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“You should go examine the body, boss,” Tyler says, eyeing me. “Maybe go with Gabe this time if you’re up to it. All the way over here he kept mentioning that he has thoughts on the new coroner in town.”
“Dr. Quinton Briggs, a pleasure.”
My eyebrows lift as the coroner removes his gloves to shake my hand, immediately going to put on another one the moment I let go, I guess it doesn’t matter to him that I’m also wearing gloves. “Special Agent Sterling Gideon. We’ve met before.”
“I’m not so good at remembering faces I’m not examining,” he replies with a chuckle, and that sounds familiar. “Dr. Whitmore had a lot of reports from an Edwin Gideon, I’m assuming there’s a relation? Agent Lapin had me look for the original files after finding the first body.”
I nod, glancing at Gabriel who just grins. “You dug out the original CGS files.”
“Yes and I have some issues with the documentation,” he tells me, closing up the bag he brought. He turns to one of the cops standing by. “If the FBI doesn’t mind I’m ready to bring her back to my office. Someone said they recovered the ID?”
Gabe nods. “One of the officers found it during the search. It was in the bushes in the back, either dropped or chucked.”
The three of us turn to look out towards the backyard. These houses don’t have fences, extending to a small, shallow creek in the back that I can see two officers wading into up to their ankles. “We’re lucky today. Had she sat out here much longer we could be dealing with gators.”
I scowl and stare around us. Crocs were always an issue when I was a kid, gators too. The swampland up here is their ideal habitat, and even though this isn’t the Everglades it’s close enough. I was always warned as a kid to watch out for those scaly beasts. “That would complicate things.”
“Indeed. I just had a body come through a few days ago from the next county over. You wouldn’t believe the bite this bastard took out of the guy-”
“Let’s stay on topic,” I tell him, and Quinton shrugs but that smile stays in place. “You’re here because…”
“I’m a naturally curious person so I was reading the files. I noticed Dr. Whitmore had some documentation missing from the files, or information omitted. They looked incomplete, every single one of them. I phoned Whitmore but he hasn’t called me back yet.”
I focus on Gabriel. “Call Soto and ask her to look into what VICAP has. Whitmore should’ve submitted complete files.”
Gabe nods and grins, looking between us before he takes a few steps away and dials the number. I doubt Briggs shared something like that with him, or we would already be looking into it. “Was that something you just noticed, Doctor?”
“I mentioned to your agent that Dr. Whitmore appeared scatterbrained in his old age and that I had some serious work to do. I discovered the inconsistencies last night when I was reading through the initial file. When I checked the rest, I realized they were all the same.”
My curiosity grows, and we follow the gurney towards his ride. “Did you read about the final victim, Porscha Surwright? Her daughter-”
“Sure, I read the Surwright files,” he interrupts with a chuckle. “He had a lot of notes in there but not a lot of it made sense. There must be another page somewhere. Her body was identified, wasn’t it?”
I stop walking, pinning him with my gaze. “Yes. By the dental records.”
“Huh.” He pauses and drags a hand across his chin, looking interested. “It’s not listed that way in the file. Too bad she’s buried. I wouldn’t mind looking at the remains.”
“Why?”
“Well, because the corpse wasn’t whole,” he says casually, and that’s true. I remember Dad mentioning that the corpse had a little bit of blonde hair remaining, but no hands. Her teeth were ripped out, indicating a whole different level of torture for Porscha, but there were enough teeth intact to make a positive ID. “With her hands missing there’s no fingerprints, and just because her blood type matches, that’s not enough to identify a person. I saw the teeth documentation, but the photographs show some recent dental work too. How do you know the body wasn’t further tampered with?”
I swallow, because that’s just nutty. Porscha was identified. Her daughter recounted the tragic end of her life and made a formal ID before claiming the remains. “Dr. Whitmore’s findings were confirmed and passed scrutiny through a rigorous trial. Challenging his determination that the corpse was Porscha Surwright changes the entire case.”
He makes some sort of displeased noise in his throat at that. “Perhaps Whitmore just likes shorthand a little too much. I’ll try to ring him again to go through the discrepancies. I want to be thorough with my comparisons when I analyze the bodies. And I’ll want to do the newest victim justice.”
“Chelsey Jackson,” I say automatically, remembering the name from the ID. We’ve already forwarded the information to Soto and are in the process of contacting her next of kin.
“Well, Ms. Jackson deserves the utmost respect on her final journey,” he says seriously. “I’ll begin the autopsy as soon as the family is notified. I need time to prepare as is.”
I nod, and the sound of a motor catches my attention. Glancing over, past the crowd of red and blue lights, I see Vinny backing out of the driveway. He’s got his window down, and appears to be focused on chatting with Jo in the passenger seat.
They seem to be heading out in a hurry. Can’t say I blame either of them for not wanting to be here, and I watch as he turns away from the crowd and cruises off. He’s going in the opposite direction that I expected, heading towards town in lieu of the highway.
Saying goodbye to Briggs, Gabe meets me at the driveway to the house. The car Tyler drove over in is gone, and he cocks his head that way. “Harrsion said they were going to check out Jackson’s residence. You were busy talking to Briggs.”
“Great,” I say, not lifting my gaze from Jo and Vinny’s car as it disappears around a bend. “You know, I wouldn’t be surprised if those two headed out of town for the day. It would look suspicious, but waking up with a dead body outside your window is a lot to handle.”
Gabe shrugs. “You know what’s off in that direction, don’t you boss?”