Free Consumed by E. H. Reinhard Page A

Dave turned his attention to the chief deputy. “Has the scene been altered at all?”
    Whissell shook his head. “No one touched anything other than laying down the tarp.”
    “Okay.” He looked back at Beth, Tom, and me. “Let me get on a pair of gloves, snap some photos, and then I’ll look at the remains to see if I can tell you anything.”
    “Sounds good,” I said.
    Tom nodded.
    Dave from forensics went about getting his things set.
    “Excuse me, I need to make a call,” the chief deputy said. He rounded the front of the sheriff’s SUV and got inside.
    Beth, Tom and I watched as Dave began to take his photographs of the scene.

CHAPTER TWELVE
    Dave had been photographing the remains and surrounding areas for the better part of fifteen minutes. The man from Nashville Medical Science, who we learned was named Jeff, was assisting Dave to roll over the remains so he could get a few photos of the woman’s injuries from behind. As soon as Dave had finished, Jeff said he would load the body and they both would head over to the next dump site with us to repeat the process.
    Beth had called back to Ball to give him an update and see if they had come up with anything regarding the family of Owen Matheson—so far, they hadn’t.
    Beth, Tom, and I leaned against the side of Tom’s government-issued cruiser. The plan to head into Nashville and speak with the local police hadn’t changed though it had been added to. We planned to take them photos of each deceased woman that we didn’t have a positive ID for. We assumed them all to be Nashville prostitutes, which meant the women were more than likely in the system. Dave said he would e-mail me photos of the two women we were in the process of viewing. I called back to Dr. Nehls, who said he would supply me with the same for the unknown woman from earlier in the week as well as the female we’d viewed the night prior.
    “We might have something here!” Dave called. He waved us toward him at the body.
    Tom, Beth, and I went over.
    “What did you find?” Tom asked.
    “Well, we were rolling her to see if the knife wound to the forehead penetrated the skull, which by the way, takes some serious energy to remove a knife after doing something like this.”
    “What does that mean?” Beth asked.
    “Just that penetrating the skull is one thing, but removing a knife after you do is something else entirely. The brain makes a suction effect on the blade.”
    The thought sent a shiver up my back.
    “Continue. What did you find?” I asked.
    “Her hair came away from behind her ear as we rolled her. She has the same tattoo as the girl I looked at yesterday. It’s a—”
    “Moon and stars?” I asked.
    He looked over at me. “You know what I’m talking about?”
    “Yeah, I saw it on the woman’s remains yesterday.” I took another step toward him and placed my hands on my knees as I bent over to get a better view. The woman had the identical crescent-moon-and-star tattoo behind her ear.
    “What do you make of that?” Dave asked.
    “Well, either they are connected, or it’s about the most ridiculous coincidence in the world. Odds say they are connected.” I looked at Chief Deputy Whissell, who was leaning against the side of his sheriff’s SUV, seemingly not interested in doing anything other than observing. His face still showed annoyance. “Know anything about moon-and-star tattoos on women around here?” I asked.
    He shook his head. “You sure they’re the same?”
    “Yeah,” I said.
    Dave turned toward the chief deputy. “I agree. They are the same.”
    “Well, we’ll have to find out what it means, I guess.” He went quiet after the comment.
    I shook my head at his disinterest, unable to figure out why he was even there. “You have photos of everything, Dave?”
    “Yeah, I’m through. I’m just going to give Jeff here a hand loading her up, and it’s on to the next one.”
    “Okay,” I said. “Can you send a photo of her face and a photo