Close to the Bone (7 page)

The medics had taken him away, albeit with grim little shakes of their heads over his condition. Theresa had found a faint pulse and nearly indiscernible respiration, and he had lost a lot of blood.

He had been beaten, just like Darryl, his head coming to rest in a pool that the Persian rug could only partially contain. Eventually, it had spread to the edge, beyond the fringe, and formed a thin stream that ran across the hardwood planks to reach some unseen low spot beneath the radiator. The radiator had only come on once since she’d been there – even doctors have to watch those heating bills – and filled the room with the smell of warmed-up blood.

Dr Reese’s face showed similar bruising and a small cut on the nose. He wore flannel men’s pajamas, white with a blue pinstripe, which fit their surroundings as well as any sleep wear could have. The bottom edge of the loose top had flipped up as he fell, but Theresa couldn’t really tell much from his fleshy abdomen – blows there might not have had enough time or blood flow to form their purplish markers. Aside from the abrasion on the nose, his only other wound seemed to be a gash in the back of the head. Theresa didn’t feel qualified to go poking around in the man’s skull, but could feel a rough indent where the bone had suffered a slight cave-in, most likely from the corner of his desk. She looked around for what could have been used as a weapon, but there were no loose candlesticks or bookends or golf trophies scattered nearby that would fit the bill, and the walnut desk felt hard as granite. Reese was a tall man, and that high center of gravity coupled with the lethally inflexible corner had apparently produced enough cerebral edema to depress his life functions to the point of nil.

The first thing she had done was to try to call Frank. Theresa had actually disconnected Sergeant Shephard without another word, selected her cousin’s name in the contact list and had her thumb on the ‘Call’ button before she remembered. Cruise ship. No cellphone service. A hollow feeling froze her in place for a moment before she thawed and redialed Shephard.

Two patrol officers and the ambulance had arrived simultaneously, and quickly enough to scare the crap out of her. Shephard had dispatched them as soon as she’d called, just in case.

Now she and the sergeant stood looking at the book-lined room, the only area of the house that showed any signs of disturbance. A lamp on the desk had been overturned and two issues of
The Wall Street Journal
sent fluttering to the floor. A framed photo of Reese with two other men in front of Case Western Reserve University had fallen over. The desk drawers were all ajar, the contents stirred up, a few paper clips and pens spilled. A two-drawer filing cabinet, built into the bookshelves and nearly invisible behind the desk, had been thoroughly rifled – each and every hanging folder removed and stacked in a slanting pile to the left. Crime scene tech Jen, looking weary, had snapped a number of pictures before moving on to the rest of the house.

Shephard floated the idea that Reese had surprised a burglar, but she didn’t even throw the idea a follow-up question. Unless someone had begun a rampage in University Circle that left a trail of bodies to Shaker Square – and no such reports had come in – then Reese’s attack somehow related to Darryl Johnson’s murder.

‘Did he say anything?’ Shephard had asked Theresa immediately upon arrival.

‘One eyelid fluttered,’ she said. ‘That was the most response I got. It doesn’t look good.’

‘What did the EMTs say?’

‘That it doesn’t look good.’

He had scanned the house himself, with Theresa trailing in his wake. As the uniformed cops had reported, nothing seemed suspicious … except for Mrs Reese’s jewelry box. A stand-alone miniature wardrobe with double doors, there seemed to be more pendants and rings on the floor than hanging from its hooks. She apparently liked diamonds, and a myriad of stones glinted with that deep twinkle that lets one know they’re real. No cubic zirconium for the lady of this house. The bed was unmade, in keeping with the victim’s attire.

‘Plenty of jewelry,’ Shephard had said, more to himself than to Theresa. What he meant was that it didn’t look like there were any pieces missing, and to judge from the floor of Mrs Reese’s closet, the clutter might just be a housekeeping issue.

He had done a quick check of the rest of the bedroom, drawers, walk-in closets, medicine cabinet in the bath. Nothing. If whoever attacked Reese had waded through Mrs Reese’s jewelry, they had been looking for a specific item. It threw out the burglary-gone-bad theory.

Now Shephard sat on the hardwood floor next to the filing cabinet skimming over the contents, blue latex gloves on his hands, legs folded underneath him like a teenage girl. They would ache when he had to get up, Theresa thought. ‘Were they friends? Reese and Johnson?’

