Close to the Bone Read online

  ‘Nah. He’s gone.’

  ‘Then please don’t move him any more than you can help until I can photograph. And don’t let the cops come in.’

  ‘What? Hey—’ he began to protest, but she had already moved on.

  The Property Department could have housed half a dozen killers lying in wait, but there was nothing Theresa could do about it. She didn’t have keys to the door; no one did, save the Property officer and probably the Medical Examiner himself, in order to protect the personal items, money, jewelry and prescription meds of their temporary residents. She hit the light switch in the reception area: boring furniture that appeared to have been there since the mid-’70s, a Formica-clad countertop and sliding window to the secretary’s desk, a double set of glass doors leading to the visitor parking lot. She checked them. Still locked, deadbolts in place.

  Theresa ignored the elevator. It moved only slightly faster than molasses in Antarctica, and any woman over forty needed to work off every possible calorie, so instead she always took the stairs to the upper floors where she spent most of her working hours. Second landing, Records and Customer Services to the right, doctors’ offices and Histology to the left.

  No one lay bleeding in the hallway. Theresa even checked the two restrooms, in case Justin had escaped the attacker and run up here to hide – not as silly an idea as it sounded, she consoled herself as she peered through the glass windows of dark offices. If he couldn’t get past the killer to the back hallway and its loading dock door to the outside, and the front doors had been locked with their keyed deadbolt, he would have nowhere else to go but up.

  But then he would have nowhere to hide. Unless both Justin and the attacker had the advanced degrees in science necessary to work in one of the labs or were Janice, Queen of the Secretaries, they would not be able to open any of the doors. None were broken, and no drops or smears of blood dotted the carpet. Same for the third floor.

  Out of habit or some sort of homing instinct, Theresa pulled her keys from her back pocket and let herself in to the Trace Evidence Department. Once the lights flicked on she could see that nothing had been disturbed. The microscopes waited, shielded by soft plastic coverings; washed glassware dried in a dish rack that Theresa had bought at Walmart; a stack of Manila files needing additions or revisions had fallen over on her desk as if to express annoyance at her inattention; and the whole place smelled of disinfectant, dried blood and burnt coffee. Her home away from home, her corner of the world, her fortress and prison in one, but now she glanced around its cluttered space as if she’d never seen it before, its expanse turned alien and unfamiliar.

  More sirens outside the building now. Theresa wondered if the police would search the lot and neighboring buildings, check for the blood trail which Justin or whoever might have left as he ran away. She should probably do that. But the twins of fear and worry pushed her to circle the entire lab, to make sure the floors were clean of blood drops and check the rear two rooms where Don performed his DNA magic.

  Nothing.

  Finally satisfied, she pulled the rear lab door shut behind her and started down the back staircase, which would let her out between the cooler and the autopsy room.

  Except that a man with a gun blocked her path.

  He said: ‘Freeze. Police.’

  ‘I gathered that,’ Theresa told him, ‘from the badge around your neck.’

  THREE

  He seemed to take her outward serenity as something of an affront, but was professional enough to let it go, and within ten minutes Theresa had told him everything she knew. The sergeant – his nameplate said ‘L. Shephard’ – and his crew had cleared the building without locating the missing deskman. They had even checked the basement, a greenish-looking young man reported to Shephard. If the autopsy room could appear in a horror movie then the basement could provide the entire setting for a fifties drive-in. But though the four-inch thick wooden doors with the heavy steel latches appeared intimidating, nothing sat behind them but supplies and old paperwork. Same for the crypts, the individual openings with smaller versions of the same heavy doors where bodies used to be stored on slide-out platforms. All empty now, but still plenty creepy-looking.

  The only nightmare-inducing items in the morgue’s basement were the plastic quart containers which looked like take-out soup but which were actually tissue sections of past victims. They would be kept for five years and then destroyed, and were harmless unless someone opened the lids and poured the irritating formalin solution over their skin. Nevertheless the intrepid officers checked each area except the large storage room, unable to get its door open. Theresa had a key but didn’t offer it. The Trace Evidence Department kept the clothing from past victims and evidence from past cases in there and she couldn’t have unauthorized people trooping through and if a cop couldn’t get in then a killer, or Justin, could not possibly have entered.

