Deadfall (16 page)

Mac could feel his cheeks redden. He struggled to keep his mouth shut and his features nonexpressive.

“Don't answer her; that's her favorite joke,” Henry said. “Don't give her the satisfaction of letting her see you squirm.”

“Oh, pooh on you, Henry.” Kristen stuck out her tongue and quickly resumed her exam. When she'd completed the legs and feet, she glanced over at Henry.

“You ready for x-ray?” Henry asked.

“You got it. I don't want to have to roll this dude over more than once, so let's get pictures before we get him off the gurney.”

Henry grabbed hold of the steel gurney and wheeled it down the hall and into a room identical in size to the one holding the autopsy tables. The room was used to store the large x-ray machine, in addition to serving as an overflow room if more bodies arrived than they could handle at the office. The cooler was adjacent to the x-ray room, holding an assortment of unclaimed body parts and corpses that were awaiting transportation to a funeral home.

Henry moved the bloated body into place under the large x-ray machine, pulling the glide arm down over the torso. He pulled on a protective vest and stepped back several feet before activating the hand-held control, taking the x-ray. Henry quickly slid the glide arm down to the midsection and eventually to the legs as he completed the task.

“Should be just a few minutes,” Henry told the detectives as he pushed the gurney back into the autopsy room. Once inside, he rolled the corpse onto the large steel table and rinsed sand and other foreign objects off the body. The runoff was trapped in the table's custom-made drain trap, in the event detectives wanted to review the contents.

Mac and Kevin slipped on rubber gloves, getting small envelopes and evidence tape ready to collect hair and skin samples, or whatever else Kristen found to be of interest. Kevin snapped a couple more pictures of the body, probably more out of restlessness than necessity. Mac let his gaze linger on his partner. He'd only known Kevin for a few months, but he had the feeling something had been bothering him lately. Several times he'd wanted to ask Kevin about his unusual behavior but hadn't felt like it was the right time or place. He figured whatever it was, Kevin would tell him eventually.

After several minutes, Kristen returned with the x-rays, affixed the three plaques on the lighted board, and snapped on the light.

“Houston, we have a problem,” Kristen said while Mac was still trying to figure out what part of the body they were looking at.

“What?” Mac asked. “Where?”

Kristen pointed it out. “See this white mark under the scapula? That's a piece of metal.” She grabbed a small ruler from the counter and held it up to the x-ray. “This is actual size, so we are looking at about half an inch. Let's get inside and see what it is.”

Henry handed Kristen a long metal rod that looked like a two-foot-long knitting needle.

“You thinking what I'm thinking, Henry?”

“Yep.” Henry nodded.

A bullet,
Mac guessed. Not wanting to interrupt the team with his observation, he watched intently. Kristen turned back to the body then looked at the x-ray again. She lifted the victim's left arm and fingered around the armpit. “Bingo.” Without explanation, Kristen placed the rounded point of the metal rod beneath her finger and gently slid the rod into the body. “Looks like you got about a ten-inch trajectory path, boys. My guess is it will go through both lungs and kiss the heart on the way.”

Mac had been right. That pleased him. “So someone shot him. Guess that rules out our bargeman theory.” He looked at the x-ray again and then turned his attention back to Kristen.

Kristen nodded. “Hard to tell for sure until we open him up, but that would be my guess. Henry?”

With a scalpel, Henry made the large Y incision in the body.

Then he cut a pathway though the ribs and sternum, allowing Kristen access. Henry removed the section of chest and set it at the foot of the metal table. Kristen dictated her findings into the audio recorder before going any further. Mac watched Kristen's animated features rather than her hands. Fascination accentuated her eyes, making them a brighter blue and giving her look of a kid with a new chemistry set.

“I need to remove the organs before I can get to the tip of the rod,” she explained. “The trajectory extends from the left side of the torso to the right shoulder blade.”

“We're not going anywhere,” Kevin told her.

