“Yup,” Lamond said, rolling his eyes.
Ethan hadn’t had a chance to look at it, but he had heard the reports on the radio.
“I’ve had to triple patrol at the scene. And we’ve already caught one journalist trying to sneak in from the woods.” Her jaw was tight. “I had three reporters calling me this morning to see if this was a burial ground for multiple victims.”
Lamond glanced at Ethan. They had both worked Halifax’s last sensational murder case. They knew how tough it was to control the media when they got the scent of blood. “It’s the Body Butcher hangover,” Ethan said, shrugging. Last year, Halifax had been shocked into the gruesome world of serial killers when the Body Butcher had been killed in the act of trying to commit yet another horrendous murder. Since then, every time a homicide victim was discovered, there was always the fear that there were other victims not yet discovered. It wasn’t just the media or the general public who harbored this anxiety—the murder squad did, as well.
“Have FIS or Search and Rescue found any bone scatter around the scene?”
Ferguson shook her head. “So far, it seems like just one body was buried in the peat bog. The sooner we can get a positive ident on it, the better. Not only for the family. We need to keep the media from getting the public all stirred up.”
“Good morning, detectives,” Dr. Guthro said, joining the trio with a broad smile on his face. He held a camera in his gloved hands. “We are ready to begin.”
They followed him to the autopsy cart. Several of the onlookers broke away, leaving room for the detectives to view the procedure. Ethan nodded to Dr. Hughes, who appeared surprisingly fresh given the arduous work of yesterday.
The morgue attendant, a young woman whose impassive expression was in stark contrast to the anticipatory gleam in the gazes of the medical examiner’s staff, unzipped the bag. Even though they all knew the body wore a rubber Halloween mask, the sight still caused indrawn breaths upon first viewing. Dr. Guthro walked around the cart, taking photos of each section of the decedent, and of the dirty rope coiled into the corpse’s shoulder.
The body was removed from the bag and placed on the autopsy table. While Dr. Guthro photographed it, the staff from the M.E.’s office took turns at the head of the table, examining the mummified tissue. Ethan had seen many bodies, in many stages of decomposition, but never a mummified body. He edged closer to study the remains. They were lucky that the neck and upper body weren’t skeletonized. The M.E. might actually be able to determine cause of death. And from what he could tell, the body had breasts. It must be female.
It must be Heather.
“I was going to have chicken for supper tonight,” Lamond whispered. “But I just changed my mind.”
“Is that what chicken looks like after you cook it?” Ethan asked under his breath. “Remind me not to eat at your house.” He had to admit, though, that the mummified tissue resembled an overcooked chicken breast: yellowy-brown and dry.
Ferguson gave them both a look. “Dr. Guthro, what are your initial thoughts about the gender of this body?”
The medical examiner leaned over the bog body’s pelvis. Unlike the torso, it was mainly skeletonized. “I’d say female. The sacrum is short and wide. And the body of the pubis is quadrangular.”
Ethan hadn’t realized he had been holding his breath until now. If the body had been male, then all his work on the Rigby case would have been futile. And they would have to start over.
“Now for the X-rays,” Dr. Guthro said. “Everyone please clear the area.” The X-ray technician rolled the portable X-ray machine over to the autopsy table. “We will recommence in half an hour.”
“Perfect,” Ethan muttered to Lamond. “Time for at least one coffee.”
Lamond arched a brow. “Is Cold Case so dull that you are willing to aggravate that ulcer?”
“The ulcer is fine. Ever since I left Homicide,” Ethan said, throwing a dark look at his former partner. It was part jest, part truth. He missed Homicide, but he had been on a downward spiral. There had been too much stress, too much frustration, in the past twelve months. He had given up coffee, but as soon as his ulcer had settled, he had warmed up his espresso machine and was back to his usual habits.
After they grabbed a coffee and a muffin—Ethan couldn’t resist advising Lamond to eat something that wouldn’t stain his clothes if he brought it all up during the autopsy—Ethan bought a newspaper at the gift store while Lamond hit the men’s room. He hadn’t realized how bang on he had been about the phenomenon of the Body Butcher hangover until he saw the front page. The media were all over the titillating question of whether the bog body could be victim zero of the Body Butcher. Accompanying the article was a photo of Kate taken after the Body Butcher’s attack last year, her face battered, her eyes haunted. His gut clenched at the sight of it. God. A year later, and his heart still rushed into his throat when he thought about her lying in the parking lot, nearly dead.
She had almost died. And he had let her walk out of his life.
But he couldn’t keep living like this anymore.
