A Simple Lie Read online

  “This person is a dentist?” Gavin said to Warren. “Why the hell didn’t Blythe mention it?” He clearly sounded pissed off. “Honestly, I’m happy to have someone besides him examine this.”

  “I agree. But Blythe will rip you a new one if you do. He’s in charge of the remains in this case,” Warren said.

  “As I see it, our medical examiner can’t be reached. It’s my decision now.”

  Rather than shooing her away, Gavin introduced Val to the men standing around them and then started to explain what was found.

  She couldn’t believe she was standing here, among police officers, hearing first-hand information about this case. This detective, the lead detective no less, was giving her information as if she was part of his team, more significantly, like she knew what she was doing. The more Gavin spoke, the more Val liked him. The fact that Dr. Blythe wasn’t here was far from her mind. Right now, she was in charge.

  “The skull is bone only. The arm appears to be mummified,” Gavin explained. “All of the teeth are missing.”

  Val just nodded her head and glanced at the body parts from where she stood.

  “You might want to take a look,” Gavin suggested

  Val moved forward slowly, anxious yet excited, like a teenager allowed to drive the family car for the first time. It took a few seconds before it sunk in that she was actually supposed to do this. Being a death investigator, she was privy to dismembered remains in front of her. She could touch them.

  She put on a pair of latex gloves and picked up the skull, holding it upside down to get a good view at the empty tooth sockets, then flipped it back around, inspecting them from the side. All were fractured as if someone grabbed a hold with a pair of pliers and ripped the teeth out, breaking the front piece of bone holding them in.

  She reached into her bag, pulled out a flashlight and shone the beam into the sockets. That’s odd. She looked at the shape of the breaks and the amount of bone remaining around them.

  Warren’s voice made her jump. “Dr. Blythe is on his way. He told me to thank you and that he’s sorry about the mix-up in sending you here. I’m to send you home.”

  Val just stared. The last thing in the world she wanted was to be pulled away now. “Okay, I’ll finish documenting this first,” she said hopefully. Maybe they would at least let her stay for that.

  “I’m sorry, Dr. Knight. He told me to send you home now.” Warren’s voice was more apologetic than forceful. “He’s in charge of the remains. It’s his call.”

  Val noticed Gavin on his phone. He was yelling at someone, but Val couldn’t make out what was going on. She put the skull down and started to gather her supplies. As she was doing so, Gavin walked over and handed her his business card, the phone still pressed to his ear.

  “Call me if you know of anything that might help on this.”

  8

  Val placed her keys in her jacket pocket and then tossed the jacket onto the back of her office chair. It barely caught the edge, holding on for a couple of seconds before falling to the floor. It was going to be one of those days. She picked it up, wiped off the dust, and set it on the counter this time. Then she quickly got situated. There was so much to do this morning and she really needed to get started.

  Dr. Stedman was scheduled to perform the autopsy later today on the old man who died on the commode. Her report from the scene needed to be done before that. She opened the file from the case and sat down.

  Val stared at the blank page, picked up a pen and began her documentation. After a few minutes she set the pen down, looked at the clock and then flipped through the remaining blank pages to see how many she needed to fill out. She let out a sigh and picked the pen back up, tapping it on the counter this time. It was no use. She couldn’t concentrate.

  All she could think about were the remains at the landfill and that made it hard to focus on anything else. Last night she was in charge of the evidence in this high-profile case. The lead detective wanted her professional opinion. God that felt good, to be a respected professional again, even if was only for a few minutes. Val pictured the skull, trying to remember the unusual breaks, then wondered what Jeanne Coleman’s skull looked like. Did her teeth come out the same way?

  Though Detective Gavin gave her his business card last night, she wasn’t sure if she should call him. She wanted to tell him her thoughts, what she’d noticed. She just didn’t know how important it was and didn’t want to look foolish if it turned out to be nothing.

