Deadly Decisions (4 page)

At three-thirty on Friday the normal weekday hustle and bustle were beginning to taper off. One by one doors were closing, and the army of lab-coated scientists and technicians was dwindling.

I unlocked my office and hung my jacket on the wooden hall tree. Three white forms lay on my desk. I selected the one with LaManche’s signature.

The
“Demande d’Expertise en Anthropologie”
is often my first introduction to a case. Filled out by the requesting pathologist, it provides data critical to tracking a file.

My eyes drifted down the right-hand column. Lab number. Morgue number. Police incident number. Clinical and efficient. The body is tagged and archived until the wheels of justice have run their course.

I shifted to the left column. Pathologist. Coroner. Investigating officer. Violent death is the final intrusion, and those who investigate it are the ultimate voyeurs. Though I participate, I am never comfortable with the indifference with which the system approaches the deceased and the death investigation. Even though a sense of detachment is a must to maintain emotional equilibrium, I always have the feeling that the victim deserves something more passionate, more personal.

I scanned the summary of known facts. It differed from LaManche’s telephone account in only one respect. To date, two hundred and fifteen remnants of flesh and bone had been recovered. The largest weighed eleven pounds.

Ignoring the other forms and a stack of phone messages, I went to find the director.

I’d rarely seen Pierre LaManche in anything but lab-coat white or surgical green. I couldn’t imagine him laughing or wearing plaid. He was somber and kind, and strictly tweed. And the best forensic pathologist I knew.

I spotted him through the rectangle of glass beside his office door. His rangy form was hunched over a desk heaped with papers, journals, books, and a stack of files in all the primary colors. When I tapped he looked up and gestured me in.

The office, like its occupant, smelled faintly of pipe tobacco. LaManche had a manner of moving silently, and sometimes the scent was my first clue to his presence.

“Temperance.” He accented the final syllable and made it rhyme with France. “Thank you so much for returning early. Please, sit down.”

Always the perfect French, with never a contraction or word of slang.

We took places at a small table in front of his desk. On it lay a number of large brown envelopes.

“I know it is too late to begin analysis now, but perhaps you are willing to come in tomorrow?”

The face was army mule long with deep, vertical creases. When he raised his brows in a question, the furrows paralleling his eyes elongated and veered toward the midline.

“Yes. Of course.”

“You might want to begin with the X rays.”

He indicated the envelopes, then swiveled to his desk.

“And here are the scene and autopsy photos.” He handed me a stack of smaller brown envelopes and a videocassette.

“The two bikers carrying the bomb to the Vipers’ clubhouse were pulverized, their remains scattered over an enormous area. A lot of what the recovery team is finding is stuck to walls and caught in bushes and tree branches. Amazingly, the largest fragments retrieved so far have come from the clubhouse roof. One chunk of thorax has a partial tattoo that will be useful for establishing identity.”

“What about the driver?”

“He died in the hospital this morning.”

“The shooter?”

“He is in custody, but these people are never helpful. He will go to jail rather than give anything to the police.”

“Even information about a rival gang?”

“If he talks, he is probably a dead man.”

“Are there still no dentals or prints?”

“Nothing.”

LaManche ran a hand over his face, raised and lowered his shoulders, then laced his fingers in his lap.

“I fear we will never get all the tissue sorted out.”

“Can’t we use DNA?”

“Have you heard the names Ronald and Donald Vaillancourt?”

I shook my head.

“The Vaillancourt brothers, Le Clic and Le Clac. Both are full patch members of the Heathens. One was implicated a few years
back in the execution of Claude ‘Le Couteau’ Dubé. I don’t remember which.”

“The police think the Vaillancourts are the victims?”

“Yes.”

The melancholy eyes looked into mine.

“Clic and Clac are identical twins.”