  Theresa sat on the ancient vinyl couches in the reception area while the men roamed the building, upstairs, downstairs, all talking and radioing and sometimes shouting. She found herself flexing her fingers and gritting her teeth, no matter how often Shephard assured her that the deskmen’s office had been undisturbed since the EMTs pronounced Darryl. A cop had been posted at the door to keep all his co-workers out until the scene could be properly processed.

  ‘Which is me,’ Theresa couldn’t help pointing out to the sergeant for the second time during the past ten minutes. ‘I process. I need to photograph, and then sketch. Please don’t let your men touch anything, including the doors, walls, banisters, because I will have to fingerprint all that and I don’t want to have to eliminate any more than—’

  ‘I understand,’ Shephard said with what might be mistaken as patience by someone who hadn’t spent as much time around cops as Theresa had. ‘We’re just securing the scene.’

  ‘You already have secured the scene. No killer on premises, guards on the entrances. Secured.’

  His eyes narrowed, but not, apparently, at her contrariness. His eye lingered on Theresa’s left pant leg where she had not been able to avoid dipping the cuff in some of Darryl’s blood. ‘Can’t wait to get to work, can you?’

  ‘I have a lot to do.’ Her voice trembled a bit. Some sort of reaction setting in? Ridiculous … Theresa had no idea how many dead bodies she had encountered by then, but it had to be halfway to five digits.

  Just not when she wasn’t expecting to encounter one.

  Not when it was someone she knew.

  He continued to study her, taking in her rumpled BDU pants and heavy sweatshirt, mud-splashed steel-toe boots and braid of mostly reddish hair, messy because she hadn’t redone it after getting out of bed. The only advantage to outdoor night-time scenes was that they took place in the dark, so she hadn’t bothered with the make-up that would have made her forty-four-year-old face look better than just tolerable. But Shephard said only: ‘Darryl Johnson doesn’t summon up a lot of grief from you?’

  ‘I – um – yes, of course. I just – don’t know what to say.’ Though she did, and it was that Darryl had been kind of a jerk. One of those men who never outgrew the class clown persona. The type that finds it hilarious to be sarcastic, cutting, leering, bigoted and misogynistic every minute of every day. A trial to be around for more than three minutes at a stretch.

  But, other than that, not a bad guy … He entered each deceased’s information with reasonable accuracy, built up muscles hefting dead weights from one gurney to another, went home with blood splashed on his own shoes from hanging up the fluid-soaked shirts and pants of victims dead from homicide or accident. He showed up when scheduled, as he had that prior evening. By the time Theresa had sidled out, not more than ten seconds after quitting time, he had already rocked back in his desk chair, observing the evening exodus through a pair of smudged glasses. He’d refrained from the more risqué comments he sometimes tossed her way and simply waved, a comfortable grin on his face. In return she had given only her standard tight-lipped, patently insincere
smile, designed to maintain office cordiality without promising even the slightest friendly feeling.

  And now he lay in his own blood, not ten feet from where she sat, in a government-operated building dedicated to the pursuit of justice, with locks on the doors. ‘He’s been working here a long time,’ she said, and now her voice really did tremble, enough to make Shephard change the subject. Or maybe he got to what was the subject.

  ‘What can you tell me about the suspect?’

  She blinked at him. ‘Nothing. I have no idea who did this.’

  ‘I meant the other deskman. Justin Warner, you said?’

  ‘I’m guessing Justin should have been working tonight, but I don’t know that for sure.’

  ‘According to the schedule by the lockers, it should have been Justin.’

  ‘But still, he’s not a suspect – why would you think Justin did this?’

