Strip Search by William Bernhardt Read Free Book Online Page A

would’ve spattered across the floor. These two, killer and victim, were standing one behind the other. Meaning the assailant had to reach around his throat, while holding him upright.”
    “So we’re looking for a guy. A very strong guy.”
    “I don’t want to sound sexist, but given the upper-body strength requirement…” He shrugged. “Either it’s one of those chicks from the Worldwide Wrestling League, or it’s a guy. A barbarian.”
    “Tall, dark, and brutal?”
    Tony shook his head. “Again, look at the main concentration of the blood spatter. Over six feet off the floor, and forming an upward elliptical arch. Our assailant was shorter than his victim, probably shorter than average.”
    “A homunculus.”
    “Well, I don’t like to make value judgments about strangers. But I wouldn’t set him up on a date with my sister.”
    I nodded my agreement. “I’m surprised the victim didn’t struggle more.”
    “Oh, God, didn’t anyone tell you?”
    Just the way he said it gave me a severe case of the jimjams. “Just give it to me straight, Tony. What happened?”
    He pointed to the stainless steel gizmo to the left, obviously uncomfortable. “Do you know what that is?”
    “Tony, the only thing I cook is Lean Cuisine.”
    “That’s a deep fat fryer. It’s where they make french fries and onion rings.”
    “I feel certain the victim wasn’t killed by onion rings.”
    Tony swallowed. “The killer pushed the vic’s face down into the fryer. Into the boiling oil. While it was on.”
    I felt an intense surge of nausea rising up my stomach like a surfer on the big kahuna. “So the temperature was…”
    “Approximately three hundred and fifty degrees.”
    I took several quick short breaths, trying to steady myself. “How—”
    “First,” he continued, “the skin would melt off your face. Then you would go into shock. Your brain would literally begin to cook. It would feel like—”
    I held up a hand. “I don’t need to know what it would feel like.”
    “Okay.” He looked away, then muttered: “Having his throat cut afterward was probably a mercy.”
    I fought back the nausea, the shaking in my knees that oh so desperately wanted a quick snort of something with a very high alcoholic content, and asked, “But—
why
?”
    Tony laid his hand on my shoulder. He was looking a bit ashen himself. “And with that question, Susan, you have officially moved out of my realm—and into yours.”
     
     
     

7
     
     
    “I STEADIED MYSELF against the counter, doing my best to stay out of the way of the scientists who had real work to do, and thought. Or perhaps more accurately…I listened. To the kitchen. What had happened? What went on here?
    Could there possibly be a rational motive behind boiling someone’s face? It was hard to imagine. Was this planned or spontaneous? The killer used his brute strength and the tools at hand—in this case, one that fried potatoes at three hundred and fifty degrees Fahrenheit. But he might’ve also brought a weapon for the decapitation. Premeditated? Every instinct told me he wasn’t killing for love, money, jealousy, revenge, hatred, or any of the usual motives. Everything I had seen so far pointed to a psychopath.
    Which led to the second question: Why here? Why commit a murder in a fast-food restaurant? Just to take advantage of the deep fat fryer? It hardly seemed likely. A private location would be better. Even the victim’s home would be better. Perhaps he didn’t live alone. Still, subduing a family would be easier than luring someone to a downtown eatery late at night, wouldn’t it? No, the only possible explanation was that the victim worked here. Maybe the killer didn’t know where he lived, maybe the victim was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. But he worked here. Which meant there was about a ninety percent chance he was young, thirty or under. He was here late, after hours, presumably alone. So he must be on the managerial staff, the