Death, Deceit & Some Smooth Jazz

by Claudia Mair Burney

  “You weren’t this hostile the last time I came here.”

  She stopped and turned to face me. Her face softened. “I’m not hostile now, honey. And last time you were here, your boyfriend’s wife wasn’t in a drawer wearing a toe tag instead of the Jimmy Choos she left at the crime scene.”

  “She’s hisex -wife. Those were Jimmy Choos?”

  Carly looked at me the way I’d looked at that eye. “I’d be much more comfortable if you had said he’s yourex-boyfriend .”

  “Maybe he didn’t do it, Carly.”

  “And you base this on?”

  “He wouldn’t have posed her.”

  Carly rolled her eyes. “That doesn’t prove anything to me. The imprint of his hands extends all the way around her neck.”

  “How do you know it’s the imprint ofhis hands? Did you find his fingerprints on her?”

  “We weren’t able to lift any prints off her neck, but that doesn’t prove he didn’t strangle her. And whose DNA do you think we’ll find underneath her fingernails?”

  I scooted up to the edge of my chair. “That will only prove she scratched him.”

  Carly threw her hands up. “Man!” When she could look at me again, the disgust in her eyes made me turn my gaze away from her. “Bell, how can you be this naive? I haven’t known you to be so weak in a long time.”

  “Weak?” Did she want a catfight right in the middle of the morgue?

  Her expression hardened. “You’re acting like you’ve gone stupid——the way someweak women do after they sleep with a man and suddenly become blind to his faults.” She cocked her head to the side and stared at me. The gesture punctuated her questions: “Did you taste that forbidden fruit last night, sis? Is that why you’re temporarily insane?”

  She wanted a catfight, all right. I wouldn’t give her the satisfaction. “I am not weak, and Jazz didn’t bed me.”Thank you very much, Amos. But that whole “weak” thing grew on me like a tumor. Okay, Iwould give her the satisfaction. I sharpened my cat claws for an attack. “Even if hehad bedded me, it would bemy business, just like you sleeping with your fiancé isyour business.”

  Meow! Rrrrrr.

  She recoiled subtly enough that if I hadn’t known her so well, I’d have missed it. “Will you look at yourself, Bell? You want him so badly you can’t even see what’s right in front of you. Jazz is the prime suspect in a woman’s brutal murder. Maybe you should have slept with him. Perhaps you would have found out he’s just a man like any other, and you could take off those blinders you’re sporting like Prada sunglasses.”

  That one was the perfect blend of smart, vicious, and fashion-conscious. She’s truly our mother’s child. But I still had my own stash. “Why do you want to see him as good for this so badly? Are you salty with him? Maybe because he wanted me instead of you?”

  A referee appeared in my head——striped shirt, black pants, whistle. “Foul!” he yelled, calling me out of the game.

  The idea had been just a tiny speck in my consciousness the moment Jazz noticed me in my red dress——the dress Carly had purchased for me to look amazing in. Men always noticed Carly first. After that, I didn’t exist. But the night I met Jazz, I felt a heady sense of power——he’d been interested inme.

  Carly threw her head back and laughed. “Oh, sweetie, your insecurity is showing like a cheap slip.”

  I couldn’t think of anything after my mind processed the visuals for “cheap slip.” We stood there glaring at each other, the silence as palpable as a thick fog. An endless minute passed. I looked away first. “I didn’t mean that,” I said.

  “Oh, yes, you did, sis. But that’s okay. I don’t have to be a psychologist to know about thisstuff we’ve had between us since you were a teenager. We should have had this little talk years ago.”

  “That wasn’t a talk. It was a fight.”

  “Bell——”

  I gave her the “stop” gesture with my hand. Carly and I were very close, but in a few notable ways, there was too much silence between us. I didn’t want to discuss this. I never wanted to discuss this. So I opted to do what I did best. I avoided it. “I’m in way over my head, Carly. I need to find out what happened to Kate.”

