Mason remembered the odd white pattern on Carson’s back.

“There aren’t any. His arms may have been taped tightly for the cutting, but once he’d passed out from the blood loss, the suspect may have removed it. I’ve submitted tissues and fluids for toxicology. Those reports I’ll have back in a few days.”

“Did you get a narrower time of death?” Zander asked.

“Yes. Between noon and four P.M. yesterday. Does that help?” Seth offered.

“Every bit helps, Doctor,” answered Mason. “What about—”

“Seth? Oh, excuse me.” Dr. Victoria Peres had stridden into the room. The tall forensic anthropologist scanned their group and made eye contact with Mason and Ray. “Detectives, nice to see you again.” She smiled, and Mason fought not to jerk in surprise.

Seth made introductions while Mason took a good look at the woman. He’d dealt with the “Bone Lady” on several investigations, but he’d never seen her smile so easily. Ever. She had a reputation for being prickly and cold. It must have been her new relationship with the medical examiner. Or old relationship. The two had recently been reunited after years apart.

A medical examiner and a forensic anthropologist. Mason wondered what their dinner table conversation was like.

She pulled Seth aside for a quick consult while the four detectives waited.

“I wonder if we’ll find the blood,” Ava murmured. “Do you think our killer let it spill out at our crime scene or carefully controlled it?”

“Do you think he wanted the blood for something? Maybe to drink or for a ritual?” Ray asked. Mason gagged slightly. Trust Ray to consider the macabre.

Ray’s mind worked in different directions from Mason’s. It was why they made a good team. Between the two of them they could consider more avenues than either could working alone.

“Did someone make a formal identification?” asked Zander. “Obviously we all recognize him from TV, and I’m comfortable moving ahead based on that, but what about a relative or with his teeth?”

“We’ve already compared his dental records,” said Seth as Dr. Peres headed toward the door. She waved good-bye to the group, and Mason dumbly raised a hand in return. He and Ray exchanged a shocked look.

“Without a doubt, it is Carson Scott,” finished Seth.

“Anything else we need to know, Doctor?” Ava asked.

“Not until the labs come back. I’m confident he died from exsanguination. Whether or not there was a chemical element involved remains to be seen. The trace evidence is ready to be sent to the FBI lab. I’m including the ropes and padding. Nail scrapings, residue samples, hair combings. He was pretty clean from my view, but I’m curious to know what you find on a microscopic level. Someone at least tried to clean up any evidence.”

Ava gave a confident grin. “They always think they’ve eliminated the evidence.”

“This has been a long day,” Mason stated, stretching his arms above his head. Ava heard his back crack as he twisted it back and forth.

“Definitely,” she agreed, and took another sip of wine. The two of them sat in Mason’s warm living room with a fire crackling in the fireplace and the dog softly snoring beside them on the sofa. It’d be a typical romantic evening in most homes, except for the paperwork strewn across the coffee table and the crime scene pictures on their two laptops.

Ava enlarged the photo of the odd white shape on Carson Scott’s back. Something danced just out of her memory as she tried to make sense of the pattern.

Is it simply a flower?

She rotated the photo, hoping the change would shake its identity loose in her brain.

“That’s driving me batshit,” added Mason, glancing at her screen. “It looks like a happy daisy embedded in his back. It’s wrong on many levels.”

“Mmmm,” she agreed. She opened up the thumbnails of the hundreds of shots of the scene. “I wish I’d been present at the scene on the bridge.” She slowly clicked through the pictures. Again.

“I don’t get it,” Mason muttered to himself as he read the report from the medical examiner. “Why did someone risk hanging the guy? Who is he sending a message to?”

Ava nodded. If they knew the answer to that question, they’d have their suspect. “The list of people to talk to is growing. We have phone interviews scheduled with his staffers from back East. There’s his friends and family in the area. We still haven’t been able to track his movements on his last day. Hopefully the computer forensics guys can tell us when he last emailed or was online.”

“No luck tracing his phone?” Mason asked.

“No. According to his wireless carrier, it’s off. We’ve got the ball rolling to get his cell phone records from the last few days and to see what cell towers picked up his location. The command center might have received this information by now. We’ll know more in the morning.”

“People will start coming forward with sightings of him from yesterday or the day before.”

“Yes, the evening newscast will definitely trigger more calls. Then we get to sort the nuts from the real reports.” Ava almost wished Carson Scott’s death hadn’t been made public. Her office had told her the hotline had lit up after the early news. She was thankful she wasn’t on the phone taking tip after tip. It was going to be bad enough investigating them all. Luckily, with the task force that was coming together with the FBI, Oregon State Police, Portland police, and Vancouver police, there should be plenty of manpower.