Falling Through Portals

Back in England

Chapter 91

All it takes is one. Two. Three.

His mind flashed to the scene. Blood pooled around the body as he breathed the copper scent through his nose.

But that wasn't all.

One, an open mind.

He smelled fresh grass mingling in the smell of the blood. Not lawn grass- no that was a much sharper smell. This one was earthier. Wild grass.

It contrasted the furniture-less room the body had been found in.

Two, collect the facts.

The body must have been in the grass before he had died. And without even taking into account how the skin had not bloated yet from death, he knew that he couldn't have been dead long because the grass smell was still there. The man could have simply fallen in the grass but no- the grass stains and marks make had patterns of dragging.

And three, Deduction.

That meant that this body was not only moved from the true murder scene, but also had a murder strong enough to drag a full grown man. Since the body was not carried and the clothes stainless then the murder must have been alone or acting on orders. From the grass alone he could find the place of death using his knowledge of different plants and their geographical locations. But whether that would be helpful or not, he didn't know.

It is a delicate process, and not one that most minds are capable. Apparently.

He crouched next to the body and lifted one of the sleeves. On the bottom, he found tiny hairs stuck to the fabric. He ran his finger over them. No- not hairs. They weren't natural. Manmade. Tough and short- like carpet hairs but firmer. Fibers.

In fact, I have met very few who can even deduct things that are right in front of them.

In his catalogue he mentally ran through the possible lists of manmade fibers like this. Nylon, Polypropylene, Corterra, Polyester, Acrylic, and Wool. It was possible Cotton as well, but much less likely. Most carpets were made out of those six materials. But which one would be used in such thin and short nature? The body was on a tile floor and there were no carpets in the apartment that would constitute something so short . . .

A memory poked his mind. When he had dropped his lighter in the taxi on the way over, the harsh fibers of the car's carpeting had the same texture. A smile pulled at the corner of his lips. If the body was placed in a car for moving that meant that the murder took place outside of the city where a car would be necessary to get the body into the city. This proved that his prior theory was correct and also told him that if he couldn't find the killer in these remaining moments he could always go back to the murder scene and uncover whatever the murder was trying to hide or why they were trying to pin it on other people.

Moving around the body, he examined the cut to the throat where all of the blood pooled from. It was fresh. The blood pool on the floor should have forced him to throw out his theory about the country. After all, the cut throat was the death wound.

Or was it?

He ran a gloved hand over the bloodied skin. It was clean, precise. Almost surgical except for a mistake at the beginning of the cut. Looking back over the blood he immediately felt foolish. He should have known from the beginning that there wasn't enough blood there. Slitting someone's throat should have encased the entire upper body in blood but only the head and shoulders had blood anywhere near it. He noticed bruising under some of the blood. Using his gloved finger, he brushed away at the blood to reveal bruise marks. He already knew that the murder was strong enough to drag a large man through the grass it wasn't hard to put together. . .