- THE BEGINNING OF DEAD ON
Main Entry: jour*nal
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English, service book containing the day hours, from Middle French, from
journal, adjective, daily, from Latin diurnalis, from diurnus of the day, from dies day
- April 5, 1903
April is the cruelest month. I don't resent March because March is always unpredictable and you
know that going into her. But April; April is a different story. She catches the sun in your eye then
darts behind snow clouds. She breathes warmly against your cheek then disappears, laughing, in
the final sting of winter's ice-clad breath. You hope for the sun's warmth, expect it more and more
each day, then wake up to find snow curling and twisting and piling itself on tree branches one
last time.
Makes me think of ice-cold fingers tangled in dark hair.
Her middle name is April. Her daffodil-blonde hair skates around her shoulders hinting of the sun;
her startling blue eyes hold silver-gray crystals of warmth; her smile holds the promise of new
beginnings. You can see them if you really look. I suddenly find I'm in no mood to write about
anything more. I'm sick of the gray shadows skidding across the sky. I'm sick of the cold. I'm sick of
the boredom. I think I'll go down to the lake. It won't be frozen now; just gulps of brown toffee water
shifting to the surface and breathing again. I sit on the bank and feel the wind reveal its secrets.
When it stings my skin, I have the strangest feeling I've lived before, and it wasn't good. Like I am
shades of all those who came before me, shadows and twists of things.
Lately, when I look out across the lake at blonde shadows scratching black water, I feel a
premonition.
I don't know what it is, but it makes me shiver. It makes me fear for April and the coming of spring.
Prologue
May 31, 1865
Virginia
The afternoon was warm and bright; the sky shimmered above the earth like soda glass. He'd
been home for three days. He hadn't really felt like he was home until she was standing next to him.
"The war's really over," she said, the words sounding more like a question on her tangerine-peach
lips. "We've both changed so much." She smiled prettily.
"I hardly feel as if I know you anymore." She looked at his left sleeve, the stump of his arm. Her
lovely tawny eyes bore pity. There was no indication she'd been impressed by his faded blue
uniform. It was itchy and he was sweating, but he wanted her to see him in it.
Sweeping a tendril of auburn hair from her cheek, she looked away from him.
"I'm sorry...I...I never meant to give you the wrong impression in my letters..."
Night was falling purple-clad as they looked out across the lake where they had first met as
children. This time last year he'd lost his arm, fighting Confederate forces not far from the tiny
village where he grew up. After three years in hell, could you return to heaven? Could you feel the
prongs of hope digging into your chest and not die? He longed to tell her how he felt, about the
things he'd experienced-the demons he couldn't chase away, the dark secrets of his childhood.
How her letters had been his only source of courage, the only reason to live through each day-when
the shot was raining like hail, the bodies of dead and wounded men falling all around him like
leaves in the autumn. He couldn't now.
It's not too late. It can't be too late.
"There's someone in my life now," she went on cheerfully. "He's a wonderful man. A surgeon.
We're to be married next week. I can't wait for you to meet him. I told you about him in my letters.
He's the one I met in Washington."
He'd faced death many times; her memory the only thing keeping him alive, the only thing that
assured him he was still among the living as another day curled into the endless, deep ink stain of
night. He'd fallen in love with her in her letters. He thought she loved him too.
Something inside him snapped.
Love is as strong as death. Our dead are never dead until we've forgotten them.
They had been children when he'd left. He looked at her face, her smooth skin, the lovely new
curves of her body. Rage and injustice welled within him. He didn't want to be forgotten. He took her
small hand in his and squeezed it gently, as if he understood her naive sentiments. A slight breeze
moved over him, as soft as his mother's voice.
Great love is a current that flows on forever, restless and circling, as fragile as glass yet as strong
as death; and death is never satisfied.
In his head, he heard the tin beat of the drummer's drum like a pulse, the gold, courageous notes
of a young bugle stretching across summer earth like skin over a youthful body. Firm. Soft. He
heard the legion steps of boys and men marching together toward death. He believed in the
immortality of the soul-that it was born again and again and again.
"June is at your doorstep," he breathed. "But I won't forget you in December."
She looked at him, confusion in her eyes.
As he knelt beside her lifeless form, he kissed her childlike lips. He removed her engagement ring
then yanked the delicate gold chain from her neck, turning it in his hands so it glinted in the
sunlight. A swan made of mother-of-pearl dangled from the chain, its black onyx eye silently
condemning him. He stuffed it in his pocket and ran his fingers along the slender curve of her
cheek.
"Death will bind us as life could not. I'll remember you. I'll find you again, my sweet. I promise."
It was a dark promise.
June 2004
Doylestown, Pennsylvania
The first time he'd done it, he'd thought it would cleanse him, make him feel better. But two days
later, the dark shadows returned.
Something was unfinished.
She wasn't the one.
He was visiting her now. It was dark and drizzling, but he wore no jacket.
He didn't even feel the rain.
I bet you wish you hadn't been so mean to me. I bet you wish you'd been a little bit nicer. Now look
at you.
