The Dying Breath Read online

  “You’re showing off, Cammie.”

  “Well, you did call me short.”

  “A mistake I will never make again,” he said. “You know too many big words.”

  “Right. Okay, Justin, you need to be serious. Two people are dead and we’re on duty. Focus.”

  “You want me to be serious?” Thrusting out his chin, he said, “I wish it was Kyle on that autopsy table. He’s the one who should be dead. But the universe isn’t always fair, is it?”

  “You worry too much about me,” she answered. Without thinking she laced her fingers through his, and she noticed the corner of his mouth bend up as he squeezed her hand, then released it. Without a word they walked on.

  The foyer had a ficus tree propped in a corner; the tips of its branches brushed her as she walked past. Justin was right—there was a smell, a faint sickly sweet odor masked by disinfectant. Noisome traces of the dead. If she believed what Lyric told her, the human cells floating through the building were already being pulled into the soil to be reborn through the leaves in an endless cycle of rebirth in an endless succession.

  Cameryn, though, had been raised on the certainty of science intertwined with the mystery of her Catholic faith. It was through these diverse filters that she attempted to explain the uncertainty of justice. How was it that two people had died while Kyle roamed free? She had to believe Kyle would be caught because of forensics, and if science didn’t nail him she’d settle for the hand of God, Old Testament style.

  After making their way down the hallway they stopped at a desk made of blond wood. A woman Cameryn vaguely recognized looked up.

  “Hey, Justin. Who’s your little friend?” She eyed Cameryn’s pink Swatch watch and her chewed fingernails. Cameryn quickly shoved her hands in her coat pockets.

  “This is Cameryn Mahoney,” he answered. “Patrick Mahoney’s daughter. She’s assistant to the coroner. Dr. Moore asked her to come.”

  “Oh, right.” There was the barest of nods. “I remember now. The child prodigy.” The woman wore a name tag that read Amber Murphy. She was about twenty-five, with short red hair and a heart-shaped face. Her eyes slid back to Justin and she gave him a bright smile. Cameryn noticed Amber had dimples.

  “So, Justin, where have you been hiding?” Amber asked. “I haven’t seen you in a while.”

  “I’ve been on duty, protecting the good people of Silverton.”

  “We could use a little of that down here in Durango, cowboy. There’s a lot of wild things going on in our big city.”

  “Did you just call Durango a big city?” Justin asked, laughing. “Remember, I moved here from New York—”

  “Excuse me, can we go back now?” Cameryn interrupted. “Dr. Moore made it sound like the case is time sensitive.”

  Amber blinked, as though she had already forgotten Cameryn was there. Clearing her throat, she said, “Of course. But I’m supposed to ask you a question. Dr. Moore’s having a holy fit about security, so . . . did anyone approach you about the decedents at any time before you got here?”

  Justin said, “No,” while Cameryn shook her head.

  “Good. I feel stupid asking, like I’m one of those security people at the airport. I mean, who doesn’t know by now not to take packages from a stranger, and who’d be dumb enough to say yes if they actually did? But Moore told me to grill everyone, so that’s what I’m doing.” She leaned forward, and Cameryn noticed that Amber lined her mouth outside the edges. A glossy lipstick glittered on lips painted the color of maple sugar. “Do you even know who we got back there?” Amber gave Justin a cloying look. She was talking to him directly while simultaneously erasing Cameryn.

  “Not a clue,” Justin replied.

  But Amber was all smiles. “You’ll see.” Another knowing look, this time accompanied by a wink as she waved them toward the swinging doors. “One thing’s for sure, when this gets out, the paparazzi are gonna go wild,” she called after them.

  The last words cut in and out as the door swung behind them and Cameryn stopped just beyond their reach. Crossing her arms, she stared up at Justin and hissed, “Little friend?”

  Justin gave a wicked, faunlike grin, his eyebrows arching into his too-long hair. “Amber’s all right.”

  “I’m sure you think so, cowboy.”

  He cocked his head and she felt her heart kick sideways. Get a grip, she told herself. She was about to do an autopsy and she had no business musing over the color of Justin’s irises, water mixed with sky.

  “Is something wrong?” he asked.

  “No! It’s just that Amber mentioned the word paparazzi . Cases that have a lot of media attention are always harder,” she lied, aware of how much she disliked Amber and her glossy lips. “Plus, I don’t know of any celebrities who live in Durango.”