Kristen removed the heart and lungs, placing them in the scale that hung over the top of the John Doe's feet. After weighing the organs, she dissected them into quarter-inch slices. “Aha. I was right, boys. Our victim was double-lunged by the metal object, and it took out the tip of his aorta. Unless this was some weird postmortem wound, this will be my cause of death. Poor guy wouldn't have lived sixty seconds with a wound like this.” She went on to examine the large and small intestines, finding nothing of evidentiary value.

Mac motioned to where the metal rod was still sticking out of the torso. “We checked over the body down at the beach. How could we have missed the entry wound?”

“With the bloating and skin slip, it was easy to miss.” Kristen nodded toward the x-ray. “That, my friend, is why we do the films.” She examined the x-ray again. “Hmm, the rib is broken inside the cavity, and the wound is right behind the external opening. It would take considerable force to shatter a rib like this.”

“Like a bullet.” Kevin came forward, and Mac thought he looked pale. His colorless face hadn't come from being around the autopsy—Mac knew that much. Kevin was a seasoned cop.

“Yep.” Kristen raised an eyebrow, looking at Kevin as though she'd noted the pallor as well. “I'm still thinking gunshot wound. If he is one of our barge guys, there's more to the story than meets the eye.”

Henry moved into position at the head of the table with the electric bone saw, preparing to remove the scalp so Kristen could examine the brain. He had previously made a circular incision around the head, level with the top of the eyebrows.

“Let's hold off on the head, Henry. I want to get that metallic object out of him before we get carried away.”

Henry put down the saw and placed all the dissected organs into a clear plastic bag, eventually to be placed back inside the body for burial or cremation. With forceps, Kristen went searching for the metal object she found on the x-ray. “Here we go; I've got it.” Kristen grunted as she twisted her arm around the body cavity of the victim. She pulled a small red glob of blood and metal from the body, held up to the light, then set it on the shiny table.

“Let me get a shot of that before you wash it down.” Kevin inched forward and snapped a photo. He then set a small plastic evidence ruler on the table for perspective and took two more photos. “Okay, thanks.”

“Here you go.” Henry handed Kristen a pair of tweezers and a small plastic cup, half-filled with water.

“Thanks.” Kristen picked up the piece of metal and tissue with the tweezers and placed it in the cup, swirling the water gently at first then more vigorously. She then poured the contents of the cup into her gloved left hand, holding it out for Mac and Kevin to examine. Mac eyed the mushroomed bullet. “Huh. Looks like a .38 or .357 to me.”

Kristen placed the bullet on the table while Kevin took several more photos. Using the tweezers, she picked it up again and held it up to the light. “Looks like murder to me.” Excitement of the find lit up her eyes as her gaze flitted from Mac to Kevin, then back to Mac. Mac caught a challenge in her eyes but wasn't sure what it meant.

Kevin dropped his camera, letting the leather strap catch it. “At best, a very suspicious death. We better get to work finding out who this character is. If it is a murder, we're way behind the eight-ball on catching the killer—by at least a couple of weeks.”

14

M
AC, GO AHEAD and let Sarge know we are going to be a couple more hours, at the earliest. Tell him we're gonna try to get some fingerprints off this guy. See if he can grease the skids for us and get someone from the latent print unit to standby for us.”

“You got it,” Mac said, already halfway out the door.

“Grab the print kit, would you?” Kevin yelled after Mac.

“You bet.” Glad to get out of the room for a few minutes, Mac jogged through the icy rain to their car, climbed in, then grabbed the cell phone off the dash and hit the speed dial to Frank. He summed up their findings to the sergeant and repeated Kevin's message. Frank agreed to make a call to the crime lab and let them know the detectives would be bringing in some inked prints and a bullet for examination. The ice was already building up on the windshield, so Mac started the car and put on the defrost. He'd have to leave the car running or they'd never be able to leave the parking lot.

Mac popped the trunk and reluctantly stepped outside. He pulled his jacket tighter around him and lifted his shoulders, hoping for a modicum of protection against the sleet. Rummaging through the damp clothing, he pulled out a small metal case from beside the spare tire. He locked the car and jogged back into the autopsy room, slipping on the icy step and almost taking a header.

