'Ruby,' Lucy snapped and Ruby sighed again.

'See, that's the difference between us,' she said.

'What, that I'm a professional?' Lucy asked sarcastically.

Ruby just grinned, unoffended. 'That too. You've got to get out, kid. See some men that don't have tags on their toes.'

'Right now, the victim in the chair is my main concern.'

Ruby puckered her lips. 'Ooh. And now we get prim.'

Lucy stopped short. 'Someone meant for me to find him,' she said quietly. 'Dressed him so that I'd think he was someone important to me. Finding out who he is and how he died so that the cops can find out who did this . . . that's my priority.'

Ruby sobered. 'I'm sorry. Why don't you go in to the lab? Alan and I can bag him.'

'If it had been my friend I'd let you, but he's not and the cops need answers.'

Ruby nodded once. 'Then let's get busy.'

'Thank you.' Ruby walked to where ME Tech Alan Dunbar waited, casting glances over her shoulder at Detective Fitzpatrick along the way. Lucy was tempted to sneak one last peek herself, but there was work to do.

A man to identify. And a question to answer. Why set the victim up for me to find?

'Lucy! What is this? Are you all right?'

The voice behind her was as familiar as her own and when Lucy turned, she automatically looked down. At five-feet-nothing, Gwyn Weaver was ten inches shorter than Lucy in her sock feet. When she wore her work boots, Lucy towered even higher.

Lucy was surprised it had taken her best friend this long to get out here. Usually Gwyn was on the front row of any crowd. This morning her smooth voice was shrill and panicked and Lucy opened her mouth to reassure.

'I'm-' Startled, Lucy cut herself off, her chin lifting and eyes widening at the sight of Gwyn's companion. 'Royce.' Who stared at her coveralls with the big 'ME' stenciled on the back. Royce, who only knew her from the club. 'You . . . you both came.'

Shit. Lucy had known when Gwyn moved into her apartment complex that this would happen eventually, that at some point one of Gwyn's boyfriends would see her in her day job attire. She had just expected it would be her nice prim suit, not her coveralls. And she certainly hadn't expected it this morning.

Although she should have. They'd gotten in so late from picking her up at the airport last night. It made sense Royce would sleep over at Gwyn's place. On any other morning it wouldn't have mattered. Except this morning it did.

'He knows, Lucy,' Gwyn said under her breath. She was searching Lucy's face, her own panic receding. 'I had to tell him. But he's not going to tell.'

'I promise,' Royce said, seemingly taking her day job in stride. 'I take it that you didn't really go to California for a sales conference.'

'No,' Lucy admitted. 'It was a forensic pathology symposium.'

'Why lie?' he asked, more curious than annoyed.

'Some people can't deal with what I do. It's easier this way.'

'I guess I can understand that,' he said with a comforting smile. 'What happened here?'

Gwyn looked around Lucy, straining to see the scene. 'The neighbors said it was Mr Pugh. But you're here, suited up, and not upset. So it can't be.'

'I thought it was, but it's not. We don't know who it is.'

Gwyn looked up at her, dark eyes troubled. 'But you're sure it's not Mr P?' she asked, so honestly concerned that Lucy couldn't stay annoyed.

'I'm very sure. Look, guys, I have to get to work. I'll catch you later?'

'Tonight,' Gwyn said, giving her a pointed nod. 'Everyone's missed you.'

And she'd missed them. Lucy had never been away so long before, and every night she'd wondered what the gang was up to. 'I'll try. I may be backed up at work.'

'Which we need to let her get back to,' Royce said to Gwyn. 'Come on. You came, you saw, so you can go back to sleep now.' He gave Lucy a warm smile and her shoulder a squeeze. 'If you need anything, let us know. I'm glad it wasn't your friend.'

'Thanks.' She watched them go, Gwyn small and doll-like at Royce's side. He'd put his arm around Gwyn, shielding her from the unpleasant crime scene and Lucy felt a tiny pang of loneliness. Gwyn always thought the next guy might be the one, but up until now it had never worked out and they were still single girls together. But this time, Lucy thought Gwyn could be right. Things would change. And I'll be alone again.

Which I will worry about later. Get to work.

When she reached the body, Lucy put her field kit on the ground next to the gurney that Alan had already prepared with a body bag. She looked up at Alan who stood grim-faced, staring at the body. 'You okay?' she asked.

