The Turin Shroud Secret Read Free

been different. He’d have known
     right away what wasgoing down – the crackhead robbing the register, jittery and paranoid, a human timebomb bound to explode; the dope of a store
     owner playing hero by grabbing a gun taped beneath the counter and the shoppers panicking and screaming, ratcheting up the
     mayhem.
    It had been Armageddon.
    After the weapon came up from behind the counter, the junkie slaughtered everyone. Then he just stood there in a daze. He
     was still staring at the carnage when the cops came. One lowlife’s moment of madness ended a dozen good people’s lives and
     created a lifetime of misery for their families.
    ‘If this was the killer’s drop spot, he’s not a local.’ Mitzi is pacing again.
    ‘What?’ Nic’s thoughts are still three years back.
    ‘The
ocean.’
She points over the rail to get his attention. ‘The water here is too shallow. The perp probably thought it was deeper. When
     he dumped her over the side, he must have believed the body would be gone for ever.’
    ‘The tide might have been in,’ says Nic, his brain and body finally reunited in the same time zone. ‘Or else the guy didn’t
     care. Could be he was only bothered about her being hidden long enough for him to skip town.’
    ‘You’re good,’ she says with a smile that hints at why ten years ago every cop in the precinct made time to walk by her desk.
     ‘I’m going to miss you when you’re working as a crabber on
Deadliest Catch.’
    He laughs. ‘Does the Discovery Channel have any other shows than that damned thing?’
    ‘Not worth watching.’
    They walk single file down the edge of the pier, close to the rails, so as not to disturb any more tyre tracks. He makes a
     slow circuit of the aquarium and marine lab, shielding his eyes and looking skyward. Eventually he finds what he’s looking
     for.
    ‘Surf cams.’ He points out two small cameras at the tip of long poles. ‘You can watch shots from these things online in real
     time.’
    ‘Kill me before my life becomes so boring that I would even think about doing that.’
    ‘Each to their own, Mitz.’ He points to another steel pole, one topped with a security camera. ‘Now this is more your taste.’
     He palm-gestures like a teleshopping host showing off some pile of crap that can only be bought in the next ten minutes. ‘A
     channel exclusively available to good-looking and talented LAPD cops, featuring –
hopefully –
all the once-in-a-lifetime footage of Big Rock Lady’s killer.’

5
    LATE AFTERNOON
    Amy Chang suits up, snaps on latex gloves and enters the newly equipped morgue. It’s a cold vault of stainless steel, illuminated
     by pools of limpid green and blue lights. Steelbody-fridges, sinks, carts, tables and tools crowd the central autopsy table with its inelegant taps and cruel draining holes,
     portals for the last of the deceased’s blood and body fluids. There’s far too much dull and deathly metal for Amy’s liking.
     Another world away from the thirty-two-year-old’s elegant bachelorette home, steel-free except for the knives in the pretty
     picture-window kitchen overlooking a small but well-ordered garden.
    Less than a week old, the morgue already smells of Deodorx and Path Cloud cleansers. Amy looks sympathetically at the flesh
     and bones laid out on the slab. To her, the remains are still a person, a desperate woman in need of her expert help. ‘So
     who are you then? What can you tell me, honey? What secrets do you have for us?’
    Even at first glance it’s obvious the victim suffered excruciating pain before she finally died. The injuries are all pre-mortem.
     Lips are split, teeth are missing and then there’s the awful cavity where her left eye should be – a terrible testament to
     the level of torture she endured.
    She clears space so she can work. Adjusts the ceiling-mounted dissecting light with its dual beams and slips on a tiny, head-mounted
     video camera for the close-ups. She wants to capture