“I’ll keep you posted.”
* * *
Nathan hated the county coroner’s office. Nice furnishings and comfortable guest chairs notwithstanding, it was an unpleasant place to visit. He knew what was inside those manila folders piled up on the desk and shoved into the file cabinets. Franklin didn’t seem bothered by it, but Nathan was. “Could the blood tests be missing something?”
“It’s not likely.”
“But it is possible.”
“Anything is possible, Nathan, you know that. But possible and probable are vastly different things.” Franklin tugged off his glasses. His white coat worn in the lab was still crisply pressed and clean; it didn’t fit with the fact he’d paused an autopsy to take a coffee break when Nathan arrived.
“I’m casting a very wide net looking for something triggering the seizure and heart attack I found in Peggy and the heart attack I found in Karen. I don’t like seeing young people die of natural causes—their age itself suggests a contributing factor. But I’ve found no signs of a systemic allergic reaction, of a poison, or of a known drug in their system, legal or otherwise, in a quantity that concerns me.”
“What about a new designer drug? That’s what I’m worried about most,” Nathan clarified.
“Most designer drugs are derivates of existing drugs on the market. The tests might not be able to identify the precise substance, but they should still be picking up traces of the common elements that are present.”
Nathan was at the edge of his medical knowledge to figure out what question to ask, but he had to leave this office comfortable with the conclusions being reached. “This situation just feels wrong, accepting these two deaths are both natural causes. Hypothetically, assuming these two cases are murders—can you give me anything that might suggest this is a substance, either man-made or natural toxin, causing the deaths?”
Franklin rocked back in his chair as he thought about it; then he nodded. “Okay, hypothetically. It’s killing fast with a seizure, a heart attack. Something they ingest that quickly metabolizes and affects their heart—a liquid maybe. Or it could be something that is affecting the brain directly. Something they might inhale.”
“Something they inhale. A perfume.”
“It doesn’t have to be that elaborate. Like smelling chlorine in a pool or broccoli steaming—the concentrations wouldn’t have to be that high to do damage if the toxin is powerful enough.”
“That’s helpful. Anything else?”
“Theoretically, and I’m really reaching here—it could be a new class of substances that we just don’t expect—kind of like how aspirin and Tylenol are both painkillers but are very different at their molecular level. Designer drugs run in those kinds of unique classes too.
“Get something so designer it’s not even expected to have a narcotic effect, and that changes this equation. Once a decade some new category appears—meth exploded into the market, ecstasy, PCP—something that changes the look of the entire narcotics landscape. But those massive sea shifts in drug designs tend to appear on the coasts and work inland, not originate in small-town mainland USA.”
“You’re talking a first-rate chemist for creating a new drug category,” Nathan clarified.
“More than that,” Franklin replied. “You’re talking about very expensive precursor chemicals. You’re talking about control of formulations, repeatability, scientific focus. The homegrown meth cook looking to make a more potent batch so he’s tinkering a bit as he heats his pot isn’t going to be this kind of cook. It’s basic things like writing information down. Otherwise it’s just a new batch of something the cook tries on himself and you find him dead next to his hot plate. It might have been a fascinating new drug, but it will never get made again—the cook didn’t write down what he did differently this time, and he just killed himself.”
“I see your point. The drug that killed those kids at the millennium rave party years ago—you’d be able to spot it?”
“In the formulation that was used then, or any reasonably close similarity to it—I’d see it,” Franklin promised. “Nathan—science of the kind I do can never be perfect. There are too many variables that change between the time of death and when the body is found. But let me offer a reassurance. If I’m right that these two deaths are natural causes, then statistically there should be no more unexplained deaths within the Justice area for some time. If they have a cause—you’ll be learning about death number three soon enough and I’ll be asking nationwide for help to figure this out. I’ll take the media hit for declaring these natural-cause deaths.”
“You know it’s more than that.”
“I know. But in this situation, we either leave the cases open, pending more information that we don’t know where it will come from or we close them as natural causes. The honest thing to do is to close them as natural causes, and if I’m wrong, admit that publicly. We both have to flow with what is before us as facts and work from there. I’ll call if there is anything that shows up in blood tests still being run on Karen. But if they’re clean, I’ll be ready to sign off on her death as natural causes by tomorrow morning.”
Nathan wished he felt better about that answer, but at least they were answers. “That’s good to know. Thanks for your time, Franklin.”
“I wish it was an easier answer to accept.”
Nathan got to his feet, relieved to be leaving the office. “It’s what you have. That matters. It will have to do.”
* * *
Nathan stretched out on Bruce’s couch and closed his eyes. It felt very good to fade into oblivion for a minute. If he had returned to the office he would have to start returning calls on the phone slips still shoved into his pocket, and the day had just been too long to want to deal with the inevitable tussles of people in this town that were not life-and-death situations but needed a sheriff’s touch to mediate and resolve. He didn’t have it in him this particular hour.
