by Lisa Regan
Again, Josie felt cold dread envelop her. “Or maybe someone tried to assault her but didn’t get very far?”
“Could be,” Dr. Feist answered. “That seems the most likely explanation.”
“What about the mark on her wrist?”
“It was fresh. It looks like a ligature mark except it’s small. If someone tied her up, it either wasn’t for very long or she didn’t struggle.”
“Can you say with certainty it’s a ligature mark?” Josie asked. “Or could she have gotten it some other way?”
“I can’t be certain. To me, it looks like a ligature mark, but if I had to testify in court as to the certainty of that conclusion, I’d have to say I’m only fifty percent sure that’s what it is.”
The double doors to the suite banged open and Ramon pushed through a transportable autopsy table, lining it up beside Tyler Yates. Valerie’s body was completely covered with a sheet. Dr. Feist walked over and turned the sheet down, folding it beneath Valerie’s chin.
She sighed as she stared down at the young woman’s face. “I love my job, but I really, really hate my job.”
Josie nodded, leaning a hip against the counter. Again, she thought of how close in age Tyler and Valerie Yates were to her and Noah. A wave of sadness washed over her. The Yates couple would never grow old together. They’d never again have the kinds of stupid arguments that long-time couples had—like whether a toaster oven was better than a toaster. “Me too,” Josie said.
They let a moment of silence pass for the young couple. Then Ramon said, “Dr. Feist, you’ll want to see this right away.”
He walked over to an open laptop on the counter next to the Tyler Yates file and started clicking until he brought up a series of X-rays. He moved out of the way so that Dr. Feist could study them. Josie looked over her shoulder as she clicked through the digital images, settling on one that showed Valerie’s upper ribs, shoulders, and the vertebrae of her neck as well as an object that was clearly not supposed to be there. It showed up bright white against the various degrees of gray, black, and hazy white on the X-ray. Something long and looped, almost like a string of some sort. Connected to it was another object, irregularly shaped but nearly round. It sat above the collar bones in the center of her throat.
Josie gasped. “What is that?”
Dr. Feist frowned. She snatched a pair of vinyl gloves from a box on the counter and walked over to Valerie’s body. “Ramon,” she said. “I need forceps. The ones that—” But he already had a small pair in hand which he gave her. He then went about flipping on the movable overhead lights that shone down on Valerie’s body. Dr. Feist tipped Valerie’s head back slightly and used both hands along her jawline to open her mouth. “I need my head lamp, Ramon,” she said.
Seconds later, she was fitting it onto her head and peering inside Valerie’s mouth. “I can’t see anything from this angle.”
She went around to the side of the table, climbed on top of it and straddled Valerie. Ramon moved the overhead lights to accommodate the doctor’s new position. She pressed a finger into Valerie’s chin, opening her mouth as wide as possible. Josie couldn’t help but cringe as she watched Dr. Feist insert the forceps deeply into the dead woman’s throat.
“It might be too deep,” Ramon commented. “You might need to use the endoscope.”
Dr. Feist’s face was inches from Valerie’s open mouth. Her eyes squinted in concentration beneath a pair of safety goggles. Her hand worked the forceps around inside Valerie’s throat. “Nonsense,” she mumbled to Ramon. “I can see the edge of it. If I can just grab onto a piece—got it!”
Squeezing the forceps, she gently tugged at the object inside. Josie knew she was trying not to damage any tissue inside Valerie’s throat as she removed whatever it was that was lodged there. It was freezing in the morgue, but sweat beaded along Dr. Feist’s upper lip.
Finally, the object slid out of Valerie’s mouth, long and slick and covered in fluid. Ramon was ready beside the doctor with a small stainless-steel tray which she dropped the item into with a thunk sound.
Dr. Feist climbed down and followed Ramon over to an empty table where he set the tray. As Josie joined them, Ramon turned on the movable overhead light and shined it down on the tray. The three of them stared at it.