Theresa snorted before she could help herself. ‘Not likely.’

‘Why not?’

She considered. ‘I don’t know for sure, of course, I can only tell you that I never saw them hanging out together, lunching together, or even saying anything more to each other than a comment on the football game or the weather or a particularly interesting victim history. On the flip side, there were no conflicts between the two that I know of. Darryl could be – irritating? But never any more than mildly irritating, and irritating to everyone equally.’

‘What about Reese and Justin Warner? Any relationship?’

‘That’s even less likely. For one thing, Justin has only been here – at the office – three months.’

‘And for another?’

She started to lean against the edge of the desk, thought of fingerprints, and rested her back against the bookcase instead. ‘The ME’s is like any workplace – there’s a pecking order. At the summit is Stone, of course; then the pathologists. They’re great people but they’re doctors, which makes them gods, just like any other place on earth. Then there’s the scientists – me, Don, the toxicologists, the histologists. The artists, our photographers. Then support staff, starting with Janice. Then the ones who really have to get their hands dirty – dieners, who end up with enough medical knowledge to open their own practice but still make peanuts because they don’t have a degree. And then, pretty much at the bottom, are the deskmen.’

He continued to fan paper files – from what she could see over his shoulder, they seemed to be tax returns, home appliances warranties, medical records and a family tree. The same kind of stuff that most people have in their personal filing cabinets. Theresa didn’t know if he was reading or digesting what she’d said, and she tilted her head back against a collection of world atlases and closed her eyes. The weariness that adrenalin had been holding back suddenly seeped into her body. She’d barely slept, and now she’d found two men – men she knew, men she worked with – lying in their own blood within the past eight hours.

She opened her eyes. ‘I’ve got to call Stone. Has anyone called Stone? Or – Mrs Reese? Where
is
Mrs Reese, anyway?’

‘According to a neighbor, she is in Minnesota helping out their daughter, who just had her second baby. A beautiful baby boy, she told us, seven pounds, six ounces. I never understand why people tell you how much the kid weighs. I’m happy for the happy happy parents, but really, what do I care how much the kid weighed?’

Theresa wondered what prompted this sudden burst of commentary … either he was getting punchy, staying up past his normal shift, or perhaps babies were a sore spot for him. Trying to conceive and not having any luck? No wedding ring, but that didn’t mean much in this day and age. He had a rip in his sleeve near his right wrist and two old stains on the left leg of his pants. He needed a shave (not surprising, he should have gone home for the day hours before) and a haircut (just a half-inch) and maybe a little bit of sun. Aftershave had worn off earlier in his shift so she couldn’t tell much from that. Theresa guessed single, probably divorced (and probably more than once, being a cop) and not in a serious relationship with anyone except perhaps video games (pale and accustomed to sitting on the floor).

Theresa had been quiet too long, and he noticed her scrutiny, flushed a bit, and rose stiffly to a crouch high enough to plant his butt in Dr Reese’s desk chair. Bent over, he continued to study the files.

Perhaps he was expecting a grandchild soon, and the idea made him nervous.

Perhaps he would never have grandchildren, and the idea made him unhappy.

Perhaps Theresa should get back to work. She asked again about ME Stone; Shephard said no one had called that he knew of and that she should. She knew she should, too, and did, and it wasn’t fun. As usual the Medical Examiner managed to imply, with silence and a single expelled breath, that the blame for all the agency’s recent misfortunes could be laid squarely at her door. Theresa kept it short.

She put the phone back in her pocket. ‘So someone knocked Reese out in order to rifle through his old tax returns? And maybe his wife’s lavalieres? You—’

He looked up. ‘What?’

She’d been about to say
you didn’t touch the file cabinet drawers, did you?
but thought better of it. It annoyed cops to constantly remind them of Principles of Crime Scene Management 101. ‘You find anything interesting?’

‘Other than wondering who would pay eighty-nine dollars for a wallet, no. He did have one file of clippings, though. Your past cases. It was on top.’

He flipped open a hanging folder, spreading some of the newspaper columns across the floor for her to see. A murder-suicide from six months before. A traffic accident in which three children died. A drive-by in Euclid. Just a fraction of the stories that pass through the medical examiner’s office.

