in his expression. Walking slowly to minimize her limp, she went to a hook at poolside where she grabbed her full-length terry cloth robe and wrapped it around her, tying the sash tightly at her waist. Her feet slipped into a pair of rubber thongs with a bright yellow daisy at the juncture of her first and second toes.

“Your answer?” Adam asked. “Will you attend the autopsy?”

“What’s my role in this?” Though her pulse raced, she kept her voice level and businesslike. “Why has CCC been called in? We usually don’t get involved in ongoing crime investigations.”

“Because of me,” David said. “About a week ago I asked CCC to take another look at my sister’s murder.”

“Why?” she asked.

“Eddy Adderly is dying, and it made me think. I want to know—without a shadow of doubt—that the right man was arrested and convicted, that the Fisherman will never harm another woman.”

She could hear the frustration in his voice. When she finally looked at David, she saw a troubled man who wanted the truth and didn’t care what she looked like. He didn’t think of her in terms of her appearance. And why not?

Her ping-pong shift in emotions was rather annoying. Only a moment ago she wanted to hide from David. Now, contrarily, she wanted him to notice her. Why shouldn’t David Crawford be interested in her as a woman?