  If only she could get another look at the skull she would be more certain. Inspecting it again would be impossible. Dr. Blythe would never allow it: everything she’d experienced so far told her that. He was excluding her. His entire demeanor towards her suggested he knew that she had lied to get this job.

  But if that’s the case, why not fire me right away? she wondered.

  Julia. Julia was the only answer. Julia must be protecting her somehow. But what power did she have even over her own boss? Val was deep in thought when a knock on the door made her look up.

  Howie poked his nose in. “Are you almost finished with the report from yesterday’s case?”

  Val glanced down at the three lines she had written. “Not quite.”

  “When you’re done, two bodies just came in. They need dental IDs.”

  “Okay. This won’t take long.” She crinkled her nose and asked of the bodies, “How bad are they?”

  “They’re going to have to be done in the decomp room. You’ll need to wear the jumpsuit. But on the bright side, I placed them in the cooler for now. The cold temperature makes the maggots move slower.”

  “Thanks.” She feigned a smile.

  “Anytime.” He turned and walked away.

  The report took longer to finish than Val anticipated. But, as she wrote it, she made a decision. She reached over to her bag and pulled out Gavin’s business card. She grabbed the phone and dialed the number. He picked up after the third ring.

  “I get off at five thirty,” she said. “I can meet you at six.”

  “Why don’t we meet somewhere closer to the medical examiner’s office, so it’s easier for you. Are you familiar with the Anchor Bar on Main Street?”

  “Yes.” She knew where the Anchor Bar was. Everyone from Buffalo did. It’s where the deep-fried, hot-sauce coated, blue-cheese dipped, chicken wing originated—before becoming a Buffalo wing in every other city.

  “Great. I’ll see you later.”

  Val rushed out of her office and headed to the decomp room, dropping her report in Dr. Stedman’s mailbox on her way.

  At 5:40pm, Val ran into the locker room, and quickly showered. Another body had arrived late in the afternoon. It took forever to get Dr. Blythe’s signature so that she could take the X-rays.

  After two rounds of soap and shampoo, she put on her street clothes, wondering just how badly she still reeked of death. Not that she could tell. Spending the day in the decomp room had made her olfactory senses immune to the scent of decomposition.

  She gave herself one last inspection in the mirror before walking out, narrowing her eyes in dissatisfaction, wishing that she could go home and change, but there wasn’t enough time. She grabbed a barrette, and tied back her soggy hair. As she ran to her car she checked her watch. Crap, I’m going to be late for Detective Gavin.

  When she finally got to her car, she reached into her pocket and felt nothing. Her hand fished around before inspecting the other pocket. That too, was empty.

  “Damn!” She grabbed her bag and began rifling through it.

  No car keys.

  If they weren’t in her pockets or purse where could they possibly be? She distinctly remembered putting them in her pocket. Val ran back to her office at full speed.

  As soon as she opened her office door, she noticed them immediately. They were on the floor under the counter, plain as day. How did I miss that? The thought left her mind as soon as it entered.

  Her attention was fully focused on trying to make her ap
pointment with the detective. Val punched his number into her cell phone, but the voicemail came on. She quickly left a message and rushed back to her car. Jesus, hopefully he’ll pick this up and not leave before I get there.

  Val arrived at the Anchor Bar by 6:30. The place was full and she had to stand on her tiptoes to peer around as she searched for Gavin. She finally noticed him sitting at the bar. A half empty bottle of beer was in front of him. “Did you get my message?”

  “Yes,” he said. “I gave the hostess my name for a table. She said it could be a while. Looks like she was right. Have you eaten? The food here is pretty good.”

  “No. And I’m starving.”

  “Can I get you something to drink while we wait?”

  “A Heineken would be great,” she said, eyeing his bottle.

  Gavin motioned for the bartender and ordered. The man sitting next to him stood up and offered Val his seat. As she sat down, the bartender brought over her drink.

