Deadline 4:59

Chapter One

No one expected Wanda Norkum’s killer to investigate the scene of her murder. Tori Madigan's return set her apart from those who seek to relive the event or observe from a distance. The police requested her response.

Gravel crunched and popped beneath the van’s tires. An unmarked Lincoln County Oklahoma Sheriff’s car nosed to an open metal gate. Its headlights illuminated Wanda’s sheet-covered body, Detective Raymond Vaught, and the near side and front of Wanda’s lackluster home. The Oklahoma Medical Examiner's investigator parked alongside the detective’s car, smoothed the front of her shirt, and checked her appearance in the mirror. She pinched her thigh and clenched her jaw.

Detective Vaught approached the van. Sun exposure wrinkled the man’s face and made him look older than fifty-three. Had anything about the crime scene nurtured uncertainty in the detective’s mind?

“What do we have here, Detective?”

Vaught motioned toward the body. “I’m hoping you can tell me. It looks like she’s been out here two or three hours based on the time we got the call.”

“No uniforms?”

“The deputy on scene when I got here had to handle another call.”

Lucky me.

Tori pulled on a pair of blue nitrile gloves while she regarded the body shrouded by the white sheet. A laceration on her left hand stung beneath the synthetic material. She took a deep breath and again pinched her thigh. Her jitters lessened with an extended exhale. She opened the door and slid off the seat.

“Anyone we might know?”

Vaught’s face wilted. “It’s Wanda Norkum.”

Tori faked a surprise gasp. “Are you sure? Who would want to harm Wanda? She was one of the nicest ladies I ever met.” She lied to test Vaught’s acuity.

Vaught shrugged and scrunched his brow. “Beats me, but I’m not so sure a person killed her. You’ll see what I’m talking about after you have a look.”

Tori followed Vaught to the corpse splayed on the driveway. The detective lit Wanda’s face with his flashlight beam. Tori squatted as if conducting an assessment and to prevent Vaught from seeing her fighting to maintain composure.

“Something got a hold of her, that’s for sure.” Tori smelled hazelnut coffee when Vaught bent forward.

Vaught cleared his throat. “Lord a mercy. It’s got to be the worst case I’ve seen in all my years doing this stuff. Poor Wanda. I imagine she screamed ‘til her lungs failed. What do you think? Ever seen anything like this?”

Poor Wanda? Tori Madigan held no such sentiment, but agreed on the screams. Wanda Norkum screamed non-stop through her last breath. “Screams this far out would’ve sounded no louder than a whisper of wind to the nearest neighbor.”

“The first deputy on scene located some tracks along the edge of that shed over there where the grass is blotchy.” Vaught flicked the light to the far side of the driveway.

“What do they look like?”

“It almost has to be a bear based on their size and appearance. They lack clarity, though. You’ll understand what I mean when you see them. This had to have happened before the last rain shower came through this morning.”

“Show me.”

Detective Vaught trudged to where he discovered three paw prints. Tori saw two indistinct prints and a partial print within twelve feet. She feigned interest in the faux markings made in hopes someone might see them. She agreed with the detective on their resemblance to a bear’s paw prints. Though disfigured by the rain, their orientation led toward the woods north of an outbuilding situated thirty feet beyond the graveled driveway.

Vaught cleared his throat. “I’ve already taken pictures of everything.”

“Did you get any photos with a measuring device to show scale?”

“Yeah.” He pulled a dull-looking six-inch ruler from a pocket. “I laid this along the side and across the base. All this seems a tad unusual, don’t you think?”

Tori craned her neck and stared at Vaught. “These?”

“Not the tracks. I’m talking about the attack on Wanda.”

“How do you mean?”

Vaught waved his left arm. “What’s the provocation?”

“Maybe she startled the animal.”

The detective shook his head. “I don’t believe that for a minute. Black bears tend to avoid human interaction. Not attack them.”

Lightning sprayed torpid thunderheads in the east. Tori returned to Wanda’s body where an acrid stench of blood mixed with odors of feces and urine. She turned away, filled her lungs, and held her breath before letting out a deliberate sigh. She glanced at Vaught to get his reaction.

He frowned. “I feel the same way.”

Tori pulled a small notebook from her back pocket, uncapped an ink pen, and documented her observations. Five linear lacerations on the Wanda’s left cheek resembled a claw slash. Dried blood crusted the jagged edges. Tori evoked the satisfaction she sensed when her claw rake inflicted the gashes on Wanda’s cheek, left shoulder and chest and across the upper back.