As he entered the autopsy room, he found Kevin and Kristen bent over and examining the victim's left hand.

“I've got the ink kit.” Mac set it down and joined them. “And Sarge is going to make those calls to the lab so they'll wait for us downtown. Might take us awhile to get there, though. We got us a full-blown ice storm out there.”

“Neither hail, nor rain, nor snow, nor ice will keep our OSP guys from their appointed rounds,” Kristen said.

“That's the post office, not OSP.” Mac brushed away the cold droplets on his forehead with the back of his hand.

“There's a clean towel on the counter over there, Mac. You might want to dry your hair,” Kristen offered.

Mac took her advice, mopping up the ice that had accumulated on his head and shoulders. When he finished, Kevin was holding the victim's index finger. “Let's try to roll one, Mac.”

“While you two are working on that,” Kristen said, “I'll check the fax and see if those Coast Guard documents have arrived with the description of the two bargemen.” Kristen dropped her rubber gloves on the empty exam table and walked out of the room.

Henry left as well, his job finished there until they were ready for him to remove the body.

Mac opened the box and slid a white-and-pink fingerprint card from a manila envelope. “You want to try the ink pad, Kevin, or the real stuff?”

“Better try the ink pad first, before we make too big of a mess.

This guy's got fairly long fingernails, so it should make for a good grip with the print spoon.”

Mac pulled a metal fingerprint spoon from the kit and handed it to Kevin. The spoon looked like a shoehorn with a trigger guard on one end. He then grabbed the circular black ink pad from the box, taking off the lid and setting the pad on the edge of the table next to the victim's arm.

“I'll hold the fingers, and you try to roll the card.” Kevin turned slightly for a better vantage point.

Printing a live person was difficult enough; printing a dead one was awkward at best. Kevin hooked the print spoon under the left index finger and pulled it over the back of the hand until it made a distended arch. “Give it a try, Mac.”

Mac moved in next to Kevin, grabbing the ink pad off the table and rolling it over the pad of the finger. He then folded the print card around the box labeled for the left index finger and rolled the paper card on the top of the inked finger.

“How's it look?” Kevin asked, still holding the lifeless hand.

“Not great.” Mac showed Kevin the card. “What do you think?”

“That's what I was afraid of. Poor quality.” Kevin let the hand rest on the table and stepped back. “The prints don't have enough ridge detail. We've got to get the skin off his index finger and thumb, then dry them before they will roll.”

Kristen came in, holding a stack of papers. “Looks like our guy may not be one of the drowning victims after all.”

“Why am I not surprised?” Mac stepped over to the empty autopsy table where Kristen was laying out the faxes she'd gotten from the Coast Guard.

“Vic number one on the drowning was Latino, only about sixty-four inches, and had some false teeth. Our guy's got a perfect smile and may have gained some water weight, but he couldn't have grown over a half a foot.”

Mac and Kevin both looked over the grainy fax pictures of the drowning victims. “What about the second guy?” Mac asked. “From what Chris said, he was about the right height and weight. Right hair color.”

“He does, or did.” Kristen slid a piece of paper to the front of the table where Mac was standing. “But take a look under the scars, marks, and tattoos section on the NCIC report.”

“‘Drowning victim number two had his appendix out and had a shamrock tattoo on his right shoulder,'” Mac read the report over her shoulder. Kristen turned for a moment, her face inches away from his. In that moment, Mac wanted nothing more than to pull her into his arms and kiss her. He stepped back and looked away, annoyed by his animal instincts and feeling like he'd gotten caught stealing.

Kristen didn't seem the least bit offended. In fact, she seemed to enjoy the moment. He expected a smart remark, but none came.

Kevin rounded the corner of the table and took a look at the victim's shoulder. “No tats on the shoulder or anywhere else I can see.”

“And no appendix scar,” Kristen added, not missing a beat.

“This guy is a totally new unsub.” Glancing at Mac, she added, “That's slang for unidentified subject.”

Mac knew that but didn't trust himself to speak. He clamped his jaw and tried to focus on what Kevin was saying rather than on the testosterone-induced state he'd fallen into.