He trembled with delight as he remembered their first meeting. She'd been easy prey, but
physically stronger than he'd given her credit for.
She'd been sitting alone at a table in Chambers. The small restaurant was always dimly lit, even at
the lunch hour, but when she turned her head a certain way the lamplight caught the ash-blonde
highlights in her hair.
She'd looked up absently a few times, and he'd finally caught her eye. She had smiled rather
sternly, as if she weren't used to it, wasn't expecting someone to notice her. Her nails were long
and manicured, her clothes tailored and expensive-looking. He guessed she was in her late
forties, and lonely. She wore a lot of make-up, but there were telltale shadows beneath her eyes-
the black paint of a lonely woman with self-imposed burdens.
He'd been patient. He'd seen her a few times in the restaurant, each time discreetly watching her,
memorizing things she told the waiter, whom she appeared to know very well. Her voice was
strident. He didn't like her voice. As if everyone wants to hear what you have to say. She always
ordered the same thing, Buffalo Chicken salad, plenty of rolls and butter, a glass of Chardonnay,
topped off with Key Lime pie.
Sometimes, after she was through, she walked to the corner of Main and State, crossed the street,
and got a mocha latte at Starbucks.
He guessed that was why she was on the heavy side. Pampered rich girl. Daddy spoiled you rotten.
He'd enjoyed reading about her disappearance in The Intelligencer. It had been front-page news in
the local paper. No one in the small, eclectic town could understand how a successful
businesswoman, active in the community and charitable causes, could simply disappear. It helped
that she was recently divorced.
Her husband had not been publicly named as a suspect, but the police were questioning him.
His head started to ache, and he knelt down in the shadows and the damp grass cradling it with
his hands. The voices were whispering, and his head felt like it was on fire.
You know what son? You're just like your good-for-nothin' mother. You ain't got what it takes to
stand up to me and you never will. No...He wouldn't listen.
He wouldn't.
He doesn't have that kind of power over me anymore. He concentrated on the sound and the feel of
the rain through the tree branches, now heavy and drenching.
Then he was there, the other voice, that stronger part of him. He always laughed at him, told him he
was weak.
The precious uniform. Great, great, great Granddaddy's uniform. The one you took. The one from
the secret closet. I'm just waiting for the right person.
She'll wear it to her grave and we'll never have to look at it again. All you have to do is find her.
He reached into his pocket and gripped the crumpled newspaper clipping. He was only going to
savor it for a few days and then throw it away. It was dangerous to keep it. Especially now that he'd
put her body by the field. He knew that. But he couldn't throw it away. Not yet. He realized he liked
reading it. He would read it over and over. But first he would go to the church and pray for his pitiful
soul-a soul his father said was as black and damned as a river in hell.
There was something about the stained glass of the oblong windows of the church-rose, coral,
apple green, and sky blue-that made him feel like he was enclosed in the wings of a butterfly. The
glorious, fluttering wings of one of nature's perfect creatures-a creature who tasted with its feet, he
remembered, as cold rain water and mud sucked at his shoes and socks.
I'm tasting with my feet too. I'm tasting death.
In the church, the voices were smaller. Yes, he would pray. Then put flowers on his mother's grave.
His mother would tell him where to find the next one.
His mother would help him because she had never meant to leave him.
Late afternoon. For early June, it was unusually warm. Recent rain had made the grounds behind
Fonthill Museum soggy. To Ann Yang, medical examiner for Bucks County, it felt more like July. As
she climbed out of her white four-wheel drive Jeep Cherokee, she grabbed her black leather
medical bag, a box of disposable latex gloves, and her camera. She was also going to need a
white body bag, neatly packaged in plastic, bearing the warning: Use universal blood/body fluids
precautions with all patients. Ann preferred the white bags to the black; they picked up everything,
carpet fiber, specks of paint, strands of hair.
They helped the dead to speak.
At 5'3", with shoulder-length glossy black hair, deep brown eyes, and nerves of steel, she was an
oddity of the homicide unit. Because she was an attractive woman with an even brighter mind,
she'd been called all sorts of things, by the men and women she worked with: intelligent,
ambitious, cagey, elusive, a bitch.
There were times when she had to be all of those things. It was due to her recent and bitter divorce
proceedings that she found herself working a crime scene in Doylestown, Pennsylvania; she'd left
New York and Peter behind months ago.
She'd ended up here because her sister Bo and her grandmother Nai Nai both lived in the area,
and she was at a time in her life when she needed to be with family.
This wasn't the kind of crime that happened in Doylestown. She'd been making her way back to her
office from Starbucks, fresh coffee in hand, when she got the call on her cell phone. A body had
been found in a field and it appeared to be a brutal homicide.
She trudged across the wide cushion of grass between Fonthill Museum and the woods, her white
blouse sticking to her skin. Located in the former home of industrialist Henry Mercer, the museum
was a concrete castle decorated with beautiful tiles and full of treasures from around the world. The
tips of her tan khakis swept damp grass; her tiny silver earrings jangled and kept time with her
hurried pace. Ann signed in at the crime scene and looked at the tops of the trees edging the
wooded clearing; it would be dark soon. Several uniformed officers, a captain, and a detective were
present. Three police cruisers with their lights flashing were parked to the side of a wide swath of
yellow police tape, wheels muddied by the wet field. EMTs stood by waiting.
