birthday back in April. Her body was found nine days later across town in the Design District — a gentrified part of the city that bordered the crime-ridden and infamous suburb of Overtown, the birthplace of Miami’s 1982 race riots.
It hadn’t taken long to get an ID. Holly’s purse, along with her wallet full of cash and credit cards, had been thrown in the dumpster alongside her. Thanks to her distraught mom, who’d flown in from Pennsylvania after Holly was reported missing by her roommate, pictures of Holly had made the rounds on all the local news stations, and Manny had known right away who it was he was staring down at from atop that ladder. In a cardboard box under his desk now sat the stack of family photos that Cookie Skole had given to him after her daughter had been pulled from the garbage and the investigation had officially changed course from missing persons to homicide. He hadn’t needed more than one picture, seeing as the girl was dead, but it was hard to tell a bawling parent, ‘One photo of your murdered kid’s enough,’ so he’d taken the whole box. Inside were pictures that started with Holly’s birth and ended with her opening presents next to the Christmas tree the last time she’d come home for winter-break. They didn’t exactly match up with the micro-miniskirts and mesh tops he’d seen Holly sporting on her Facebook page.
Although she’d been found more than a week after disappearing, unfortunately, Holly hadn’t been dead that long. In fact, her body had likely been in the dumpster only a matter of hours, and according to the Medical Examiner, rigor mortis — a condition of joint and muscle stiffening that a body goes through in the first seventy-two hours after death occurs — was still in effect. That meant Holly hadn’t been dead very long at all when she was found. And that meant someone had kept her somewhere for a long while before finally putting her out of her misery …
She had chemical burns on her feet, hands, and face, bind marks on her wrists, and a strange burn wound on the nape of her neck. Toxicology reports indicated that she’d been injected with copious amounts of diphenhydramine and dextromethorphan — the active ingredients in Benadryl and Nyquil, respectively — both of which, Manny knew, induced hallucinations when given in high enough doses. She’d been raped and sexually abused with an object or objects. The cause of death was asphyxiation. The most disturbing injury for Manny was the smile. Or lack thereof. Her lips had been melted with sulfuric acid, exposing her teeth and gums, so that it looked, from a distance, like she was grinning. As Manny figured it, Holly’s killer had actually wanted her to be found. He’d wanted everyone to see the Joker smile he’d put on her face before it could be blamed on hungry rats or decomposition had taken the rest of her flesh with it. No wonder poor Papi had dropped right after he opened that lid on the dumpster — he’d peered down into hell, only to find it grinning back up at him.
Twenty-three years as a cop in Miami — eighteen of them spent working homicides — and some things unfortunately still shocked even Manny Alvarez, on rare occasions leaving the usually unflappable, physically intimidating six-foot-five, 280-pound detective unnerved. Because the way he saw it, murder usually had a point. You got mad at someone and you lost your temper and you pulled the trigger, or lashed out with a knife, or hit the gas pedal. Or maybe you exacted revenge on someone who’d wronged you, or stole from you, or cheated on you, or failed to fork over all the dope you’d arranged to pick up. Or you needed money and the gun went off while you were trying to take it. Or you didn’t want to leave witnesses. Even with gang shootings that were committed solely to intimidate others, or gain initiation into a gang — as perverted as those reasons might be, slayings committed in their name had a point. But every once in a rare while a case landed on Manny’s desk that defied reason. Any reason. A life taken by someone simply for the purpose of taking it. Perhaps to satisfy a morbid, primal curiosity, or worse — for sheer amusement. Manny stared at the final picture of the coed’s abused body, taken on a steel gurney at the ME’s office. The macabre smile, bind marks, burns, chemical injections — all were obvious signs of sadistic torture. And her killer had held her captive for several days, undoubtedly to play with her, experiment on her, terrify her, before finally strangling the life out of her.
The suspect in custody whose bond hearing he was preparing for was not a boyfriend or an ex-lover, or a co-worker or a frenemy of Holly. He was not related to her, or mad at her, from what Manny could tell. In fact, it appeared that Holly had only met her murderer that night, as fate would have it, while she was trying to have a good time. She was not robbed; her car was found in the parking lot of Menace, right where she’d left it. There was no withdrawal from her bank accounts, or unauthorized charges on her credit cards. There was no evidence of a drug deal, no gang involvement. The rape in and of itself did not explain the overt use of torture or the violent sexual abuse. In fact, the injuries inflicted on Holly were way outside the psychological confines of what was considered ‘normal’ behavior for a rapist. Even a murdering rapist. Without any further explanation from the perp, it was a murder that simply defied any reason, and the most terrifying rationale for Holly’s death was that there was none; her murder had no point.
Manny glanced at his watch. Shit. It was already almost 2:00. Time to head over to the courthouse. His hearing was with an uptight, well-heeled prosecutor who probably really meant 1:30 when she said it — though Manny knew there was no way the case would be heard before 3:00, since it was Slow Steyn on the bench today and the man never returned from lunch before 2:00 and his calendars were always the size of a Harry Potter novel.
As he finished the last of his coffee, Manny stuck the photos and reports into an accordion folder that was already tearing at the edges. It was time to move up to a box. Or boxes. After enough years in the trenches, you developed a feeling for which cases would be ‘quickies’ — plenty of evidence, cooperative witnesses, a damning confession — all leading to a fast-tracked plea bargain. Then there were the headaches — sloppy scene, no witnesses, circumstantial evidence, and a closed-mouthed, cocky, SOB defendant. Not to mention the years of BS appeals if you did get a conviction. The State of Florida v. Talbot Lunders unfortunately fell into the headache pile.
Crumpling up the remains of his empanada in the deli wrapper, Manny pitched it across the room and over the head of the only other detective currently in the squad bay and not out to lunch. It landed in the overflowing wastebasket next to the copier, causing an avalanche of paper down one side. Mike Dickerson, an ornery fixture as old as the building itself, shot Manny a dark look over his black spectacles. ‘Watch it, Bear,’ he grumbled, shaking the sports section of the Miami Herald in Manny’s direction. ‘You ain’t no Josh Johnson.’ Then he buried his head behind the paper and carried on gumming his sub.
‘I coulda been, Pops,’ Manny said with a heavy sigh, as he crumpled up the paper bag lunch had come in and chucked that, too, across the room. This time he hit the copier.
‘Yeah, yeah. I don’t know what you was throwing those ten minutes you spent in the minor leagues, boy, but I’ll tell you, your aim is for shit now.’
‘Took your piece off.’
Mike’s hand shot to the top of his head.
‘Don’t have a heart attack, Pops. I’m just busting balls,’ Manny said with a hearty laugh. ‘It’s still there.’
‘Bald fucking Yeti.’
‘You should go natural, Mikey. It beats the rug. The missus would love it, rubbing her hands all over your smooth, silky melon.’
Manny had shaved his head the day he joined the force and worn it that way ever since. But he did let hair grow everywhere else it naturally wanted to on his body, including his arms, hands, back and chest — thus earning him the nickname Bear. He wore a five o’clock shadow by noon and a thick, wiry, black mustache 24/7. The decision to go bald wasn’t solely motivated by vanity, though. It kept him cool, for one thing. And as a hulking, over-sized, olive-skinned, bald Cubano with a thick mustache and dark, full eyebrows that were perpetually furrowed, he looked menacing.
