by Vella Day
Only good old-fashioned forensics would supply the answer.
Dr. Dobbins was busy working on a mature male when she slipped into his cold room. “Knock, knock.”
The tall, thin man looked up. “Yes?” His hands continued to probe the body, and blood streaked his goggles and rubber gloves.
They’d never met, but John claimed Quentin was one of the best pathologists he’d ever worked with. “I’m working with John Ahern on the four women found in the field in North Tampa.”
He plopped a liver into a tray and removed his mask. “How can I help you?” Not the most friendly greeting, but given the chore in front of him, she couldn’t blame him for being a bit testy.
“We brought in an infant about three weeks ago. John said you’d be doing the autopsy, and I haven’t gotten the results.”
Dobbins removed his gloves and goggles and stepped over to a file cabinet. “Oh, yes. Sad case. John requested a rush on her. I finished running the tests quite some time ago and sent the report over to him.” He lowered his chin and glared over his glasses. “Were you with him when the body was discovered? I don’t recall seeing you before.”
She didn’t care for his accusatory tone, but she was the beggar here. “Yes. I’m Kerry Herlihy, a forensic anthropologist consulting for the summer.”
He half smiled. “Oh, you’re the one from Brahman University that John found.”
“Yes.”
“Welcome on board.” His tone came out civil this time. “I usually work the late shift, so that’s why we haven’t crossed paths.”
“Ah.” Kerry straightened her lab coat. “I just assumed someone would have handed the little girl’s remains over to me for identification purposes. I hadn’t realized I needed to ask for them.”
“No problem.” He pulled open his desk drawer and leafed through a stack of folders. “Here is a copy of the report.” He handed her the paper.
Kerry read what he’d given her. “Natural causes?”
“Nothing else was conclusive. I ran a tox screen but came up with nothing. The pathology showed only healthy tissue.” His posture softened. “We only had the lower part of her body and nothing pointed to a violent COD.”
She wondered if he’d studied the bones for fractures. “Where’s the body now?”
“In drawer number three. Help yourself.”
“Thank you.”
“I’d like to do a facial reconstruction on her and scan her face into our age progression software. I’m sure someone has to be missing her.”
“Given she was buried without a casket, I’m guessing that someone didn’t want anyone to find her.”
How could someone dump a baby in a grave in the middle of the woods? “Did you send her DNA in for testing?”
“No. I didn’t see the need given we have nothing to compare it to. If you can get a possible identity, then I’ll go ahead with the matching process. However, don’t hold your breath for an answer from the lab for a few months. They’re backed up right now.”
“If Tampa’s labs are anything like the ones in Cleveland, they’ll stay perpetually backed up.”
“Sad but true.” He pulled out the morgue drawer, removed the tiny body bag and placed her on a gurney. “Knock yourself out.”
Kerry’s heart ached for what she was about to do. She wanted to clean the bones to see if she could determine evidence of violence. “Thank you.”
“Just let John know you have her.”
“Will do.”
With a heavy heart, Kerry wheeled the young female down the hall. The edge of her gurney knocked into Steven’s thigh as he breezed out of John’s lab.
“I’m so sorry. Did I hurt you?”
“No I’m fine,” he said rubbing his leg.
Thank goodness he wasn’t hurt, but he did always seem to be under foot. “I must have been off in la-la land.”
Without asking permission, he grabbed the cart and steered it into her lab. “Who you got here?”
“The little girl John and I processed about three weeks ago. I want to do a facial reconstruction on her.”
“You have any luck with the other faces you did?”
She held open the door, and Steven pushed the gurney into the lab. “Actually, yes. Jane Doe #1 was identified by her fiancé. I’m still waiting to see whether anyone recognizes #4.”
“But a baby? They kind of look alike. Won’t it be hard?”
“Yes, very hard, but I have to try. Can you imagine the pain the parents must be in?”
“No, I can’t.”
