Hurley considers this. “That should be okay,” he says. “At this point, I’ll take all the help I can get.”
After another brief silence, Izzy says, “Mattie tells me you’ve made some progress on the investigation into Hal’s case.”
Hurley makes a frustrated grimace. “Not enough,” he says. “I talked to a friend of mine who’s with the FBI because I think it’s too involved for us to handle alone, but he didn’t think there was enough for them to go on. We already know who killed Hal, Tina, and Carolyn Abernathy, and he’s dead, so as far as they’re concerned, those cases are closed. And they think Marla Weber’s killer has been caught and convicted, as well.”
“You told your FBI friend that Prince was blackmailed into it?” Izzy asks.
“I did,” Hurley says with a sigh of resignation, “but there isn’t any proof of that other than the man’s dying declaration to me. I’ve already given Laura the task of trying to match up names of people who live in the Kenilworth area near the cell towers that both Hal and Carolyn pinged off of to see if any connections pop up.”
“Yeah, Mattie mentioned that,” Izzy says. “Sounds like a long shot.”
“Maybe,” Hurley says, though he seems relatively upbeat about the idea. “I’ve also got Arnie and Laura digging into the Big Pharma industry to see if they can sort out the corporate maze and find anything useful, but it looks like these guys cover their tracks all too well.”
“Mattie told me your theory about the Kuppers,” Izzy says. “Those are some high-powered suspects you’re dealing with.”
Hurley nods, a sober expression on his face. “It might help if we could definitively decipher Hal’s cryptic notes, but we haven’t had much luck with that other than my suspicions about those initials. I can’t be sure I’m right, and unless we can find something that clarifies it all . . .” He shrugs, letting us reach the conclusion on our own. “We’ve searched everything in Hal’s house, in Tina’s house, and on both of their phones and computers. If there’s a clue in there anywhere, we didn’t find it.”
“Or perhaps you just didn’t recognize it,” Izzy says.
Hurley shoots him a bemused look.
“Sometimes we see what we expect to see,” Izzy says. “Try thinking outside the box.”
Hurley gives Izzy a look of amused tolerance. I can tell he thinks Izzy is just spouting some clichéd phrase he heard somewhere. In fact, I’m almost positive I read something just like that on a fortune cookie I got from Peking Palace a while ago. But the longer I think about what Izzy just said, the more I feel like there’s something to it. I sense a tiny niggle in my brain, a nudge that I know means those words have triggered something, some memory or connection that is deeply buried. But I can’t quite unearth it yet. I make a mental note to take another look at that list Hal left.
“I’d like to stay for the autopsies,” Hurley says in a tired, resigned tone, “but I need to go get Matthew and drop him off with Dom. Plus, I’ve got tons of stuff to do at the station. Let me know what you find when you’re done.”
Izzy nods, and with that, Hurley leaves us to our grim duties.
CHAPTER 12
As soon as Hurley’s out the door, Izzy gives me a look.
“What?” I say.
“He is a bit testier than usual.”
“I know. We both are. I think it’s a combination of the usual stuff . . . worries about money, worries about the kids, worries about the job, worries about the new house . . . there’s a lot on our plates right now.”
“It will get easier,” Izzy says.
I hope he’s right. I’ve already racked up one failed marriage; I don’t want to become a serial divorcer.
We finish Craig’s autopsy—Izzy lets me sew Humpty Dumpty back together again while he goes to dictate and write down his findings—and when I’m done, I bag Craig up and move his body back to the morgue fridge.
We decide to take a quick lunch break before starting on Meredith. I grab a BLT sandwich from a shop two blocks down and top it off with a bag of Cheetos—the lunch of champions. We eat together in the breakroom, and Izzy eyes my meal with an expression that looks disturbingly like lust. His lunch—lovingly prepared by Dom, he mentions—consists of some carrot sticks, some rye crackers with something that looks like either chicken or tuna salad to go with them, an apple, and a low-calorie yogurt for dessert.
“I’m glad to see you’re eating healthier,” I comment.
Izzy drops a rye cracker back into the cute little multi-sectioned Tupperware container it came in with a puff of disgust. “If I have to eat like this for the rest of my life, I think I’d rather be dead.”
