by Anne Frasier
The fire marshal stopped them. “Sprinklers are still running.”
“Fuck the sprinklers.” David pushed past him and strode inside. Officers tried to stop him. He shoved them out of the way with a look so fierce they dropped back. Avery and Elise followed close behind, Avery mumbling “Holy shit” over and over.
Emergency backup lighting was operating. Not much, but a few bulbs cut through the darkness of the windowless building. Beneath the odor of burnt wires and melted plastic was the unmistakable scent of gasoline. Water from the sprinklers pelted them, and within seconds David and Elise were as drenched as Avery, the deluge making it hard to see. It plastered hair to their heads and dripped off their chins.
They waded through water two inches deep, stepping over saturated acoustic tile that had fallen from the ceiling to reveal the dark bones of the building. The water sloshing around their shoes was tinged pink. Blood? If so, it would have taken a lot to give such a large amount of water that hue.
“First responders found John here, by the door.” Avery pointed.
Elise turned her back to a sprinkler. “Was he conscious?” She blinked. Water ran in her mouth, muffling her voice as she spoke.
“They said one of his eyes was open, but it didn’t look like he was registering anything. When I arrived, they were loading him into the ambulance.”
Had the intent been to burn the place down, or trigger the sprinklers? Whatever the reason, the results were the same. Severe damage.
“The medical team was here,” Avery said, continuing to fill them in on what had transpired before their arrival. “There was nothing I could do, so I pulled my gun and moved down the hall.”
While the sprinklers continued to soak them, Avery paused at a door, fiddling with the knob. “I didn’t see anybody, and I couldn’t find a passkey to the evidence room. It locks automatically whenever anybody leaves. Through the glass you can see whoever attacked John has been in there.”
David and Elise took turns looking through the window in the door. Evidence files were strewn around the room. Computers were smashed, data files probably destroyed, along with security footage.
Avery kept talking. “I figured it was the guys from the cemetery. That’s probably what you’re thinking, right? They wanted the body once, so they were probably here to finish what they started. So I went to the coolers.”
He sloshed away, Elise and David following, the three of them moving deeper into the building, past the autopsy suite they’d been in just hours earlier, to the cooler room with its row of stainless-steel doors. Avery stood in the center of the room while the sprinklers continued to rain down on them. He shifted from one foot to the other and motioned toward the stainless-steel doors. “Open them.” Like a dare.
David opened the first drawer, and Elise pulled back the sheet. Lamont, a hole in his chest and a sutured Y incision. In all that had happened, Elise had forgotten about Lamont, forgotten his body would still be there.
David opened a second drawer.
Elise had been focusing her thoughts on John Doe, half expected to find the body had been taken. But it was there, in the vault, doused with some type of acid, the face melted. Shifting her gaze, she noted that the hands had been doused too.
Somebody didn’t want them to discover the identity of the body. “So that’s what this is all about. Not money, not drugs. Whoever did this wanted to make sure the face was unrecognizable and no prints were left behind.”
David shut the drawer. “All for nothing if John got the autopsy information entered into the database.”
Which he might or might not have done, given how busy he’d been yesterday.
The odor of gasoline was stronger now, and the water sloshing around their ankles had an oily sheen. If someone were to strike a match, the surface would catch fire. But they continued on, numbly following where Avery led.
“I’m guessing they made her open the evidence room,” Avery told them. “Then maybe when they didn’t find what they were looking for, or even if they did, they came in here.”
They were in the break room now, the place where Mara used to offer homemade ginger cookies when people stepped from the autopsy suite looking pale and ready to pass out. She claimed she’d gotten the recipe from a coroner she’d trained under in Dallas. “Secret formula,” she’d always said with a smile.
The plate was still there, covered in clear wrap, a couple of cookies left. Elise didn’t want to stop looking at the cookies, but she forced herself to take in the rest of the scene.
There was Mara, on the floor, her body crumpled like a doll’s, legs askew, arms at odd angles, eyes open, the rain from the ceiling running across the porcelain of her skin. Elise thought about how much John adored her, how much they all adored her, how wonderful it had been for John to have finally found someone to share his life.
It was Elise’s turn to let out a sob, her turn to press her hand to her mouth. Beside her, David looked stunned. She saw his grief and had to look away.
Had they made this happen? If they hadn’t come back, if they’d gone on that vacation, the truck with the body would have gotten away, and the police would never have known that the coffin didn’t contain the body of Frank J. Remy.
“We did this,” she whispered.
David wiped water from his face and muttered some weak attempt at a protest, but he had to be thinking the same thing. And then she remembered her father’s warning. He’d told her to let it go.
From beyond the break room came the sound of activity. Two members of the crime scene team appeared with cases, both men wearing plastic rain ponchos. Elise was glad to see Abe Chilton, the head investigator. He wouldn’t miss anything. He gave them a grim nod, then shouted to anybody listening, “Somebody turn off this fucking water!” The scene was chaos.
“What’s going on?” Avery spoke to no one but himself. “What the hell is going on?” He blinked, reached for a wall. “Think I’m gonna pass out.”
