Bones Never Lie

CHAPTER 10

WHEN I WAS eight, following the loss of my father to an auto crash and my baby brother to leukemia, my grandmother relocated Mama, Harry, and me from Chicago to the Lee family home at Pawleys Island, South Carolina. Years later, after Harry and I had each married and moved on, Gran died at the overripe age of ninety-six.

A week after Gran’s funeral, Mama disappeared. Four years later, we learned she was living in Paris with a maid/nurse named Cécile Gosselin, whom she called Goose.

When I was thirty-five, Mama and Goose returned to the States. Since then they’d migrated between the Pawleys Island house and a sprawling condo on Manhattan’s Upper East Side.

Throughout the years, if Mama felt the darkness closing in, or if Goose noted the telltale signs, they’d make their way to whatever facility had caught my mother’s attention most recently. While Daisy reassembled herself, Goose would return to France to revisit whatever life she’d lived pre–Katherine Daessee Lee Brennan.

It was midnight by the time I’d explained Mama to Ryan. Her beauty. Her charm. Her madness. Her cancer. By then we’d ingested sufficient caffeine to barefoot the entire Appalachian Trail.

“She’s smart as hell. And kick-ass on the Net. You want something, Mama will find it.” Perhaps needing to emphasize the positive. “She helped me find you.”

“Sounds like your mother should work for the NSA.”

“My mother should be shot straight back into treatment.”

We looked at each other, both knowing the time for therapy was past.

“Check her emails?” Ryan suggested.

“Sure.”

There were nine in all, sent to my Gmail, AOL, and university accounts. Coded, to indicate what linked to what.

“She is cautious,” Ryan said.

“She’s batty,” I said. Immediately regretted it.

We opened the lot, and I copied the information into a Word document.

Avery Koseluk, age thirteen, went missing in Kannapolis, North Carolina, on September 8, 2011. The child’s father, Al Menniti, vanished at the same time.

Tia Estrada, age fourteen, went missing in Salisbury, North Carolina, on December 2, 2012. Her body was found in a rural area of Anson County four days later.

Colleen Donovan, age sixteen, had been reported missing in Charlotte the previous February.

“I remember Donovan,” I said. “She was a high school dropout living on the streets. I think a prossie filed the missing persons report.”

“Cops probably wrote her off as a runaway. And she was older, so she didn’t fit Rodas’s profile,” Ryan said. “Koseluk would have been treated as a noncustodial parent abduction.”

“Estrada was Latina, so she wouldn’t have matched Rodas’s profile, either.” I’d just said that when my phone pinged three times, signaling incoming texts. Mama had sent photos of the girls, undoubtedly copied and pasted from the archived articles she’d found.

Ryan put his head close to mine as I tapped to enlarge each image. I had to work to keep breathing normally.

Each girl had fair skin and long center-parted brown hair. Each was at that child-woman phase typical of adolescence, limbs gangly, chests showing the first blush of breasts.

Donovan didn’t look sixteen. Estrada didn’t look Latina. It didn’t need stating.

“Slidell can contact Salisbury tomorrow,” Ryan said.

I nodded in his direction, not really seeing him. We knew what the police and autopsy reports would say. The article on Tia Estrada reported that she was found in the open, dressed and supine. Cause of death undetermined. No arrest made.

“Until then, we could both use some sleep.”

“Yeah.” I didn’t move.

“Tempe.”

I brought Ryan’s face back into focus. His eyes made me think of cool blue fire.

“You solid?”

“As a Russian tanker.”

“Would you prefer that I stay here tonight?”

Yes.

I shrugged.

“Go on up.” Ryan’s voice sounded strange. “I know where you keep the bedding.”

I awoke to the feeling that something was wrong.

Birdie was gone. Sunlight was knifing in through the shutters.

My eyes whipped to the clock: 8:10. I’d slept through my alarm. I never do that. Larabee may have already started the Leal autopsy.

I shot out of bed, threw on clothes, no shower. Pulled my hair into a pony and brushed my teeth. Thundered down the stairs.

Ryan was in the kitchen, pouring Raisin Bran into bowls. The cat was asleep on top of the fridge.

“Jesus, Ryan. Why didn’t you ring me? Or holler up?”

“I figured you were tired.” Adding milk to the cereal. “Eat.”

“We need to go.”

“Eat.”

“I’m not hungry.”

“You have to eat.”

“No. I don’t.”

“I do.”

Ryan filled two travel mugs with coffee, added cream to mine. Then he sat and began spooning flakes into his mouth.

Eyes rolling, I sat and emptied my bowl. “Can we leave now?”

“Yes, ma’am.” Salute to the brim of his cap. Which was purple and said This is not your father’s hat in Spanish.

The drive took only minutes. An advantage to crossing uptown on a Saturday morning.

I swiped us in at the MCME. We passed through the lobby and biovestibule, then followed the sound of muted voices to autopsy room one.

The wave hit as soon as I pushed through the door. Sulfur-saturated gas produced by bacterial action and the breakdown of red blood cells. The stench of putrefaction.

Larabee was viewing X-rays on wall-mounted illuminators. He wore scrubs and had a mask hanging below his jaw. A half-dozen crime scene photos lay on the counter.

Slidell was beside Larabee, looking like hell. Dark stubble, baggy eyes, skin the color of old grout. I wondered if he’d been up all night. Or if it was the odor. Or the grim show he was about to witness.

An autopsy assaults not just the nose but all senses. The sight of the fast-slash Y incision. The sound of pruning shears crunching through ribs. The schlop of organs hitting the scale. The acrid scorch of the saw buzzing through bone. The pop of the skullcap snapping free. The frrpp of the scalp and face stripping off.

