A Hard Death (5 page)

T
he deputy sat inside the car, watching them move the bodies into the morgue. He'd figured it would've taken longer to find them.

As he watched, he thought about how funny it was how a life changed. You start out with the best intentions, wanting to help people just get along, live peaceful lives, free of fear, free of violence. Then life gets complicated. You buy a house, get a mortgage, have to make payments each month. You meet a girl, and you marry her, and you have kids.

But she trips and falls in the kitchen, and injures her back, and needs physical therapy and pain meds, and soon she doesn't like to get up too much, but now she needs pain meds just to lie in bed and watch TV. And your kids go to school, and it's a public school in a good district, but they need clothes, and they grow so quick. And the fifty grand you're making as a county cop suddenly doesn't go as far as it should.

But you go on busting bad guys, laying down the law, carting lowlifes off to jail. You are not one of them, you are better than they are. One day you bust some scumbag coke dealer, and he has a brown paper bag with twenty-five thousand in hundreds in it, old, new, worn, intact, just thousands and thousands of dollars in hundreds. And he says take it, just take it and let him go. And you need a new roof, and a new water heater, and the boy's birthday is in a week, and that money would let you breathe for a second, just a second, help you get your head above water.

But you say no. And you arrest him, because he's a scumbag and you're the Law.

But now it's different. You know it's out there, that little brown paper bag or one just like it, that one-inch-thick wad of untraceable hundred-dollar bills. Or one just like it. And you coulda had it, but you said no.

But it's still out there.

And things don't get better. The real estate market tanks, and you can't sell the house, and you can't afford to fix the roof. Your wife is drinking, but not as much as your fifteen-year-old. He's dropping out of high school, but you're not there, because you're working overtime to save up for the roofing, doing details or working security at the parties of the rich. And you stand there watching them go past, blond high school girls driving German sports cars that cost as much as your house, laughing and tanned and carefree.

And your wife is now a sucking hole of need, a festering ulcer in your bed, and as you lie next to her, you want to gnaw off your arm, hack it off, anything to escape, you want to be parked off the sand at Gran Turtle Beach, slipping the bra off that sixteen-year-old blonde in the back of her Mercedes convertible, breathing in the smell of million-dollar perfume on her neck as you slide aside those silk panties and start fingerfucking that rich little pussy.

And you discover busting bad guys is like watching the tide—they just keep coming, sliding in, going down, always more mopes to take down. And the funny thing is you get to know them—you see they have families, people who care about them. And one day you realize they're just like you—screwing up their lives trying to make a fucking buck, trying to make enough to keep their own heads above water.

And it occurs to you that the problem is the scumbag customers: dealers just give the customer what he asks for, a product that in some countries isn't even illegal anymore. You've learned that users will
always
find drugs, that if they can't buy from one scumbag, they'll buy from another. And you finally understand your life is just some picayune shit, measuring out the ocean with an eyedropper.

And then one day someone offers you a thousand dollars; you don't have to do anything, you just have to not be somewhere. All you do is make sure your patrol route doesn't take you past a particular intersection during a particular hour.

And this time you say yes.

And after that, it's all over.

 

He checked the cell phone; another eighteen minutes credit before he had to chuck it. He answered on the second ring.

“They found the car in the canal, and identified the body.”

He listened.

“Yeah, I know it was fast. The new medical examiner recognized the wife's jewelry.”

He shook his head.

“No, they did. But she had a small necklace, and I guess they missed it.”

The parking lot was mostly empty now. As the cars began to trickle out of the lot, the radar gun mounted on the dash sporadically flashed the speeds—7, 12, 8—the digits splashing pale green light on his face.

The deputy shook his head firmly. “He's sharp—we need to be careful with this one. We'll keep a close eye on him.”

He hung up. Sixteen more minutes, and this phone would be history. Fuck it, he should just trash it now, pick up the next one.

What he was doing wasn't so bad—it was just information.

The rain picked up again, and the last of the mourners scurried in to shelter. He liked the sound of the rain on the car, liked being quiet and dry while it poured around him. Tonight, he'd lie in bed awake a long while, listening to the sound of the rain drumming against the terra cotta tiles that covered his beautiful new roof.

J
enner asked all staff other than Flanagan, and Bunny Rutledge and Calvin Major, the mortuary technicians who'd be assisting him, to leave the morgue area. He followed the employees out of the autopsy room, crossing the breezeway into the main office facility so he could change into his scrubs.

Marie Carter, the office manager, put up a fresh pot of coffee in the break room, then disappeared, returning a short while later with four dozen doughnuts from the Dunkin' Donuts on Country Club Road. Bucky Rutledge, another technician and Bunny's twin brother, arrived with an almost full bottle of Jack Daniels. He set up at the opposite end of the room to Marie, with the bottle of Jack and a line of mugs swiped from the sink.

