When You See Me (Detective D.D. Warren #11)(54)

D.D. introduced the medical examiner, Dr. Dale Cabot, then his scrawny assistant, Arnold Cabot. Apparently, the coroner’s office was a family business.

“What can you tell me?” Kimberly asked, flashing her credentials.

“I can tell you a cup of coffee every morning is perfectly good for you,” Dr. Cabot replied drolly, working with his son to slowly lower Martha Counsel onto the waiting gurney. “And I can’t wait to have one this morning myself.”

She deserved that, asking for an opinion before the body was even on the stretcher. Even so, Kimberly held up a hand. “Hang on a moment.”

She stopped beside the gurney. Martha’s embroidered silk bathrobe remained open in front, but the kid, Cabot junior, had respectfully smoothed down her long white nightgown. No good way to do this.

“We’re told this woman received a kidney transplant,” Kimberly said. “Given the circumstances, I need to check.”

Dr. Cabot stepped back, gesturing for her to do what she had to do. His son, on the other hand, stared at her wide-eyed.

Kimberly never liked this part. It felt intrusive, donning a pair of gloves then slowly raising up the hem of a dead woman’s nightgown to better inspect the body. Mentally, she made her apologies as she drew Martha’s nightgown above her thighs, exposing plain white underwear with discreet lace trim, then finally Martha’s bare torso. There on the left-hand side: a significant surgical scar, still puckered and dark pink after all these years.

“Is that scar consistent with a kidney transplant?” Kimberly asked.

“Appears so. I can tell you more once I open her up.”

Kimberly nodded, held out her cell phone with the photo she had shot of the prescription bottles. “And these drugs?”

The ME took her phone, played with the photo till he could make out all the labels. “These are all standard anti-rejection meds, consistent with someone who received an organ transplant.”

He handed back the phone.

“Did you know a Dr. Gregory Hatch?” D.D. asked, coming to stand beside them.

“Dr. Hatch? He passed away years ago.”

“Would he have been qualified to perform a kidney transplant?”

“As a general surgeon, yes, but UNOS—the United Network for Organ Sharing—could tell you more. They should have a record of everyone.”

“Assuming the organ came through UNOS,” D.D. said levelly.

Dr. Cabot stared at them. Then he looked back at the body, the red bathrobe sash knotted around Martha’s neck. “I don’t know why someone would go to such lengths to live once,” he said slowly, “only to give up now.”

“Guilt?” Kimberly offered.

“The Dr. Hatch I knew . . . I wouldn’t rush to conclusions. Especially with the man not even alive to defend himself.”

“Who might still have access to his medical records?” Kimberly asked.

“Dr. Hatch was a private practice physician. Upon his death, patients would have been notified and given the opportunity to transfer their records to the new doctor of their choice.”

Kimberly exchanged a glance with D.D. Would a doctor even keep records of an illegal surgery? And yet, Martha had still required ongoing care, including the meds.

“Who would be in charge of transferring the files?” D.D. spoke up.

“Dr. Hatch’s assistant. Sorry. I can picture her, but I can’t seem to remember her name.”

“Amy Frankel,” his son offered immediately.

Kimberly and D.D. looked at him.

“Blond, beautiful,” said the boy. “What’s not to remember?”

Fair enough, Kimberly thought. D.D. was already jotting down the name. Kimberly went back to her photo of Martha Counsel’s meds. There, on the lower left-hand label, she could see the name of the prescribing doctor.

“Dr. Dean Hathaway,” she read off. “Do you know him?”

“No. But given the critical nature of maintaining the transplanted kidney’s health, it’s highly possible Mrs. Counsel was seeing a nephrologist out of Atlanta.”

Kimberly nodded and moved on to the red silk sash still tied around Martha’s neck.

She could just make out bruising above the fabric, from where it had ridden up on the neck from the force of the hanging. Kimberly had seen cases where someone had manually strangled a victim, then tried to cover it up by staging a hanging. In those cases, however, the distinct bruise pattern of fingers squeezing the victim’s throat always gave the murderer away.

At the moment, she didn’t see anything like that here. Of course, more would be visible once the sash was removed.

If this death looked and sounded like a suicide, why was she so uncomfortable?

She moved away from the gurney, thanked the ME for his time, and indicated that he and his son could go.

“I don’t like it,” D.D. said the moment they disappeared down the hall.

“We’re trained to be paranoid,” said Kimberly. “Doesn’t mean they’re really out to get us.”

“Ah, but my new friend dropped this.” D.D. held out a scrap of paper.

Kimberly looked at the hastily crayoned drawing of a hulking black figure with glowing red eyes. “Is that . . . what? Some kind of boogeyman?”

“I think it’s a monster.”