Bury Me With Barbie (11 page)

“A girl.”

“No duh, a girl. If you became a switch hitter all of a sudden, I’d run down to the main stage and do a strip tease.”

“I didn’t know you liked stripping,” he said.

All of sudden, P.J. wanted to get off the phone. She didn’t want to hear what Darby had to say about any prospective girlfriend.

“She likes Barbies,” he said.

“How do you know that?”

“She’s the same as you and all your friends. You’re addicted to Barbie jewelry. She was wearing a gold Quentin Tarantino Barbie cameo bracelet with crystals and pearls the day I met her.”

“
Tarina
Tarantino,” P.J. said hotly.

“I know it’s not Quentin. I was just being funny. Of course, you could make it a Quentin bracelet if you hung little daggers and vials of pills and beer cans and cool cars off it.”

“Well, where’d you meet her and what’s her name?”

“Jordanne,” he said.

“Jordin, like Jordin Sparks?” P.J. was an avid
American Idol
fan.

“Not Jordin Sparks.”

“I know it’s not Jordin Sparks, but her name is Jordin like Jordin Sparks?”

“Jord
anne
,” Darby clarified.

He explained that Jordanne was the sister of a friend he knew at the Glendale Market where he went—not often enough—to shop for groceries. His fridge, it turned out, was much fuller these days, thanks to his desire to go hang out with her. She had graduated from Glendale High School two years ago and was almost nineteen. Her new job as a cashier at the market where her brother had worked as a stock boy for as long as Darby could remember had begun two weeks earlier, and she was nearly done with training. He had begun smoking again so he didn’t feel awkward joining her on her cigarette breaks.

“You know that song
Tiny Dancer
by Elton John?” he asked.

“Who doesn’t?” P.J. wasn’t even trying to keep the animosity out of her voice now.

“She’s tiny, like a tiny dancer,” he enthused. “She’s blond like you and…” he trailed off, realizing P.J. didn’t want to hear about her at all.

“Thanks for wrecking my night,” P.J. said.

It was Darby’s turn to get a bit cross. “How could I possibly do that?”

“Well, how do I know you’re gonna be around for me if you go getting yourself involved with little Miss What’s-Her—”

“Jordanne,” he said. “Listen, P.J., I started this project with you and I’ll finish it, whether it’s ten more outings or twenty or thirty or forty.”

“Outings,” she scoffed.

“Well, you think of a better term when you’re talking on the phone—which isn’t exactly private, no matter how much you think it may be. You know, anybody could—”

“Okay,” P.J. relented, picking up the TV remote she had dropped on the bed.

She resumed channel surfing. Jord
anne
was roughly half Darby’s age. He would get what he needed from her physically, find out they had nothing in common, and then he’d dump her. She just needed to wait it out.

But as inexplicably mad as P.J. felt when she threw one of her shoes against the wall after hanging up, she would have been far angrier if she knew Darby had already gone into P.J.’s storage and taken a blond American Girl Barbie and given it to his new sweetheart, rationalizing that P.J. would never miss it.

Back at the
County Times
, Caresse found time to log on to the Best Barbie Board. First, she did a search for “Grace” and came up with the latest news.

BBB Moderator Sabeana Moss had posted that services for Gayle and her husband Mike had been held on Lake Ontario, and their ashes had been scattered at sea.

In response, Gayle’s sister Megan had posted a note beside a new profile photo of herself and Gayle playing with dolls when young.

Caresse bolted upright. She knew who Time was. She had practically lived on the BBB as the self-appointed authority-in-residence, answering questions from newbies oftentimes only minutes after they had posted their requests for help. She had one friend who always backed her, Sally, and if anyone had issued the alert, it would have been her.

A search for “Sally” turned up the only Sally on the board, and it was indeed Time’s friend. Her user name was CASEY_LUV, because she was particularly fond of Casey, a good friend of Barbie’s “MODern” cousin Francie. A full body shot of a 1967 Twist Casey, wearing her gold mesh-topped swimsuit and single gold-tone triangle dangle earring, served as Sally’s avatar.

While attempting to get more information, Sabeana had replied with as much tact as possible.

Sally’s had not yet replied.

Caresse knew that Time’s collection not only included some of the best examples of the earliest Barbies and outfits but superlative examples of later dolls as well.

If the killer had struck again, this time they were not focusing on any one Barbie doll, friend, or era.

The killer was totally unpredictable.

And greedy
, Caresse thought.

Military explosive ordnance disposal personnel from Naval Air Station Whidbey Island arrived at Time Taylor’s home in Oak Harbor after it had been assessed that she died in an explosion involving a toxic substance. Neither the local police nor the toxicology expert they brought in from the University of Washington had ever been called to a crime scene of this precise nature before. It was eye opening, unsettling, and abhorrent.

It was critical for personnel operating in and around the contaminated entryway to remain cognizant of the dangers presented by skin contact with any toxic substances. They were less concerned with inhaling airborne contaminants since they were standing outside in the light but chilly breeze.

Investigators treated the victim as a Jane Doe, pending confirmation of her identity. Prior to the collection of evidence, the photographer, sketch preparer, and evidence recorder took stock of the crime scene.