  “So, you were a dentist?” Gavin asked. “Are dead patients treating you better than live ones? I can’t imagine they would pay better.”

  Val looked down and started to play with the ends of the napkin that her beer sat on, nervously fidgeting and tearing at the corner. She hated this question, but tonight as she tore bits of paper, the answer wasn’t difficult. Taking a deep breath she said bluntly, “I can’t practice anymore. I had an accident.”

  Gavin immediately apologized, “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—”

  “There’s no need for you to be sorry. Personally, I’ve spent too long feeling sorry about it.” Her days as a dentist were a thing of the past, plain and simple. She had a new career. She dropped her fingers from the napkin and turned to face Gavin directly, ready to handle any more questions.

  “Now I’ve done it,” he said. “Sometimes I don’t know when to keep my big mouth shut.”

  She smiled. “That’s okay. In order to make up for it, I’ll let you buy me dinner.”

  “Deal,” he replied, grinning back at her. “So, what happened?”

  “This.” She held up her hand. The scar was clearly visible.

  “That’s pretty bad. Were you doing something dangerous?”

  “Dangerous to the max,” Val said, and rather than describing what happened, added, “I was trying to fight crime.” She couldn’t believe how therapeutic it felt to state it so simply. Her response made Gavin laugh.

  “If that’s what happened, you should probably leave crime fighting to the experts then,” he said.

  “Now that I’m one of the experts, I think I’ll need pepper spray, Mace and a stun gun to avoid any more mishaps like this.” Val took a sip of her beer and leaned forward. She had thought Gavin was a handsome man the first time she saw him. Here tonight, that opinion was reinforced.

  “You might need a better weapon. Like something with bullets.”

  “I don’t know how to shoot a gun. Is it hard to learn?” Val suddenly realized she was flirting and caught herself. This wasn’t a date. It was a professional meeting with a detective, on a high-profile murder case. Her behavior was wrong on several levels. Apart from the professional issue, luck with men wasn’t something Val could claim. She often made poor choices leading to doomed relationships that seemed to drag on longer than necessary. It was a cycle she couldn’t seem to break. Her accident had closed the dating chapter of her life. Val hadn’t gone out with anyone in over a year. Getting involved now, with this man in particular, was not an option.

  Gavin smiled. “Not at all. I could teach you to shoot in a few afternoons.” He was still smiling when the waitress interrupted their discussion, telling them the table was ready.

  The two sat with menus and chatted comfortably about the food. It wasn’t until the meal was ordered that they focused on the case. Though Val reassured herself that the more professional tone was for the best, she had to admit that she was also enjoying her evening with Detective Gavin on the personal level that she needed to avoid.

  “What’s your opinion of that skull? It seemed like you were looking at something last night,” Gavin asked.

  “There were several perfect rectangular shaped breaks around the sockets, like someone had used a set of pliers to get the teeth out.”

  “What’s wrong with that?”

  “None of the sockets had broken teeth in them. Getting a tooth out isn’t easy and from the level of interseptal bone, that’s the bone between the teeth, I would guess they were in pretty firmly. If you just grabbed them with pliers, chances are the crown of the tooth would snap off, leaving the roots in the socket.”

  “Is there any possibility of getting the teeth out without breaking them as you described?”

  “Maybe. A good portion of the front part of the bone was gone where the pliers were placed, so I know the killer put the tool on the tooth and pulled forward. The bone was ripped out with it, so this could have helped to loosen it, making it come out intact. But this isn’t the correct way to do an extraction so fracturing it still would have been an issue.”

  “Teeth do loosen in skeletal remains, it’s not uncommon for them to just fall out,” Gavin suggested. “Is it possible that if there were broken roots, they might have come out on their own?”

  Val paused. For the front teeth where there’s a single root, she might have agreed about this possibility, especially if this skull was being tossed around a landfill, but for back ones, with multiple roots, it was unlikely. She had to admit that she wasn’t one hundred percent sure.