“It’s a necklace,” Josie said. She pointed to the long loop, which was only a couple of millimeters in width and perhaps twelve inches in length. It had no metal clasps, but its two ends were tied together in a knot. “Looks like leather.”
“I’d say so,” Dr. Feist said. She used the forceps to nudge the necklace so they could get a better look at the quarter-sized object attached to the leather. Again, there were no clasps but one end of the leather band had been fed through a hole in what looked like a small wooden item. The side facing them was brown and flat with two deep holes in its center, side by side, like two lobes or two sides of a heart. Around it were tiny, irregular, pin-shaped holes and deeper, longer indentations. Nothing about it was uniform. Dr. Feist turned it over to reveal that its underside was rounded, ridged, black, and rough. Almost like a miniature charred coconut.
Josie said, “That’s a black walnut.”
“What?” Ramon said.
Dr. Feist looked at her, waiting for her to continue.
“A black walnut,” Josie said. “You can tell by the color on the back. It’s been cut in half. Black walnut trees grow all over Pennsylvania. They grow in big green hulls. They’re very difficult to harvest. I’ve seen people use hammers to break them open. That is the shell. The actual nut has been removed.”
Dr. Feist said, “Someone made a necklace with half a black walnut shell and jammed it down this girl’s throat?”
Josie felt a buzz of anxiety work its way through her body. She took out her phone and snapped a few photos. “Yes.”
“But why?” Dr. Feist asked.
Josie took a step back from the table, finding a counter edge to lean against. She felt slightly dizzy. Exhaustion and sleep deprivation worked in tandem to slow her mind. “It’s a signature.”
This time, Ramon gave her a quizzical look and Dr. Feist said, “What do you mean?”
“A signature,” Josie repeated. “Something a killer does for his own gratification, but which is not necessary for the commission of the crime. In other words, stuffing that necklace into her throat didn’t kill her. He put it there for his own reasons. It means something to him.”
“The necklace could have killed her,” Dr. Feist pointed out. “Being that deep in her throat.”
“That’s true. It very well could have killed her, but I think when you do the autopsy, you’ll find her hyoid was broken as well. Or she succumbed to the hemlock poisoning.”
Ramon said softly, “Whoever did this was going to kill her one way or another.”
Josie nodded. She closed her eyes for a moment. She felt Dr. Feist’s fingers on the inside of her wrist and opened them again. Dr. Feist knew better than to ask Josie if she was okay. “Your heart is racing,” Dr. Feist said. “Why don’t you have a seat in my office? Ramon can stow Mr. Yates and get Mrs. Yates ready for autopsy.”
Ramon nodded and immediately busied himself. He looked glad to have something to do besides talk about the black walnut necklace.
Dr. Feist’s office was just off the examination room. Although the walls were blue-painted cinderblock, the lighting was softer, and the doctor had decorated said walls with several pastel abstract paintings which made the space seem almost soothing. Josie plopped into the guest chair in front of Dr. Feist’s desk. “Take five,” the doctor told her.
She left the room and Josie could hear her giving instructions to Ramon. When she returned, Josie had regained some of her composure. Dr. Feist perched on the edge of her desk and said, “So, is there some significance to the black walnut? The heart shape on the inside?”
Josie nodded. “It could be that. Some symbol of love—or what this sicko believes is love.” Her mind ran through the scene ag
ain and the little that they knew. “I think the killer poisoned them with hemlock. Maybe he wanted her, but he couldn’t get to her without eliminating Tyler. With both of them ill, he easily killed Tyler. Then he would have had Valerie to himself.”
“Except that she was extremely ill,” Dr. Feist said. “Like you said.”
“And there was a third camper,” Josie added, “but we don’t know where they were during all of this. We’re assuming the third camper was a woman because we found a gold necklace in the sleeping bag.”
“Maybe he took her,” Dr. Feist suggested.
“That’s what I’m afraid of.”
A moment passed between them while they each collected their thoughts. Finally, Dr. Feist said, “What else do you know about black walnuts?”
Josie rubbed her temples where a headache began to pound. “I know that the roots of black walnut trees exude something called juglone.”