  She knew my avoidance techniques and showed mercy by not pressing me any further about the matter of our “stuff.” “I’m trying to help you, snookums. Step back and let the evidence speak. What if you’re wrong about him? Do you think I want to see you here on a slab? I don’t feelany allegiance to Jazz Brown, no matter how fine he is.”

  “But what if the evidenceis speaking, Carly? What if it’s saying it could be someone else? There’s more to evidence than fingerprints and DNA.”

  She sighed. “I can’t get through to you.” She shook her head. “Maybe you should go.”

  For a moment I thought I should. Last night had proved to me that I was way too close to Jazz to be objective. But what I had seen at the crime scene gnawed at me. I couldn’t give up so easily. “Can I see her?”

  “You saw her at the crime scene.”

  “So what would it hurt for me to take another peek?”

  Carly put a hand on her hip. Those purple gloves looked so good with the fuchsia scrubs. “What would it hurt? Try, first of all, my professional integrity. I did enough damage bringing you to the scene. Maguire is still questioning me about you. Second, Maguire could be in the building, and I don’t want him to see you. This ishis investigation, not yours. You shouldn’t be poking around here asking for trouble. And third, you get all goofy in the presence of the dead.”

  “If Maguire has already been here and knows you haven’t started the autopsy yet, he probably won’t be back too soon. And I promise I’ll be composed. Look, I’m fine.” I nodded as vigorously as a bobblehead doll. “I even kept my cool when you had an eye, with those tubular thingies hanging off of it, right in your hand!” I shuddered to think of The Eye.

  She pointed a gloved finger at me. “See? You’re loopy already, just thinking about an eyeball. How am I supposed to show you the woman your man killed?”

  “He’s not my man.” Not completely. “And maybe he didn’t kill her. Please? One look, Carly, and I promise I’ll never ask you to do anything like this again.”

  “I’m not buying in to your fulfilling some Columbo fantasy, Bell.”

  “I’m not sleuthing. Really.” I was going to burn in hell for the lies I kept telling myself. And Jazz. And now Carly.Lord, have mercy on my soul.

  But Carly knew me well. “I don’t believe you.”

  “I just want to see what you see. Let me have a peek.” Okay, seeing what Carly saw was way secondary to seeing whatI wanted to see. More hot coals on the fire for me.God help me.

  She crossed the room again and came back over to me. She pursed her lips and looked away. Finally, she sighed and returned her gaze to me. “One look, missy. And don’t you ask me for another thing after that.”

  I got up from the metal chair and hugged her. “I don’t know how to thank you.”

  She squeezed me back, avoiding touching me with her gloves, which she peeled off after she released me. “Thank me by seeing that he could be guilty.” She tossed the gloves into a nearby trash can.

  Before she led me out of the autopsy room and over to where Kate lay in repose, I grabbed her arm. “I’m sorry about what I said about you and Tim.”

  “You don’t have to be sorry. I do sleep with my fiancé.”

  “My attitude smacked of self-righteousness. I have no right to judge you, especially as raggedy as I am. And just to set the record straight, Jazz and I got a little hot and heavy. It could easily have happened last night.”

  Carly’s wise eyes looked into mine. “Last night?”

  I nodded.

  “All those times you were with him before and you raved about what a gentleman he was——you mean to tell me the two of you neveralmost let it happen untillast night, after his wife was murdered in his loft? Don’t you find that a bit odd? Not to mention convenient for him
?”

  I did, and the knowledge of it was killing me on the inside. “I don’t want to go a few more rounds, Carly. Can we just drop this for now?”

  She paused. “Whatever.” Another heavy sigh. “Look. I’m sorry to be so witchy, but I’m worried to death about you, not to mention you kinda hurt my feelings.”

  Not a typical Carly admission. I had indeed fouled out. “I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

  She crossed her arms and sighed, her stance telling its own story. She looked me squarely in the eyes again. “I know you think I’m the carefree little sex kitten, but I talk to God about more than you realize.”

  “I know you talk to God, Carly. Say a few words to Him about me today, will you?”