David grabbed his arm. “Let’s get out of here.”
They left, moving three abreast.
Just like old times.
Elise distantly noted that the sprinklers were no longer raining down on them. She wished they were still on, still drenching their interior world, because the water had muted everything, made it seem less real.
From deep in the heart of the building, something kicked on, and a few emergency lights responded.
In the hallway, David pulled Avery out of foot traffic as the crime scene team moved back and forth. Avery leaned against a wall while David and Elise waited for his color to return. Once it did, she said, “I’m going to the hospital. Will you be okay here?”
He nodded. “Somebody needs to contact their parents.” It was obvious he didn’t want the job.
“When we have more information.” Elise headed for the exit door.
David ran after her.
CHAPTER 17
They headed straight downtown, Elise driving this time, feeling the need to do something, grip something, focus on lights and streets. Her clothes, her stupid and inappropriate clothes, were soaking into the car seat, her wet hair plastered against her neck. Both she and David smelled like gasoline.
Her mind was clicking along, trying to make sense of everything, when she became aware of David fiddling with the dashboard dials. “What are you doing?”
“Turning on the heat.”
She glanced at the outdoor-temperature gauge. “It’s seventy-five degrees.”
“I’m cold. You’re probably cold too.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“We should change before going to the hospital. Take the next exit.”
“No.” Stopping at her house, then David’s apartment, would take too much time. “We can’t waste a moment.” John could be dying.
David pulled out his phone, poked at the screen, muttered about it being wet and dead.
It was still early, but rush-hour traffic had begun. Four lanes, blasting toward downtown.
Elise passed in the right lane, one wheel on the shoulder. Without comment, David grabbed the handle above the door as she swerved back into the fastest-moving lane.
“I can’t quit thinking about the conversation with Mara yesterday,” Elise said. “I dismissed her. I was annoyed by her worry. God, I can be such a bitch sometimes. If someone else had said the same thing, I would have given it more merit. But because it was Mara—”
“Bank that.” David opened his phone and pulled out the battery. He dug a small pack of tissues from the glove compartment, pulled one free, and wiped off the phone and battery. “Put it wherever you have to put it, but put it away with that other stuff you put away and never look at.”
His words felt like a slap. She’d expected some empathy, not an attack. “Go to hell.”
“This is not the time to go soft.”
“I think it’s okay for me to feel something right now.” Her voice was tense, and there was no way he could miss how mad she was. “Mara is dead. John might be dead.”
He put his phone back together, tried to restart it, failed. “Which means we have work to do.” He dropped his phone into the cup holder between the seats.
Elise wasn’t sure she’d ever heard that formidable and deadly tone in his voice. Her anger faded. He was right. They had to focus. They’d both just witnessed Avery’s mental state. Somebody had to keep it together.
If David’s dressing-down and dismissal of her emotions was meant to get her back on track, it worked. This wasn’t about her or how she felt. This was about Mara. John.
She pulled into the ER lot, tires squealing. Shooting into the first available slot, she braked, cut the engine, and dove out of the car. Side by side, she and David ran for the entry doors. They didn’t have their badges. They were wet, wearing jogging clothing.
The nurse behind the counter recognized them instantly. Checking her computer screen, she said, “Mr. Casper’s in surgery.” She gave them directions to the waiting area. “I’ll let the doctors know you’re here.”
“Can you tell us anything about his condition?” Elise asked.
“No.” She shook her head. “I’m sorry.”
They thanked her and headed down the maze of hallways.
“We’re here so often we should just rent a room,” David said.
Elise didn’t laugh. She was still processing the news that John was lying on an operating table instead of dead downstairs in a stainless-steel cooler. “At least he’s alive, but I was hoping we’d get here in time to see him, talk to him.”
“I know you were.”
She pictured the scene. “But he would have asked about Mara. You know she would have been his first thought. And I’m not that accomplished an actress. I’m afraid he would have read her death on my face. Maybe this is better. Not seeing him. I wouldn’t have wanted him to head to surgery knowing Mara was dead.”
In the waiting area, the receptionist brought them blankets. “They’re warm,” she said. “And you two look cold.” Elise had to think about that. Yes, she was cold. Wet clothes and air-conditioning didn’t go together.
Wrapping the blankets around their shoulders, she and David sat on a hard couch. At one point David found a coffee machine and returned with two cups, handing one to Elise. “Somebody needs to call Mara’s parents before they hear about it on the news. Let me use your phone.”
“I’ll do it. You can call John’s family.”
He didn’t argue, and she saw the relief in his eyes.
Elise pulled her phone from her pants pocket, wiped the damp screen, and was relieved to find that the device hadn’t succumbed to water damage. She contacted the police department. Research was able to quickly locate the number of Mara’s parents.
When her call was answered, Elise introduced herself and heard the catch in Mara’s mother’s voice.
They always knew.
She gave her the news, then asked, “You have my phone number, right?”
The woman hesitated, probably checked her screen, answered, “Yes.”
Right now she was too numb to absorb much more than the awful news, but in an hour or so she’d begin to have questions. Elise explained about John, said they didn’t know anything yet, then told her to call when she had questions or needed more information.
