Chapter 1
Margie really didn’t like early morning calls.
The sunrise was so late in the autumn and winter that she really couldn’t expect the sun to have risen before she got to every homicide site. But she never could understand people getting up so early to run or walk their dogs, coming across fresh bodies when it was still too early for Margie to drag herself out of bed.
She had been doing better about getting out to run before work herself but, sometimes, she just kept snoozing her alarms until it was too late to get out. She had stumbled across a body herself on one of her early-morning runs, so who was she to criticize anyone else for doing the same thing?
Margie sat up and grabbed her phone from the nightstand. She used her thumb to answer the call and held it to her ear.
“Patenaude.”
“I’m looking for Parks Pat,” the dispatcher told her cheerfully.
“This is Detective Pat,” she acknowledged, trying not to groan. “Does that mean you’ve got a body in a park?”
“Carburn Park this morning. DB on a park bench.”
Margie envisioned a homeless person sleeping on a bench and dying from hypothermia overnight. It had been a mild fall so far, but Calgary weather was not kind to those who preferred to sleep rough.
She covered a yawn before speaking again. “Where is Carburn Park?”
“Not far from you, actually. But it’s one of those little gems that is kind of tucked away, and you don’t know about it unless it’s in your neighborhood or someone tells you about it.”
“Okay.” Margie cleared her throat. She picked up the water bottle from the nightstand and had a drink. She was not an early-morning person. “I will punch it into my GPS and get there as soon as I can. Tell them I’m on my way.”
“Will do, detective.”
“Has OCME been called?”
“Yes. They will be behind you. I’m not sure how long you’ll have to wait. Take coffee.”
“Okay. Thanks.”
Margie didn’t need to terminate the call; the dispatcher had already hung up. Margie rubbed her eyes. She knew better than to lie back down or even just sit on the edge of the bed waiting until she was fully awake. It was a sure way to fall back asleep.
She went to the bathroom to splash water on her face and quickly do her hair, coiling her long braid on top of her head. She didn’t start the coffee machine in the kitchen. It might wake up Christina. Instead, she would stop by Tim’s and get a box of coffee for herself and the other professionals already on the scene. She had learned that the Take 12 worked better than taking a tray of filled cups, when she could only carry a few at a time.
“Mom?”
Margie stopped in Christina’s bedroom doorway as she left the bathroom.
“Go back to sleep, honey. It’s not time yet.”
“You got a call?”
“Yeah.”
“I’ll call you when I get up.”
“That would be great. Let me know how you are doing.”
Christina murmured a reply and fell back asleep. They had agreed that Margie would not wake her up before leaving when she was called out, but often Christina woke up anyway when she heard Margie getting ready. Christina would get the details when she was up and getting ready for school or riding the bus.
Stella, though, was a different story. However excited the dog was when Margie got home from work or took her for a walk in the morning, she did not stir if Margie got up before seven—a dog after Margie’s own heart.
Chapter 2
With her Take 12 in the footwell of the passenger seat, Margie set up Carburn Park on her GPS and headed out. The electronic voice directed her south on Deerfoot Trail, which was busier than Margie would have expected so early in the morning. But at least she didn’t have to contend with rush hour traffic. The drivers of the cars out on the road were happy to let her zoom over the Calf Robe Bridge and down to Glenmore, even without flashing lights.
She didn’t need emergency lights or siren to get to a homicide scene. What difference would it make if she arrived five minutes later without a siren? The victim was already dead. The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner death scene investigator would be behind her somewhere, and the other crime scene investigators wouldn’t have much reason to be there before it was light and they could see what they were doing properly. It wasn’t like a kidnapping or hostage situation where seconds counted. The victim would still be dead when she arrived.
What had looked like a fairly simple route to the park turned out to be a lot of twists and turns, and then, finally, Margie reached the park entrance.
It was right in the middle of a residential area. Probably a lot of walkers liked to take their turn around the park every day or two. Lots of witnesses who could help narrow down the time of death. Though there had probably been only a few walkers out that late or early.
Margie drove in slowly and parked her car with a cluster of other vehicles. A young constable with a traffic wand indicated the direction she should go. “Around the pond here, ma’am. Clockwise is shorter. Just keep hugging the pond on your right. Can’t miss it.”
Margie could see large lights being set up partway around the pond. She would have to be blind to miss them. “Thank you,” she told him and offered the Tim’s box. He took a cup and she filled it.