He was beyond tired right now. He shook off that desire to cut and run and told himself to suck it in. He’d known days like this would be part of the job when he’d put his name on the ballot and asked townsfolk to trust him. “Where’s Rae?” he asked, stopping the circling thoughts running around in his head.
“At the hotel catching a nap,” Bruce answered.
The idea of a bed sounded so much more appealing than this couch. “We got preempted earlier on a trip out to Nella’s. You want to come along?” That stop was the last one Nathan could think of that might give him an answer on the details of the story Peggy had been working on at the time of her death. After that he was going home to let his dogs out and crash for a few hours of sleep.
“I’ll pass. That lady doesn’t particularly like me.”
“Why am I not surprised?” Nathan sighed. “This is typing as a second accidental death and that is freaky.”
“I don’t know what you could do besides what you’re already doing. If it is murder there has to be something that says murder.”
“I know. And I’m no doctor. The coroner is the best we have in the county, and I would have said he is as good as any in the state.”
“Then let him do his job and trust his judgment. It’s the best you can do.”
“Yeah. I got a science lesson today that convinced me I’m definitely not on ground I understand particularly well.”
If there was a link between these two cases, it circled back to the story Peggy was working on, it meant a designer drug, and that meant a cook somewhere in his area willing to kill people—the thought of that was more than just depressing, it left him chilled. Who?
Nathan swung himself back to sitting up. “I need some dinner before I probably end up out at the tile plant for the night. Let’s get Rae, go find that thick steak I owe you, and then I’ll take her out to meet Nella and we’ll try and wrap up the Peggy Worth questions tonight.”
“It sounds like a good plan.” Bruce closed the file he had been working on. “You’ll get through this, Nathan. Peggy and K
aren really will be natural-caused deaths, the tile-plant strike will end, and this town will get back to normal. You’ll get back to dealing with the occasional vandalisms and the domestic fights and your grandfather speeding.”
Nathan smiled, appreciating the encouragement. “Answer me one thing first. You met folks in your career who would cook up stuff like what killed Prescott’s grandson. What were they like, the cooks who did that kind of thing?” Bruce might have been retired for years, the drugs might have changed, but the people didn’t.
Bruce rocked back in his chair and thought about it. “Not flashy, not out in front. Dispassionate about people, cold, the better ones enjoying their craft just like an arsonist would enjoy striking a match to watch it burn.”
Bruce looked over, his eyes colder now from the memories. “Greed drove them, rather than power. They wanted the cash that came from their new product but rarely wanted to work to be the power broker in an area, the one holding the most territory. Cooks were the face in the background, rarely seen, avoiding connections to the dealer crowd. Very tough men to catch. I always thought of them as assassins at heart.”
“You caught a few.”
“Not as many as I knew were out there working against me. Some were artists, labeling their products with initials and fancy names; others were clinical about it, their products merely hitting the streets with a number. One guy, I always knew his stuff was six-nine-something. After I caught him I realized sixty-nine was his street address.” Bruce winced at the memory. “That arrogance was more rare than common. Most just wanted to stay in the background and get rich. And most eventually ended up spending the money in ways that gave themselves away.”
Bruce shrugged. “I once had a kid boast how he had burned up a million dollars’ worth of cocaine swiped from his dealer brother as he figured out how to make cocaine-laced lollipops. That kind of cost structure—you will find financial backers for cooks occasionally, but it is rare. There is so much money to be made in known drug formulas that there is not much investment interest in creating more.”
Nathan listened and he realized it was the most he had gotten Bruce to say about his former job in all the years he had known him. Bruce had forgotten more about the subject of drugs and dealers than Nathan had personally ever known. If there was something here to see, Bruce would have already spotted it.
Nathan pushed his hands through his hair and had to laugh. “Up until a couple years ago my biggest headache around here was worrying about the kids who were splitting open fireworks to use the gunpowder to make their homemade rockets go higher. Please just give me back those days.”
“They’ll be back,” Bruce promised, amused. “If there really is a local connection to the Prescott kid’s death, it’s just a couple people, Nathan. Justice is too small a town to have its own population of drug dealers and players living here. They need big cities and plentiful customers nearby. Two or three guys who will eventually either get busted by you for a crime or who will move on, because everyone moves on in this mobile society, and they will become some other town’s problem.”
“You know how cynical that is, hoping that any bad guys that happen to be in the area just move away?”
Bruce shrugged. “You take whatever works. And if they are good enough to not get caught—let them move and become someone else’s problem.”
Bruce got up from his desk chair. “Population growth in Justice being what it is it’s major news having five more births in a year than deaths of elderly residents. Face it, Nathan, Justice is a small town that will always be a small town. That’s one of the reasons I moved here. It’s hard to have a long-term serious crime rate when criminals consider the town boring to live in.”
Nathan smiled as he got to his feet. “Before you cheer me up too much more, let’s go get that steak.”
