Tess Gerritsen - The Apprentice

She took a deep breath, inhaling a last gulp of unfouled air, and pushed through the door into the next room.

She had expected to find Dr. Isles and Korsak waiting for her; what she had not expected was to find Gabriel Dean in the room as well. He stood across the table from her, a surgical gown covering his shirt and tie. While exhaustion showed plainly on Korsak’s face and in the weary slump of his shoulders, Agent Dean looked neither tired nor bowed by the day’s events. Only the five o’clock shadow darkening his jaw marred his crisp good looks. He regarded her with the unabashed gaze of one who knows he has every right to be there.

Under the bright exam lights, the body looked in far worse shape than when she had seen it, just hours ago. Purge fluid had continued to leak from the nose and mouth, trailing bloody streaks on the face. The abdomen was so bloated, it appeared to be in the advanced stages of pregnancy. Fluid-filled blisters ballooned beneath the skin, lifting it from the dermis in papery sheets. Skin was peeling away entirely from areas of the torso and had bunched like wrinkled parchment under the breasts.

Rizzoli noted that the fingerpads had been inked. “You’ve already taken prints.”

“Just before you got here,” said Dr. Isles, her attention focused on the tray of instruments that Yoshima had just wheeled to the table. The dead interested Isles more than the living did, and she was oblivious, as usual, to the emotional tensions vibrating in the room.

“What about the hands? Before you inked them?”

Agent Dean said, “We’ve completed the external exam. The skin’s been sticky-taped for fibers, and the nail clippings have been collected.”

“And when did you get here, Agent Dean?”

“He was here before me, too,” said Korsak. “I guess some of us rate higher on the food chain.”

If Korsak’s comment was meant to feed her irritation, it worked. A victim’s fingernails may harbor bits of skin clawed from the attacker. Hair or fibers may be clutched in a closed fist. The examination of the victim’s hands was a crucial step in the autopsy, and she had missed it.

But Dean had not.

“We already have a positive I.D.,” said Isles. “Gail Yeager’s dental X-rays are up on the light box.”

Rizzoli crossed to the light box and studied the series of small films clipped there. Teeth glowed like a row of ghostly headstones on the film’s black background.

“Mrs. Yeager’s dentist did some crown work on her last year. You can see it there. The gold crown is number twenty on the periapical series. Also, she had silver amalgam fillings in numbers three, fourteen, and twenty-nine.”

“It’s a match?”

Dr. Isles nodded. “I have no doubt these are the remains of Gail Yeager.”

Rizzoli turned back to the body on the table, her gaze falling on the ring of bruises around the throat. “Did you X-ray the neck?”

“Yes. There are bilateral thyroid horn fractures. Consistent with manual strangulation.” Isles turned to Yoshima, whose silent and ghostly efficiency sometimes made one forget he was even in the room. “Let’s get her into position for the vaginal swabs.”

What followed next struck Rizzoli as the worst indignity that could befall a woman’s mortal remains. It was worse than the gutting open of the belly, worse than the resection of heart and lungs. Yoshima maneuvered the flaccid legs into a froglike position, spreading the thighs wide for the pelvic exam.

“Excuse me, Detective?” Yoshima said to Korsak, who was standing closest to Gail Yeager’s left thigh. “Could you hold that leg in position?”

Korsak stared at him in horror. “Me?”

“Just keep the knee flexed like that, so we can collect the swabs.”

Reluctantly Korsak reached for the corpse’s thigh, then jerked back as a layer of skin peeled off in his gloved hand. “Christ. Aw, Christ.”

“The skin’s going to slip, no matter what you do. If you could just hold the leg open, okay?”

Korsak let out a sharp breath. Through the stench of the room, Rizzoli caught a whiff of Vicks menthol. Korsak, at least, had not been too proud to dab it on his upper lip. Grimacing, he grabbed the thigh and rotated it sideways, exposing Gail Yeager’s genitalia. “Like this is gonna make sex real appealing from now on,” he muttered.

Dr. Isles directed the exam light onto the perineum. Gently she spread apart the swollen labia to reveal the introitus. Rizzoli, stoic as she was, could not bear to watch this grotesque invasion, and she turned away.

Her gaze met Gabriel Dean’s.

Up till that moment, he had been observing the proceedings with quiet detachment. But at that instant, she saw anger in his eyes. It was the same rage she now felt toward the man who had brought Gail Yeager to this ultimate degradation. Staring at each other in shared outrage, their rivalry was temporarily forgotten.

Dr. Isles inserted a cotton swab into the vagina, smeared it across a microscope slide, and set the slide on a tray. Next she took a rectal swab, which would also be analyzed for the presence of sperm. When she’d completed the collection and Gail Yeager’s legs were once again lying straight on the table, Rizzoli felt as though the worst was over. Even as Isles started the Y incision, cutting diagonally from the right shoulder down to the lower end of the sternum, Rizzoli thought that nothing could surpass the indignity of what had already been done to this victim.

Isles was just about to cut a matching incision from the left shoulder when Dean said, “What about the vaginal smear?”

“The slides will go to the crime lab,” said Dr. Isles.

“Aren’t you going to do a wet prep?”

“The lab can identify sperm perfectly well on a dry slide.”

“This is your only chance to examine the fresh specimen.”

Dr. Isles paused, scalpel tip poised over the skin, and gave Dean a puzzled look. Then she said to Yoshima, “Put a few drops of saline on that slide and slip it under the microscope. I’ll take a look in just a second.”

The abdominal incision came next, Dr. Isles’s scalpel slicing into the bloated belly. The stench of decomposing organs was suddenly more than Rizzoli could bear. She lurched away and stood gagging over the sink, regretting that she had so foolishly tried to prove her own fortitude. She wondered if Agent Dean was watching her now and feeling any sense of superiority. She had not seen Vicks glistening on his upper lip. She kept her back turned to the table and listened, rather than watched, as the autopsy proceeded behind her. She heard the air blowing steadily through the ventilation system and water gurgling and the clang of metal instruments.

Then she heard Yoshima call out, in a startled voice, “Dr. Isles?”

“Yes?”

“I’ve got the slide under the scope, and…”

“Is there sperm?”

“You really need to see this for yourself.”

Her nausea fading, Rizzoli turned to watch as Isles peeled off her gloves and sat down at the microscope. Yoshima hovered over her as she gazed into the eyepiece.

“Do you see them?” he asked.

“Yes,” she murmured. She sat back, looking stunned. She turned to Rizzoli. “The body was found around two P.M.?”

“About then.”

“And it’s now nine P.M.-”

“Well, is there sperm or not?” cut in Korsak.

“Yes, there’s sperm,” said Isles. “And it’s motile.”

Korsak frowned. “Meaning what? Like it’s moving ?”

“Yes. It’s moving.”

A silence dropped over the room. The significance of this finding had startled them all.

“How long does sperm stay motile?” asked Rizzoli.

“It depends on the environment.”

“How long?”