“That’s a natural herbicide, isn’t it?” Dr. Feist said.
“Right,” Josie said. “It kills everything around it.”
Sixteen
Ramon poked his head into the office. “Valerie Yates is ready for you, doc,” he said.
Dr. Feist smiled at him. “Thank you, Ramon. I’ll be there shortly.” To Josie, she said, “I don’t know about you, but I could use a cup of coffee before I dive into this next autopsy. How about if I run up to the cafeteria?”
“I need to get back to work,” Josie said.
“One cup,” Dr. Feist said. “Did Noah come with you?”
“Yes, he’s in the NICU.”
Dr. Feist raised a brow. Obviously, news of the morning’s dramatic birth hadn’t yet made its way into the bowels of the hospital. Josie recapped what had happened.
Dr. Feist said, “Then you need that coffee more than I thought. Stay here. I’ll get the drinks and track down Noah.”
Josie didn’t have the energy to object. Remembering the main reason she had come to speak to the doctor, she asked, “Did you get anywhere with the next of kin?”
“I had a little help from your department. Detective Mettner is quite helpful.”
“Yes, he’s fantastic,” Josie agreed. Discreetly, she checked her phone. “I’m actually waiting to hear from him on whether or not he could get into the Yateses’ cell phones. I tried to check their social media profiles on my phone but there are about a dozen ‘Tyler Yates’ and almost as many ‘Valerie Yates’. I didn’t see any profile pictures that looked like either of them.”
Dr. Feist smiled and motioned toward her desk chair where her laptop sat open. “Sit over there,” she said. “We tracked down next of kin for Tyler. His dad is Wesley Yates and he, too, lives in Fox Mill. I called the coroner there, and they’ll be making the death notification in the next twenty-four hours. You can have his number. I imagine you’ll want to talk to him.”
“Yes,” Josie said as she moved over to Dr. Feist’s desk chair. “That would be great.”
Dr. Feist leaned over Josie’s shoulder and clicked a few times, bringing up a document that included a photo of Wesley Yates’ driver’s license. Josie took out her phone and used a note-taking app to take down Yates’ address and below the photo of his license, his phone number.
Dr. Feist said, “While you’re there, you can log into Facebook if you’d like. Search for Wesley Yates.”
“I can use my phone,” Josie told her.
“I know. I like the company though.” With that, she was gone.
The list of Wesley Yateses on Facebook was even longer than the list of Tylers and Valeries, but lucky for Josie, the Wesley Yates she was looking for used a clear photo of his face for his profile picture. She was able to easily match it with the driver’s license photo. She checked his friends list and found Tyler’s profile as well. He had used a photo of a forest at dusk for his profile picture, but several of his other photos were set to public. Josie clicked through them, finding several photos of him and Valerie. She was able to determine from the dates of some wedding photos that they’d got married four years earlier. It looked as though they went camping once or twice a year. Valerie was in almost all of the photos but not tagged in any of them. She was also absent from both Tyler and Wesley’s friends lists which meant she likely didn’t have a Facebook account.
Josie took one last look through Tyler Yates’ photos, noticing that several photos of him and Valerie featured another couple who looked to be of similar age. The couple weren’t tagged in any of Tyler Yates’ photos. Josie searched the comments of many of the pictures, but no one mentioned any names besides Tyler’s and Valerie’s. She went back and studied the photos, noting the difference between the athletic-looking Yates couple and their friends. Tyler was average height and lean like a runner. In his photos he had a crooked smile and bright blue eyes. He kept his sandy hair cut short and sometimes spiked. The other male was taller with darker features, including shaggy brown hair that brushed his collar and shaded his deep brown eyes. His smile was restrained somehow, like he was gritting his teeth. The woman Josie assumed was his girlfriend or wife was short and curvy with ash-blonde hair that flowed down to her rear end, unlike Valerie who was a brunette, slightly taller and more angular. In the earliest photos, the mystery woman’s wide smile revealed perfectly straight teeth and a dimple in her right cheek. As time wore on, the man with the shaggy brown hair disappeared and appeared to take her smile with him. In the most recent photos, she stood between Tyler and Valerie Yates, giving a thin, closed-lip smile that barely registered joy.