Evidence recovery personnel and specialists in and around the porch area wore safety glasses, gloves, and protective clothing as they worked. Methodically, technicians began bagging bits of plaster of Paris and glue, cardboard, toilet paper, aluminum foil, tiny rocket engine fragments, and primer wire. Because it was impossible to submit the entire wall of the archway as evidence, samples of the stucco were removed with sharp, clean instruments, and transferred to leak-proof plastic bottles. Hanks of Time’s wispy blond hair were carefully collected with clean forceps to prevent damaging the root tissue. Each chunk of hair was then packaged separately in an envelope with sealed corners. Tissue, bones, and teeth were collected with gloved hands and clean forceps. Tissue samples were placed in clean, airtight containers without formalin or formaldehyde. Teeth and bone samples were wrapped in clean paper.

Time’s bracelet-style Seiko wristwatch was recovered and bagged. It had stopped running when hit by flying debris at 11:47 a.m.

When technicians finished lifting prints from the screen door, they discovered the lock had been filled with glue. Using a thin tool, they filed and scraped the keyhole, depositing shavings of hardened glue in a bag they marked as evidence.

Investigators followed the trailing wires that fell behind the potted plants and discovered the large battery hidden in the shrubbery.

“Remote control,” Detective Mel Brinkman surmised. “The killer had the igniter. That explains those little rocket engines.”

“So something poisonous hit her from all sides,” his partner Keenan Francis guessed.

“She had open wounds from the detonated rockets, and the poison they carried entered her bloodstream,” Brinkman replied.

Francis got the picture. “Like chemical darts.” He paused and thought before he spoke again. “Isn’t that a rather convoluted way to kill someone?”

“Creative,” Brinkman replied. “Insanely creative.”

Time’s Taurus was parked in front of her house.

The UPS man who had called 911 sat on the curb by his truck, too weak to stand. The package he had been attempting to deliver remained on the lawn near the front walkway. Investigator Adam Puchalski sat down next to him and attempted to get him to talk, but the man was too shaken to speak.

“You were on the porch,” Puchalski said. “I’m gonna need to see the bottom of your shoes.”

Without answering, the man lifted his left foot. Puchalski bent over and looked. Embedded in the tread of the man’s running shoes were bits of skin, plaster, glue, and toilet paper. Gently, Puchalski untied the man’s left shoe, took it, and debated removing the evidence from the grooves with forceps. He realized he should get photographs first, so he told the man he would be back. He stood up slowly, casting a glance backward, and headed off to find a photographer.

The UPS man, whose name was Don Chambers, had been on the job for twelve years. Until that Monday arrived, he had been quite content with his line of work. Now, as he sat on the curb, missing a shoe, he wondered if he would ever be able to get the vision of the large blond woman, transformed into a bloated creature with craters of skin missing over her entire body, from his mind. Her eyes had been opened, but not by choice. She was missing her eyelids, eyebrows, and forehead. She had lost so much blood she was in a thick, slick, dark pool.

Raw meat
, he thought. S
he looked like something ready to be hacked up by a butcher
.

Working on the assumption that the vic was indeed Time Taylor, investigator Editha Moran did the necessary background check and learned Time’s father had been killed in prison and her mother died of liver cancer. She also confirmed Time had been arrested once for possession of marijuana, owned the home she lived in, lived alone with two poodles, and drove the Taurus that was present at the scene.

Another investigator, Patty Graybill, began to canvass the neighborhood. She went door to door, asking anyone who answered if they had seen anyone suspicious in the neighborhood that morning.

Outside, in the arched entryway, technicians removed Time’s tattered baggy pants, shirt, and Birkenstock sandals. The sandals and clothing would be bagged, and she would be transported nude to the coroner’s office, where her official cause of death would be determined.

Inside, detectives found two crumbs of bacon the poodles had missed in the front hallway. They combed through the pastel living room with meticulous precision and then headed up the plush, peach-carpeted staircase. After analyzing the bathroom, they moved to the study and discovered the smashed curio cabinet. Shards of glass covered the floor, flung as far as the stacked cardboard boxes across the room.

Two clear impressions of footprints remained in the carpet, directly in front of the cabinet. They would need a photographer as well as someone to dust the smashed cabinet for latent prints.

Time’s friend from work, Sally, pulled up a distance away from the crime scene vehicles and patrol cars. She ran up to the house and Brinkman and Francis approached to block her path.

“Sorry, Miss,” Francis said to the heavyset brunette. “You can’t go any closer.”

“Do you know who lives in this house?” Brinkman asked.

Despite the chill in the air, he was sweating profusely. He removed his shades to wipe his eyes.

“Time. Time Taylor—my friend from work. We work at Burger King right around the corner. When she didn’t come back, I thought I’d run over here and—”

“See if anything was wrong,” Francis finished for her.

“Why did she come home?” Brinkman asked.

“Oh, she does that every day,” Sally said. “To check on the dogs. Is she okay?”

“Does Miss Taylor have any relatives in the area?” Francis asked, already knowing the answer.

“No,” Sally said, looking at the ground. “We’re her family. Her friends.”

“We may need to talk to you further,” Brinkman said, pulling out his pad and pen. “Can I get your contact information?”

“Sure,” Sally’s voice quavered. “But why? Is anything wrong?”

Francis put his arm around her, offering comfort.

Sally was crying now, sensing the gravity of the situation.

“She was my best friend.”

“Do you know why anyone would want to hurt her?” Francis probed gently.

Sally looked up. Her face was blank.

“Money? There was supposed to be some money her father hid in the house before he was sent away, but we looked and I swear, we never found it.”