Done, she handed David her phone and listened as he gave John’s parents a quick sketch of what was going on and where he and Elise were. He told them he’d have the surgeon call once John was out of surgery. From David’s side of the conversation, it sounded as if they were planning to catch a flight to Savannah. Elise wasn’t sure how John would feel about that. Neither he nor Mara had been particularly close to any of their relatives. Neither set of parents had been at the wedding, and Mara had often remarked that John was closer to Elise and David than he was to his own family.
Elise was a homicide detective. She dealt with death and the dark side of life on a regular basis. And although she’d dealt with an unusual kind of loss—the loss of her mother and father due to abandonment—she’d never lost anyone close to her, but she’d come close with Audrey. Now she’d lost Mara and might lose John. And suddenly the world was so much darker and so much more unbearable.
It was always a surprise to accidentally stumble upon the thoughts that broke you, that wrapped around your heart and squeezed it hard. She’d found them.
She tossed the blanket aside, put down her coffee, and walked deliberately to the nearest restroom. It was empty, so she locked herself in a stall and cried. At some point she heard the outer door open, caught her breath, got herself under control, flushed, pulled out toilet paper, blew her nose. Footsteps came close, and knuckles rapped lightly on her door.
“Someone in here!” she shouted.
“Elise.”
Damn.
“Do you mind?” Had he come to tell her to get a grip? Pull herself together? That they had a case to solve?
Through the closed stall door, he said, “I’m sorry about what I said earlier in the car. That was shitty of me. I was freaking out, and I turned it on you.” His voice tightened. “John’s a good friend.”
She pressed her forehead against the door, tried to catch her breath. John was David’s best friend.
“Don’t try to hide your emotions,” David said. “You do too much hiding. Ignore what I said on the way here. That was bad advice. Really bad advice, and the last thing you should be doing. Hell, I’m the one who’s always saying you need to talk about things more.”
She opened the door.
He had a hand braced against the stall. Damp and wrinkled clothes, hair dried in clumps. She sniffled and wiped at her nose. “You look like hell.”
“So do you.”
How did David do it? The loss of a child. How did he face every single day with this pain? And not only pain, fear. She’d felt that fear when she thought Audrey might be dead, but it had lasted only hours.
The pain—it was a physical thing. Her head and heart felt as if they were being crushed. “How do you do it?” she found herself asking him. She immediately regretted the question. Why had she shined a light on him and his suffering?
Forget I said that.
He seemed to know she wanted to take back her question, but he answered anyway. “I don’t. Not always.”
How quickly the euphoria of Chicago had faded, and how quickly she was once again face-to-face with the dangers she brought into her own life, their life. Someone had to do it, but did it have to be her, them?
He put an arm around her. “Come on. The operation is over, and the doctor is going to talk to us soon.”
Back in the waiting area, the surgeon finally made an appearance. Time had shifted, was hard to track, and Elise had no idea if a few minutes or a few hours had passed since they’d burst into the ER.
The doctor wore blue scrubs, a cotton cap over his head, a mask around his neck. She could tell it was bad. Someone needed to turn down the lights. They were so harsh. So blinding. So brittle.
&n
bsp; “We were able to stop the bleeding in his brain,” he said. “We’re giving him medication to hopefully control the swelling. Unfortunately, he lapsed into a coma before surgery, and he’s not rousing. Not a surprise considering the severity of his injuries. Right now all we can do is wait. His hand is a mess, bones crushed, and it will need pins. That will be dealt with once he’s stable.”
He might or might not wake up. Those were the unspoken words. And how awful to think that at least right now he didn’t know about Mara.
“You should go,” the doctor told them. “If there’s any change, you’ll be contacted.” David handed him a scrap of paper with the number of John’s parents, and the doctor promised to call immediately.
They both needed to change clothes before heading to the police station. Elise drove David to his apartment, pulling to a stop in the parking lot. He grabbed his dead phone, got out, but didn’t shut the door.
Looking straight ahead, she said, “I’m not sure he can live without her.”
“I’m not either.” Bent at the waist, he peered inside, hand on the roof of the car. “Want to come in? I’ll fix scrambled eggs. I’m not hungry, but we both should eat something.”
“Thanks, no. I need to be alone for a little while. I’ll meet you at the office.”
“Okay.” He slapped an open palm against the roof and closed the door.
On her way home, Avery phoned. “I tried to call David, but it went straight to voice mail.”
She told him what was happening with John. He told her arrangements were being made to bring in a temporary medical examiner, Hollis Blake from Atlanta. Elise knew the name, knew the woman. Cold and hard-nosed, nothing like John. “The morgue will be closed down for a while, and someone else, maybe Blake, will be doing the autopsy on Mara.” He paused. “I wanted to know if you’d like to be there. For the autopsy.”
“No.”
“That’s what I figured, but thought I’d ask.” He sounded sane, together. Probably shut off, doing his job.
Back home, Elise grabbed the portable phone from the counter, sat down on a stiff kitchen chair, and speed-dialed her ex-husband’s number. When he answered, she told him about John and Mara.