Alan was a little green. 'Somebody did a real number on him, didn't they?'

'Indeed,' Lucy said, feeling a tug of guilt. Alan had been with them for only a few months, and he'd never seen a corpse this mutilated. 'I should have prepared you.'

'It's okay. The cops said that you thought it was your friend. I'm glad it's not.'

'Me too,' she murmured. Pulling on gloves, she motioned Alan and Ruby to follow. 'He's past rigor, so he'll be limp. Try to keep his hands in his pockets.'

'Why?' Alan asked.

'His face is messed up, honey,' Ruby said. 'Chances are his hands are too.'

'Oh.' Alan swallowed. 'Okay.'

Lucy lightly touched the victim's head, studying the dried blood with a frown.

'What?' Fitzpatrick asked.

Lucy looked up. He and Mazzetti stood a few feet away. 'The texture of the dried blood is wrong somehow. But I can tell you that his head has been shaved.'

Stevie leaned close to see. She was a petite brunette, at thirty-four she was a year younger than Lucy, but had always seemed much older. 'Are you okay?' Stevie murmured over the dead man. 'I heard you had a shock. We could call another pathologist.'

'No. I'm fine.' Lucy managed a smile. She respected Stevie a lot, even though the woman's side-gig creeped her out. Grief counseling. The thought made her want to shudder. All that focus on death. When someone was dead, they were dead. I should know. Talking about it week after week was futile and just plain strange. 'But thanks.'

Stevie smiled back, then straightened, back to business. 'Does he have any ID?'

Lucy patted the victim's coat pockets lightly then grimaced when her fingers met with no resistance where there should have been bone. 'No wallet. No fingers either.'

'At all?' Fitzpatrick asked.

'Left hand, they're gone at the second knuckle. Right hand, the same. Except . . .' She touched a single finger through the coat. 'He still has his ring finger.' She looked up at Fitzpatrick who watched her intently, and she realized she was holding her breath. Detective Hot Cop, Ruby had called him. Indeed. Quietly she exhaled. 'It's got a ring on it.'

Drew Peterson crouched beside her and she could focus again. 'Can we get it off once he's on the bag?'

'We can try.' She probed the victim's legs through his trousers, then grimaced again. 'Multiple breaks. His knees feel like mush. This guy was tortured.'

'I hate tortures,' Stevie muttered.

'I imagine he hated it worse,' Fitzpatrick said dryly.

Lucy stepped back from the body. 'Alan, Ruby, he's all yours.'

Ruby was a pro, but Alan looked queasy enough to have Lucy worried. She was watching to see if anything fell from the body to the ground as they moved him, when a new shiver ran down her back. Where she'd been freezing, she was now warm. Fitzpatrick stood behind her, his body blasting heat.

'I found the Pughs,' he said softly. He'd bent down so that he spoke in her ear, and she could feel the tickle of his breath against her neck. 'They're both fine.'

A combination of relief and awareness had her knees wobbling but she held herself straight, keeping her eyes on Ruby and Alan. 'Thank you. Where are they?'

'The emergency number the super had was Mrs Pugh's sister. They've been there for two days. I'm sending a squad car by to check, just in case.'

'Thank you. I've been out of town a few weeks and when I got back last night it was too late to check on them. I didn't know they were gone, but it makes sense they're there. Barb visits her sister often.'

He was quiet a moment, still standing way too close. 'Who knew you were gone?'

She thought about the two weeks of silence the other tenants had enjoyed in her absence. 'Everybody in the building and at work. I went to a training symposium, then lectured at a university in LA.'

'You didn't post anything on your Facebook page about being away?'

She looked over her shoulder, annoyed. 'Of course not.'

His nose was about two inches from hers. This close she could see that his eyes were dark, dark blue, not black as she'd thought before. 'Some people do,' he said.

'Some people are stupid. I am not.'

'Ugh!' Alan's grunt had everyone looking back at the body. The victim's hands had fallen from his pockets as they'd placed him on the gurney. Luckily the hands had flopped straight down, falling on the unzipped body bag, so no evidence had fallen to the grass.

'Like you said,' Fitzpatrick said grimly when they'd surrounded the gurney. 'Just his ring finger, complete with a ring. Missing the tip.'