When Jenner got back to the autopsy suite, Flanagan was prepping the table while Bunny and Calvin positioned Marty's body for photographs. As the Crime Scene technician photographed the unclothed body, Calvin hung Marty's shirt and slacks in the drying cupboard. Then Flanagan wheeled the body into the radiography suite to X-ray the head and chest. Jenner asked him to do dental films, too—with both Marty and his wife dead, a legal identification could be tricky. Visual identification wasn't an option—Jenner had seen the man barely two weeks before, and hadn't recognized his corpse. Marty had no ID on his body—no wallet, no cash; the fish hook necklace was either removed or lost in the water.

Jenner said, “Do you guys have an odontologist?”

“Of course, doc. Both Dr. R. and the missus went to Dr. El-Bashir—he's our odontologist. I'll give him a call in the morning, and I bet he'll walk the dentals over himself. Heck, he'll be pounding down our door as soon as he hears.”

The three lifted Marty Roburn onto the autopsy table. Marty's size and condition made him difficult to hold, and when they eased him flat, he started to slip off the sides. They were still placing support blocks to secure the body on the table when the door flew open.

A thickset, heavily freckled blond man, maybe forty years old, strode over to the table and stood there, swaying. He jabbed a finger at the body and said, “Is it him? Is it really Roburn?”

Jenner said, “Who are you?”

“Sheriff Tom Anders…” He looked Jenner up and down warily, then added, “Who are you?”

“I'm Dr. Jenner. I'm covering for Dr. Roburn.”

“Oh, yes.” The sheriff's eyes stayed narrow as he looked at Jenner. “Well, I'm your boss.” He gestured impatiently to the body. “Is it really him?”

Jenner could smell the alcohol.

“We need to confirm with dental in the morning, but yes. I think it's Dr. Roburn.”

“Oh, Jesus Christ!” The sheriff struggled to focus, then blurted, “I
liked
that old guy…”

He leaned against the cabinets, breathing fast. Jenner turned to Flanagan and raised an eyebrow; Flanagan shrugged.

Jenner said, “Sheriff, you don't have to stay for this—I can stop by your office first thing in the morning to discuss my findings.”

In a heartbeat, Anders's gaze shifted from dazed to suspicious, his eyes teeny ball-bearings in his chubby baby face.

“No! I'll stay! I want to stay.” He looked around the room, spotted a stainless steel stool, and pointed. “I'll be right there, out of your way. No need to worry about me, Mr. Jenner! I'll be right there…”

He walked carefully toward the stool, then sat down hard and slumped back against the drying cupboard. Jenner figured he'd pass out soon.

Back at the table, Jenner muttered to Flanagan, “Rich, how do we get this clown out of here? A guy that big, if he slips and hits his head, there'll be blood everywhere—I don't need the hassle tonight. Anyone we can call to get rid of him?”

The morgue director thought for a second, stroking his mustache.
“Well, he scares the crap right out of the deputies. Maybe Detective Rudge? He's out in the loading area, talking with Crime Scene.”

“Okay, good. Can you get him?”

Flanagan nodded and left the room.

Jenner looked over to the techs. “Bunny, Calvin? I'm about ready to start. You okay with this? If you don't want to stay, I can manage by myself.”

Calvin said, “We want to see it through, doc.”

Jenner nodded.

He turned, stood directly in front of Marty's body, scalpel in his hand.

How was he supposed to feel? Jenner knew pathologists who said you could do no higher honor to an old colleague than to perform his autopsy, but he'd always thought that was bullshit—he would choose for his friends what he'd choose for himself: leave my body alone. Just burn it, scatter my ashes somewhere I loved. Don't cut me up, and don't put me in the fucking dirt to rot.

But there he was, about to cut right into the heart of a man he had loved—his mentor, his friend. The person who'd helped Jenner, thrown him a lifeline when things were bad, when everyone else was talking about just how badly Jenner had fucked up.

He felt a nudge at his elbow, and turned to see Bunny. Behind the face shield, her eyes were pink and puffy. “Doc, you okay? You think maybe you should take a break?”

He shook his head. “No, I'm okay.”

He looked at Marty's body.

He was my friend.

But that wasn't true anymore, was it? This wasn't Marty, this was some spongy, rotted husk that had once been wrapped around Marty's spirit. Christ, the bloated form on the table barely looked human…

No, this wasn't Marty Roburn: Marty had left the building long ago, and the bloated corpse on the autopsy table was nothing but evidence. And Jenner would read the evidence and document the information perfectly.

He smiled at her. “I'm fine, thanks, Bunny. How about you? You really sure you don't want to wait in the break room?”

“No, doc. I'm with you here.”

She was crying. Jenner looked away.

In the corner, Sheriff Anders began to snore. In his pale blue Lacoste tennis sweater and pink Polo Grounds Country Club shirt, he looked like a big three-year-old dozing off after a busy day playing with toy trucks.