One of them could die at any time—he could take a bullet in the head on his job, or she could develop CJD. Either way, life was too short. He would never be able to live with himself if he didn’t give things one more try.
Third time’s the charm.
He folded the paper, ensuring that the front cover was tucked inward, and stuck it under his elbow.
When they arrived back at the autopsy suite, the dregs of their coffees consumed in the elevator, the
X-rays had been loaded into the view box. Dr. Guthro hovered in front, his tall, gowned form hunched in concentration.
“Excellent news,” Dr. Guthro said, peering at an X-ray of the chest area. “Looks like there’s a bullet in there.” He pointed at the glowing white firefly lodged between two lower ribs.
Ferguson grinned at Ethan and Lamond. “We are in business, Dr. Guthro.”
“We certainly are.”
The rest of the X-rays showed no obvious signs of trauma or injury. “No skull fractures, no major bone fractures,” Dr. Guthro murmured. “Let’s take the mask off and see what we have under there. Dr. Hughes, would you like to hold the skull?” His request was an act of professional courtesy, a nod to the assistance that the forensic anthropologist had provided yesterday.
Dr. Hughes stood at the head of the table and gently held the top of the skull. Dr. Guthro gripped the bottom edges of the mask. As he peeled up the first inch, he nodded to himself. “A ligature,” he said. The rope, which they knew was attached to the neck, had been tied with a slipknot. It obviously had been very tight, because even with the shrinkage of the tissue, it was still taut around the throat.
The rubber was brittle, and it took some time for Dr. Guthro and Dr. Hughes to ease it off the skull. “The epidermis has slipped,” Dr. Guthro said, “hence the lack of hair and eyebrows. But there appears to be a considerable amount of hair on the interior of the mask.” He placed the mask on a tray, and with a pair of tweezers, removed a hair for the standard for the homicide team, which they would use as a benchmark for comparison and analysis with any other hairs found on the scene, then bagged and labeled it. The mask would be bagged and labeled later, and sent to the FIS lab for analysis.
As one, the team studied what remained of the face of the victim. Her eyes were long gone, her lips dried and shriveled. Both ears were still intact, as was her nose. The mask had obviously protected her face from rodents. Ethan mentally overlaid an image of the smiling, fresh-faced girl from his university criminology class and decided that this shriveled, eyeless head could be her face.
Or not.
Who knew? He needed to keep reminding himself that they had no objective confirmation that this dead girl was Heather Rigby. He had jumped to conclusions before, with disastrous results.
Right now, all they knew was that the body was likely female.
It could be any female.
And that reali
zation chilled him.
Kate could have ended up in the morgue last year, along with the Body Butcher’s other victims.
She could have been the one on the autopsy table, her remains being examined to determine how she had died, how she had defended herself.
She would have been identified as “female, age twenty-five to thirty-five, shoulder-length brown hair.”
But what she felt, and who had occupied her last thoughts, no one would have ever known.
He wanted Kate’s last moments to be with him. With love in her heart. And the knowledge that they had been happy together.
When he faced his maker, he wanted to be with Kate the same way.
And have no regrets.
He had seen enough dead bodies on these autopsy tables to know that some would have regretted their actions that led them to this final destination; others would have regrets for actions not taken before this final destination.
He did not want regrets.
This desiccated body, this leathery shell that had once housed a vibrant young woman was impetus enough.
Why was he wasting time?
Life was too short.
He’d never know until he tried.
Remember, third time’s the charm, Drake.
He would call Kate. Tonight.
If nothing else, to stop the self-help clichés that kept urging him on.
“The hair inside the mask is brown,” Lamond said, as if reading Ethan’s mind. He shivered. Kate’s hair was brown. That must be a sign from the universe.
Stop it, Drake.
Dr. Guthro began the external exam. The mummified tissue extended to just below the diaphragm. The left arm was also mummified, but the rest of her limbs were skeletonized. The skeleton was surprisingly intact—again, a sign that rodents hadn’t found it—with the exception of the ulna that Rebecca Chen had unwittingly removed in her zeal to complete her biology lab.
“Some evidence of adipocere on the left anterior femur,” Dr. Guthro said. Adipocere, Ethan had learned from experience, was a white waxy substance that occurred when the fatty tissues of a body had a post-mortem enzyme reaction due to cold, moist conditions, resulting in saponification of the tissue. Essentially, the chemical reaction of the fatty tissues created a soaplike substance, known as grave wax.
