"Human kisses." Pewter grimaced.
As Pewter wriggled out of Harry's arms, Murphy kissed the human back, her rough tongue making Harry giggle. Then she put Murphy down and knelt to kiss Tucker. Harry loved her animals and, if truth be told, she probably loved them more than people.
As for her declaration that she would figure out what was going on, she might have been a little less cocky if she had been sitting in on Mychelle Burns's autopsy.
26
Cooper, wearing a lab coat, stood beside the corpse as Tom Yancy worked.
Sheriff Shaw had prowled the corridors of the Clam during the game. He didn't have to say why. She knew her boss. He was a good law officer, his methods were laudable, but he also had a sixth sense. Sometimes if he'd just walk around or sit at a crime scene, he'd get what he called "a notion." Through his example, she'd learned to trust her own instincts. There was no shortcut to hard police work but, still, those instincts could put you on the right track.
"No strangulation. No rape." Yancy talked, his face not two inches from Mychelle's neck. "No bruises."
"No struggle?"
"No. The first wound you saw, the one here right under the thoracic cavity didn't kill her. It was this one, not so easily seen." He pointed to a surprisingly clear stab wound. A few drops of blood discolored the entry point right below her heart. "The weapon nicked her heart but it took some time for it to kill her. She had a strong heart."
"No similarity at all to H.H.?"
"No. Not in method. She faced her killer. He or she stabbed her once, then twice. Close. The killer was very close. He used a stiletto or thin-bladed knife. Delivered with force. The internal bleeding was much more severe than the external. As I recall, you said there was blood but not a mess of it."
"Right."
"She wasn't expecting the blow. There are no fingerprints on the back of her neck. If she had tried to flee, the killer would have reached around and held her by the back of the neck to deliver this wound at this angle. If she'd turned away or he'd grabbed an arm, the wound would be at a different angle, flesh would be torn. My educated guess is this blow was a complete surprise delivered by someone she knew well enough to let him or her get very close."
"Stiletto." Cooper thought to herself that this was an odd choice for a weapon, something for opera, not real life or death.
Yancy half-smiled. "Be a lot easier to knock someone off with a butcher knife but a big knife is harder to conceal."
"Anything else I should know?" Cooper asked.
Yancy shrugged. "She had genital herpes."
"Did H.H.?"
"I saw no external sign."
"Do you have any blood left from that autopsy?"
"Down in Richmond. Yes."
"Better run a test for it. It'll show in the blood, won't it?"
"Oh yeah." Yancy exhaled. "I wish we'd get that toxicology report on H.H. soon."
"Amazing what shows in the blood, isn't it?"
"The human body is amazing, how people abuse it and it just keeps ticking. I've cut open people whose livers were like tissue paper. I'd lift them out and they'd disintegrate, I mean come apart between my fingers. And that wasn't what killed the corpse. Makes me wonder."
"Apart from the genital herpes, anything else?"
"She was in good health. The knife pierced the left lung, as you can see here"-he held down the chest cavity where he'd opened her up-"then nicked the heart. With each beat of the heart the nick tore a little bit more. The blood seeped out."
"Was it painful?"
"Yes. You can feel your heart."
"Jesus."
"Hope she believed in Him. Maybe it gave her comfort."
"How strong would you have to be to stab her twice like that?"
"Not weightlifter strong but strong enough."
"A slight person could do it with great force?"
"Sure."
"H-m-m, well, the usual. Tests for drugs, alcohol, and I guess poison."
"She wasn't poisoned. The body doesn't lie, Coop. She died by violence."
Cooper noticed Yancy's blue eyes. "More than any of us you see what we do to one another. I see it in a different way but you see it in the tracery of the veins."
"Like you, I try to keep my professional distance and I'd be a liar if I said there weren't people on this slab who didn't deserve it. But a young woman, prime of life, I gotta wonder. Don't take this the wrong way, but if she'd been sexually molested it would make more sense to me. This," he shook his head, "this was about as far away from sex as you can get."
27
Wearing a white hard hat, Fred Forrest buttonholed Matthew Crickenberger at the site of the new sports complex. Tazio and Brinkley had just arrived, too. Matthew greeted the wiry man with no affection and none was returned. Tazio said hello to Stuart Tapscott and Travis Critzer who would be in charge of the earthmoving operation. They didn't get a chance to put in another word.
Fred folded his arms across his chest. "Don't think because I'm shorthanded that you can get away with anything."
"Oh, come on, Fred, I'm not trying to get away with anything. I've always gone by the code, exceeded code." Matthew's voice betrayed a hint of disgust.
"You're all the same," Fred sneered. "I'm hiring someone real soon and I'll have him up to speed in no time. You'd better toe the line. Going to be my special project, right here." He tapped the frozen earth with his foot. "Going to drop by just about every day."
"You can do whatever you want," Matthew, his face florid, replied.
"That's exactly right." Fred, no trace of humor, jutted his chin out. "Think you were damned lucky to get your environmental impact studies passed. UVA." He sniffed, implying the studies were accepted because this was a UVA project.
The truth was the opposite. Any time the university sought to expand or build, the county faced the hue and cry from non-university people that the school, like a giant gilded amoeba, was smothering the county. Any UVA request going before any county board or the county commission itself bore unusual scrutiny. Also, any university project was certain to be reported in the newspaper, radio, and on TV. The public then would respond.
Fred knew that. He wanted to get Matthew's goat. If the opportunity presented itself for Fred to needle Matthew, he took it.
"You've got a copy of the study, Fred. Read it yourself."
"Did. That's why I said you're lucky."
Stuart Tapscott, an older and wiser man, had to walk away. Travis, in his thirties, followed Stuart's prudent example. They didn't want to say something they would later regret.
Tazio stuck by Matthew. Brinkley stuck by Tazio.
"Get that damned dog out of here." Fred pointed a finger at the handsome animal.
"No." Tazio stared Fred straight in the face.
"You'll do what I tell you or I can make life interesting." He practically licked his lips.
"It's not against code for me to have a dog with me on the job. And you push me, I'll push right back. Go bully someone else."
"You think because you're a woman and black I'll go easy on you? Think again. You're all the same, you architects, big construction people. You think you're better than us. Make more money. We're just clock punchers. I know what you think. How you think. Get away with whatever you can."
"Leave Tazio alone, jerk," Brinkley warned as he put himself between Fred and Tazio.
"That dog's growling at me. I'll call Animal Control."
"He's clearing his throat." Matthew, feeling unflappable today, smiled. "Fred, run along. We've got work to do."
"I'll go when I'm goddamned good and ready."
"Suit yourself." He turned his back on Fred, put his hand under Tazio's elbow, guiding her to a spot ten yards away where a peg with surveyor's tape was in the ground. Brinkley remained next to Tazio but looked over his back.
Fred followed them. "Design will never work. Too much glass. Too expensive to heat."
"It will work. Not only will it work, it will be less expensive to heat and cool than the building currently in use, and this building is twice the size, thanks to my design"-she squared her shoulders-"and thanks to modern materials."