•    •    •

By seven that evening I’d examined everything but the video. Using a magnifier I’d gone over scores of photos showing hundreds of bone fragments and bloody masses of varying shapes and sizes. In shot after shot arrows pointed to red and yellow globs lying in grass, entangled in branches, and flattened against cinder blocks, broken glass, tar-paper roofing, and corrugated metal.

The remains had arrived at the morgue in large black plastic bags, each containing a collection of Ziploc bags. Each bag was numbered and held an assortment of body parts, dirt, fabric, metal, and unidentifiable debris. The autopsy photos moved from the unopened bags, to shots of the small plastic sacks grouped on autopsy tables, to views of the contents sorted by categories.

In the final photos the flesh lay in rows, like meat arranged in a butcher’s case. I spotted pieces of skull, a fragment of tibia, a femoral head, and a portion of scalp with a complete right ear. Some close-ups revealed the jagged edges of shattered bone, others showed hairs, fibers, and scraps of fabric adhering to the flesh. The tattoo LaManche had mentioned was clearly visible on a flap of skin. It depicted three skulls, bony hands covering eyes, ears, and mouths. The irony was priceless. This guy would be seeing, hearing, and saying nothing.

After examining the prints and X rays I’d come to agree with LaManche. I could see bone in the photos, and the radiographs revealed the presence of more. That would allow me to determine the anatomical origin of some tissue. But sorting the jumble of flesh into specific brothers was going to be tough.

Separating commingled bodies is always hard, especially if the remains are badly damaged or incomplete. The process is infinitely more difficult when the dead are of the same gender, age, and race. I’d once spent weeks examining the bones and decomposing flesh of
seven male prostitutes excavated from a crawl space beneath their killer’s home. All were white and in their teens. DNA sequencing had been invaluable in determining who was who.

In this case that might not work. If the victims were monozygous twins they had developed from a single egg. Their DNA would be identical.

LaManche was right. It seemed unlikely I’d be able to divide the fragments into separate bodies and attach a name to each.

A gastric growl suggested it was time to quit. Tired and discouraged, I grabbed my purse, zipped my jacket, and headed out.

•    •    •

Back home, the flashing light told me I had a message. I spread my take-out sushi on the table, popped a Diet Coke, and hit the button.

My nephew Kit was driving from Texas to Vermont with his father. Intent on bonding, they were coming north to fish for whatever it is one hooks in inland waters in the spring. Since my cat prefers the space and comfort of a motor home to the efficiency of air travel, Kit and Howie had promised to pick him up at my home in Charlotte and transport him to Montreal. The message was that they and Birdie would arrive the next day.

I dipped a slice of maki roll and popped it in my mouth. I was going for another when the doorbell sounded. Puzzled, I went to the security screen.

The monitor showed Andrew Ryan leaning against the wall in my hallway. He wore faded blue jeans, running shoes, and a bomber jacket over a black T-shirt. At six foot two, with his blue eyes and angular features, he looked like a cross between Cal Ripkin and Indiana Jones.

I looked like Phyllis Diller before her makeover.

Great.

Sighing, I opened the door.

“Hey, Ryan. What’s up?”

“Saw your light and figured you might be back early.”

He gave me an appraising look.

“Rough day?”

“I spent today traveling and sorting flesh,” I said defensively, then tucked my hair behind my ears. “Coming in?”

“Can’t stay.” I noticed he was wearing his pager and gun. “Just thought I’d inquire as to your dinner plans for tomorrow night.”

“I’ll be sorting bomb victims all day tomorrow, so I may be a little zonked.”

“You will have to eat.”

“I will have to eat.”

He placed one hand on my shoulder and twirled a strand of my hair with the other.

“If you’re tired we could skip dinner and just relax,” he said in a low voice.

“Hmm.”

“Broaden our horizons?”

He swept back the hair and brushed his lips across my ear.

Oh yes.

“Sure, Ryan. I’ll wear my thong panties.”

“I always encourage that.”

I gave him my “yeah, right” look.