The morgue attendant turned the body over. At first glance, the decomposition on the posterior view was almost identical to the anterior: mummification of the tissue to a midpoint of the torso, as well as the entire left arm. The rest of the body was skeletonized with adipocere on the coccyx and upper left femur. A member of the FIS team took photos while Dr. Guthro slowly circled the body. But it was Dr. Hughes who noticed the mark first.
Dr. Hughes pointed to a spot almost at the base of the corpse’s neck. “There. Do you see that mark, Dr. Guthro? It’s not dirt.”
Dr. Guthro picked up a magnifying glass. He frowned. “Looks like a very crude tattoo.”
Ferguson threw Ethan a look. Did Rigby have a tattoo?
He did a mental run-through of Heather’s description in the dog-eared missing-persons file, and gave a subtle shake of his head.
No, she did not.
11
Yoshi, her old friend and owner of Yakusoku Tattoo, had told her to park in the back of the building. He hadn’t mentioned that finding the driveway would be so difficult. All these old buildings were connected. Kenzie slowed her car and peered through the side window.
There. Three buildings over, she spotted the narrow carriage lane that led to the parking lot. She eased her car between the brick buildings, careful of the rental vehicle’s side mirrors. The lane was barely wide enough for her car. But, she discovered to her surprise, the parking lot behind the buildings was actually quite big—one of those strange lot divisions from earlier times.
She glanced at her watch. She was early. Hardly surprising, since she hadn’t slept last night. God, she felt like hell. She grabbed her Americano, slung her kit bag over her shoulder, and led Foo down the carriage lane to the front entrance of Yakusoku Tattoo. The tall buildings had protected her from the weather, but as soon as she reached the sidewalk, heavy drizzle dampened her skin.
Ugh. She wasn’t used to this chill damp anymore. She craved warmth and sun.
One more reason she should have just flown in and out again.
I shouldn’t have let Yoshi talk me into this.
This was supposed to be a quick trip, but when Yoshi heard she was coming to Halifax, he asked her to do some guest spots.
He wasn’t someone to whom she could—or would—say no.
Yoshi had been the tattoo artist to design the arm sleeves and koi design on her back. Whenever he was in her neck of the woods, she would book off a few days and have him work on her. He had finished the final section of her tattoo a year and a half ago. No, she could never say no to Yoshi.
She’d never been to his studio before. They had met eight years ago when she was in Tokyo at an international tattooing conference. He had been demonstrating the technique of tebori, something she had always wanted to learn. Not only had Yoshi been willing to share his vast knowledge of traditional woodblock designs and the art of tebori, but while she was in Japan, he had been instrumental in making an introduction to the famed Horifuyu, one of the great masters of the art of Japanese tattooing. It had been a lifetime ambition for Kenzie to meet him, and she was beyond thrilled when he tattooed a crane taking flight around her ankle.
Four years later, Yoshi had created a tattoo studio that was known across North America. His clients, who were willing to invest the time and money into the art on their bodies, booked vacation to come to Halifax to have their tattoos done.
And now, here she was—about to ink clients in a studio owned by a Japanese artist in good ol’ Halifax. If someone had told her seventeen years ago that she would be doing this, she would have laughed. But her life had many strange twists. This, fortunately, was one of the more pleasant ones.
There were already a few clients hanging around the waiting area when she shouldered open the door. They all turned to stare. She gave a quick smile, and scanned the room. It was exactly what she expected Yoshi’s place to be: cool, eclectic, immaculate. The room had an urban industrial vibe, the tall ceiling crisscrossed with venting and pipes, the slightly uneven floor finished with distressed concrete. It was all gray. But serene gray. Zen gray. On the walls hung Hori’s designs in the most brilliant, breathtaking colors. Dragons, koi and serpents curved with sinuous grace. Above the counter were designs and flash from the other artists at the studio: skulls, hearts, pinup girls, Celtic and tribal. She eyed a Celtic cross. Nicely done but a bit mechanical.
“Yookoso, Kenzie.” Yoshi walked around the front counter and gave a small bow. She bowed back. It was a little ritual they had, from one professional to another. Then she reached over and gave him a hug. He was shorter than she, stocky in build. A soft goatee contrasted with the thick stubble bristling his head. “How are you?” he asked, stepping back.
“Good.” She flipped her hair off her shoulder and stretched.
He scrutinized her, his gaze concerned behind the tinted John Lennon–style glasses. “You look like shit.”
She shrugged. “I went to my old house yesterday.”
“How’s your mother?”
“Dying.” She took a big gulp of her espresso. “So, what’s my schedule like today?”
Yoshi took the cue and sat down at the computer behind the counter. “Let me see… Your first client is in ten minutes. You’ve got a full day ahead of you.”
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