Once he parked the cart under the overhead light, Kerry lifted up the maceration station hood and grabbed the large stainless steel pot.
“Here, let me help you.” Steven took the pot from her and placed it in the sink. “Dr. A told me some crank caller threatened you after he saw you on TV.”
“Yes, can you believe it?”
She filled the large container with water, and then added some mild detergent, along with some bleach. No use subjecting herself to more smell.
“Here, let me put this back on the burner for you.” Steven carried the filled pot to the station and set it on the burner. “That’s a heavy mother.”
“I know.” She’d hurt her back the last time she had to lift the water.
He swiveled to face her, his back blocking the burner. “I didn’t see your car in the lot when I drove in.”
“Excuse me.” Steven moved out of the way. “Detective Markum is driving me to work. He’s afraid my caller might come after me.”
His brows rose and the ends of his lips turned up. “I didn’t realize the police offered door-to-door service.”
Kerry face heated. “I think it’s more than the usual police concern.” She added the meat tenderizer, keeping her back to Steven, not wanting him to see the blush that colored her face.
“He likes you?” Steven hopped on the counter next to the station. “You want to talk about it? I’m a good listener.”
She turned back to him. “Some other time maybe.” Kerry smiled. “I really do need to work.”
The guy was sweet, but she couldn’t afford the time to chat. She was, after all, on temporary loan from Brahman University. If she ever expected more jobs from the M.E.’s office, she had to perform well.
He jumped down and saluted, nearly knocking her purse off in the process. “My bad.” He pushed her purse to the back of the counter, safely out of the falling zone. “Then I shall leave you to the infant.”
Before she could unzip the body bag, Steven disappeared out the door. She sobered the moment her fingers touched the body. The chore ahead would test her resolve to the max. This could have been her child had her baby lived.
Don’t do this to yourself. The only way to bring comfort to the parents was to find the identity of the child.
With a plastic utensil, Kerry scraped the soft tissue from the bones, forcing her mind on the technique, not on the person beneath. Next, she brushed the bones clean and placed them in the pot of warm, soapy water.
With the worst of the job complete, she studied the cranium, hoping to find a clue as to the baby’s cause of death, brushing away her tears with back of her hand. The skull had been broken into a few pieces, but with a little glue, she’d be able to recreate the whole cranium.
While she couldn’t tell what the baby looked like from the bones alone, she bet the child would break the most calloused of hearts.
It was such a horrible, horrible tragedy. When the tears blurred her vision, she closed the fume hood and placed the dried bones in anatomical order. Before she’d managed to put the hand together, her door creaked open. Hunter?
She looked up and froze.
18
“Susan?” Kerry’s jaw tightened, and her stomach swirled.
Kerry almost didn’t recognize her sister standing in the doorway. The security guard was behind her. “She said she was your sister,” he said. “She wanted to surprise you.”
“She did at that. Thank
you.”
He nodded and closed the door.
Why was Susan wearing red glasses instead of her customary contact lenses? Not that it mattered.
Kerry studied her. Something else looked different—out of place. Sure, Susan’s hair had streaks of gray and her hips looked much wider than they had ten years ago, but those signs of aging were normal.
Her sister’s nose looked as though she’d broken it, and the cartilage hadn’t healed properly. That’s what was different. Had Brad done that?
Susan rushed in. “I know I said I’d meet you at seven, but Grandpa told me you had to move out because of some psycho. I came to Tampa just to see you, and I didn’t want you to disappear on me like I used to do to you.” She chuckled, but the tight lines around her mouth told Kerry that Susan saw nothing funny in her statement.
“What a minute. Did you say disappear?” Queasiness grabbed her. “You’re admitting you abandoned me when we were growing up?”
Susan avoided eye contact by glancing over at the bones on the metal gurney. She wrinkled her nose and pointed to the remains of Baby Doe. “What are those?”
Everyone knew what bones looked like. What game was Susan playing now? “They’re the skeleton of an infant, a baby girl, or at least most of the bones.” Kerry forced her tone to be even.
Susan’s face turned ashen. She grabbed the top of the desk chair next to the gurney and slid onto it. “How did the baby die?”
Kerry couldn’t figure out if this was some kind of ploy to soften her up or if the appearance of the small bones truly distressed her sister.
“I’m not sure. Florida had some pretty heavy rains last fall that washed the dirt away from the grave site and exposed the body bag.” Susan didn’t need the grim reality of the dog ripping apart the heavy plastic. “We’re still trying to determine cause of death.”
Susan covered her mouth for a moment. “How terrible. She wasn’t in a casket?” Her eyes brimmed with tears.
“No. Someone buried her in the woods. Why the interest?”
“How old was she?”
Susan’s quick change of focus more than hinted she wasn’t ready to address Kerry’s questions of abandonment. “Susan why did you come? I don’t think it was because you were interested in my work.” Yes, she sounded bitter, but Kerry’s pent up anger got the best of her.
“I wanted to tell you my side of the story of what happened years ago. I’ve kept my secret way too long.”
“Secret?”
“Yes. Secret. I know I’ve hurt you, and I want to right that wrong.”
Kerry didn’t have time for some phony confession, or some made up secret for that matter. “I’m busy right now.” Another harsh comment, but her sister had never been straight with her.
Susan leaned forward. “I know you hate me.” She reached out and grabbed Kerry’s hand. Kerry flinched, but didn’t pull away. “Trust me, I only did what was best for you when you were young.”
“That’s rich.” She slid her hand from Susan’s tense grasp and fiddled with the bones on the cold, metal tray. “Why should I believe you now?”
“Maybe because it’s the truth.”
Kerry was tired, irritable and pissed, but Susan’s words rang true. No doubt her stubborn sister wouldn’t leave until she vented. “Fine. Tell me about this secret.”
“Do you want to sit?”
“No.” She wanted to pace, stomp, kick something. Instead, she stood still.
Susan let out a long breath. “I’m not sure where to begin.”
“Don’t do this, Susan. Just start at the beginning.”
She sucked in an audible breath. “I know you think I always ran off when Mom left town, but it’s not what you think.”
Kerry’s hands flew to her hips. “That’s because you always did.”
Susan slipped a strand of hair behind her ear, a habit Kerry always adopted.
“I realize now how terrible and frightening my disappearing act must have been for you.”
Took her long enough to figure that one out. “I was only seven. You were supposed to stay with me, watch me, make sure I was taken care of. At least that’s what Mom told you to do. What was I supposed to think when you took off and stuck me with the drunk neighbor?”
“I know. My leaving was inexcusable.” Susan studied her lap. “I used to visit Dad whenever Mom left town for one of her auditions. He didn’t like picking me up when she was around.”
“You spent alone time with Dad? I always thought we visited him together.”
“I didn’t want you to know. That’s why I told you I was out with my friends.”
This was getting them nowhere. “Yeah, you always had some reason why I couldn’t come. I asked Mom about that once, but she said teenagers needed to be away from their sisters sometimes. I believed her.”
Susan bit her lower lip and sniffled. She surveyed her hands. “Daddy and I did more than visit. I never told you. In fact, I never told anyone.” Susan twisted her fingers together.
Something wasn’t right. Oh, shit. A two-by-four could have smacked her across the back of her head, and Kerry wouldn’t have been more surprised. “Are you saying Daddy molested you?” Kerry’s pulse zipped to warp speed. That couldn’t be true.
Shame slammed across Susan’s face. “Yes. If I hadn’t agreed to service him, he said he’d...he’d come after... you.”
Kerry’s mouth dropped open. “When I was six or seven?” Her legs weakened and bile rose up her throat.
“Yes. It was unthinkable, is unthinkable, but I was fourteen when the abuse began. He was our dad. I believed he’d harm you if I didn’t do what he said.”