  “I do every day, bunny, but I will especially today.”

  chapter six

  CARLY LED ME THROUGHanother set of double doors and down a long corridor to a reception area. It actually seemed like a nice space, with the homiest-looking institutional furniture available. The jail had a similar ensemble. We went into a space beyond the reception area——plain beige walls, nondescript seating area, no personality.

  A video monitor set up near the ceiling made it possible to identify a body by viewing an image on the screen. This particular innovation meant one didn’t actually have to go into the freezer and get up close and personal with the dead. Carly must have thought she’d caught a break with this technology. She’d already reminded me of how I behaved in the presence of the departed. She motioned with her head to the monitor. “Stand here and watch the screen. I’ll go inside, set things up for you, and you can take a peek from here.”

  “Can’t I go inside? I’ll be good.” I smiled at her, giving her my most hopeful and innocent cherubic face.

  Her shoulders sagged. “Tell me you’ll be content to see her this way.”

  “You said you haven’t done the autopsy yet, right?”

  That question elicited an exaggerated eye roll. “I need some coffee.”

  “Let me go in the freezer with you. I promise when we’re done, I’ll buy you some Starbucks. Venti. And an almond biscotti. I will personally deliver it to you. STAT.”

  Carly, clearly unmoved by coffee bribes, put a hand on her hip. “You can’t handle stuff like that.”

  “What? I go to Starbucks almost every day.”

  “I mean dealing with the deceased.”

  “Carly, look at me. I’m good to go.”

  She gave me that blistering frown she and our mother torment me with when I insist on wearing my hair “natural.” “And you’re wanting to do this why?” She knew why but had to ask, just like Ma would.

  “Her body is as much of a crime scene as the loft was. I just want to see if there’s anything I may have missed.”

  “You think we missed something?”

  “No. I’m just saying…”

  Make it about her.

  “You were the one who invited me to the scene.” If I thought this would garner any guilt, I was sadly mistaken.

  “I asked you there so you’d ditch murder boy.”

  “Please, Car?”

  “I don’t like this.I shouldn’t even be on this case. The only reason I am is because the chief is in Barbados, and he insisted that I do it because of the police connection.”

  “A quick look. That’s all I want, and I promise I’m outta here after that.”

  She didn’t have to worry. I wasn’t known for tarrying at the morgue.

  She punched in an electronic security code, and one hydraulic door sighed open. I followed her in, noting any physiological changes in myself that could swiftly render me in a horizontal position. All clear, rubber legs notwithstanding, I took in the cold——literally——room. It didn’t strike me as being quite as scary as the autopsy room, with those metal tables and things that gave me posttraumatic stress syndrome just to think about——things like those horrible scales that you know weigh all kinds of disengaged organs.

  Mind you, even though this area didn’t spook me as badly as the autopsy room, nothing about it invited me to come and sit for a spell. The room was impersonal and clinical, with too much steel and horrid fluorescent lights. Metal drawers housing the dearly departed lined one long wall.

  I tried not to think about what those drawers held. In my mind, some kind soul had chocked them full of designer shoes and handbags. Lots and lots of Manolo Blahniks and Hermès Birkin bags.

  My little mind game didn’t work. Goose bumps beaded my arms as the truth of my woeful environment invaded my conscious mind. I tried to hold fast to the false image just the same, to keep what fledgling bit of composure I could manage. I also hoped my efforts would keep Carly from throwing me out.

  Carly headed over to the drawers and placed her hand on the handle of one. “Ready?”

  “Yes.”

  I must not have convinced her.

  “Ready?” she repeated.

  “Yes.”

  She crooked a perfectly arched eyebrow at me. “Bell, are youready ?”

  “Carly, are you going to keep asking me that? Like Jesus asked Peter, ‘Do you love me?’”

  In those ten seconds, she’d undermined my already nonexistent confidence, but she moved to yank the drawer open anyway, ready or not.

  “Wait,” I shrieked.

  Carly rolled her eyes again and sighed so hard I wondered if she was doing a yogic cleansing breath. “What now, Bell?”

  “Uh——what have you done to her so far?”

  She paused, her hand still resting on the handle of the drawer. “Do you know how we process bodies once we get them here?”

  I shook my head.