  “There’s some festival going on in Telluride—I think it’s the TelluVision Showcase, or something like that. Telluride’s only a couple of hours away. But . . . aren’t you the one who said the case was time sensitive?”

  “What?”

  “You’re loitering.” He grinned at her in a way that made heat creep up her face. “You chewed out poor Amber and now you’re the one standing in the hallway. I could write you up for that.”

  “You are such a punk.” Walking quickly, she charged ahead of him to the autopsy room, but before she could push through he grabbed her hand.

  “I could let you off for good behavior,” he teased. “All you have to do is—”

  But whatever he was about to say was interrupted by a low rumble coming from inside the autopsy suite. “Miss Mahoney, Deputy Crowley—enough with the happy chatter. Get in here. Now!” The voice belonged to Dr. Moore. His tone was even more cantankerous than usual.

  “I’ll review your case later,” Justin whispered as he thrust open the door.

  The room was large, as big as five of her classrooms, with gleaming chrome and lights that droned like insects in a swamp. The floor, laid with green and white tile, had been scrubbed so often the shine had dulled. Cameryn knew that at times bodies leaked fluid through their body bags to leave trails across the floor. As always the odor was stronger in here, the last traces of life still discernible beneath the fumes of bleach. Huddled around an autopsy table were Dr. Moore; his assistant, Ben; Sheriff Jacobs; and Cameryn’s father, Patrick. They all turned to stare as Cameryn and Justin entered the room.

  “Well, I’m glad you two finally made it,” her father said. Patrick’s eyes seemed to linger on Justin a brief moment before flicking away. It was hard to discern what he was thinking because the mask made his expression inscrutable.

  “This case will require your full concentration,” said Dr. Moore. The doctor, still bent over the body, wore thick gloves and a heavy plastic apron over pale scrubs. His morgue shoes, a pair of black high-tops with Velcro instead of laces, were shiny with blood. Half-moon reading glasses perched on the bridge of his paper mask, magnifying his eyes so that they seemed owl-like; a ring of white hair haloed his balding head. Lately, Cameryn had seen a difference in him. His bullfrog neck had thinned, while his round, apple-shaped torso had diminished so that it resembled a deflated ball. But the voice sounded as petulant as ever.

  “Grab the clipboard next to the histology samples, Deputy. I’m going to need everyone on this.”

  “Yes, sir,” Justin said as he quickly moved toward a set of cupboards located by the walk-in refrigerator.

  “And now for you.” Dr. Moore lasered in on Cameryn. “The sheriff has brought me up to speed concerning your shenanigans at Leather Ed’s. I’m surprised. I pegged you as an intelligent girl.”

  “Woman,” she corrected automatically under her breath. She flushed when she realized the doctor had heard her.

  Moore bit off each word. “Not. Yet.”

  She felt the full heat of the doctor’s gaze, and as much as she wanted to cringe away, she knew she could not. Although she had learned to like Dr. Moore she also understood he would steamroll over anyone who let hi
m. Carefully arranging her face so that it conveyed strength, rather than the panic she was actually feeling, she said, “I already told the sheriff I was sorry.”

  “Water under the bridge,” Jacobs answered, clearing his throat. He shifted uncomfortably. “Let’s move on. We got other fish to fry.”

  “Yeah, give Cammie a break,” Ben jumped in. A diener, Ben assisted Dr. Moore in the most difficult aspects of the forensic job. Every corpse was gently washed by Ben, its skin stitched with sutures so wide they looked like the teeth of a zipper. Organs were dipped in water before dissection, the contents of bowels washed clean, and yet, somehow immune to death’s gruesomeness, Ben kept his jovial warmth. “We can’t gang up on her, Dr. Moore,” he said, shooting her a grin. “Not when we’re askin’ for her help.”

  “Well, I see you’ve got your fan club ready to defend you, Miss Mahoney.” Dr. Moore drew in woolly brows. “But I still have a few things to say.”

  Everyone in the room seemed to draw a collective breath. Moore, seemingly unaware, carefully set down a scalpel so that it lined up perfectly along the edge of the counter. “Here’s my problem: I do not want to unzip a body bag to find the remains of the assistant to the coroner tucked inside. Since I am, in essence, mentoring you, I expect you to show a modicum of intellect. O’Neil is a psychopath with a fixation on you. What you did was foolish in the extreme.”