Everything smelled damp, sticky. At least it wasn't raining anymore. Ann soon discovered who was
first on the scene, a young officer named Jeff Stevens with a full head of blonde curly hair and a
boyish face; he was new to the force and looking very pale.
"Dr. Yang," he said, sweat starting to bead on his smooth forehead. "I was the lucky officer today-
closest to the scene. I didn't know it would be so...it's bad. I mean, she's just lying there, for
everybody to see." He looked like he was going to vomit.
"You notice anything unusual?" Ann asked.
"No, ma'am. Guy walking his dog found her. The scene's been roped off with controlled access."
"Anybody else been in out?"
"Not since he called it in."
"Good. I've had problems before with contamination of scenes. I need to Preserve the chain of
evidence. Thanks," she said, quickly walking toward the body lying at the edge of the field.
Ann was thankful the museum was closed. It would make things easier-no crowd of museum-
goers-most likely school kids on an outing, their teachers, and supervising parents-gawking at the
swarm of officers, yellow police tape, emergency vehicles, lights and equipment, not to mention the
body. It would be easier to protect the scene from destruction or contamination by onlookers, and
curious police officers too. The latter were usually curious to see things for themselves, and the
less experienced left behind items that were then mistaken as important evidence. And then there
were the obnoxious reporters, eager to be the first to break the story, the first to break a family's
pain wide open for the whole community to see.
Personally, Ann couldn't stand reporters. Especially TV reporters. They were so pompous; thought
the world hung on their every word, and thought every word they spoke was news. Ann had come
close to physically assaulting a reporter who'd managed to get past the barrier of yellow tape and
men in blue inside the home of a murdered woman and her three children; the reporter and his
cameramen were so busy capturing this family's grief for the 6 o'clock news that they unwittingly
destroyed evidence.
The area around the victim had been cordoned off, divided into manageable sections to be
searched individually. So far, no cameramen were present. A pathway had been marked off with
string and flags to be used as the sole entrance and exit to the scene until the search was finished.
Several officers were already out canvassing the neighborhood for information, potential
witnesses, so Ann was sure the news vans would be there soon.
She heard Chief Hyde before she saw him; he had a loud, rasping voice.
The local community was divided on how he ran things-some thought he was a bully. You either
did things his way or he made it difficult for you.
The Newspaper editorials about him were interesting. Ann was still taking his measure. So far, he
was doing his job containing the crime scene.
Wearing white latex gloves, she bent down and examined the body lying Face up not far from the
run-down remnants of a boarded-up shack in the woods, where local teenagers came to smoke
pot and drink cheap beer. She looked at the ground surrounding the body then looked up-nothing
but a canopy of green leaves.
The woman was fully clothed in a pair of dark blue tailored slacks and a rose blouse; both were
soaking wet. There was a large, glittering diamond ring on her finger, so the intent hadn't been
robbery. Without moving the body, she looked between the arms and legs, the hands and fingers.
No visible defense wounds; nothing immediately visible under the immaculate fingernails, painted
a glossy pink. The body was lying about 300 yards from the museum parking lot.
Ann examined the face and neck. The vessels were occluded, the face and neck dark red. There
were bruises and contusions. Her eyes protruded, the conjunctivae showing petechial
hemorrhages, small bright red spots resulting from increased pressure in the veins and
capillaries. It was obvious the victim had been strangled.
Ann tried to quell the sadness that rose up inside her. What a senseless waste of a life. Her job
always showed her firsthand how short and fragile life was. She felt the familiar ache to bring the
grieving family members and friends of victims some sense of justice, some sense of closure.
She gently placed her hand on the cheek. It was cold to the touch. The muscles in the jaw and neck
were already stiff. She'd been dead at least 12 to 24 hours. There was something odd about the set
of her jaw. The lower side of her face had dark discoloration. She pressed it with her fingertip and it
blanched pale.
When she'd finished making notes about the appearance of bruises, the direction of blood flow
patterns, the external appearance of the body and clothing, noting the tiny folds and rolls indicating
that the body had indeed been dragged, and all the photographs had been taken, she carefully
examined the inside of the woman's mouth.
Chief Hyde approached the body. "What you got, doc?"
"Victim was strangled. Probably with a cord or clothesline. Muscles still stiff, so she's been dead at
least 12 to 24 hours. She was killed and then her body was moved here."
"Shit."
"Killer left a calling card. Some sort of button." After it was photographed in the victim's mouth, she
removed it, turning it over. It was brass with an eagle imprint. It glinted in the butterscotch sun
poking through the clouds as it leaned toward dusk. Someone had deliberately placed it under the
woman's tongue.
Ann felt a terrible dread brush her soul. This was no ordinary homicide case.
Onetime killers didn't leave calling cards. Neither did professionals.
The button appeared to be some sort of military button. She handed it to the gloved team
supervisor. "Bag it."
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