Pathologists aren’t surgeons. They’re not concerned with vital signs, bleeding, or pain. They don’t repair or overhaul. They search for clues. They need to be objective and observant. They don’t need to be gentle.

The autopsy of a child always seems more brutal. Children look so innocent. So soft and freckled and pink. Brand-new and ready for all life has to offer.

Such was not the case with Shelly Leal.

Leal lay naked on a stainless steel table in the center of the room, chest and abdomen bloated and green. Her skin was sloughing, pale and translucent as rice paper, from her fingers and toes. Her eyes, half open, were dull and darkened by opaque films.

I steeled myself. Kicked into scientist mode.

It was November. The weather had been cool. Insect activity would have been minimal. The changes were consistent with a postmortem interval of one week or less.

I crossed to the counter and glanced at the scene photos. Saw the familiar faceup straight-armed body position.

We watched as Larabee did his external exam, checking the contours of the belly and buttocks, the limbs, the fingers and toes, the scalp, the orifices. At one point he tweezed several long hairs from far back in the child’s mouth.

“They look a little blond to be hers?” Slidell asked.

“Not necessarily. Decomp and stomach fluids can cause bleaching.” Larabee dropped the hairs into a vial, sealed and marked the lid.

Finally, the Y-cut.

There was no chatter throughout the slicing and weighing and measuring and sketching. None of the dark humor used to lessen morgue tension.

Slidell mostly kept his gaze fixed on things other than the table. Now and then he’d give me a long stare. Shift his feet. Reclasp his hands.

Ryan observed in grim silence.

Ninety minutes after starting, Larabee straightened. There was no need to recap his findings. We’d heard him dictate every detail into a hanging mike.

The victim was a healthy thirteen-year-old female of average height and weight. She had no congenital malformations, abnormalities, or signs of disease. She’d eaten a hot dog and an apple less than six hours before her death.

The child’s body had no healed or healing fractures, scars, or cigarette burns. No bruising or abrasion in the area of the anus or genitalia. None of the hideous indicators of physical or sexual abuse.

Shelly Leal had been nurtured and loved until a maniac decided it was time she should die. And there was nothing to verify how that had happened.

“No petechiae?” I was asking about tiny red spots that appear in the eyes due to the bursting of blood vessels.

“No. Though the sclera is toast.”

“What’s that?” Slidell.

“Petechial hemorrhage is suggestive of asphyxiation,” I said.

“The lips are badly swollen and discolored, but I saw no surface or subdermal hemorrhage. No cuts or tooth impressions.”

“So, what? You thinking smothering? Strangulation?” Slidell said.

“I’m thinking I can’t determine cause of death, Detective.” Larabee’s voice carried a slight edge. He’d just dictated that conclusion.

Slidell’s cheeks reddened through the pallor. “We done here, then?”

“I’ll go over her with an ALS. Recheck the clothes. Not sure there’s much point, given the decomp, but I’ll try to get samples to send off for tox screening.”

Slidell nodded. Made a move toward the door.

“Ryan and I think we’ve found evidence of other victims.” No way I’d mention Mama.

“Yeah?” The pouchy eyes shot to Ryan. “You planning to share that?”

“We’re sharing it now.”

Slidell drew a long breath through his nose. Exhaled with a dry whistling sound. “I gotta explain this to the parents.” Flapping an arm at the table. “Ryan, you want to ride along, lay it all out on the way? Then we brief Barrow.”

“You’re the boss,” Ryan said.

When Slidell and Ryan were gone, Larabee and I got out the alternate light source kit, donned goggles, and killed the overheads. As we ran the wand over Leal’s body, I told him about Koseluk, Estrada, and Donovan. He listened without comment.

We found no latent prints, no hairs or fibers, no body fluids. No surprise but worth a shot.

Leal’s clothing hung on a rack by the side counter, stained and mud-stiffened. Yellow hooded nylon jacket, plaid shirt, red jeans, cotton panties, black and yellow Nikes, white socks.

We started with the jacket. Got nothing on the front. Flipped it.

“What’s that?” I pointed to a bat-shaped luminescence on one edge of the hood.

Larabee bent close but said nothing.

“I’ll bet the farm that’s a lip print,” I said. “Look at the shape. And the wiggly vertical stripes.”

“How’s a lip print survive a week in the elements?” Still studying the vaguely lustrous smear.

“Maybe it’s gloss? Or ChapStick?”

Our eyes met. Wordlessly, we crossed to Leal. Under our light, the bloated little lips showed not the faintest glimmer to indicate makeup or balm. Larabee wiped them and sealed the swab in a vial. “You thinking cheiloscopic ID?” Some researchers believe the patterning of a lip’s surface furrows is as unique to an individual as the lines and ridges on a fingerprint. Larabee was referring to the science of analyzing them.

“No. Well, maybe. Mostly, I’m thinking DNA. If there’s saliva and the lip print’s not hers …” I let the thought hang.

“Son of a biscuit. Could we get that lucky?” Larabee placed the jacket in an evidence bag and scribbled case info on the outside.

The rest of the clothes yielded zilch.

As Larabee and I removed our aprons, gloves, goggles, and masks, I mentioned an idea that had been percolating since I’d read Mama’s emails.

“Gower was abducted in Vermont in 2007. Nance was killed here in Charlotte in 2009. Koseluk was 2011, Estrada 2012, Donovan late 2013 or early 2014.”

“Now there’s Shelly Leal.” Larabee balled and dropped his gear into the biohazard bin. “An annual kill since the action moved to North Carolina.” The lid clanged shut. “With one gap.”

“I’m going to pull a file from 2010,” I said.

Larabee turned to me, face glum. He also remembered.