Josie checked the dates on the early photos, noting that they went back six years. The male partner in the second, unnamed couple stopped appearing in the photos two and a half years earlier. Josie wondered what happened to him. Had he passed away? Had they simply broken up, or divorced?
Dr. Feist sailed back into the room with a cup carrier containing three paper cups of coffee and an assortment of sugar, creamers, and stirrers. Noah trailed behind her. “Look who I found wandering around in the hall,” Dr. Feist joked.
“Hey,” Noah said. “Dr. Feist told me about the autopsy. I just had a look at the… necklace.”
“Pretty disturbing,” Josie said. “How’s the baby?”
Noah smiled. “He’s doing great. Also, I saw Moore upstairs.”
“How lovely of him to travel out of his jurisdiction for us.”
Noah laughed. “What’ve you got on the next of kin? Anything? Social media accounts?”
Josie told him about Wesley Yates and showed him what she had found on the social media profiles. “Look at this woman in these photos,” she told him. “Her boyfriend or husband—or whoever that guy was— is gone, and she’s still hanging out with these two.”
“So? Maybe he died and they were consoling her,” Noah said.
Josie clicked back through several of the pictures again. “But look: here’s one of the three of them at a movie. Here are the three of them at a fireworks display. An art museum. A food festival.”
“What are you thinking?” Noah asked.
“I’m wondering if this woman is the third camper.”
“Because she hangs out with them a lot?”
“Not just hangs out with them. They take her everywhere with them.”
“You’re only seeing the photos that are set to public,” Noah pointed out.
Josie made a noise of frustration deep in her throat. “There’s a killer out there. He could have this woman, for all we know.”
“Josie, you know we have to get this right. I agree that he could have the third camper. I understand she’s in danger, but we need proof that the woman in these social media photos is the third camper before we get too excited.”
Josie said, “There are enough photos of the three of them together to reasonably assume that she could have gone camping with them. We have to work with what we have. I’ll take the risk of being wrong about her identity. But if we can find out who this woman is, we’ll have a better idea of whether she is the person w
e’re looking for or not.”
“Wesley Yates probably knows.”
“I don’t know if the death notification has been made yet,” Josie said. She pointed to the woman on the screen sandwiched between Tyler and Valerie Yates at a Phillies game. “If she’s the camper and she’s missing, we need to know right away.”
Dr. Feist said, “I’ll call the Fox Mill coroner and see if they’ve made the notification yet, and if not, ask them to give me a time frame for doing so.”
“Thank you,” Josie said. “I’m going to send this profile link to Mett and ask him to start contacting anyone he can find on Tyler Yates’ friends list to see if they know her name. I also want him to make sure our people are out in the woods looking for the third camper the minute the storm lets up.”
She took out her phone but before she could dial Mettner, a call came in from Moore. She flashed her phone at Noah. “I’ll call Mettner,” he told her. “You take that.”
“Quinn,” Josie answered.
Moore said, “I called Mr. and Mrs. Bestler. They should be in Denton in the next hour. I’m at Denton Memorial Hospital now. You guys still around? You know what room this woman claiming to be Maya Bestler is in?”
“Fourth floor, room 428. We’re in the morgue. We’ll meet you there.”
Seventeen
Moore met them at the nurses’ station. He must have gotten a shower as well, Josie thought, because his hair looked clean and freshly combed, and he had on a more casual uniform: a tan polo shirt with the Lenore County sheriff’s insignia on it and navy-blue slacks. A manila file folder was tucked under one arm. Josie arranged for them to use the staff break room for ten minutes so they could exchange information. The file Moore had brought was a copy of the file on Bestler’s disappearance. “You can keep that,” he told Josie as she leafed through it. Noah recapped Dr. Feist’s initial findings on the Yates couple and asked if he could arrange for units to search the Lenore County side of the campsite for the third camper.
