Winter's Black Christmas (Winter Black FBI Mystery Series) by Mary Stone

Author:Mary Stone [Stone, Mary]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2021-12-07T00:00:00+00:00

7

After the shock of discovering a body had worn off a little, Winter’s training kicked in and she ran through the list of everything she knew she needed to do.

Check for signs of life.

Even though the woman before her was most clearly and sincerely dead, Winter pulled off a glove and pressed two fingers to her neck. Skin the same temperature as the snow outside nearly burned into her flesh.

Inhaling deeply, Winter couldn’t catch even a hint of the telltale scent of decay, and neither could she tell at a glance how long the woman had been dead. Though she wasn’t anything close to a medical examiner, Winter thought that the frigid temperature and low humidity had combined to leave the body relatively unscathed from typical decomposition.

Call it in and secure the area.

Winter snorted at the first guideline and frowned at the latter, deciding that closing the door against the blizzard outside was just about the best she was going to do. She wished she had her phone with her so she could take pictures, but present circumstances didn’t give her many options. Instead, she examined the corpse, committing each detail to memory.

White female in mid to late forties. Light brown hair cut at shoulder length, wearing jeans, a flannel shirt, and brown hiking boots. No rings on her fingers or other jewelry of any kind. No coat, purse, or other identifying objects to be seen.

Stooping low, Winter searched for any sign of injury, and without touching or rolling the body, nothing apparent stood out. She was loathed to move the poor woman, preferring to leave that task to trained examiners.

This was a crime scene, after all. Unless this lady had decided to roll herself up in a blanket like a burrito and toss herself into a freezing shed to die, this was murder. At the very least, she could have died of natural causes, and someone moved her here. Charges along the line of abuse of a corpse was a misdemeanor at the very least, depending on the circumstances and judge.

What had killed her, though?

That question would need to wait to be answered because Winter had no intention of interfering with a crime scene any more than she already had. She could already imagine the looks she’d receive from the local medical examiner and detectives.

Plus, she had bigger questions she needed to address right then.

If the woman’s death wasn’t due to natural causes, who had murdered this poor woman? And was the killer or killers nearby?

Laughter echoed in her head, and Winter whipped around, her hands up in defense position. No one was there.

More shaken by the phantom sound than she’d been by the discovery of the murdered woman, Winter took in the deepest breath she could manage without coughing. Exhaling the air from her mouth in a cloud of vapor, she fought to compose herself.

Pull it together.

After another moment of deep breathing, Winter’s hands no longer shook. Of course she’d be jumpy after finding a body so unexpectedly.

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