  He gave her a look which might have been pity. ‘We started with two guys, and now one’s dead and the other is not present. It’s a math thing.’

  ‘So they’ve been working on the same shift together for six weeks without a problem, and suddenly Justin takes it in his head to beat the guy to death?’

  ‘How long have you been working here?’

  The change in topics made her head swim. ‘Twelve years. Almost thirteen.’

  ‘And what’s the motive for most murders?’

  She shifted her weight, which sent the vinyl creaking. ‘Anger.’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘But Justin never struck me as short-tempered. Darryl, maybe, but not Justin.’

  ‘Fine. So maybe Darryl attacked Justin and it was self-defense. He panics and runs away. When we find him, we can ask him. What does the word “confess” mean to you?’

  ‘What I expect it means to everybody else.’

  ‘Did Justin Warner believe that the victim was keeping something from him? Did he mention any conspiracy-type theories? Believe that the ME’s office had covered something up? Ever express distrust of your administration?’

  ‘Never.’ Though how would she know? The most likely candidate for those sorts of heart-to-hearts now lay in his own blood on their linoleum.

  ‘What about someone else? A grieving family member who thinks there’s more to their loved one’s death?’

  ‘And might want to hold Justin hostage until we reveal the truth? There certainly could be – many families have a hard time accepting certain facts. But I don’t know of any such situations myself.’

  Shephard kept asking questions, most of which Theresa could not answer. Justin Warner stood over six feet tall, perhaps weighed two-fifty, was a light-skinned black man of about thirty or thirty-five. Some tattoos on his neck, but she’d never looked closely enough to be able to describe them. He seemed cheerful enough but, now that she thought about it, never said much of anything beyond the weather, the state of the victim, or what he might have for lunch. No political commentaries, no complaints of a spouse or girlfriend or children, not even the strengths of the Indians’ starting line-up. Theresa didn’t know where he lived or what he drove. She had no idea if he lived alone, but had heard that he spent time flirting with one of the secretaries up in Records. She could contribute only one useful fact, that his cellphone number would be posted in the deskmen’s office, scrawled on a curling piece of paper taped to the glass.

  Meanwhile, other cops poked their heads in once in a while to give Shephard updates. No blood had been located on the outside loading dock or in the parking lot, at least so far as they could establish under the tungsten street lights. They had also checked DMV information. Justin Warner drove a seven-year-old brown Chevy Cavalier, which did not, currently, reside in the parking lot.

  Shephard didn’t say a word, but obviously young Justin’s absence made him appear guiltier with each passing moment.

  ‘Maybe he didn’t even work tonight,’ Theresa pointed out.

  ‘Is there another deskman who would make a more likely suspect for you?’

  She thought of the four other deskmen. The office had only six total, two each on rotating twelve-hour shifts. ‘No.’

  ‘Easy way to find out for sure – your cameras? Can you cue up the tape for me?’

  She gave him her baffled blink again, so he pointed out that he had seen a camera outside the loading dock entrance. Were there more cameras, where were they, and could she operate the system so they could review what had happened?

  Theresa hated to tell him that the one he had seen was the only one they had.

  She didn’t add that the county had tried to add more, specifically in the deskmen’s office and the Property Department – a much criticized move, since these were two of the lowest-paid occupations in the building and did not attract college graduates or Shaker Heights residents. But the county’s thinking didn’t stem from simple bigotry; these were the only two areas with access to victims’ cash and jewelry. No one thought of adding cameras to other floors because there was virtually nothing in the building worth stealing. And though the paperwork could be considered confidential, there wasn’t much of a black market for autopsy reports and toxicology read-outs. No one in Cleveland warranted that kind of interest. Lacking a bit of wealth also kept the city from having the problems of LA or DC.

  But in any case the first-floor interior cameras hadn’t lasted long. They encountered an endless string of bad luck, mysterious power surges that melted their circuits, moisture somehow seeping into their wiring, condensation fogging their lenses, until the county gave up.

