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She glanced at her notes. “The kids are Jenna, age six, and Bobby, who is four. She said the girl has autism and doesn’t speak.”
    I saw a van from the coroner’s office coming down the street. The department’s SID, or Scientific Investigation Division, was already here, unloading supplies. Unlike the TV version of a crime scene unit, SID staff were notorious for tampering with, or misplacing evidence. That was something I was determined not to let happen.
    “Let’s get inside and take a look before everything gets trampled,” I said.
    After gloving up, putting on paper booties, and moving past a uniform that was standing guard at the front door, we found the victim on the floor of the home’s expansive marble kitchen. Maybe it was the fact that the kitchen was white and all the lights were on, but the scene was as bad as anything I’d ever encountered.
    In most homicides, the victim’s blood is pooled or confined to an area in fairly close proximity to the body. In the case of Maria Chavez, her blood looked like it had been sprayed around the room. I pushed down the bile rising in my throat, trying to come to terms with the horrific scene.
    After examining the body for a couple of minutes, Leo said, “I’ve got a feeling she was placed on the kitchen island, where the sink is, and then…”
    “Agreed,” Darby Hall said when Leo didn’t continue. “I think the decap was done there and her body was pushed onto the floor. The place looks like a fucking slaughterhouse.”
    I now saw there was a lot of blood in proximity to the island that was in the center of the kitchen.
    Hall’s partner, Mel, who was obviously also impacted by the gruesome scene, grimaced and said, “Did the responding officer see any signs…of the…head?”
    Her partner answered, “Not from what I heard, but we’ll need to check the rest of the house.” Darby’s gaze wandered back over to the bloody kitchen island. “At least she didn’t suffer.”
    “What makes you say that?” Leo asked.
    “While it doesn’t look pretty, a decap is a lot quicker than other forms of execution. The vic bleeds out quickly and loses consciousness. Not a bad way to go.”
    The murder obviously didn’t have the same impact on Darby as it had on the rest of us. I walked over to the adjacent dining room where I found a large carving knife on the floor, and called the others over. “It looks like the perp tossed the knife here on the way out.”
    There was a smattering of blood where the knife had landed. I could only hope we’d catch a break and find prints on the weapon.
    We held the SID staff back for a few minutes until we were satisfied that we had a good overview of the crime scene and the evidence. We limited access to four technicians. Leo and the others went upstairs while I met with the responding deputy coroner who was a friend of mine.
    “It’s a pretty bad scene in there,” I said to Brie Henner after meeting her at the front door. My friend was a tall African-American woman who was being treated for breast cancer. The chemo and radiation had left her bald and thin.
    Brie followed me inside and set her bag on a coffee table in the living room. “How was your vacation?”
    I smiled. “Heavenly.” I was about to go on about what a good time Noah and I had, but was struck by her appearance. She looked weak and fragile. “How are you feeling?”
    Her gaze moved off. “Okay.” She glanced down the hallway toward the kitchen, then met my eyes again. “Let me take a look. We can talk afterward.”
    I nodded before she walked away, wondering if there was an unspoken message behind her words.
    While Brie and the SID staff went over the crime scene, Selfie Rogers, the crime analyst assigned to Section One, showed up and told me what she’d learned about the family. Selfie, whose real name was Sophia, had pink hair tonight and her usual quota of a half-dozen piercings in her brows, nose, and lips.
    “The husband is Vincent Marsh, a