  “I guess it’s possible. But if it didn’t happen this way, someone purposely removed the broken roots,” she said.

  “Any idea why?” he asked.

  She shrugged her shoulders and tried hard to come up with answers. “They could have been used for an X-ray comparison, to get an ID.”

  She knew dental ID was an excellent way to identify someone. It was accurate, quick and inexpensive. With only the roots though, there wouldn’t be much to go on. It would be a questionable ID. DNA would be indisputable. “The pulpal tissue, that’s the nerve inside the tooth and roots, is a good source for DNA. Dr. Blythe is using DNA for the identifications. Right?”

  “Yes.” Gavin sat upright. “Is there any way to tell for sure if the roots were purposely removed?”

  “The easiest way is to look at the victim’s teeth and see if those are all intact. Were any of them broken?” she asked, trying to remember what she saw lying on Francine Donohue’s pillow. Those teeth were covered in blood with bits of bone still attached, making it hard to tell what kind of shape they were in. She would need to inspect them more carefully to determine if any were fractured.

  “I’ll have to look at Julia’s report. I can’t remember if she noted that any of the teeth were broken or not.”

  “I thought Blythe was doing this case, not Julia,” Val said, surprised.

  “He is. He’s in charge. Julia’s assisting.”

  Both looked up from the conversation as the waitress came to the table with dishes. Dinner was here. Val’s stomach growled. The grilled cheese sandwich she had eaten at lunchtime from the hospital cafeteria had long since dissipated. She took a few quick bites of her fish fry, and then asked another question, strategically. “I’m assuming this is a pretty big case?”

  “Yes.” Gavin set down his burger and wiped his mouth.

  She trod carefully, hoping that maybe he would share some details with her. “You have to imagine that I would be interested in this because of the dental aspect. Is there anything more that you can tell me? Any way that I can help?”

  He stared at her. Val waited to hear a no from him.

  “I have two murdered women. One was a recluse. The other, a dentist, disappeared from an affluent community six months before she was found dead in the same low-income apartment complex as the recluse. They were both killed the same way. The same person committed both crimes. I have no leads for this case and the more we find, the more bizarre it gets.”

  “How so
?” Val asked.

  “The killer wants us to know what happened. This person is dropping clues very strategically. It all reeks of a serial killer but these can’t be random murders. I think both Francine and Jeanne were hiding from someone. So, any information that you can add, from a dental angle of course, may be important.”

  “I’ll do what I can.” She knew Blythe would never let her examine the teeth or the skulls. But she remained hopeful that she’d be able to help Gavin in some way.

  The two talked nonstop as they finished their food, Val didn’t even notice when the waitress placed the bill on the table. She had grown more attracted to Gavin as the evening wore on. She was about to ask him one last question about the case and then take a chance by proposing dinner again another time, but his cell phone rang. He checked who was calling.

  “Can you excuse me? I have to take this one. It’s my wife.”

  Gavin got up to answer the call. As soon as he said wife Val felt her heart sink. She sat at the table alone as he walked away. When he came back he laid two twenty-dollar bills on the check and thanked Val for her time. His demeanor was completely different. His face was taut, the smile that he had all evening completely gone. He seemed preoccupied and barely said goodbye before leaving.

  Two hours after dinner with Val, Gavin sat at the desk in his study going over the crime scene photos again, drinking his third glass of wine. His limit was two, especially after a beer at dinner. The open bottle, a Saint-Émilion Grand Cru, was next to him, and tonight he intended to finish it. With each sip, he felt his frustrations easing.

  Staring at the photos from Francine Donohue’s and Jeanne Coleman’s apartments, he knew something wasn’t right. He just couldn’t put his finger on it.

  Though the wine was easing his stress, it was doing nothing for his ability to deduct anything and his thought process was getting more clouded by the second. He jotted down a few notes and as he did, his thoughts drifted to Val, and as quickly as she entered, he pushed her from his mind.