  “That’s enough, Doctor.” Patrick Mahoney peeled the tape back and tugged off his mask. He was tall, with white hair as thick as a pelt and skin seamed by a lifetime in the mountains. Ever since she’d been small, Cameryn had learned how to read him. When upset he seemed to swell with emotion, and by the current size of him Cameryn could tell he didn’t like Moore dressing her down. “I appreciate what you’re saying, but Cameryn is my daughter. Mine, not yours. And we’ve handled it between us.”

  Moore’s eyes snapped from Patrick to Cameryn. The conversation was unspoken now, just between the two of them. “Are we clear, Miss Mahoney?”

  “Yes,” she answered softly.

  “Good. Now come closer. You see this man?” Obedient, Cameryn walked toward the hollowed body. She could almost taste the blood, yet there was no smell of decay. Even though her fingers weren’t gloved she touched his skin. It was cool. From the softness of the arm she guessed he hadn’t been dead long. Once again her mind began to whir as she took in the details of what remained—the puzzle pieces were there, just waiting to be assembled.

  “Whatever killed him most likely took his friend there as well.” Moore jerked his head toward a second autopsy table. Cameryn glanced at the other body. Wrapped in a sheet, the body was shaped like a man’s. His feet made steeples beneath the thin cotton.

  “The two vics died just minutes apart,” Moore said, redirecting Cameryn to the body that had been opened. “Look there, Miss Mahoney. Tell me what you see.”

  As she leaned closer, the daughter-girlfriend part of her personality melted away, and in its place rose a scientific passion that drove her to understand the intricacies of the body splayed open beneath her.

  Beginning at his feet, Cameryn studied the corpse. The decedent was a slender white man with muscled arms and a tattoo of a dragon snaking up one calf, its fangs bright yellow with eyes the color of garnets. A cloth had been placed discreetly over his groin. Because his scalp had been pulled free and folded beneath his chin, the features of his face had been rendered blank; his skull had been opened and emptied. Cameryn briefly wondered if this man had been famous in life. If he had been, it no longer mattered. There was nothing left to suggest either fame or ignominy. All humans, she knew, were reduced by death to their parts. She stared into the empty space and saw the white knots of his spine gleaming like pearls.

  “Well?”

  “I’d like to take a look at the organs.”

  “Very good,” Moore said, looking pleased. “That is where the real question lies. To be specific, I’d like you to examine this man’s lungs. Here,” he said. From a bloodstained towel Dr. Moore plucked a piece of tissue, sliced opened like the pages of a book. “What do you see?”

  Whatever disappointment he’d felt toward her for breaking into Leather Ed’s had seemingly vanished. In its place was an eagerness, as though the two of them were playing a game where only they understood the rules. “You see what I see? I found it in every lobe.”

  Fascinated, Cameryn bent so that she was only inches away. The tissue glistened with a coating of clear gel that shimmered like ice. Dr. Moore scraped the viscous matter and rubbed it between his gloved fingers.

  “Is this a dry drowning?” she asked.

  Again, the smile. “You’re on the right track, Miss Mahoney, but no. Dry drowning is caused by the body’s delayed reaction to inhaling too much water. But this”—he rubbed his fingers together again—“is not mucus. What you are looking at is a foreign material of unknown origin. The man drowned, yes, but whatever this is”—he pulled his fingers apart, the gel forming a thin, tenuous thread—“caused him to drown while sitting in a Durango restaurant. I’ve never seen anything like it and we have only a short window of time to figure this out before the vultures, and by that I mean the media, swoop in.”

  “The media?” Cameryn echoed.

  “Yes. They’re going to accuse me of being a hick pathologist out of my league. I want to be prepared with answers before they do.”

  Cameryn’s heart skipped a beat as she once again looked at the dragon tattoo snaking up the decedent’s leg. A memory flashed through her, followed by a sick understanding. “Dr. Moore, who is this man?”

  “The lung tissue you’re examining belongs to Brent Safer.” He gave a cursery nod. “Yes, the Brent Safer. The other man is Joseph Stein, world-renowned producer. One of the biggest stars of our time just died in our little town. And when that story breaks . . .” Dr. Moore shut his eyes. He paused, but when he opened them, he looked only at Cameryn. “God help us all.”

