The Bones She Buried

Six

Denton’s city morgue was located in the basement of Denton Memorial Hospital, which was an old brick building that sat on top of a hill overlooking most of the city. The small suite of rooms that Medical Examiner, Dr. Anya Feist, presided over were windowless and drab with a lingering odor that was half chemical and half biological decay. Josie had grown used to it over the years, but she could tell the moment she stepped into the large exam room that Mettner had a long way to go. He looked green as he stood beside Dr. Feist at one of the tables, a file spread out between them.

On the far side of the room, Colette’s body lay covered, her brown-gray hair showing from the top of the sheet. A shiver ran through Josie. It was still so difficult to believe this was happening. Her heart ached for Noah. She had always envied him his normal upbringing and had felt grateful and a little jealous that he had had such a kind, loving mother.

“Didn’t expect to see you today,” Dr. Feist said when she saw Josie. Offering a sympathetic smile, she added, “Please give Noah my condolences.”

“You didn’t have to come,” Mettner added. “I just wanted to keep you up to date with what was happening.”

Josie jammed her hands into her jeans pockets. “Noah wanted me to come. The family wants to know what happened.”

Dr. Feist frowned, then reluctantly she held up a page from the file in front of her. “I don’t really know how to tell you this, but Mrs. Fraley was definitely murdered. Asphyxiated. She aspirated on the dirt when she breathed it in.”

Josie swallowed over the lump that had formed in her throat. “You mean she choked on it?”

Dr. Feist put the page onto the table and stepped toward Josie, regarding her with sympathy. “Josie, are you sure you want to hear this?”

“I have to,” Josie croaked.

Dr. Feist motioned toward Officer Mettner. “I’m sure Mett can handle it. He told me this is his first homicide, but everyone has to start somewhere. Maybe he can catch you up on the details later? After you’ve taken some time. We can release the body to the family tomorrow. Then perhaps after the funeral, if you still want to know the details, Officer Mettner can fill you in?”

Josie felt tears stinging the backs of her eyes as her gaze drifted back to Colette’s small, shrouded body. Josie didn’t want to know the intimate and gruesome details of her murder, but she owed it to Noah to continue. Mettner was a fine officer, and Josie had no doubt that one day, he’d be one of the best detectives Denton PD had ever had, but she couldn’t trust an investigation this personal to him alone. When Noah had taken enough time himself to process some of his shock and grief, he would need justice and closure. Josie knew this from her own experience of losing loved ones to violent crimes. She also knew how crucial the early stages of a homicide investigation were. She had to make sure that everything was done according to procedure; that no detail was left unexamined; and that Mettner explored absolutely every avenue of inquiry.

Josie blinked back the moisture in her eyes. “I’m fine. Please. Just tell me what you found.”

With a sigh, Dr. Feist continued, “I say ‘aspirate’ because there was particulate matter—small amounts of soil—in her lungs. She inhaled it. But to answer your question, yes, she choked on it. Her airway was completely blocked. There are small petechiae in the conjunctiva of her eyes.”

Mettner pulled out his phone, swiping until he pulled up his note-taking app. “Petechiae?” he echoed.

Josie said, “Petechial hemorrhages. They look like tiny, pinpoint red marks in the eyes and sometimes on the skin—sometimes only visible with a microscope and sometimes as large as a couple of millimeters. They occur when the body is deprived of oxygen. The tiny capillaries in the eyes leak or rupture from the pressure on the veins in the head.”

Dr. Feist nodded approvingly as Josie spoke. “Exactly. They are indicators of death by asphyxia. Sometimes by hanging or strangulation, but in this case it’s quite clear how she was asphyxiated.”

Mettner used one finger to tap the page that Dr. Feist had discarded. “There were some marks on her arms—bruising and lacerations—that we believe were defensive. No sign of sexual assault.”

Dr. Feist added, “Her brain showed—” she broke off, looking back toward Colette’s body and shifting from one foot to the other. Josie had never seen Dr. Feist look so uncomfortable. Josie guessed she wasn’t used to discussing the clinical aspects of her examinations with people so intimately connected to the victims.

“It’s okay. Noah and his sister suspected she had some form of dementia. Is that what you found?” Josie asked, urging her onwards.