'His teeth appear broken too,' Lucy added. 'I don't think you're going to find ID.'

'The ring on his finger's the ID,' Stevie said. 'Whoever did this left it behind for a reason. Can you get it off?'

Lucy tugged at the ring and held it up to the morning light. 'University of Maryland Medical School,' she read.

Fitzpatrick frowned. 'Wonder what the doc did to get his knees capped?'

Lucy dropped the ring into the evidence bag Drew held open, then gingerly pulled the victim's sleeve back, revealing a gold wristwatch. 'It's a Rolex.' She removed it and placed it in Fitzpatrick's outstretched gloved hand.

'Not a robbery,' he said and studied the back of the watch. 'Inscription says "Thanks for the memories." They spelled "memories" with an extra "m". Wait.' He squinted at the inscription, then rolled his eyes. 'Make that "Thanks for the mammaries." '

'I'd say you're looking for a plastic surgeon,' Ruby said dryly, and Lucy felt an appalling urge to laugh out loud. Gratefully, she stifled it. This was not funny.

'A plastic surgeon who really got on someone's wrong side,' Fitzpatrick said.

'Dr Trask?' Alan said quietly. 'He's got something in his mouth.'

The object was dirty white and looked like it might have been a handkerchief. Stevie and Fitzpatrick bent closer but Lucy put a hand between them and the victim. 'I need to remove it in a protected environment.'

Fitzpatrick straightened with a scowl. 'We know, we know, back at the morgue. Look, he probably doesn't, but at least see if he's got a wallet in his breast pocket.'

'That I can do.' Lucy probed the man's chest with her fingertips, then flinched, her hands stilling abruptly when what she felt wasn't anywhere close to being right.

'What else?' Stevie asked in a tone that said she really didn't want to know.

Lucy pressed a little harder against the beige trench coat to be sure. Once again there was no resistance where there should have been a ribcage. This is very bad.

'They're not supposed to do that, are they?' Fitzpatrick asked blandly. 'I mean, your fingers sinking into his chest like that.'

'No, they're not.' She looked up grimly. 'I don't know if this is your cause of death or not, but there's a big hole here where his heart used to be.'

Stevie let out a breath. 'I think this guy just moved to the top of your priority list.'

Lucy nodded. 'Indeed.'

Monday, May 3, 8.15 A.M.

Clay Maynard hung up his phone with a frown. He'd had one hell of a night last night and this morning wasn't looking much better.

'Well?' his assistant asked from the doorway of his office.

'Evan missed checking in both last week and this morning, he's not answering his cell, and he's not where he's supposed to be. The foreman at the construction site just said he never showed up for work last week so he fired him. What did you find?'

'The landlord of the place Nicki rented in his new name said he hasn't shown up yet.' Alyssa Moore bit her lip. 'This doesn't sound good. Could Margo have found him?'

'Not if he did what Nicki told him to do.' A headache was brewing. 'He said Margo would kill him if she found him.'

'She's already tried twice. Maybe three times was her charm.'

'Dammit,' Clay hissed. 'We gave him a new life. All he had to do was claim it.'

Alyssa sat in the chair next to his desk, crossing long legs that made his headache even worse. He'd been engaged to her older sister Lou four years ago when he first met Alyssa. Back then Alyssa had been a scrawny tomboy always getting into scrapes. Now she was a leggy eighteen year old getting into a whole different kind of trouble, which was why Lou asked him to hire her as his assistant. Though Lou and he called off their wedding, they'd stayed close close enough that she didn't mind hitting him up for favors, like keeping an eye on her baby sister.

Luckily Alyssa was a decent assistant, because keeping his promise to keep her out of trouble was turning out to be a lot more trouble than Clay had bargained for.

'Do you mind?' he snapped at Alyssa, gesturing to her skirt. 'I pay you enough to buy clothes with more material than that.'

Alyssa rolled her eyes and tugged at the skirt. 'Oh my God. You sound just like Lou. Or my dad. I'm not sure which is worse.'

'I don't know,' Clay muttered. 'They both carry a gun.'

Alyssa's older sister and father were cops. Lou was a Maryland sheriff and Mr Moore had retired from a Boston beat. That Clay was a former cop was the reason Mr Moore had allowed his younger daughter to come to work at Clay's PI agency.