“Look at this.” Tori lifted Wanda’s left arm to reveal burns on her hand. She gestured to the tissue stuck to the gate’s top rail. “What time did the storm come through here?”

Vaught shrugged. “Couple hours ago, I guess. Why?”

Tori penned notes related to the burns and shared her fabricated opinions. “The storm produced lightning. See this tissue?” She motioned to the top rail. “Lightning struck the fence or perhaps the gate while Wanda had her hand on this rail.” From the rail to the set of keys on the ground ten feet from the body, Tori stressed every aspect of circumstantial and tangible evidence to support her premise.

Detective Vaught acknowledged with a series of nods while Tori offered her scenario based on training and four-year employment in the medical examiner’s office. He scrunched his brow.

“An animal attack and a lightning strike? I might consider the remote possibility of one or the other, but at the same time. No.”

How dare he question her? Tori offered her version of the incident, albeit far from the truth. “It’s only a preliminary opinion, Detective. The conditions aren’t ideal out here. You can appreciate that. The pathologist will determine the cause and manner of Wanda’s death.”

“Well, I assure you something’s amiss here,” Vaught said. “I don’t know what it is, but I feel it.”

Vaught’s something-amiss comment must have come from the man’s breakfast based on his silent flatulence. Tori stepped to the van’s rear for the gurney and to catch a breath of fresh air.

They spread a white sheet over the body bag and wrapped Wanda’s body. Vaught zipped it closed and transferred the body to the gurney as if Wanda weighed nothing. The gurney clicked and the wheels folded beneath the stretcher as Tori guided it in the van. Vaught’s latex gloves snapped when he removed them. He tossed them in the back of the van, closed the rear doors and tracked Tori to the driver’s door. She sensed his presence yet startled when she turned. She hadn’t realized his proximity.

“What’s up with the jitters?” he asked.

Tori laughed. “Caffeine deficiency. Care to join me after I drop off the body?” She climbed on the driver’s seat. “I imagine the doctor won’t get there until around nine. Aren’t you planning to attend?”

“Unless something comes up to prevent it. I have to log in the evidence and dictate my scene report beforehand. I called a deputy to go notify Shannon.”

Tori closed the door and waved. She backed to the highway with Wanda Norkum’s body strapped down in the back. After a quarter mile she glanced at the rearview mirrors. No one followed her.

The reality of this unfortunate accident—the premise she planned to swear to under oath—pleased her. If lightning were to strike any Avoca resident on a Saturday morning by choice, it selected the right person.

Tori yearned to share the news. Excitement fizzed inside her. She again looked in the mirror. This time she focused on her reflection and smiled to herself. What a great day. Wanda’s demise, and seeing the condition of the woman’s corpse, fulfilled a dream. When the chance presented itself, she planned to blurt out what she’d witnessed to her former lover, Donald Theissen. She would sit back and watch him bask in delight.

The former chief medical examiner awaited a court appearance for providing skin from a corpse’s thumb to serial killer, Geoffrey Norkum. Forced on Donald, she might add. Norkum used the skin to mark scenes of his victims with a bloody thumbprint. She felt it justified her reason for the attack on Wanda Norkum.

Tori glanced at the body bag’s reflection in the mirror. Theissen’s incarceration strained their relationship. She longed to feel his arms around her. She missed feeling his day-growth whiskers brush her cheeks and his hot breath on her neck. Reprisal proved a poor substitute. Revenge was all she had to look forward to before this morning, along with the two-hour visits the Sheriff’s Office allowed her to enjoy twice each week.

Lost in reverie, Tori caught sight of the driveway to the morgue. She jammed her foot on the brake pedal and jerked the steering wheel clockwise. The van listed to the left. Tires shrieked on the pavement, yawed through the turn, and scraped the curb as the van settled onto the driveway. Tori removed her foot from the brake pedal and rolled forward, upset for not paying attention to what she was doing.

She glanced in the mirror to check the body. It remained secured to the gurney, although it had shifted and leaned outboard. She refocused on her task and continued around the building to the rear entrance.

Tori shut off the engine and sat there. She crossed her arms on the steering wheel and rested her head on her forearms. What am I doing? Any second thoughts should come before the deed, not afterward.

A deep inhale and relaxed exhale released some tension. No sense of guilt daunted her. She felt great except for the onset of inept driving behavior.