Shephard asked her, ‘Any of those ring a bell? Stand out in your mind? A case that was controversial, that particularly involved Dr Reese? Any disgruntled customers?’

Theresa shook her head. ‘I wouldn’t have any idea. You need to ask Stone – if there were complaints or threats, he would know. I wouldn’t.’

‘Pecking order, huh?’

‘Exactly. Everything is need-to-know.’

‘And you didn’t have any beefs, arguments, or dramas with one or both of these two victims in recent memory?’

Theresa felt sure her eyes widened, which probably looked ridiculous.

He shrugged, all casual-like but with a piercing gaze. ‘I have to ask. You’ve reported two brutally attacked victims in less than a full shift.’

‘Well …’ She swallowed. ‘Yes. And no, no conflicts with either man.’

After a moment he shrugged again. ‘Don’t worry. My money’s still on our missing Justin Warner.’

This time she didn’t argue. She also felt guilty about not arguing.

‘And,’ he went on, ‘there’s a slim – very slim – chance that the two cases aren’t related. This place was rifled, like a burglary gone bad or maybe a family member who needed cash right away. Your deskman still had on a nice watch and a diamond ring, wallet in his pocket. On the surface it looks like very different motivations.’

‘That’s true. But why just the office and the wife’s jewelry box, and then not take half the jewelry? He didn’t open another drawer or a closet; usually, they’re looking for cash, guns and prescription meds – well, you know that. He might have been interrupted.’

‘By what? The wife isn’t home, the neighbors are two hundred feet away, the trees give plenty of cover. No one phoned.’

So he had checked the caller ID already. Theresa felt fairly impressed by Sergeant Shephard.

He went on: ‘And if Dr Reese surprised him in here and he attacked the doctor, thought he killed him, why did he go upstairs and open the jewelry box before getting overcome by the heebie-jeebies and decide to run? It’s possible, of course.’

Theresa knew it was
possible
. Criminals were human beings, fully capable of being as capricious, inexplicable and illogical as anyone else.

Something started to swell in the base of her brain, some vague wisp of an idea that melded into some faded scrap of memory.

She left Shephard to his tasks and exited the doctor’s house. From the driveway she called Don. ‘Are you still at the lab?’

‘Of course I’m still at the lab. It’s back to business as usual here, according to the county. Time to get our butts back into our task chairs.’

‘Stay there,’ she said – stupidly, in light of what he had just told her. ‘I have a really funny idea.’

‘Funny ha ha, or funny—’

‘Funny scary,’ she said. ‘I think someone’s hunting us.’

EIGHT

F
or the second time that morning she presented herself to Janice, Queen of the Secretaries, for consideration. She needed more than just a copy of a fingerprint card this time. She needed to get into the vault itself. Theresa needed to see a case file.

Case files were not like personnel files, though, and Janice let her in without hesitation.

Theresa had to look up his six-digit number but located the file for George Bain. Bain had been a cop in Euclid Heights for most of his life, but the moment he had his twenty years in he took the retirement and came to the Medical Examiner’s office for the regular hours and (relatively) safe working conditions of Ambulance Crew Member, aka bodysnatcher. Within two weeks the regular hours and safe but sometimes back-straining conditions had him bored stiff and stiff as a board, and he spent the next fifteen years bemoaning his haste to bid his cop days adieu. Then eight months ago he bid the ME’s adieu as well and retired completely.

That hadn’t agreed with him, either; he’d barely made twelve weeks of leisure before his heart succumbed to despair. Or succumbed to too little exercise combined with too many chicken wings. Either way the result had been the same.

Theresa sat at a table in the center of the room. She could look at the file all she wanted, maybe even make a copy of some items, but couldn’t leave with it. Janice always gave Theresa’s lab coat a long look upon her exit, as if considering a quick frisk. Happily for both of them, Janice had never actually tried it.

Theresa skimmed the contents of the file. George Bain had been sixty-seven years old, divorced, overweight, a smoker, with cholesterol deposits and arteriosclerosis. Essentially, a heart attack waiting to happen, and the autopsy confirmed it. She had always wondered how, even with a partner, he managed to heft dead weights on to gurneys without becoming one himself.