“N-no.”
He smiled and looked at the doll. “Are you sure?”
“Y-yes, sir.”
He narrowed his eyes and looked at her. “I find that hard to believe because she just told me that she got lost and that she belonged to the prettiest little girl in the neighborhood. Now that can only be you, the way I see it ’cause you are the prettiest little thing I have ever seen.”
That made Kitty chuckle. She placed a hand over her mouth, feeling shy. She couldn’t help blushing. No one had ever told her she was pretty before. Her stepdad always said she was like the ugly duckling, except she would never turn into a swan, not with that mother she had come from.
“Are you sure it’s not your doll?” the man asked again.
“It’s not… sir,” she said.
“Well, I think it is. Here, you have it.”
He reached out the doll toward her, and she looked up at him, eyes wide. He was the police, and you had to obey them, she had learned in school.
“I…”
“Take it.”
She took it. Hands shaking, she grabbed the doll and pulled it toward her. She hugged the small Barbie doll and couldn’t stop smiling. The officer chuckled. He tousled her hair.
“That’s better. Now… what do you say?”
She swallowed, feeling so happy she could barely contain it. “Thank you! Thank you, officer.”
He laughed. “Call me Damian, kiddo.”
“Okay, thank you, Officer Damian. Thank you so much. I love it.”
“I had a feeling you might,” he said, then touched her cheek gently with his finger, before standing up straight.
“Well, I better get going,” he said. “You take good care of that doll, you hear me?”
“I will, Officer Damian, I promise. I will sleep with her every night and never let her out of my sight.”
He made an imaginary gun with his finger and winked at her, then turned around and walked to the cop car he had parked on the side of the road. He got in and waved at her once again, before he took off.
Kitty stared at the nice man in the nice car, then ran back to the house to show her mom her new doll.
FIVEBILLIE ANN
Neither of us spoke in the car. Tom and I hadn’t said anything to each other since the Chief had spoken. Just those four infamous words.
It was a kid.
Now as I drove the car down South Brevard Avenue toward the spot where it met Tenth Street, Tom finally made the first sound to break the silence.
A deep sigh.
It wasn’t often we had cases involving children, but drowning accidents did happen from time to time in Florida. Usually, it was tourists coming down on vacation and running into trouble in pools or getting caught in a rip current in the ocean. Rarely, we had a shark bite, but that was usually not fatal.
Chief Doyle said the girl was already dead when she was pulled out of the water. Having children myself, it made me sick to my stomach. The coroner had declared her dead and something about her body was suspicious. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have been called out there. We were needed because it was likely murder.
I killed the engine and looked at Tom. “You ready for this?”
He swallowed. Tom had a huge heart underneath all that joking and sarcasm. Often, I believed he tried to be funny just to hide how soft he really was. Calling him a gentle giant would be a cliché, but hey if the shoe fits, and it did.
“I guess I’m as ready as I will ever be.” I wished for a second I had asked Scott to come along, but he had another case he was finishing up his report on. I could have used him here. He was good at keeping his head cool in these types of situations.
I exhaled. “We’ll need a drink tonight.”
We got out and walked toward the police blockade. The forensic tech department was there in their white vans, and the place was crawling with people in blue body suits. Someone handed us plastic shoes and gloves to wear as we showed him our badges.
I spotted my colleague from the coroner’s office, Dr. Phillips. He was talking to someone, a young officer, when I approached him.
“Tom and Billie Ann. Just the duo I was hoping for.”
“What have you got?” I asked. I threw a glance toward the body by the side of the pond. It was covered by a white mortuary sheet.
Dr. Phillips pushed his glasses back on his nose and started to walk. I followed him. Tom stayed back and told me he would have a chat with the responding officer. I knew he had a hard time seeing bodies, and I didn’t mind him not coming. Even if I knew I was going to have nightmares for a very long time, there was no reason for us both to have them. Besides, I was the far more experienced one.
Dr. Phillips knelt down and pulled off the sheet so I could see the girl’s face. I bit back my tears as I saw her eyes staring blankly into the air.
“Oh dear God,” I said.
“As you can see, we’re dealing with a female body here. She has been in the water all night, probably longer, but no more than twenty-four hours I’d say.”
