Autopsy(Kay Scarpetta #25)(67)

“What did you hear about how Cammie Ramada might have gotten hurt?” I close the log.

“I heard she must have fallen, hitting her head, knocking herself out and drowning. She had some medical problem, maybe got disoriented. That’s all I know except it was strange,” he says.

“Were you around when she was autopsied?”

“I never go in there when they’ve got cases.”

“But were you here in your office at the time. Or was someone else on duty?” I ask, and Wyatt nods that yes, he was on duty.

The autopsy waited until Monday morning, and that’s not unusual. Wyatt says he started his shift that day at seven A.M., and I ask if he might have seen police and others associated with the case coming in and out of the morgue.

“Yes, ma’am, it was busy. Mondays almost always are because of what comes in over the weekend. But that morning in particular, there were a lot of people.”

“Who do you remember seeing in connection to the Cammie Ramada death?”

“Well, the FBI was involved, and a couple of their agents were hanging around.” He constantly monitors security camera images on the big computer screen in front of him.

“Did Investigator Ryan from the park police show up?”

“I don’t think I know who that is,” he says, and I doubt August was there.

I haven’t seen his name listed as a witness to the autopsy, and if the FBI had rolled in, the park police were going to be overpowered.

“What about Doctor Reddy?” I ask.

“He may have walked through once, maybe twice.” Wyatt is visibly uncomfortable talking about him.





CHAPTER 27

WAS DOCTOR REDDY WITH anyone when you’d see him pass through?” I ask.

“He was with the FBI.” Wyatt dips a plastic spoon into what’s left of the chili, squeezing out the last few drops of hot sauce.

“Was he in scrubs?” I can bet on the answer.

“No, ma’am. I’m pretty sure he was dressed like he always is. In a suit.” He confirms what I suspect, and I gather my belongings, heading toward the stairs.

I detect the familiar telltale clatter as I near the anthropology lab’s observation windows. The big stockpot simmers on the portable cooktop as it has for days, and it can take quite a while to deflesh and degrease bones completely. When they’re whistle clean, they’ll be examined painstakingly.

We’ll make sure there’s no nick, cut, bullet hole or other defect suggesting violence. At least in this case we know who the man was but not what happened to him or when. We may never know what his final moments were like. But I’m grateful there won’t be yet one more resident in my overcrowded skeleton closet.

I can’t think of a bigger failure than never figuring out who someone was. The eighty-seven unsolved cases Elvin left go back two decades, and I envision the storage closet with its labeled archival boxes, and the distinctive paraffin-like musky odor of waxy old bones.

Reaching the autopsy suite, I don’t see Fabian but his brand of pop music is booming inside the men’s locker room. He’s probably cleaning up, changing back into his investigative clothes, and I take the stairs, my shoes loud on the metal-edged concrete steps. I push my way through the door to the sound of Maggie Cutbush talking to someone.

“. . . I thought you’d want to know.” She’s on her cell phone, and not always aware that her British voice carries.

There’s no one else in the corridor except me, and I decide against noisily rolling my scene case along on its wheels. I keep quiet and my distance.

“. . . No, no, I don’t think so. Nothing new that I know of.” She’s maybe twenty feet in front of me talking hands-free, her wireless earpiece winking blue.

In her standard wool skirt suit and matronly shoes, her hair in a tight bun, she’s carrying an armload of files that probably are destined for my desk eventually.

“. . . Of course, I asked why the sudden interest. But when she gets hold of something? Well, you know this better than anyone.”

I can tell that whoever she’s talking to is high in her pecking order, someone she might care about deeply. There’s a protective tenderness in her tone that I’ve not heard before, and I hope what I suspect turns out to be wrong.

“Yes, like a pit bull, not knowing when to quit, hell-bent on creating the latest drama,” she agrees, walking into her office.

Then I’m walking into mine, setting down my belongings on the conference table. The first order of business is to close the shades as I watch the parking lot continue to empty. Next, I unlock the supply cabinet I obsessively keep stocked with what I consider forensic and medical necessities.

Finding the Narcan nasal spray, I try to ignore what I overheard a moment earlier, doing my best not to let it get to me. I have no doubt who Maggie was talking about, and it’s not true that words don’t hurt. They can hurt mightily, and if I didn’t feel unwelcome and on my own before, I do now, that’s for sure.

“Oh! Well, hello.” She appears in our shared doorway. “I didn’t realize you were here.” A shadow passes behind her eyes, and it may be the first time I’ve seen her flustered.

I’ve just walked into my office, and she’s worried about what I overheard in the corridor while she was talking on the phone. I play dumb, grabbing Narcan from a shelf.