  Chapter Five

  “YOU’VE GOT TO be kidding,” Justin exclaimed, looking awed. “This is Brent Safer? The famous Brent Safer? The Brent Safer who starred in Raw Fever and Blaze?”

  “The very one,” Moore replied. “Although I believe action pictures of that caliber to be the lowest kind of tripe. That said, I would like to find some answers before this story breaks. Suit up, Miss Mahoney. I’m counting on your keen eye when we open decedent number two. Ben, my nerves are shot. I need some music.”

  “Anything in particular, Doctor?” Ben asked genially as he moved to the counter where the boom box was kept. Thickly muscled, Ben moved with a lithe grace Cameryn envied, his shoulders stretching his scrubs thin, his dark skin shining like liquid chocolate. Everyone knew that Moore was particular about his music. But the doctor surprised her by saying, “Make it anything you like, Ben. Diener’s choice.”

  Ben smiled, flashing teeth. “I don’t suppose I could push you far enough for some vintage Tupac Shakur?” Even while asking, Ben shook his head. “Yeah, I didn’t think so.” He ran his finger along the edge of the CD cases lined up on a shelf. “I’d like to try something a little bit lighter than opera. Hmmm.” He plucked a square case from a bottom rack. “This one’s got a cover with a ship about to sail off the edge of the world. Falling Star by some band called . . . The Seers.” He flipped the case from the front to the back, narrowing his lids. “Man, how old is this thing? That’s some seriously funky hair.”

  “They’re from the seventies,” said Moore. “An inspired choice. Now hustle, Miss Mahoney. I’m expecting an onslaught of the media at any moment.”

  “Right.” Cameryn hurried to the metal storage cabinet, pulling out her gear so that she could quickly suit up: pale green doctor’s scrubs were folded beneath a plastic apron with long ties made of twill. From the highest shelf she took down her least favorite piece of gear, a disposable cloth cap to tuck her hair in so that it protruded like a bell. From another shelf she plucked a mask and a pair of latex gloves. In the adjoining locker she found h
er morgue shoes, and next to them a stack of paper booties. Suiting up, she watched Ben put in the CD, and listened to acoustical instruments float around them, light as summer rain.

  “Are you ready?” Moore asked.

  “Ready,” she answered. She could feel excitement in the air as she moved toward the body of Joseph Stein. A partially filled-out chart on a clipboard lay next to him. On the top she saw a pen fastened by a string.

  “They must have been here for the television festival,” Cameryn said. “But why wasn’t Brent Safer recognized? He’s famous.”

  Her father, jotting down items for the personal inventory, paused long enough to say, “Safer had on a wig and sunglasses, which have already been bagged as evidence. I guess the man wanted to be left alone.”

  “Wow,” Cameryn said. “So no one recognized him?”

  “Nope,” Ben interjected. “We had no idea who he was until I found his ID. That’s when we decided to call you-all—Dr. Moore said he wanted the help.”

  “That’s enough, Ben,” Moore grumbled.

  “I’m just sayin’ that if Stein’s got that Jell-O stuff in his lungs then things’ll really go crazy.”

  “Do you want me to unwrap Stein?” Cameryn asked Dr. Moore, but the doctor shook his head vigorously. “There is still an open body that needs to be addressed. Remember, Miss Mahoney, we have procedures and protocols.” Once again, although the room was filled with people, the doctor addressed his comments only to her. Just her. It was as if an invisible bubble encased Cameryn, Ben, and Dr. Moore, shutting out everyone else. The others seemed to sense it, too. She watched as Sheriff Jacobs tilted his head and scratched it, shaking it slowly from side to side while he and Justin exchanged glances. Her father, on the other hand, looked pleased, because he understood this was what she’d always wanted. As coroner, Patrick was limited to the collection and identification of bodies—the basic paperwork of death. Cameryn, though, dreamed of becoming a medical examiner like Dr. Moore. It was the medical examiner who opened up the body. Through autopsies, the ME determined the cause and manner of a victim’s death, disassembling and reassembling the decedent’s pieces until the picture of what happened became clear. And now, surprisingly, Dr. Moore seemed ready to share his secrets with her. Sensing this, Patrick shot her a knowing smile before jotting another item on the clipboard.