I returned to the crime scene for a closer look at the body.  

 

A paper thin serenity had settled amongst the bags and bullet marks. Dried blood gathered in dark pools beneath the sheet that covered Emilia’s body.

 

Determined to learn more about the poor girl’s final night alive, I gathered my strength and peeled the starched white sheet from her face. The area around one of her eyes was swollen with a dark ring around it–no doubt the result of a recent impact. Gently, I pushed her raven black bangs to one side. A trail of hardened blood ran down her forehead from somewhere near the hairline.

 

Her face was cold, her arms stiff. Around her nose, the bruising was so profuse that I suspected it to be broken. 

 

Pulling the sheet free from the rest of her body, I saw that she was dressed in the same grey blouse and vestment she'd worn to dinner. The skin on her face and arms was pale as the linen now crumpled beside her. The single pocket of her blouse was empty: no room key; no personal effects.

 

I examined her wrists, her forearms, her hands. Bloodless and cold, they showed no evidence of defensive wounds. 

 

Emilia was very much a stranger to me. In our month at the excavation site, I had rarely seen her. The few conversations we’d had were quick and impersonal, but she seemed pleasant enough to me. 

 

How such a young girl had ended up in this position baffled me.

On a hunch, I removed her shoes. The black loafers were clean and clung tightly to her small feet. Pulling the right shoe from her foot, a note tumbled to the floor. My heart beat rapidly in my chest as I unfolded it and read: