Beneath the Ashes

by Dea Poirier

  “My personal life does not interfere with my work,” I say and stride toward the doors, leaving Lillian staring. Footsteps trail behind me. In the reflection of the glass doors leading to the ME’s office, I see Austin shuffling a few steps behind.

  I shove into the familiar waiting room. How many times was I here last year? Three? Four? It all gets lost beneath the other case details. The sterile waiting room greets us. It’s so bright the walls practically glow. As always, the air is heavy with the scent of cleaner. I swear it coats my tongue. Though chairs line the room, as if they anticipate a crowd, I’ve never seen anyone other than the employees in here.

  The receptionist smiles when she sees me, recognition clear on her face. Then she glances toward Austin, her smile faltering, flickering like a light bulb. “Hello, Detective. Here to see Dr. White?” she asks, though I don’t know who else I’d be here to see.

  “Yes, she should be expecting me,” I say before introducing Austin.

  “One moment. I’ll tell her that you and your partner are here,” she says, picking up the phone. She’s only on the phone for a few seconds, but by the time she hangs up, a door far down the hall clicks closed.

  Dr. White appears in the hall, her lab coat nearly blending in with the walls. She’s in her midfifties, I’d guess, with a wide face and large gray eyes. Her blonde hair has been cropped a bit shorter than usual, the ends of it dusting the shoulders of her coat. It suits her, making her face look longer and her cheekbones sharper. She’s about six inches taller than me, plus a couple more with her heels. “Claire, good to see you,” she says in a way that would lead most people to believe we were old friends. I introduce her to Austin quickly.

  “Sabrina, how are you doing?” I ask as we follow her down the hall to the morgue.

  “You know, would be better if things quieted down a bit,” she says, and a grimace darkens her face, deepening the lines that bracket her thin lips.

  This certainly isn’t a line of work where you cross your fingers for a busy day. Nerves gnaw at me as we follow her. Not only am I anxious to see what we can find out about the victim, but I’m also concerned about how Austin will handle this. She may have seen a body before, but this is different. She didn’t even want to look at Melanie’s body while it was at the motel, not that I blame her.

  “That bad?” Concern is thick on my words, my usual mask slipping. I’ve been so consumed with wrapping up my last case that I haven’t paid much attention to anything else.

  She shakes her head and waves me into the morgue. Cold air slips into the hall, cloaking me before I enter. Mist escapes with each breath as I approach the metal table in the center of the room. Austin hangs behind us. Beneath a sheet, the form of a body is clear. My mind flashes to what Rachel must have looked like on a table like this. But as soon as the thought appears, I banish it. I can’t make this about her. Her book should be closed, and I have to keep it that way.

  Will I ever be able to put this behind me? Maybe it’s better if I don’t. I’ve always been afraid I’d become desensitized to homicide once I found her killer. How could I keep doing this if it all stopped feeling so personal? Detectives who have lost someone are more invested, because we know what’s at stake; we know what it’s like to be broken.

  “Anywhere you’d like to start?” Dr. White asks, dragging me back from my thoughts. “I saved cutting the plastic away for your arrival. Sergeant Pelletier told me that you were en route.”

  “I know you won’t have gotten far yet. But anything you know would be helpful. If you want to start with the plastic removal, that’d be fine with me.”

  She grabs a clipboard, sifts through a few pages, and pulls back the sheet, exposing the corpse from the belly button up. I glance back at Austin, who’s still several paces behind me. I wave her over. She looks a little pale but thankfully hasn’t gone green. Once I’m sure Austin is fine, I turn my attention back to the body. The plastic sheeting covering her face has debris clinging to it, ash mars the skin on her arms and chest, and there’s black clinging beneath her fingernails.

  “Do you know the source of the cigarette ashes?” Dr. White asks.

  “There was a large cigarette receptacle outside the room. It appears it was brought into the room and dumped on the body,” Austin chimes in.

  She glances to Austin, then back to me. “I took swabs from the plastic sheeting and checked to see if we have any latent prints on it or the tape, but I couldn’t find anything.”

  “Just cut it as carefully as you can; we’ll take it for evidence and have the CSI team take another look,” I say, though I doubt there will be anything for us to get from it. Dr. White is fastidious. If there were something to be found, I’m confident she would have found it.

  “As I’m sure you noticed, there are signs of trauma all over her body in the various stages of healing: what appears to be a broken wrist, along with some severe bruising on her arm. Based on the ligature marks on her uninjured wrist and ankles, I assumed the bruising was from her being bound. However, the bruising on her right arm is far worse than the left, and it appears to be older. I have to wonder if she was in a car accident recently or something to that effect to cause these other injuries.”

  I take all the information in. I noticed the wounds and some of the bruises on her body but not the additional bruising on her right arm until now. I assumed the ashes had led to discoloration.

  Dr. White grabs a pair of scissors and begins to cut at the nape of Melanie’s neck, snipping upward toward her jaw. Tension in the room thickens around us, and I can hardly breathe as I wait for her to peel the sheeting away. As she strips away the plastic, I focus on Melanie’s face. Her wide lips are bloody; red congeals in the cracks in them and paints her chin. Faint bruises darken her right eye and her neck. If the bruising is starting to show, it has to have been antemortem. Once the blood stops flowing in a body, bruises no longer form.

  Melanie’s blue eyes are open, staring up. Dr. White leans in for a closer look, peeling the eyelids back with a gloved finger.

  “Petechiae are present, which as you know can be a sign of asphyxia,” she says as she glances to me.

  “Are you comfortable with what we have here to rule it as asphyxia as the COD?” I ask.

  “I’m pretty sure that is what I will rule it. However, I do want to open her up first, just to be sure. We’ll also run toxicology, but they’re backed up on that about three to four weeks.”

  “Three to four weeks?” Toxicology always takes a while to get back, but in Detroit, where I worked before moving to Maine, we were usually able to get it in two.

  She nods. “They’re using all the resources with some cases up in Bangor. Someone is tainting drug supplies. It’s all hands on deck with that case.”

  I shift gears. Toxicology isn’t high priority on this case anyway. “Semen?” I ask, but I don’t dare to get my hopes up.

  “I don’t have preliminaries yet. She hasn’t been on the table long enough. I took swabs of the fluids; I should know tomorrow.”

  “Do you believe that she was raped?” I ask.

  She flips through the chart, though I think she’s ruminating on my question more than she is looking at the pages. “It appears she did have intercourse before death, but I can’t be certain if it was rape. There’s nothing that can prove it either way based on the evidence on the body.”

  I want to deflate, but I don’t. We’ll find out more as time goes on. It’ll likely be a few days before we have the full autopsy, but I want to know exactly what trauma she suffered before her death. That information can help me determine who might have done this.

  “Sergeant Pelletier said the family will be coming by to formally identify her later today, but I’ve made impressions of her teeth to search dental records if necessary, in the event that we need them,” Dr. White says as she looks at her clipboard.

  “Thank you.”

  Dr. White and I finish up going over her preliminaries, and I’m troubled by the amo
unt of injuries on Melanie’s body. I’ll need to ask the family if there is a reason to suspect abuse or if there was an accident recently.

  Austin tails me as we head out of the ME’s office. Her feet scuff against the pavement as she walks. I glance to the side and slow my pace, waiting for her to catch up. On the surface, she appears to be unfazed by the ordeal, as if this morning she expected to be dragged into a homicide investigation.

  We climb back into my Mustang, and I turn to her. “What can you tell me about the victim? Did you know her?”

  “Well, in the same sense that everyone in a small town knows everyone else,” she says. “She was a couple months short of graduating, didn’t get into much trouble. Pretty average, really. I would never have expected anything like this to happen to her.”

  “Have you ever noticed bruising on her before? Signs of trauma that you could see?”

  She shakes her head. “No. I also didn’t know about the cast, though.”

  “Did she get into a car accident recently?”

  “Nothing that was reported to the station.”

  That doesn’t mean an accident didn’t happen. I’ll be sure to ask her parents about it. “Do any of the teens normally hang out in that motel?” I pull out of the parking spot and turn right out of the lot, my tires crunching on the snow.

  “Not that I’ve ever seen. There’s a golf club, the bowling alley, Walker Park, the boat club, or the quarries in the summer.” She ticks the places off on her fingers as she talks.

  It sounds pretty similar to Vinalhaven. I’m surprised anyone would visit this motel and risk the rest of the town finding out about it. Usually in towns like this, if you were meeting someone at a motel, everyone in the town would know about it within an hour.

  “Did anyone report her missing?” I ask as we pass large wood-frame farmhouses on either side of the road. The two-lane road is lined with towering trees that are dusted with snow.

  “You’ll have to check with the sergeant. If she was, no one let me in on it.”

  I don’t know how this girl could have been missing all night in that motel without anyone noticing, especially if she was still in high school. The gray clouds above us grow thicker as we approach the coast. Thick white flakes spiral from the sky, freckling the road. I slow, not wanting to risk skidding.

  By the time we pull back into the station, the sky is darkening, and a curtain of white surrounds us. I wish I could interview Melanie’s family today, but with the weather heading sideways and Sergeant Pelletier wanting me to wait, Austin and I agree to call it a day. I head toward the docks, hoping that I can get a ferry back to the island tonight. After a fifteen-minute wait, I pull onto the ramp.

  I drive back toward my rental, snow billowing around me, and plan to spend my evening going over notes on the case so far.

  CHAPTER 2

  The morning light reflects off the fresh blanket of snow. I squint against it as I stare out the kitchen window. I didn’t get far yesterday. After I finished at the ME’s office, dropped off Austin, and got back to Vinalhaven, it was nearly seven p.m. I spent my evening digging through the little I could find in the file from Camden PD. Overnight another six inches of snow fell on the island.

  I sit in the kitchen sipping a cup of coffee. In front of me, toast is piled on the plate, the thin Camden file beside it. Though I might be back in Vinalhaven, my mind is far off, in Camden, going over the interviews I’ll need to conduct today.

  “Morning,” Noah says as he wraps his arms around my waist. His lips graze my neck, sending a shiver down my spine and pulling me from my thoughts. As he moves, his long hair tickles my cheek and neck. The feel of him against me puts a smile on my face. He’s been staying in my rental almost every night. At this rate he may as well live here, which is what he’d prefer. He’s made that clear several times. But I’m still on the fence. I can’t deny that I’ve thought about asking him, though only casually. That’s a big step, and I’m still unsure if I’m ready for it. Maybe it’s because I’ve never lived with anyone else. Maybe it’s because I’m not there yet. At the very least, while I’m not ready to share an address with Noah, I have been considering giving him a key to my place. Baby steps. That’s the best I can do right now.

  Back when I lived in Detroit, though I picked up guys occasionally, I never wanted anything serious. A few guys stuck around for a little while. But I didn’t really want them there. My job has always consumed the majority of my focus, energy, and time, and it always will. And that’s the way I want it. It’s easier being detached. Getting involved makes my life more complicated.

  I glance at my phone and see another three emails requesting interviews. I swipe them away, ignoring them like I always do.

  “How’d it go yesterday?” he asks, giving me a quick kiss before pouring himself a cup of coffee. As per usual, he’s got on a retro band T-shirt, a tattered Sex Pistols tour shirt he’s probably had for ten years. His Chuck Taylors are worn, but the faded black matches the shirt well. He adds so much sugar to the cup—at least six heaping spoonfuls—it makes me cringe. With all the sugar he consumes, it’s beyond me how he keeps up his muscled physique.

  When I got in last night, Noah was in the middle of working on a story, and I didn’t want to interrupt him. Since Noah’s article came out, he’s been busy with stories, calls. The article started off slow but gained so much traction online that it was featured on several true-crime podcasts and even mentioned in the New York Times. Thankfully most of the attention has been focused on him, and I’ve been able to stay out of the spotlight. That’s the way I want to keep it.

  “As good as it could have gone. It’s early, lots of unanswered questions so far,” I say. But I also explain my new partner, or whatever Austin is, and the circumstances around the death. I shouldn’t let the case bother me, but it does. I try to shake the feeling, the memories of Rachel, the other dead girls from last year, but they keep creeping into my mind.

  “A partner, how do you feel about that?” he asks.

  “Right now, I’m concerned about how she’ll handle all this. She’s got no experience. I’m not sure if she can really help me or if she’s just going to get in my way.” And I don’t know if Sergeant Pelletier is really doing this to show her the ropes or keep an eye on me.

  He sips slowly, testing his cup. It’s nice that he understands the procedure for cases. I don’t have to fill him in on all the details. That’s one thing I’ve never had, a guy who really got my job, got me. And Noah does. My whole life has been laid bare in front of him, all that I am, and he has stayed. Hell, he dug his heels in deeper when I tried to push him away. We shouldn’t be the sum of everything that’s happened to us, but I was forged by loss. It made me who I am. So without understanding what made me this way, Noah could never understand me.

  “I’m going to interview her family today, maybe some of her friends if I can track them down,” I explain. “Camden PD will be assisting with some of the interviews as well, but I’m going to tackle as many as I can myself.”

  “So you can go ask the important questions,” he says with a smirk.

  “Something like that,” I say, not meaning to return the smile, but I just can’t help it. My gaze shifts back to my coffee while my mind wanders. “Look, I don’t know how late I’ll be at the hospital, and the ferry stops running at nine—”

  “I’ve actually got to go out of town for a few days,” he says casually.

  I raise an eyebrow at that. He hasn’t mentioned anything about going out of town recently. “Where to?” I ask. Him being away would actually be great. It’d allow me to focus on my case without feeling like I’m ignoring him. Struggling to balance my work obligations with a relationship and the attention that it needs has always been a problem for me.

  “Do you remember Josh and Tina?” he asks.

  When Noah and I began dating, he told me about this part of his past. It’s what drove him to investigate cold cases. Josh was Noah’s childhood best friend, and
Tina was Josh’s mother. Tina was murdered when Noah was in middle school, sending Josh into a downward spiral. They never found Tina’s killer, and it’s always haunted Noah. Though I know it’s the one case he’s never dared investigate. From what I remember about the details, her death was connected to several others, the bodies all dumped in the same area.

  “Yes, I remember,” I say.

  “My brother Cameron works at the police station there. He told me they found another body. One they think is connected to the original murders.”

  “Oh, wow.” If they find new evidence on this body, that could mean their team could finally solve this case. New evidence often reinvigorates cold cases. That’d be huge for him. I know what it’d mean to Noah to finally put that cold case to rest.

  “So I’m finding a flight today. Going to go down there and dig into it.”

  “I really hope you’re able to help them find who did this,” I say. He needs it. I know he does. I’ve been there.

  “You won’t mind that I’ll be gone for a few days?”

  “I’m going to be up to my eyeballs in this case. I may not even notice that you’re gone,” I say with a laugh.

  “Ah, that’s exactly what a man wants to hear,” he says, smirking.

  I shake my head at Noah, trying not to smile. “I’ve got to get to the ferry. Have a safe flight,” I say, giving him a quick kiss. I relish the feel of his lips against mine, and then I throw on my coat and head out into the cold.

  CHAPTER 3

  I pull off Washington Street into the parking lot of Camden PD at eight thirty a.m., just as snow begins to fall. I bundle up in my coat and head inside. The station is downtown, huddled between several restaurants and a consignment shop. The building is short, made of brick, with white accents around the roofline, doors, and windows. I pass through an open lobby that also doubles as a waiting room. An empty receptionist desk stands against the far wall. The station is a ghost town when I get inside. That is, except for Austin, who’s already stationed at her desk, still clad in her uniform. If she’s going to be out with me working this case, I’ve got to talk to her about wearing plain clothes.