Dr. Feist nodded. She waved Josie over to a corner of the room where a long, stainless steel counter jutted out from the wall. A microscope rested in the center with several glass slides beside it. Dr. Feist leaned over and studied the slides—all of which bore Colette’s name—before sliding one into the viewer. She took a quick look and then motioned for Josie to do the same.

To Josie, the small square in her vision looked like a child had scrawled on it with a fuchsia colored crayon. Uneven purple dots scattered across the slide, and in the center was a large, dark splotch, almost brown, with another, purple dot inside of it—this one much larger than the others. “What am I looking at?” she asked.

Dr. Feist said, “I took several samples from Mrs. Fraley’s brain. That one was taken from her hippocampus. It’s a pyramidal cell from the CA1 area of the hippocampus.”

Josie looked up. Behind them, Mettner said, “The hippocampus is responsible for memory.”

Dr. Feist said, “Basically, yes.”

Josie pointed to the microscope. “So this specimen is from Colette’s hippocampus.”

“Correct. The large, spherical mass you see in the center—”

“With the purple dot inside of it?” Josie asked.

Dr. Feist smiled.

Josie said, “Simplistic is better.”

“Very well,” Dr. Feist said. “Yes, the purple dot. That’s evidence of a Lewy body.”

Mettner’s thumbs froze. He looked up from his phone. “A what?”

Dr. Feist waved him over. He placed his phone on the counter and gazed into the microscope while Dr. Feist explained. “The simplistic explanation is that a Lewy body is an abnormal mass of protein that develops inside nerve cells. These deposits of protein affect chemicals in the brain and that leads to problems with cognition, movement, perception, behavior…”

She drifted off. Josie thought of what Noah had told her about Colette mistaking him for his father—not just mistaking him but going back in her mind to a time when she was married to his father. Sadness engulfed her. A woman as kind as Colette deserved better. She hadn’t deserved to lose her faculties just as her first grandchild was about to be born. Still, had she lived, there might have been treatments or medications that could have improved her quality of life or perhaps extended her periods of lucidity. Now they would never know.

Dr. Feist said, “Josie?”

Mettner had abandoned the microscope and picked up his phone again. He looked back and forth between the two women, waiting for more information to add to his notes.

Josie shook off her grief. “I’m fine. So, she had dementia? Alzheimer’s?”

“Well, Lewy body dementia is a common form of dementia. With Alzheimer’s, I would also expect to see amyloid plaques and neurofibrillary tangles in the brain so this may have been Lewy body dementia.”

“May?”

“Well, the other diagnosis associated with findings of Lewy bodies is Parkinson’s. Did Mrs. Fraley have any noticeable physical symptoms? Poor balance or coordination? Trembling of her extremities? Stiffness of limbs or trunk?”

Josie shook her head. “No. I don’t think so. Noah never mentioned that, and I never saw her struggle physically.”

“But you said her children were concerned about dementia,” Dr. Feist said.

Again, Josie mentally put aside the emotion that was in danger of taking over. Without meaning to, her eyes drifted once more to Colette’s covered body. She tried to speak but her voice came out as a rasp. Clearing her throat, she tried again, “Uh, yes, she was, um, having cognitive issues. Memory problems.”

Dr. Feist nodded. She stepped directly in front of Josie, blocking her view of Colette. Elegant fingers reached out and brushed Josie’s arm. “Well, I’d have to do an in-depth interview with her family to be absolutely sure, but my initial diagnosis would be Lewy body dementia. Although I’m not sure it’s really relevant now.”

Mettner’s thumbs stopped moving. “Not relevant?”

“Well, yes,” Dr. Feist said. “The finding of dementia is really incidental. It has nothing to do with her death and didn’t contribute to it at all, unless, of course, she wasn’t lucid when the she came into contact with the killer.”

Josie said, “Meaning she may have thought the killer was someone she knew, someone she trusted? Maybe if she had been lucid, she wouldn’t have let him into her house?”

Dr. Feist shrugged. “Perhaps. It really doesn’t matter though. As I told you, the cause of death is asphyxiation; manner of death is homicide. You’ve definitely got a murder on your hands. I’m so sorry, Josie.”