Page 83 of Burning Justice

“Then I think your case is closed,” Rollins said drily.

Maybe not. “Do you have an approximate TOD?”

“Maybe a couple of days. We’re waiting on the investigator.” She grimaced. “It’s pretty gruesome. The body’s been chewed up by foxes, coyotes, and magpies gnawing on it. I was first on scene and could barely make out the bullet holes in the guy’s chest.”

He and Gemma exchanged glances. If Nash had only been dead for two days, he could have set the warehouse fires, and they still couldn’t completely rule out the possibility he had something to do with the Leadville and Burlington fires. But he doubted Nash had been the shooter at Piggly’s or was Gemma’s attacker. Nash’s description didn’t fit those suspects.

In Brett’s estimation, David Hawkin was still looking good for those crimes.

“Who found the body?” Brett asked.

“Some oil workers. They came here to service the derrick. This one’s old and off the beaten path. That’s why they didn’t find it sooner. They didn’t see the body at first.” The trooper wrinkled her nose. “But they smelled it.”

“Why is this section here taped off?” Gemma pointed to the path leading from the road, through the field, and right up to the crime scene that had been taped off on either side. The short grass was slightly more tamped down than the surrounding area. “Was the body dragged into the field?”

Rollins nodded. “That’s what we think.”

Good observation, not that Brett was surprised. Gemma had excellent investigative instincts.

“He could have been killed on the side of the road,” Brett suggested. “Or anywhere else, for that matter, then dragged through the field, so the body wouldn’t be discovered quickly.”

“Exactly,” Rollins said. “If workers hadn’t shown up to service the derrick, it could have been months before he was found.”

With all the predators out there, by then, there would have been nothing left but a pile of bones.

A stocky man wearing khakis, a blue polo shirt, and tight-fitting blue gloves walked toward them from the crime scene, skirting the taped-off drag trail.

“These people are with the ATF,” Rollins said. “This is Investigator Peter Chu with the coroner’s office.”

“What can we do for the feds today?” Chu asked.

“I had a BOLO out on the deceased,” Brett said. “He was wanted for questioning in an arson investigation. What can you tell us?”

“Despite the condition of the body, I estimate he was killed approximately two days ago, but I need about a week’s worth of testing to confirm that. We can just barely make out GSWs to the chest, three of them. Animals have been feeding on the body. If it weren’t for the driver’s license in his wallet, we would have had a hard time ID’ing him without dental records. Most of the tips of his fingers have been chewed off.”

“We’d like to see the body,” Brett said.

“Follow me.”

Before they’d gotten within twenty feet of the crime scene, a whisper of a breeze brought with it the putrid odor of decaying flesh. Chu lifted the yellow tape for them to walk under. Cameras clicked as two CSU guys took close-up shots.

Nash had been thirty years old, five-nine, and weighed one-sixty, according to his rap sheet. What remained of the man was every bit as gruesome as both Rollins and Chu had described.

Nash lay on his back. Half the man’s face was gone, revealing most of his teeth in a gruesome, macabre smile. As Chu had said, the tips of his fingers were all but gone. In the upper right portion of his chest were small holes in the once-white T-shirt Nash wore. What remained of skin was covered with dirt and black residue Brett surmised was dried blood.

Other than funeral service viewings, for which a mortician had cleaned, prepped, and dressed the deceased to look the same as he or she had been prior to death, most people never saw a dead body. Gemma’s face had paled considerably, but he saw no signs of imminent puking. She’d seen the charred body in the Frodo warehouse, but this was different, even more gruesome, and she was still holding it together.

Several orange evidence markers had been set by boot prints in the mud, but no shell casings, giving more credence to the theory that Nash had been killed elsewhere, or the shooter may have picked up the shells. “Any slugs in or under the body?” If there were, they could be compared to the casings Blaze had found at Piggly’s, and both the casings and projectiles the ATF lab would collect after firing David Hawkin’s seized 9mm.

“We were just about to check.” Chu signaled to one of the CSU guys. “Let’s roll him over.”

Chu and the other man took position at Nash’s shoulders and legs, carefully rolling the body onto its side. Gemma gulped. Masses of squirming maggots spilled from three holes in Nash’s back onto the ground.

That answered one question. The GSWs were through-and-throughs. There’d be no slugs found in the body. Even if this was the kill location, which Brett doubted, the slugs could have penetrated as far as twelve inches into the ground.

Chu frowned. “I can’t tell if there are any holes in the soil. We think he was dragged here from the road. Either way, I’d have to go back to the office for a metal detector.”

“No need,” Brett said. “I may have something better. Are you just about done documenting the scene?” Rollins had already told him the deputy coroner investigator and his team had been here for hours.