“Thank you!” he said, pulling down his mask to drink and giving her an appreciative grin.
Margie switched the box of coffee from one side to the other as she walked around the pond. It wasn’t that heavy, but it got heavier the farther she walked.
As she approached, she studied the scene, brightly lit in the middle of the dark park. It was a strange sight, like a play or tableau with spotlights on it. She had imagined an old man in voluminous coats lying on the park bench, having passed away in his sleep. Not too much to investigate. Just a natural death. Sad, but something that inevitably happened at least once a year in Calgary, usually in the depths of winter when it was 35 or 40 below. Some homeless person sitting in a bus shelter to avoid the wind and snow.
Instead, the victim appeared to be sitting up. As if he were just looking out onto the pond and had fallen asleep, never to wake up again.
As Margie got closer and again switched the Tim’s Take 12 from one hand to the other, she realized the victim was a woman rather than a man.
It didn’t take long to reach the bench. At her approach, the other law enforcement officers looked up and fell silent. Margie stopped a short distance away to put on protective gear. She wasn’t as sure now that it was just someone who had died of hypothermia or passed away in her sleep.
“Here, someone better take this,” Margie offered, showing the Tim’s coffee. A couple of officers hurried to take it from her and set it on a table with folding legs that had been set up away from the scene. Margie saw a garbage bag that already contained a few discarded coffee cups.
Free of her offering, Margie approached the bench to have a look at the victim.
It looked at first glance as though the woman were merely sleeping on the bench. Her face was at rest, her eyes closed. Her body was leaning slightly to the side but not falling over. As if she might jerk awake at any moment. The bright white lights were not flattering, but she did not have the gray pallor of many of the victims Margie saw. Her skin was a rich golden brown and had not yet taken on the chalkiness Margie expected. She was probably around Margie’s age, in her thirties, and was not a homeless person. Her hair and skin were well-cared-for and her overcoat was pristine and good quality. Margie couldn’t see the brand and didn’t know enough about fashion to immediately identify it, but guessed it was LL Bean or a pricier brand.
“Well, this is not at all what I was expecting,” she told the others.
“What were you expecting?” one of the patrol cops asked, taking a sip of the fresh Tim’s coffee.
“The dispatcher said a body on a park bench, and I just figured… an old homeless man.”
“That’ll teach you not to jump to conclusions.”
“Do we have a name yet? Does anyone know how long she’s been here?”
“No identification yet. But we haven’t touched anything other than to make sure that she was dead. Waiting on you and the ME’s office.”
Margie was not going to go poking through the woman’s pockets either. She would wait until the death investigator had a chance to examine the body in situ and to check her pockets and handbag.
“Does she have a purse?” Margie asked, looking around.
Everyone looked at the woman, under the bench, and scanned the nearby ground.
“Nothing immediately obvious. We’ll need to check the bushes and water when it’s light out.”
“Yeah.” Margie took another step back and carefully looked around. There was no sign of the woman’s personal possessions. “Is she wearing any jewelry? Watch?”
“You think it was a mugging? Doesn’t look like any mugging I’ve ever seen,” disagreed a cop with a short, grizzled beard that showed around his mask.
“No, I’m not making any assumptions. I’m in the information-gathering phase.”
Margie stretched medical gloves over her warm gloves and gently pushed back the sleeves and collar of the coat to expose the victim’s wrists and throat.
She was wearing a pretty but practical wristwatch. It was not a big name, nothing Margie recognized, and probably the jewels inset in the bezel were nothing more than zircons. No wedding ring on her finger. No necklace.
“No gloves,” the younger cop noted.
Margie nodded. “It might be unseasonably warm, but I still wouldn’t walk to this side of the pond without gloves, much less sit down to watch the ducks or wait for someone to meet me with bare hands.”
She had made sure she had her gloves on before she stepped out of her car and picked up the Tim’s box. Had the woman walked over and sat down without gloves? If so, why? Had it been a rush trip and she’d forgotten? Had she dropped them? Had someone taken them? With a jacket like that, she had to have gloves. Probably leather. Real leather, not the synthetic stuff.
Margie made a mental note of the missing purse and gloves. She didn’t want to take off her own gloves to write in her notebook yet; it seemed like it took forever for her fingers to warm up again once they’d gotten good and cold. Policing in the cold weather was not at the top of her list of favorite things to do—especially middle-of-the-night or early-morning callouts.
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