“Izzy,” I admonish.
“I mean it, Mattie.” He picks up the rye cracker he dropped a moment ago and bangs it on the tabletop, crumbling it. “This is like eating wood. And the chicken salad wouldn’t be so bad except Dom made it with low-fat mayo, and there’s no taste to it. I might as well be eating that white paste they give kids in kindergarten.”
I know the change must be hard for him. Dom is an amazing cook, and his specialties are Italian dishes that are typically rich with creams, sauces, and all kinds of bad fats that taste spectacularly good. It dawns on me then that Izzy’s new diet means the likelihood of my getting to enjoy one of Dom’s yummy creations anytime in the near future is small, if not nonexistent. My stomach growls in protest at the thought.
“You’re looking good,” I tell Izzy, trying to provide encouragement. “I can tell you’ve lost some weight.”
“Of course I have,” he grumbles. “How could I not, given that all I eat is cardboard, roots, paste, and sticks? Not to mention that cardiac rehab tyrant who keeps running me through the paces. That witch seems determined to turn me into Arnold Schwarzenegger. The other day she made me sweat so much on the cycling machine that someone nearby suggested they put a kiddie pool beneath me.”
I snort back a laugh, and Izzy shoots me a mean look. Though in my defense, I do have some sympathy for him. When I was going to the gym with Bob Richmond in support of his weight-loss efforts (trying hard to ignore the fact that I needed my own efforts in that regard), I experienced some torturous moments at the hands of my personal trainer, Gunther. I spent many a workout session imagining how easy it would be to use those exercise machines as torture devices on Gunther for revenge. It’s not easy for me to admit it, but I loathe exercise simply for the sake of exercise. And these days, I get plenty just chasing my son around, trying to maintain a household, and working full-time.
Izzy looks so miserable that for a moment I seriously consider offering him a piece of bacon from my sandwich. But then I envision his mother, Sylvie, finding out about it and seeking revenge. Izzy’s mother is a tiny woman who looks quite frail, but looks can be deceiving. I’ve seen her sport her walker like a weapon, and her verbal barbs are capable of piercing the strongest armor.
Once we’re done eating—or in Izzy’s case, kvetching and mourning—I go and fetch Meredith’s body from the fridge and wheel her into the autopsy room. By the time Izzy joins me, I have her on the autopsy table ready to go.
Our autopsy process is a routine one, and that can get boring at times. But the routines are in place for a reason. Skipping or skimming over any one step might mean missing a critical piece of evidence. For me, the hardest trick is to not let the tedium of the routines lull me into a state of inattention. It would be easy to let muscle memory take over and lose focus.
We carefully remove Meredith’s blouse and shorts, and I dutifully bag and tag them. But when it comes time to remove her underwear, I pause, frowning.
“Izzy, this is all wrong,” I say.
“What do you mean?”
“Her underwear. Look at it. Her panties are plain white cotton, obviously old because the material has separated from the elastic in places and they look like they’ve been washed hundreds of times. And her bra isn’t any better. It’s basic 18-hour Playtex kind of stuff: white, ordinary, and, again, old. Yo
u can tell from the wear and tear on the straps, and the underarm stains.”
Izzy stares at the underwear for a few seconds and then shakes his head. “I guess I’m not seeing what you’re seeing,” he says. “Help me out.”
“It’s a girl thing, or a girl hooking up with a guy thing,” I say. “That’s why you don’t see it, although I would imagine guys hooking up with guys do it to some extent. Maybe.” Izzy stares at me over the top of his glasses. “Or maybe not. Let me paint you a picture. Meredith and Craig just met, what, a month ago or so? She went to him about her retirement plan; the texts and e-mails only go back a month, so I think it’s a safe assumption. That means their affair is a relatively new one. Except I’m not convinced they were having one.”
“You don’t think Meredith and Craig were having an affair?” Izzy says, his voice rife with skepticism.
