My husband looked at my body with eyes full of disgust.
Jayden hated people involved with drugs more than anything. Perhaps, a fleeting thought crossed his mind that I might somehow be involved with drugs.
The forensic doctor provided them with the details and started to explain his findings. "The victim," he began, "is a woman, likely between twenty-two and twenty-five years old. She bled to death after suffering horrific abuse. There are marks on her wrists and ankles from being restrained. Also, her body was bruised and her head was repeatedly whacked with a blunt object. Moreover, we found traces of drugs in her bloodstream."
"The most disturbing part," the doctor continued, "is that the victim was pregnant. Her uterus was cut open, not cleanly but with signs of struggle and infection. That means, while she was still alive, the murderer performed a crude forced surgery. They cut open her belly, removed the fetus and replaced it with a mysterious powder."
"After sewing her back up, somehow, she managed to survive for at least seventy-two hours after this ruthless act. Then, they beheaded her while she was still conscious and dismembered her body."
"The powder left inside her for those seventy-two hours," the doctor explained further, "caused unimaginable suffering, inhumane torture."
The captain of the criminal investigation division, Zac Miller, slammed his fist on the table in anger and disbelief. "This is crazy! A brutal murder!"
Disgust and fury filled the officers' faces. "Such cruelty, especially to a pregnant woman! It was most likely to be a revenge killing!" one yelled.
"How much hate can one person have to be this ruthless to a pregnant woman?" another echoed.
"And the audacity!" someone else growled. "Throwing the dead body in the police station's sewer? That's a direct challenge to us!"
Amidst the uproar, Jayden remained silent as his gaze fixed on the lab report detailing the unknown powder. His jaw clenched as he saw the drug identified and its purity listed.
A single, chilling sentence came out of his lips, "It’s them. It’s The Death Reaper."