Nerves somewhat calmed, Tori slid out of the driver’s seat. She unloaded the body and rolled the gurney into the cold room where she transferred Wanda Norkum’s remains to a portable stainless steel autopsy table. She hummed as she filled in the required information and signed the forms that bore Wanda’s legal name, age and date of birth. She placed the file on the counter in the autopsy suite and locked the doors to the building and the van.

Tori strutted to her silver Ford Explorer backed to the curb at the rear of the building. The interior smelled of stale French fries from a half-eaten order she’d bought last evening. She dumped the bag into a garbage can at the nearest convenience store and headed toward Shawnee.

Chapter 2

A knock on the door at 7:06 a.m. put Shannon Roe on alert. Everyone who knew her used the side door whenever they came to visit. Shannon huffed. She pulled on a robe and wrapped her wet hair in a towel. On the way through the house, she prepared herself to handle the unexpected and unwanted visitor on a Saturday morning.

Another knock.

Shannon paused, backtracked to her bedroom, and stuck her service weapon in the pocket of her robe.

Before she opened the door, she put her face up to the blinds covering the double window to the right of the door and peered between the slats without moving them. A Lincoln County Sheriff’s deputy stood on the porch looking over the porch rail on the end abutting the driveway. Shannon recognized the woman but could not remember her name.

She unlocked the door and tugged on the knob. The door resisted and swung open on squeaky hinges.

“Deputy?”

“I wasn’t sure this was where you lived, Detective. I’m sorry to disturb you like this, but … May I come inside? This will only take a couple minutes.”

Shannon glanced at the name tag on the uniform shirt as she backed away from the door. A.L. Barton … Ashley. That’s it. “Sure, Ashley. C’mon in.”

Deputy Barton removed her hat and followed Shannon to a blue and beige plaid couch pushed to the opposite wall. Before she sat, Barton said, “I think you’d better sit down.” Her tone sounded serious. She waited until Shannon sat and eased down next to her.

“What’s Geo done now?”

“Geoffrey’s behaving himself, believe it or not, but I don’t know how long that’s going to last when he finds out why I’m here.”

Shannon did not like the tone of Barton’s last statement. “What do you mean?”

“It’s Wanda.”

Shannon crossed her arms and drew them against her abdomen. She dreaded what she imagined was coming next. Her face flushed. “What happened? Is she okay?”

“They found her on her driveway this morning. I’m sorry, Shannon. She’s gone.”

Bending forward over her arms, Shannon’s body tensed as though squeezed by some unseen force. A sudden onset of nausea seized her midsection. She suffered the loss of a mother a second time. Losing her biological parents occurred at a time in her life when she was too young to realize the total effect of it. With Wanda’s demise came an agony of indescribable proportions.

“Who found her?” The question came out croaky.

“One of the girls at the diner called our office at five thirty after Wanda failed to show up for work.”

“She must have been on her way in. She never voiced any health issues to me, and I have no idea the last time she saw a doctor for anything more than a cold.” Shannon’s inquisitiveness kicked in. “Did you go out there? Did you see her? Do you think she suffered?”

Deputy Barton shook her head. “I don’t know, Shannon. I wish I could tell you. Wanda had some marks on her that looked like burns. Tori Madigan responded to the scene from the ME’s office. She looked at the marks after she got there and discussed the case with Investigator Vaught. Tori told him the trauma was consistent with an animal attack and a lightning strike.”

“Lightning?” Shannon said. “I don’t remember hearing a thunderstorm during the night.”

“It sprinkled a few minutes, but no storm. There were a few flashes north of here about four-thirty this morning. I was up with John around that time and knew it wasn’t worth trying to lay back down. I stayed up and headed to the office early. It’s not that unusual to see lightning without rain this time of year. The highest chance of getting struck by lightning is before a storm, or so I’ve heard. Tori told us that’s what she believed happened, but she’ll wait on the ME’s official assessment.”

Shannon lowered her head. Tears failed to diminish the image of Wanda’s cinnamon eyes and biscuit cheeks that had so often hovered over her at bedtime when she felt too sick to attend school. Two features of the only mother she had known and loved since the adoption. Wanda’s love steered her through the murky abyss of her teens and into adulthood.

She imagined no one considered telling Geoffrey. Besides, who cared about people incarcerated for murder? Shove them in a cell out of the public eye and forget about them?

Shannon believed no matter what Geoffrey had done in the past, he deserved to be told about his mother’s death by someone other than a correction’s officer. She wanted to be the one to tell him.