  ‘Fine, the one camera, then,’ Shephard sighed. ‘Can you cue up the tape? Or – well, it’s probably digital, right?’

  ‘It’s nothing,’ she told him gently. ‘It doesn’t record. It’s just a monitor.’

  His face darkened so much that Theresa thought he might yell at her, an experience she had planned to leave behind after signing divorce papers. ‘What?’ he said.

  ‘The purpose of the camera is to let the deskman see who’s knocking at their door in the middle of the night, that’s all. They’ll either open the door or they won’t. There’s no need for it to record.’

  Under the razor stubble his skin flushed. ‘And you call that security?’

  I don’t call it anything, Theresa thought but didn’t say. ‘It’s not my job’ never sounded like a mature, responsible thing to express, even when it truly wasn’t. ‘This is a morgue. We’re not a bank, and we’re not the NSA. No one wants to break in here. Why would they?’

  ‘Maybe to kill your deskman – assuming, just for the sake of argument, that he wasn’t killed by your other deskman. Maybe they wanted to break into your property room, or wherever valuables are stored.’

  ‘Then they changed their minds, because there’s no damage to the door and the keys are not stored on site.’ Something else occurred to her as her brain ping-ponged all over the place. ‘What are you doing here?’

  This confused him into speechlessness.

  ‘I mean,’ she went on, gesturing at the stripes on his sleeve, ‘what are you doing here? Why is a sergeant the first responder?’

  It was his turn to blink. ‘The call came in, and – an ME’s office employee killed at the ME’s office? I—’

  ‘Wouldn’t miss it for the world?’ She didn’t intend it as criticism. She’d have felt the same way in his shoes.

  ‘—thought I should supervise in person as a professional courtesy,’ he finished. ‘I came here enough times when I worked homicide.’

  He did look vaguely familiar – dark hair, dark eyes, could use a shave, tall and solid. And now he was back in uniform as a sergeant. A promotion, a bigger paycheck and more regular hours, but Theresa wondered if he missed the unpredictability of the murder beat. ‘You know Frank?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said, with a complete absence of inflection. Sometimes that happened when people spoke of her cousin. ‘You don’t need to call him, you know. I mean, the case will be assigned to the on-call detective. Though if you need so
me moral support I suppose there’s nothing actually wrong with it—’

  She put him out of the misery of worrying that another cop might interfere in his case. ‘I would love to, but I can’t. He’s on a Royal Caribbean ship somewhere in the Panama Canal.’ She didn’t add that Frank had gone on his first real vacation in about a decade with his partner, detective Angela Sanchez. Her cousin subscribed to the don’t ask, don’t tell policy with his own department.

  Shephard looked relieved, and Theresa made a mental note to ask her cousin how he got along with his co-workers. ‘Has this ever happened before?’ he asked. ‘Someone actually killed here?’

  She thought, which seemed to require way more effort than it should. ‘Never, that I know of. We haven’t even had a staff member die, here or anywhere … not since Diana, I don’t think. That was ten years ago.’

  ‘She died here?’

  ‘No, in her home. She was—’

  Polished shoes clacked against the floor as Medical Examiner Stone strode into the lobby, trench coat swirling around his calves in a way that would have looked much more impressive on a foggy bridge instead of sixty-year-old linoleum. ‘What the hell is going on?’

  His gaze fell from Shephard to Theresa. He didn’t actually say, ‘I might have known,’ but it was a close thing. He’d never quite forgiven her for accidentally bringing an unstable explosive back to the lab, which had required an evacuation of the entire building. Make one mistake …

  ‘Darryl’s dead,’ she said, ‘and someone’s kidnapped Justin.’

  His scowl merely deepened, and Theresa couldn’t really blame him. She had never mastered the art of concise summary. At the same time she noticed that his shirt had a few uncharacteristic wrinkles and his usual aroma of too much Axe had been replaced by old-fashioned sweat, so either he was wearing the previous day’s clothing or he had never been home. Perhaps his wife had gone out of town again—