  She removed her hand from the handle and placed it back on her hip. “The first thing we did after we got a positive ID was take a bunch of pictures of her with the shirt on. After that, Souldier came in and got trace evidence. That’s standard procedure.”

  I nodded again, just to let her know I was still with her.

  “The next thing we did was get her clothes off. Take more pictures, gather more trace evidence, and when we get clearance from the police, we can wash her body and start the autopsy. The worst you’ll see is what you saw at the crime scene, minus her clothes.”

  “I can handle that.”

  “There’s one more thing.”

  “Yeah?”

  “This is a sisterly warning, not a medical-examiner one.”

  “Okay, what?”

  “That woman has perfect breasts.”

  Oh no.Perfect? Carly was not one to throw the word “perfect” around lightly. “Thanks for the warning. Open the drawer.”

  Carly slid the drawer open with a flourish to reveal the completely nakedgoddess. “Katherine Anne Townsend, the former Mrs. Jazz Brown.”

  “Oh no!”

  Carly touched my arm. “You okay?”

  “Theyare perfect!She’s perfect. Dear Lord! I will never feel good about myself again.Ever .”

  Carly laughed. “Of course you will. Just get an enhancement, like I did.”

  My eyes widened in horror. “You gotenhanced ?”

  She looked around as if someone could hear us and would be scandalized. “Remember when I took six weeks off last year?” She pushed up her own perfect pair. “I got these babies.”

  And here I’d thought a good underwire bra was her secret.

  She continued to hold her ample bosom. “I’m going to be thefinest thing in the nursing home with these. In fact, when I’m dead and gone, they’ll still be looking good.” She released herself with a satisfied grin.

  And speaking of dead and gone…

  I gratefully turned my attention back to Kate Townsend, avoiding the area below her battered neck. Thoughts about my small, saggy disappointments dissipated as I took in Kate’s horribly flushed face.

  Her body is a crime scene. What do you see?

  “You didn’t find any prints on her, correct?”

  “Correct,” Carly said. I could hear the disappo
intment in her voice. She badly wanted some solid evidence.

  “How ’bout trace?”

  “We found fibers: a single brown hair that looks like Jazz’s. Not much else that’s not excruciatingly ordinary.”

  “Has your lab done a comparison with the hair?”

  “Not yet, we’ll get to it.”

  I tried to peer past Kate’s impeccable double D’s. “Is there anything unusual on her body?”

  “You mean besides her broken neck?”

  “Yes, Carly.”

  “She’s got old scars all over her arms and thighs.”

  “What kind of scars?”

  “Take a look. That’s your area of expertise. Not mine.”

  Carly pulled out the drawer some more, revealing the tops of Kate’s forearms. Rows of neat scars crisscrossed down both her arms and stopped midway between her inner elbow and wrist. They could easily be taken for cat or bramble scratches. Too perfect, though. A skilled wielder of a knife or a razor blade made these scars——scars she could hide with a long-sleeved shirt. My heart sank. Poor Kate.

  I remembered that Jazz had said he’d grabbed her. I saw no evidence on her arms or shoulders that he had. He must not have grabbed her too hard, even if he had pushed her. Why had she fallen so easily?She had on heels. She was still dressed when he pushed her.

  I didn’t ask to see her thighs. I was sure I’d be traumatized. Not by the scars but by what I imagined were her perfect model’s thighs. She hadn’t been uncovered far enough for me to see them at the scene. Not that I wanted to then, either. “How old would you say the scars are?”

  “Some aren’t too old. Maybe a month.”

  “Anything else notable?”

  “Her wrists. Looks like she botched a suicide attempt once upon a time.”

  I examined her wrists, careful not to touch her with my ungloved hand. Jagged, unsure white lines scarred the skin above her hands. It’s harder than people realize to actually kill yourself by slitting your wrists. You have to go deep enough to get an artery, and arteries don’t want to go easy. They’ll try to spasm shut. It’s possible to kill yourself that way, but it’ll take a few hours to bleed to death. You’d have to be pretty committed. Apparently, Kate was not.