From Susan’s shifting eye movement, Kerry knew her sister was telling the truth, and a wave of disgust blasted her. “Couldn’t you have told Mom?” Kerry slipped down in the seat next to Susan.
Her sister leaned forward. “You don’t understand what it was like. He made me promise not to tell anyone. I know he would have hurt you if I hadn’t done what he’d asked. Besides, do you think Mom would have believed me? She claimed Dad could do no wrong.”
“Until he took up with another woman and left us.”
“She always became angry when I bad mouthed him.”
Mom was a wonderful, warm woman, but she was often in denial about most issues. Too bad she had more prescription drugs than a pharmacy, which made their mom less than coherent at times.
Reality stabbed Kerry in the heart. “You protected me and never told me?” How could she have been so blind for so long?
Susan cocked a brow. “At seven, would you have understood?”
Kerry’s mind took a trip back in time. “I guess not.” She wanted to forgive her sister, but Kerry recognized there was a lot more to the story. “When Daddy died, why didn’t you tell me about the abuse then?”
Susan pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose—a definite stall tactic. “Shame maybe. Besides, you were in high school and able to fend for yourself. Why ruin your year? Even after the abuse ended. I wasn’t ready to face what I’d done.” Susan stared off into space for a moment.
“Couldn’t you have spoken to a shrink or something?”
“Maybe, but I thought if I just left town, I’d be fine. I wasn’t ready to confront Mom with the accusation Dad abused me while she did her thing. Knowing her, she would have pushed me even further away, so I came to Florida. Grandpa was someone I could count on.”
“At least we agree on one point.” Kerry had missed so much of her sister’s life, and sadness replaced bitterness. “How could you leave Ohio though? It was our home.”
“You left too.”
“But I had a good reason.”
“So did I.”
She’d give Susan a chance to explain. “I’d like to hear it.”
Susan studied the hanging light in the ceiling before fixing a look at Kerry. “You were in school when I met a guy who I thought would solve all my problems and help me get away from Dad. Only Brad was as bad
as our father. Eventually, I had to hide from him too, had to leave.”
Ohmigod. “He abused you, didn’t he?”
She nodded as her lower lip trembled. “I didn’t want to leave you or Mom, but I had no choice. You think I wanted to quit my teaching job and sever ties to everything I held dear?”
“That would be hard.” If Kerry ever had to stop working with bones, she’d go crazy.
“Damn right it was hard, but if I hadn’t, Brad would have hounded me. Trust me, I moved three times and he still found me. He even showed up at work.” Susan shook her head. “I finally had to pay a skip tracer to help me hide. I had to give up my career, my friends, my church group, everything. Only Grandpa knew I was in Florida. Even then we had to be super careful anytime we contacted each other.”
“You couldn’t have called me? Even once?”
“Back then, they didn’t have burner phones. I always believed somehow I’d slip up and Brad would trace my call. He was a computer programmer, and well-trained in all the latest technology. You were in college and happy. Grandpa kept me informed what was happening in your life. Why ruin things?” Susan shifted in her seat. “Would you have welcomed my calls back then?”
“Maybe not.” Kerry swallowed hard, thinking of the trauma Susan had suffered. “Grandpa said you’d met someone in Florida.”
She shook her head. “I told Grandpa that. I was pregnant with a little girl and had to make up an imaginary man. Brad was the father.”
The first hint of excitement raced through her. “You have a baby?” Without thinking, her own hand shot to her belly.
“I had a baby. Eventually, Brad found me. I called you when Grandpa told me Mom had died.”
“I remember.”
“I was careless with my landline. Brad arrived on my front doorstep about a week later.”
Kerry couldn’t imagine her sister’s pain. “And your daughter?”
Tears streaked down Susan’s face. “He stole her.”
“Stole her?” Kerry could only imagine the trauma. When her unborn child had died, devastation kept her company for months. “Why didn’t you report him?”