“I can’t say for sure, but I have my doubts because of this underwear. When a girl hooks up with a new guy, whether she’s single, married, or somewhere in between, she’s going to wear her very best lingerie, not the ragged, old, washed-a-million-times, only-wear-them-during-my-period undies. She’s going to have on the colorful, racy, Victoria’s Secret kind of stuff, not this.” I wave a hand over Meredith’s body. “And Meredith has that kind of underwear. I saw some of it when we were in her apartment. This is the stuff you wear when you’ve been married or living together for a long time, when you’re more comfortable with one another, and when you have a kid and a job that suck up every spare minute of your life, leaving you exhausted and feeling about as sexy as a barbed-wire fence.”
Izzy shoots me a wary side glance, and I realize my voice grew a little shrill toward the end of my last statement.
“I take it you’re wearing undies like Meredith’s,” he says finally.
“I am, and I’m not proud of it,” I tell him. “I think it’s important for couples to keep some fun and interest in their sex life. I got too blasé with David, and I’m determined not to let that happen again. But lately I’m just so damned tired all the time that the idea of sex seems like work, just one more duty I have to check off on my to-do list.”
Izzy’s eyes widen. He looks away and makes duck lips while he tries to think of something to say.
“Too much information?” I ask, wincing.
“No, not exactly,” he says, looking back down at Meredith’s underwear. “In fact, in the context of what we’re doing here and the investigation, it’s very valuable information, at least in the general form. I’m just not sure what to say about your personal issues.”
“I shouldn’t have said anything. Sorry. It just blurted out.”
“If you need to talk about it, I’m willing to listen,” he says. “But maybe we should shelve it for later? When we’re done here?”
“Right. Yes. Of course.” My cheeks are burning hot, and I know my face is turning as red as a baboon’s ass, which is what I feel like I am right now.
“Your point about the underwear is an interesting one,” Izzy says. “I’m just not sure how it plays into the overall picture. And if Meredith and Craig weren’t having an affair, what motive have we got?”
He has a point. Even if the murder-suicide thing was staged by someone else, we’ve been working under the assumption that Craig and Meredith were likely killed by a jealous spouse who discovered the affair. If they weren’t having an affair, what motive is left? Just money. I start backtracking on my theory.
“The text messages did seem to hint at Meredith wanting to end the affair,” I say. “So maybe she wore her old undies as a way of making a statement to that effect.”
“Unless she wanted one last roll in the hay for old time’s sake,” Izzy suggests.
I sag and gape at him. “Which side of this debate are you on?” I ask him.
“Whatever side gets us to the truth. You make a valid point. I think we need to keep it in mind.”
With both of us placated for the moment, we remove the suspect underwear and bag it. Then I help Izzy examine Meredith’s skin closely, looking for any puncture marks, wounds, or unusual bruises. Unlike Craig, Meredith’s lividity is in keeping with the scene at the motel, her death occurring in the bed from the gunshot to her chest. The entry wound has a stellate pattern with a minimal ring of gunpowder stippling around it, meaning it was likely a contact wound. The exit wound on her back has more of a torn appearance.
We move on to the internal exam, and the stomach contents are a mirror image of Craig’s: pasta, red sauce, and some sort of alcohol-based drink. At first blush, Meredith’s internal exam doesn’t seem to reveal any more surprises or significant finds other than the known bullet wound.
Then Izzy says, “Look at the bullet track. What do you see?”
I look at the area, studying it closely. The bullet’s trajectory is an upward one, entering just to the right of her sternum—our right, not hers—between two ribs, shattering part of one and tearing the cartilage in between them. From there, it passes through the right ventricle, exiting to the left of her spine—or what would be her right—just below her scapula. I run through some scenarios in my head, recalling the scene in the motel. “It’s a slight upward trajectory,” I say, “and also from right to left as we’re looking at her. It looks like whoever fired the bullet was probably straddling her in the bed, and firing with their right hand.”
Izzy nods, looking pleased. “Let’s assume for a moment that Craig was ambidextrous and did fire with his right hand. If he was straddling Meredith in the bed when he shot her, what other evidence might we expect to find?”
I wrack my tired brain, thinking, and imagining the scene. “Gunpowder residue?” I say. “On his clothes. On his pants.”
