“What I want to know is whether I’m going to have ulcers by the time we leave office.”

Nick’s low chuckle made Terry laugh. “Nah, don’t sweat it. If we’re approaching it from a we-don’t-care-if-we’re-reelected point of view, what can go wrong?”

“Pass the Tums.”

Sam raised the collar on her coat as she walked toward the yellow crime scene tape in Rock Creek Park. Freddie had the car he’d borrowed from his mother and would join her when he arrived. It was too damned cold to stand around and wait for him.

Patrol Officer Keeney lifted the tape for her. “Nice to see you again, Lieutenant.”

“You, too.” Sam was trying to remember when she’d last encountered the young patrolman. During the sniper shootings, she thought.

“Right this way, ma’am.”

Sam followed him down a wooded path, watching for patches of ice as she went.

“I saw you and your family going to Camp David on Marine One. That must’ve been so cool.”

“Yes, it was.” She didn’t want to talk about Marine One or Camp David when there was a murder victim in need of justice. “Where’s the person who found her?”

“With the paramedics. She was pretty shaken. Her dog ran off and led her to the victim.”

Great. Our crime scene has been compromised by a dog. She pulled on latex gloves. “Have you called the ME and CSU?”

“Yes, ma’am. They’re on the way.”

“Thank you.”

Another Patrol officer stood watch over the victim, a white woman who was facedown and naked from the waist down, which meant she’d probably been sexually assaulted. Because it was her job, Sam took the required photos and then handed a pair of latex gloves to the patrolman before asking him to help her turn the woman over.

Her clothes were torn, her breasts were covered in abrasions, and her neck was badly bruised, indicating manual strangulation. The poor woman had endured a brutal attack.

A glove covered one hand, but the other was bare.

Sam pulled a paper bag from her coat pocket and carefully inserted the woman’s ungloved hand into the bag to preserve any evidence. She checked the pockets of the woman’s jacket, found a small wallet with a DC driver’s license that she held up to the beam of the patrolman’s flashlight, which was needed as storm clouds and tree cover made it almost as dark as night in the thicket.

Audrey Olsen, age twenty-four. The address listed was in Adams Morgan. Sam took a picture of the license and then bagged the wallet and the woman’s phone to be added to evidence.

“What’ve we got?” Lindsey asked as she joined Sam.

“Twenty-four-year-old Audrey Olsen, found by a woman walking a dog that broke loose and led her to Audrey. I took photos and bagged the one hand that was bare.”