When I die, I want to be cremated. I don’t want a stranger pumping me with formaldehyde, painting my face, and prettying up my hair, all so I can be shoved into a silk-lined casket. Not a lot of things bother me. This does. The entire process of people crying over the top of the shell of what was once a human being is just creepy. The autopsy process isn’t much different. Strangers stand around and examine what is left of a human being. It’s actually morbid but necessary, and today is no different, nor is it my first rodeo.
As I’ve done too many times before, I walk to a reception area of the medical examiner’s office, where I show my credentials to gain entry into the offices. After which, I’m allowed to travel onward to the office marked Room B as DD directed in her text. I enter a small office and then stop at a second door, where I hit a buzzer. The door pops open and I walk into the lab where a covered body rests on one of the four steel tables, the other three empty.
DD steps out of an office directly at the center rear of the lab. Today she’s wearing a lab coat over some sort of dress, I assume, since her legs are bare.
“I was just about to call and check on you, Agent Love,” she greets.
“Well, thanks,” I say. “My mom is dead and she’s the only one who ever did that for me.”
She blinks, looking confused. I’d remind myself she’s not a suspect I’m trying to throw off in some way, but I’m not so sure about anything with DD, the model who might be connected to the Society.
DD presses past her confusion and says, “I came in early and got a jumpstart on the examination but there’s something I want to show you before I go further.” She motions to the body and then walks to a station between tables, grabbing gloves from a box and sliding them into place. I don’t bother. I don’t plan on touching anything.
DD and I meet on either side of the table and she pulls back the sheet to Emma’s shoulder blades. “She was too bloody to make this out on the scene,” she says, using her finger to indicate jagged marks on Emma’s neck that look like cuts. “As I expected and stated, this wasn’t a poisoning.”
My brows dip at the strange injuries I continue to study as I ask, “Did someone try to cut her throat?”
“Those cuts originate from the inside.”
My gaze jerks to hers. “As in, she swallowed sharp objects?”
“Exactly.”
Inside a pill, I think. “Do we have a toxicology report?” I ask.
“It’s not poison,” she insists.
“I understand that, DD, but our job is to find out how that happened. Whatever cut her ended up in her body through some method of transport. Food or a pill. Do we have a toxicology report?” I repeat.
“Right. Yes. Of course.” She clears her throat and straightens. “We do, and obviously, as you know, I’ll have to send off for the more extensive testing, which will take time. But for now, this is what we know. She had a few expected prescribed drugs in her system as well as ibuprofen.”
“Was there a bottle of ibuprofen found?”
“Not that I know of but she could have easily had a pill bottle or case in a kitchen drawer that was discovered after I left. Or maybe she grabbed it upstairs and then walked downstairs.”
“I’ll find out,” I say. “That’s one option. Another. Could she have eaten something that caused this?”
“If there was something in her food, I’d think she’d know it, she’d bite down on it,” she replies, “but certainly I’m looking at all possibilities.”
She’s right. We chew our food or those of us that don’t, act like the animals do. She would have felt the crunch of a sharp object. I’m back to the ibuprofen. A gel tablet maybe, which drives my next question. “Could a gel tablet be used to hide a sharp object?”
“In theory, it would be possible. I still need to open her up and take a look inside her throat and stomach. I didn’t want to do that until you saw the cuts. But that’s when I’ll know exactly what she swallowed.”
My brows dip. “How would you get something inside a pill large enough to cut her inside out and her not know it was there?”
“Believe it or not because of how stupid I sounded over the toxicology report—you make me a little nervous—I thought the same thing.” She fidgets slightly. I do make her nervous. Good. Maybe she’ll tell me who sent her here because it wasn’t organic. “But then,” she continues, “I thought I, now we, could be overthinking this. In theory inserting sharp objects into a pill is easy. What’s not as easy is inserting enough sharp objects to kill someone while making those pills appear untouched. Furthermore, why did whatever this was, cut her throat? If the sharp object was embedded in the pill it would have landed in her stomach. Which would also be deadly, but something just doesn’t add up.”
“And of course, how does the killer know the person is going to take the exact medication or even a food that has the sharp objects? They’d have to be close to the person, very close.”
“But isn’t that the case with food as well?” She asks but she doesn’t wait for an answer. “Pills make more sense than food. And she had the ibuprofen in her system.”
“In other words, we need an expert in pharmaceuticals to walk us through the mechanics, equipment needed, and so on.”
She holds up a gloved finger. “Which is why I have a call into an old college friend. Her father is CEO of a drug company. I’ll find out what we need to know.”
“Well then, DD the model, I’m slightly impressed.”
“How impressed do you have to be to call me Danica?”
“More than humanly possible,” I assure her. “I still don’t trust you.”
“At least you’re honest. I’d rather you say it to my face than behind my back.”
“Well as long as you’re pleased, DD,” I say sarcastically, but really, truly for me, that’s kind of nice. “When are you opening her up?”
“I have to deal with an incoming. It’s going to be a while, but you’re welcome to stick around.”
I might be able to stab monsters to death, but I can do without the rest of this process. “Just call me after. Unless you have more for me now, I’m done here.” I’m already headed toward the door.
I pass through the lobby and step into the hallway, replaying the crime scene in my head. Emma Wells. The dress. The bottle of water. Fake Naomi at our house. Too easily she was in our house and her connection to us originated with Kane. I snag my phone and punch his auto-dial. He doesn’t answer. “Damn it,” I murmur, “not now, Kane.” I shoot him a text message: Emma Wells ingested something that cut her from the inside out. We don’t know how or what yet, but I don’t like how easily Fake Naomi got to us. I also don’t like that it came through your contacts. Be careful.
By the time I’m in the elevator, he hasn’t answered.
I rejoin Jay in the Escalade and still, Kane hasn’t answered.