Izzy smiles. “Very good,” he says. “We need to do GSR testing on Craig’s clothing.”
“Should I do it now?”
“Go ahead.”
I back away from the table, strip off my gloves and gown, and head for the evidence locker. Once I find the packages containing the appropriate clothing items, I bring them back into the autopsy suite, don fresh gloves, open the seals, and remove the clothing. Then I take pads out of a GSR kit and start wiping along the surfaces of Craig’s shirt, and then his pants. I dedicate one swab to each specific area of the clothing—doing the lapels of the shirt first, then the right and left sides of the collar, then the shoulders, then the fronts of the short sleeves, and finally six different sections of the shirt front. I spray the reactant on each swab and watch for a reaction.
The only one that comes up positive is the test I do on the right side of Craig’s collar, shoulder, and sleeve, which is not surprising given that the gunshot wound was on the right side of his head. We already know Craig was left-handed, so the whole right-sided thing is a major red flag. But just in case someone tried to argue that Craig might have fired with his right hand, the lack of GSR on the rest of his shirt is damning.
Izzy watches me as he continues with Meredith’s internal exam, and I give him a running dialogue of my results. I move on to the pants, swiping sections along the front with another dozen swabs. None of these tests positive for GSR.
“So there it is,” I say when I’m done. “No GSR on Craig’s clothes where we would expect to find it if he had straddled Meredith when he shot her.”
“This case just gets curiouser and curiouser,” Izzy says.
“We need to test for GSR on the clothes John and Pamela were wearing,” I say. “And any other dirty clothing we can find in their houses. I need to call Hurley right away.”
CHAPTER 13
Hurley answers on the second ring. “What have you got for me, Squatch?” he says.
I fill him in on our findings: the bullet trajectory, the underwear, and the GSR testing.
“I’ll get on it right away,” Hurley says.
A few seconds of silence stretch between us until I say, “Thank you for the apology, Hurley. It meant a lot to me. What you said to me earlier, I know it was born out of frustration
and exhaustion. I know you didn’t mean it.”
I hear him sigh on the other end, and a second, more uncomfortable silence ensues. I wait him out.
“Look, Squatch, I’d like to discuss this more, but I can’t do it now. So suffice to say, I love you. And in my mind, that’s all that matters. It’s enough to get us through whatever life throws at us.”
I can’t swallow; there’s a huge lump in my throat. And for a moment I can’t speak either. But I finally manage to eke out a few words, and I think they’re enough. “I love you, too, Hurley. More than you know.”
With that, I disconnect the call, letting him go do what he needs to do. Izzy, who has overheard the entire conversation, says nothing as I once again don a paper gown and a fresh pair of gloves. When I return to my spot at the autopsy table, there is a satisfied smile on his face.
Half an hour later we are almost done with Meredith’s autopsy when Cass pokes her head into the room. “You guys have another call,” she announces, and I squeeze my eyes closed in frustration.
“I can go if you want to stitch up Meredith,” Izzy offers.
I shake my head. “You’ve done enough today. You need to rest. You’re not that far out from your heart attack. I’ll get Doc Morton to come with me.” I glance at my watch. “He’s taking call tonight anyway, right?” Izzy nods. “So we’ll put him to work a little early. I’m sure he won’t mind.”
Cass says, “You can debate which doc takes this call all day long, but either way I think Mattie has to go.”
In unison, Izzy and I both turn to her and say, “Why?”
“Because the body is on the property you and Hurley bought. Your contractor unearthed it when he was digging for your foundation. Hurley said he’ll pick you up out front in ten minutes.” She pauses and looks at her watch. “And that was almost five minutes ago.”
Well, isn’t this just grand? Not only does this mean that our whole construction schedule will likely be pushed back, it also means we’re planning to build our house on potentially haunted ground. Not that I believe in ghosts—at least not the menacing, harmful kind. I find the living to be much scarier than the dead. I do believe there is an energy inside all of us that gets released when we die, and what happens to it is anyone’s guess. But the idea of living in a house built above a burial ground is a little creepy. And if it turns out to be some sort of historic or Native American burial site—they are scattered all over Wisconsin—we might not be able to build at all.
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