Page 37 of Close Her Eyes

Bone was visible where the vultures had taken flesh from her hand. Her fingernails were long and expertly manicured a bright red. Josie looked around for her missing ballet flat but didn’t see it.

“Hold this,” said Anya, thrusting the camera at Josie.

She took it and watched as the doctor knelt next to the body. First, she bagged the woman’s hands to preserve any evidence that might be under her nails. “She’s in full rigor.”

“Does that mean she’s been dead about twelve hours?” Josie asked.

Without looking up, Anya began riffling through her coat pockets. “You know I can’t give you an exact time just based on that. I have to take her internal temperature and do some calculations based on the ambient temperature. It’s pretty cold, which could slow the process, but you may be looking at a window of twelve to fifteen hours. I’ll have a more definitive answer once I complete the autopsy.”

If the victim had been killed twelve to fifteen hours ago, it would have been in the early-morning hours of Sunday. Anytime between one thirty and four thirty on Sunday morning. This was consistent with what Zeke had told them in terms of the body being dumped in the middle of the night.

Anya pulled a cell phone from the victim’s coat pocket. Josie called for Hummel, who took it into evidence.

“Help me turn her over,” Anya instructed.

“You sure you want to turn her over?” Josie said. “In full rigor?”

“Yes,” said Anya. “Come on.”

Josie set the camera aside and squatted beside Anya, prepared to handle the woman’s lower body. One of Anya’s gloved hands reached for the victim’s shoulder and froze.

“What is it?” said Josie.

“If—” She broke off, fingers trembling.

Josie looked to Anya’s face. “If what?”

“Josie, if she’s got a brand, like Sharon Eddy, I don’t think I should be the one doing the autopsy. If Vance had something to do with this—” She stopped, eyes still on the victim’s blonde hair.

Josie said, “It’s okay, Doc. Go on.”

“If she was killed sometime late Saturday night or early Sunday morning and then dumped here, it’s possible Vance could have done it. He didn’t show up to my house until almost noon today. Sure, he’s in jail now but he wasn’t when this woman was killed or when she was left here.”

She was right. Although Cyrus had arrested Vance Saturday afternoon, they knew he’d been released almost immediately. That Dermot had been able to get him out of town lockup on a weekend in a matter of hours spoke to how much influence the man still had in Bly. That meant that Vance would have been home the evening before. Josie also knew that Vance had driven a pickup truck to Anya’s house on Sunday. It had been parked along the street when they took him into custody. But the Hadlees also had a white sedan. He could have used that to kidnap and kill this woman, gone home, and returned several hours later to Anya’s house in one of the trucks.

Anya added, “If there is any connection to him at all, then I shouldn’t be involved. Even if there is only a possibility that he did this.”

“I get it,” Josie said. “Who do you have in mind?”

“There’s an ME in Lenore County I’d trust to do it. I’m sure he would love to do it, actually. They don’t get as many cases as we do.”

“Let’s take a look,” Josie said.

Together, Anya taking the upper part of the body and Josie the lower, they muscled her stiff limbs so that she was face up. The first thing Josie noticed was the way the blood had settled to the lowest part of her body, causing her skin to turn an ugly reddish purple. The second thing Josie noticed was that her eyes were wide open. They’d been blue in life but now were covered in a milky haze.

“Corneal opacity,” said Anya. “Normally you can clearly see the cornea, right?”

“Yes,” Josie said, stomach turning as she stared into the woman’s eyes. She was grateful in that moment that the woman had landed face down because she knew from experience that the first thing that scavenger birds usually ate were the eyeballs.

“Because the cornea is transparent. In the back of your cornea is a layer of cells—they’re in a honeycomb pattern—and they regulate hydration or how much water or fluid makes it into the cornea. When we die, those cells break down and more fluid gets into the cornea, causing it to become less and less transparent. Usually, we’ll see this about two hours after death and it gets more and more opaque as time goes on.”

Josie said, “Can you tell the time of death by how opaque her eyes are?”

Anya gave a half-shrug with one shoulder. Her fingers were now gently pulling at the woman’s lower eyelids. “You can, but it’s not the preferred method. Also, the best way to determine time of death using corneal opacity is by removing the eyeball.”

Josie tried to suppress her flinch, but Anya wasn’t looking at her. Anya continued, “I can measure the level of potassium in the vitreous humor—that’s the gel-like stuff between the lens of the eye and retina—and that will give me a good time of death. But really, it’s just as easy to do it the way I normally do and use body temperature while taking into account the ambient temperature of where the body was found. But for that, I’ve got to get her to the morgue. Or, as I said, my colleague can do it.”

Anya checked the woman’s hairline and her mouth, looking for visible injuries. All Josie could see was more dirt and debris from the dry brush.

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