“Will you spring for Chinese?”

“Chinese is good,” he said, drawing my hair upward and swirling it into a topknot. Then he let it fall and wrapped both arms around my back. Before I could object he pulled me close and kissed me, his tongue teasing the edges of my lips, then gently probing the inside of my mouth.

His lips felt soft, his chest hard against mine. I started to push away, but knew that was not what I wanted to do. Sighing, I relaxed and my body molded to his. The horrors of the day evaporated, and for that moment I was safe from the madness of bombs and murdered children.

Eventually we needed air.

“You’re sure you don’t want to come in?” I asked, stepping back and holding the door open. My knees felt like Jell-O salad.

Ryan looked at his watch.

“I’m sure a half hour won’t matter.”

At that moment his pager sounded. He checked the number.

“Shit.”

Shit.

He rehooked the pager to the waist of his jeans.

“Sorry,” he said, grinning sheepishly. “You know I’d really rath—”

“Go.” Smiling, I placed two palms on his chest and shoved him gently. “I’ll see you tomorrow night. Seven-thirty.”

“Think about me,” he said, as he turned and headed down the hall.

When he’d gone I went back to the sushi, definitely thinking about Andrew Ryan.

Ryan is SQ, a homicide detective, and occasionally we work the same cases. Though he’d been asking for years, only recently had I started seeing him socially. It had taken some self-persuasion, but I’d come around to his point of view. Technically, we didn’t work together, so my “no office romance rule” didn’t apply unless I wanted it to.

Nevertheless, the arrangement made me edgy. After twenty years of marriage, and several as a not-so-swinging single, new relationships just weren’t that easy for me. But I enjoyed Ryan’s company, so I’d decided to give it a whirl. To “date” him, as my sister would say.

Oh, God. Dating.

I had to admit that I found Ryan sexy as hell. Most women did. Wherever we went, I’d notice female eyes checking him out. Wondering, no doubt.

I was wondering, too. But at the moment that ship was still in port, the engines stoked and ready to go. The Jell-O knees had just reconfirmed that. Dinner out was definitely a better idea.

The phone rang as I was clearing the table.

“Mon Dieu,
you’re back.” Deep, throaty English with a heavy French accent.

“Hi, Isabelle. What’s up?”

Though I’d known Isabelle Caillé only two years, in that time we’d grown quite close. We’d met during a difficult time in my life. In the space of one bleak summer I was targeted by a violent psychopath, my best friend was murdered, and I was finally forced to face the reality of a failed marriage. In a display of self-indulgence, I had booked a single at a Club Med, and flown off to play tennis and overeat.

I’d met Isabelle on the flight to Nassau, and we were later paired for doubles. We won, discovered we were there for similar reasons, and passed an enjoyable week together. We’d been friends ever since.

“I didn’t expect you until next week. I was going to leave a message about getting together, but since you are home, what about dinner tomorrow?”

I told her about Ryan.

“That one’s a keeper, Tempe. You get tired of that
chevalier,
you send him over and I’ll give him something to think about. Why are you back early?”

I explained about the bombing.

“Ah, oui.
I read about that in
La Presse.
Is it just terribly gruesome?”

“The victims are not in good shape,” I said.

“Les motards.
If you ask me, these outlaw bikers get what they deserve.”

Isabelle never lacked opinions, and was rarely hesitant to share them.

“The police should just let these gangsters blow each other up. Then we wouldn’t have to look at their dirty bodies with filthy tattoos anymore.”

“Hm.”

“I mean, it’s not like they’re murdering babies.”

“No,” I agreed. “It’s not.”

The next morning Emily Anne Toussaint died while walking to her ballet lesson.

H
OWARD AND
K
IT HAD ARRIVED AT SEVEN, LEFT
B
IRDIE, AND
continued on their way. Birdie was ignoring me and checking the condo for canine intruders when I left for the lab at eight to resume work on the bomb victims.