Page 111 of Unnatural Death

“It’s beginning to look like a lot of events are connected, including a dairy farmer who was crushed to death when his tractor overturned in August,” I reply. “Benton and I stumbled upon what might be a terrorist outpost in the woods.”

“The same violent extremists are causing so much trouble around here,” Clark says. “Trying to shoot out electrical power substations, committing robberies and home invasions.”

“And selling snake venom,” I reply. “Maybe causing someone’s death because he has a huge life insurance payout. Only his widow wasn’t anticipating the insurance company would argue suicide. Had I ruled the death an accident months ago, Bonnie Abel would be some ten million dollars richer.”

“Do you think she was tied in with these extremists?”

“Very possibly. In fact, I’d say that’s a certainty. Mostly, I’m worried about her son, Ledger, and what he’s got to do with any of this.” I get up from my desk. “The animal rescue place where he works likely is the source of the trace evidence Rex found on the painter’s tape in the dentist’s case. The snake cells, monkey hair, bits of feathers, etcetera.”

“I sure wish we had Ledger’s DNA and fingerprints,” Clark says as I walk out my office door, the baseball bat coming with me. “What I’m calling to tell you is DNA from the painter’s tape in the dentist’s case matches DNA recovered from Buckingham Run. I’m talking about the plastic cap to an inhaler of some sort the police discovered on the footpath.”

“The same person killed the Mansons and Nan Romero?”

“Possibly, and we’ve also got partial fingerprints from the painter’s tape. Unfortunately, no hits in IAFIS or CODIS, and that’s most likely because the person isn’t in the system. Apparently, whoever left the prints, the DNA, is someone who’s never been arrested or even a suspect in a crime.”

“We may not have Ledger’s DNA,” I reply, “but we likely will have his mother’s soon enough if she’s one of the Nokesville victims. We’ll be able to determine if her son left DNA on painter’s tape wrapped about Nan Romero’s head.”

I envision the video of a masked figure dressed in black entering the back of the dentist’s medical building. Sending a text message to Fruge, I ask if anyone in the Abel family might have been the dentist’s patient.

* * *

Opening the fire exit door, I take the stairs to the morgue level. I tuck my phone in my lab coat pocket, the reception not good down here. Glancing up at every wall-mounted security screen I pass, I’m looking for any sign of Norm, feeling irked as I imagine him taking a nap.

Or worse, he’s sitting someplace eating one of his smelly snacks while watching me as I’m looking for him, worrying about where he is. No doubt he’s amused if he’s observing me walking around with the baseball bat. The white tile corridor is empty and silent, and I tell myself I may as well enjoy the peacefulness while it lasts. Soon enough this place will be crawling with feds because of Patty Mullet.

As I near the autopsy suite, I hear music drifting out, and Fabian must have forgotten to turn it off. I take off my lab coat as I walk past the gleaming steel tables on my way to the locker room, looking for any sign that Norm or anybody else has been snooping, perhaps swiping more PPE or who knows what? I hang my lab coat in my locker, covering up with Tyvek.

I return to the autopsy suite, and Paula Abdul is belting out “Straight Up” as I attach forms and other paperwork to a clipboard that I place on the countertop of my workstation. I realize I can’t get a head start labeling cartons, test tubes or anything else because the bodies haven’t been accessioned yet.

“Damn,” I mutter, thinking how stupid I am.

Taking off my gloves, I push through the double doors on my way to the security office. I get on the computer in there, assigning the case numbers myself. As I’m leaving, I hear a crash over the CCTV microphones, something having rammed through the parking lot’s security gate. The roar of a diesel engine as headlights flare on the video screen I’m looking at, and I’ve stopped in my tracks, my heart pounding.

The white van looks like one I’ve seen before, but it’s hard to tell. I can’t make out the tag or who might be behind the wheel, and then it’s suddenly accelerating. I watch in shocked disbelief as it splashes through the slushy parking lot, crashing into the rolled-down bay door, bowing it away from its frame. Then the driver’s door opens and someone steps out, but I can’t see who it is.

All that’s picked up by my parking lot’s thermal imaging cameras is the disturbance of invisible feet moving through the snow. Metal creaks as the opening between the door and the frame is spread wider by hands I can’t see. My nerves are alive, my system in overdrive. I can hear the heavy footsteps through the dark vehicle bay.

My briefcase is upstairs in my office. What I wouldn’t give for that canister of bear spray right now as I hear a terrific banging down the hall. The intruder is breaking through the pedestrian door, and my hands are shaking badly as I unlock my phone. I send Benton a one-word message:

Mayday!

Then the pedestrian door slams open. Now the intruder is inside the lighted receiving area, and I can see the monster on camera, every inch encased in an exoskeleton that reminds me of a deadly space-age Tin Man. The helmet has shielded eyes, and a mouth cover that is open. I catch a glimpse of teeth and shiny metal as the intruder breathes loudly, striding along the corridor, the armor-covered hands cradling an assault rifle.

My fingers seem made of wood as I fumble with a quart jar of diluted formaldehyde, the buffered solution of formalin we use as a tissue fixative. Unscrewing the lid, I carry the jar and the baseball bat to the autopsy suite’s closed doors that lead out into the corridor. I can hear the heavy armored feet ringing against tile, nearing the double doors, and I open the circuit box near the cooler.

I flip off the breaker for the lights, throwing me in complete darkness as I wait. Then he’s banging through the doors. Closing my eyes, I dash the formalin in the direction of the noise, aiming for where I imagine the head would be, and the screaming is bloodcurdling. Shrieking and shrieking, cursing in Russian as I start swinging the baseball bat.

It cracks against the composite shell, the shock vibrating up my arms. I hear the assailant crashing to the floor while screaming and writhing in pain, and I’m pretty sure it’s a woman. Running across the room in the pitch dark, I feel my way back into the locker room.

I listen for her, moaning now, gasping for breath and coughing. Getting to her feet, she stomps and stumbles to a sink, splashing water into her face.

“You’re going down, bitch … !” she yells in a heavy accent as I’m shocked by multiple gunshots ringing out deafeningly.

I don’t know where it’s coming from as I’m pressed against the wall inside the locker room, not moving. I strain to hear. Nothing. Just the sound of water drumming into the steel sink. Then someone flips the breaker switch, the lights back on.

“Kay?” It’s Benton calling out,oh thank God.

I leave the locker room, and he’s turning off the small flashlight he held in one hand, his pistol in the other. The assailant is on the floor in front of the sink, blood pooling under her head. She’d taken off her helmet to rinse the caustic fixative from her face, and I recognize her.

---