Jenner turned to Bunny and grinned, and she began to giggle, the tears streaking down to her mask.

Jenner looked down, shut his eyes tight for a second, and then made his opening incision.

He would get whoever did this, get them if it was the last act of his whole fucking train wreck of a career.

C
ause of death wasn't an issue—anyone could see someone had cut Marty's throat with ruthless efficiency, slicing cleanly through the carotid arteries and jugular veins, even severing the windpipe from the Adam's apple. This would have been the final injury, the coup de grâce.

And Marty would have needed a coup de grâce: he had been tortured systematically, long, shallow cuts made into his chest, carefully and methodically inflicted. Since the wounds were roughly parallel, Jenner could tell Marty hadn't moved much during or between each injury; he had to have been restrained, either with bindings or by force.

Jenner made incisions to explore the wrists and forearms; there was no evidence of a ligature, but a soft or broad ligature could leave no marks.

Flanagan appeared in the doorway.

“Doc, Detective Rudge from Major Crimes.”

Jenner had heard about David Rudge; everyone in the Port Fontaine ME office thought the guy walked on water. Sharp, driven, stellar arrest record, the sort of cop who could nail down the truth in seven questions. Jenner took police legend with a grain of salt, but Marty had said if he ever had trouble, Jenner should find Rudge. And Marty had been a good judge of people.

Jenner was expecting some kind of All-American Brylcreem-and-Vitalis jock, but as Rudge stepped into the autopsy room, he looked more like a man on the cusp of undistinguished middle age. He was gently pear-shaped, with a shabby gray suit and a grubby white shirt. The expanse of shirt covering his belly was dotted with ketchup stains, and his tie hung loosely; apparently Rudge didn't believe in wasting a decent knot when a tie could be easily slipped off over the head and replaced the next day with minimum fuss.

The other surprise was that Rudge was black. No one talking about Rudge had ever hinted at his race—score one for his own Yankee stereotypes, Jenner thought: this was the New South, not the TV South.

Whatever his expectations of Rudge had been, when Rudge looked at the body, Jenner knew he was the real deal. The detective stood in the doorway, nodding absently at Jenner while concentrating on Marty's body; it reminded Jenner of one of those fifties' sci-fi movies, where the alien robot scans an Earth object—a car, maybe, or a dog—its gaze tracking over the body in a beam of focused light, inch by inch, measuring, gauging, analyzing.

He stepped back to give Rudge a better view.

The detective came closer, shaking his head. “So, what, they tortured him, then cut his throat?”

Jenner nodded. “Yes.”

“Shit.” Rudge shook his head sadly. His lip curled. He paused, then shook his head again. “That ain't right.”

Jenner nodded again.

Rudge glanced at the incised wrists and forearms, then turned to Jenner. “Did they tie him up?”

“I can't see anything, but I think they probably bound him, yes.”

“And Mrs. Roburn?”

Jenner stepped back and tore off his plastic gown. “She's in the X-ray room. I haven't looked at her yet.”

Face grim, Rudge followed Jenner down the hall.

Bobbie Roburn lay on a gurney next to the X-ray table, clothes and duct tape bindings undisturbed. The bloating stretched her clothes tight, her body bulging through the mesh of silver tape. Her blouse was stained with purge fluid, but there was no blood, and Jenner could find no holes in the clothes, nothing to suggest a stabbing.

Her wrists were taped in front of her—her abductors had felt she'd posed little threat. They'd wrapped the duct tape in loops that completely encircled her torso, securing her arms to her sides. Her ankles were taped together, and her thighs and knees.

Jenner put on gloves and reached for the gag.

“Doc, want me to get the photographer?” Rudge said.

“We've already taken all-overs.”

Jenner focused on the gag. The duct tape wound between the lips and around the head, but they'd left Bobbie's nostrils exposed.

He used scissors to cut the tape where it passed behind her ear, then peeled it up carefully from her hair, gradually rolling it around to where it entered her mouth. There, he gently opened her lips and slipped the tape out of her mouth; there was nothing stuffed inside the oral cavity.

Jenner hung the tape in the drying cupboard with clothespins; the way it had been applied seemed pretty random, without any distinctive pattern. He looked the tape over carefully, but could find no hairs or fibers; the Crime Lab might still be able to recover fingerprints or DNA.

He opened the mouth wider, tilted the head to examine her neck. There were no injuries of the mouth, no bruising or cuts on the lips. No visible hemorrhages in the bulging eyes. Her neck was clean, free of any obvious wound.

“Christ.”

Rudge took a photo of the neck, then looked at him. “What is it, doc? You got something?”

“No, the opposite: there's no injury at all.”

Rudge wrinkled his brow.

“So how did she die? You think…”

Jenner tore off his gloves and said, “I think they just fucking threw her in the trunk and let her fucking drown.”