Read Shaken for Free Online

like two torpedoes. Except for their color—a very pale blue—they looked like they’d popped right out of the pages of Playboy .
    “Maybe you should have that done,” Harry said. “You’re sort of lacking in that department, Jackie.”
    “You forgot to take your pill today, Harry.”
    “My pill?”
    “Your shut the fuck up pill.”
    “You’re funny.”
    “And you’re seven kinds of stupid. You ever want to make detective?”
    Harry shrugged.
    “Well, I do,” I said through my teeth as Blasky came back into the room. “So try to act like a cop.”
    Harry saluted me. “Yes, sir.”
    Asshole. I still couldn’t believe I got stuck with him as a partner.
    Blasky stood across the autopsy table from us. He nodded at me. Unlike the old boys’ network back at the district house, Blasky treated me like a cop, not like a girl or a pretender to the throne.
    “Do you know the cause of death?” I asked.
    “I’m not a doctor,” Harry said, “but I’d put my money on the severed head and limbs.”
    Blasky smiled condescendingly at Harry. “Then you’d lose your money,” Blasky said, his voice deep and commanding, not far off from Darth Vader’s. “The amputations were postmortem. CAT scan shows she died from internal hemorrhaging. Several major organs were pierced.”
    “How?” Harry folded his arms across his chest. “There are no stab wounds at all.”
    I was wondering the same thing, but then I noticed a trickle of blood seeping out between the woman’s legs.
    “A sharpened broomstick,” I said.
    Blasky raised an eyebrow. “That’s my guess as well. We’ll know for sure when I open her up. Why didn’t you think it was a sword? Or a poker?”
    “Those would have damaged her labia.”
    “What?” McGlade asked. “You mean someone stuck a…oh, shit…that’s sick .”
    “Have you swabbed for semen?” I asked. “Yes. Negative.”
    That didn’t rule out rape. Perp could have used a condom. The cause of death made this an obvious sex murder.
    “Defense marks?” I asked.
    The medical examiner shook his head. “No. No ligature marks either. I’m betting the blood work shows drugs.”
    After discovering the body in the Dumpster last night, I’d stayed and watched the crime scene team do their work. They’d dusted for prints on the body and come up negative. They’d also scraped under the fingernails in the hope the victim scratched her killer and picked up some of his skin cells or blood. Chicago had adopted the new DNA profiling technique begun in England, and it could directly link a perp to a crime by determining a genetic match.
    But if the victim were drugged to the point where she didn’t even need to be tied up while she was being assaulted, chances weren’t high there would be DNA evidence.
    I put my hand in front of my face to stifle a yawn. After watching the crime scene guys do their thing, I’d had to write my report of the murder, as well as my report for arresting the john who hopped into the Dumpster after asking me to manipulate his prostate. As a result, I slept a total of two hours, and that was mostly tossing and turning. I’d been struggling with insomnia since graduating the police academy, but I was pretty sure it was a transitory thing.
    At least, I hoped it was.
    The door to the autopsy room opened, and two men walked in. Both were thin, both were older than McGlade and I. One was dressed like me—a cheap suit, barely concealing the shoulder holster. He had a thick, wide mustache that looked a lot like Teddy Roosevelt’s. I don’t think he could have appeared more like a stereotypical Homicide detective if he tried.
    The other wore a gray suit that fit like it was made just for him and probably cost more than I earned in a month. He obviously wasn’t a cop, and he was kind of cute, in a strong-jawed male-model sort of way.
    The cop eyed Harry and me, then held out his hand.
    “Detective Herb Benedict, Homicide. Call me Herb.”
    His grip was warm and