Bruce grinned. “I did the math before I moved here, you know. A 2 percent criminal population—which you don’t have—gives you two hundred fifty people to worry about, and only one or two of those are capable of being trouble with a capital T. You’ve got twenty-some officers. You should be able to take them eventually.”
Nathan pushed his friend in the doorpost as he went by. “Eventually indeed. You really did the math?”
“Insulting, isn’t it?”
“I want a raise. I can count two hundred fifty troublemakers that show up at the city council meetings alone.”
22
By the time he was headed out to Nella’s, Nathan felt like he had relaxed for the first time in days. Bruce was the kind of guy that had that influence on him, and listening over dinner to Rae and Bruce talk about their former days together at the Chicago PD brought back good memories of his own first days as a beat cop.
Traffic was light, and the snow in the air was holding off to only an occasional skiff. Nathan glanced over at Rae. She sat beside him now, quietly looking through her notes for what she might want to ask Nella. He liked that quiet focus she brought to her work.
He’d suggested she ride with him rather than have her drive separately, figuring it was better to know what she was finding as she worked for Peggy’s parents than not. He skirted the line of having a civilian along for police business by accepting the technically true fact that Peggy’s case was no longer a police matter, for they still didn’t have enough to override the coroner’s ruling and formally reopen her death. Truth was, he didn’t want Rae to find out something sinister without a cop at her side.
Andy had suggested Peggy talk to Nella, and the reporter had been persistent enough on this story that she would have taken that suggestion and stopped by Nella’s on Saturday night after leaving Andy’s. Nella had probably told her an earful of news.
And knowing Nella, she would likely have more questions for them now about Peggy’s death than they had for her about Peggy’s visit. Nella was the kind of lady whose life revolved around what she heard as news and what she could pass on as news. Nathan liked Nella well enough, for she meant no harm in the gossip. Single and without family in the area, being a part of the town grapevine helped give her purpose in life.
Nathan turned into Nella’s long driveway, slowing to avoid the depressions and sinkholes taking over the crushed rock. The hardware-store owner might know someone willing to dump a load of rock for Nella free of charge. It wasn’t something she would think about dealing with until it tore up her car’s undercarriage, and she was perennially short of funds for things like home repairs.
Nathan parked near the front of her house rather than pull around to the detached garage. The trees in front of the house cast shadows that just brushed the front porch. Enough snow had melted through the day that he could see patches of grass peeking through.
Nathan picked up his notebook. “Rae, you’ll want to let me do the introductions and handle the conversation for the first bit, or you will have Nella asking enough questions to get your entire life history before she answers a single one of our questions about Peggy. She will want to end up with the scoop on the new town resident or she’ll feel shortchanged in this exchange.”
Rae smiled as she pushed open her door. “Got it.”
Nathan could hear dogs barking inside as he walked up the steps to the porch. Nella had a couple mixed-breed dogs, leaning toward the aggressive breeds. He opened the screen door and knocked on the door.
Newspapers were by the door, buried behind the planter box she still had set out, and a dozen letters were in the mailbox. The newspapers looked soggy.
Not hearing Nella coming, he pushed the doorbell and heard chimes echo inside. The dogs intensified their barking. She was normally home of an evening and quick to come to the door when she heard a car arrive.
She hadn’t been at the diner eating dinner in town, and her car hadn’t been parked on one of the streets downtown; he would have remembered that red station wagon she drove. He rang the doorbell again.
He walked down the porch and glanced through the window but could see only the living room, gla
sses on the kitchen counter, and more mail on the counter. They’d made a wasted trip; he should have called first. “I’m sorry, Rae. She’s not home.”
“Want me to leave her a note?”
“Leave her your hotel number. Knowing Nella, she’ll call you as soon as she gets home.”
While Rae dug out paper and a pen to write the note, Nathan walked back to the driveway. It really did need a load of rock to smooth it out. He estimated the width and walked toward the garage to check the length and estimate the volume she’d need. As he rounded the back corner of the house he smelled it. Garbage going bad, but worse.
“Rae.”
She came around the house.
She stopped when she got a first whiff of the odor. He could see it in her face, as her expression went still, that she recognized it too. “What kind of car does she drive?”
“A station wagon.”
Rae walked to the garage and found a window. “Her car is here.”
Nathan went to get his flashlight.
He walked the house circumference, opening the backyard gate and checking windows and doors as he went. Nothing obvious looked out of place, but the smell grew stronger.
He shone his light on the window at the east end of the house. The window screen had flies congregating on it and even a line of ants around the sill. He leaned against the house and shone his light inside, but the curtains were heavy and he could see nothing inside. The smell made his eyes water.
“We need in the house, without the dogs attacking us.”
Rae looked around. “We can force the back door and let them into the fenced backyard. If you pull over the picnic table and stand on it there should be decent protection from them going at you.”
“Which just leaves me stuck on the picnic table watching them go for my toes. I don’t want to have to shoot the dogs.”
“We can’t exactly wait around until animal control gets out here. Assuming they can find the place.”
Before I Wake Page 17