Page 4 of Fallen

Careful not to disturb the scene, I sidle around to the other side of the woman. I know immediately she’s dead. The left side of her face has been destroyed. Cheekbone caved in. Eyeball dislodged from its socket. Nose an unrecognizable flap of skin. Tongue protruding through broken teeth. A string of blood and drool dribbling onto the carpet to form a puddle the size of a fist.

I shift the beam of my flashlight to her face. Recognition flickers uneasily in my gut, the stir of some long-forgotten memory. A punch of dread follows, because at that moment I do not want to know her. But I do and the rush of nausea that follows sends me back a step.

Bending, I put my hands on my knees, and blow out a breath. “Damn.”

I choke out a sound I don’t recognize, end it with a cough. Giving myself a quick mental shake, I straighten, look around the room. A high-end purse with leather fringe has been tossed haphazardly onto the chair. An overnight bag sits on the floor in front of the cubbyhole closet. I go to the chair, pluck a pen from my pocket, and use it to flip open the flap. Inside, I see a leather wallet, a cosmetic case, a comb, perfume. I pull out the wallet. I notice several twenty-dollar bills as I open it and I know that whoever did this didn’t do it for money.

Her driver’s license stares at me from its clear-faced pocket. The floor tilts beneath my feet when I see the name. Rachael Schwartz. The dread bubbling inside me burgeons as I stare down at the photo of the pretty young woman with strawberry-blond hair and her trademark almost-smile. It’s the kind of smile that shouts I’m going places and if you can’t keep up you will be left behind! But then that was Rachael. Hard to handle. High emotion and higher drama. Even as a kid, she was prone to making mistakes and then defending her position even when she was wrong, which was often. If you hurt her or angered her, she lashed out with inordinate ferocity. Faults aside, her love was fierce and pure. I know all of those things because I was one of the few Amish who understood her, though I never said as much aloud.

Closing my eyes, I bank the rise of emotion, shove it back into its hole. “Son of a bitch,” I whisper.

I knew Rachael Schwartz since she was in diapers. She was seven years younger than me, the middle child of a Swartzentruber family here in Painters Mill. The Swartzentruber sect is an Old Order subgroup and its members adhere to the timeworn traditions in the strictest sense. They eschew much of the technology other sects allow, such as the use of gravel for long lanes, indoor plumbing, and even the use of a slow-moving-vehicle sign for their buggies. The Schwartzes had five kids and I babysat them a few times when I was a teenager. Her mamm and datt still live in the old farmhouse off of Hogpath Road.

I lost track of Rachael over the years. I heard she left Painters Mill at some point, before I returned here as chief. She was the only girl I’d ever met who was worse at being Amish than me.

Using my cell, I snap a photo of the license in case I need to reference the information later.

“Chief?”

I startle, turn to face Mona, hoping my face doesn’t reflect the riot of emotions banging around inside me. “You get the crime scene tape up?” I ask.

“Yes, ma’am.” Something flickers in her eyes. She cocks her head. “You know her?”

I sigh, shake my head. “Not well, but…” I don’t know how to finish the sentence, so I let the words trail off.

Mona gives me a moment; then her gaze flicks to the purse. “Anything?”

“Driver’s license. Cash.” I acknowledge the thought that’s been nudging at the back of my mind. “No cell phone. Have you seen one?”

“No.”

I use the pen to go through the scant items inside, then drop the wallet back into the purse.

By the time I’ve finished, I’ve got my head on straight. I start toward Mona. “I’m going to call BCI,” I say, referring to the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation. “Get a CSU out here. In the interim, we need to canvass, starting with the motel rooms. Check with the manager to see which ones are occupied. Start with the rooms closest to this one and work your way out. Talk to everyone. See if they saw or heard anything unusual.”

“You got it.”

We exit the room. On the sidewalk outside the door, I stop, draw a deep breath, let it out, draw in another. “Get Glock out here, too,” I say, referring to Rupert “Glock” Maddox, my most experienced officer. “We got four vehicles here in the parking lot. I’ll find out which one belongs to her and we’ll get it cordoned off, too.”

“Got it, Chief.”

Pulling out my cell, I call Dispatch. Usually, we communicate via radio. Because I don’t want Rachael’s name floating around on the airwaves in case someone is listening to a police scanner, I opt for my cell.

“Run Rachael Schwartz through LEADS,” I tell Lois, referring to the Law Enforcement Automated Data System, which is a database administered by the Ohio State Highway Patrol and allows law enforcement to share criminal justice information. “Check for warrants. Phone number. Known associates. Whatever you can find.” I glance down at the photo on my phone and recite the address off her license. “Check property records, too. Find out who owns the property where she lives.”

“Roger that.”

I hit END and turn to the motel manager, who’s standing a few feet away, smoking a cigarette. “She dead?” he asks.

I nod. “Can you tell me which rooms are occupied?”

“Two. Four. Seven. And nine.”

I nod at Mona and she starts toward the room two doors down.

“Do you know which vehicle belongs to Schwartz?” I ask the manager.

He looks down at the paper in his hand. “Let’s see if she included the info on her check-in form. Here we go.” He motions toward the Lexus parked a couple of spaces down from the room. “Right there.”