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kid I saw at the park,” Keir said
after studying the features. “Do you know who he is?”
    “The body’s been fingerprinted,” Hoyt
replied, “but it could take a day to get the results back from the
IAFIS data base. He also has a tattoo.” Hoyt glanced at the
coroner, who then lifted the sheet to show a tattoo of a wasp, the
stinger strategically placed at the vein in the bend of the boy’s
elbow. “Does that mean anything to you?” Hoyt asked Keir.
    “Hard to tell. I knew a kid way back when who
did that to show he was off drugs but I don’t know if that’s its
literal meaning or just his idea.”
    “There are no tracks on his arms,” the
coroner pointed out, “but we’ll run a tox screen, of course.”
    “All right,” Hoyt said, “we’ll leave you to
it, Doc. I’ll be back in ten, so don’t start without me.”
    As soon as they left the morgue, Keir let out
a shuddering sigh of relief. “I know it makes me sound like a wimp,
but I’m glad all I had to look at was his face. Are you really
going to attend the autopsy?”
    “Yep. It’s procedure.” They were at the exit
from the morgue by then. “Tell Teague I’ll be in touch as soon I
know anything.”
    “I will.” Keir started to open the door then
paused. “I know it’s none of my business to say this, but Teague’s
a good man.”
    Hoyt cocked an eyebrow. “Have I said
differently?”
    “I mean…Oh, hell. Never mind.”
    Chuckling dryly, Hoyt replied, “Are you
trying, in your own way, to tell me I should look at him as more
than just a man I have to deal with because we’re both involved in
trying to find the killer?”
    “Maybe?”
    “Keir, you’re something else. Still,” Hoyt
barely grinned, “you might have a point. For now though, get out of
here so I can get back before the good doctor wonders if I’ve
chickened out.”
    “I’m going.” And this time Keir did. When he
was outside, he smiled happily. Mission accomplished. I think
he’s as interested in Teague as Teague is in him. Now to do
something about that. He shook his head. Or not. They’re
adults. They can figure it out on their own. I hope. Teague needs a
real life that doesn’t revolve around the agency and the people
working for him. But short of locking him in a room with
Hoyt… Chortling at the image that brought to mind, Keir headed
back to the motel, taking a circuitous route to be certain no one
was interested in him and where he was going.
    * * * *
    Hoyt left the morgue no wiser about the
killer than he had been when the autopsy started. There was no
semen in his mouth, throat, stomach, or anal cavity. According to
the coroner that indicated the victim hadn’t had sex in any form
within at least a day before his death. When Hoyt asked about
condoms he was told there was no trace evidence that one had been
used just before the murder. “And no condom wrapper was found at
the crime scene to indicate the victim had planned on committing
fellatio on the killer before he was assaulted,” the coroner
added.
    The boy’s fingers, as with Grimes, were
broken intentionally rather than being the result of his fighting
his attacker. “No flesh or other trace evidence under the nails,”
the coroner stated. “No bruising on the knuckles. Some bruises on
his wrists, besides the abrasions caused by the ropes. They were
probably the result of his killer grabbing his arms to twist them
behind his back.”
    “Tie them, then when the boy tried to scream,
if he did, stuff the gag in his mouth.” Again, as with Grimes, it
had been a rag not from something the victim was wearing. The CSI
people were going over it in the lab, Hoyt knew, to see if there
was anything about it that could connect it to its place of
origin.
    Hoyt related all of this, as well as the
other details of the killing, to Chief Davis when he went upstairs
to the police department.
    “I just got off the phone with the mayor,”
the chief said when Hoyt was finished. “He is on a tear, to put