Page 35 of Girl Between

“What’ve we got?” George asked.

“Different cemetery, same MO,” an officer already on scene replied.

“Why’s it always gotta be cemeteries?” Neville muttered.

Dana understood the sentiment. There’d been a time when she hadn’t minded cemeteries. Actually, she might’ve even been a bit of a taphophile. She wasn’t a tombstone tourist by any means, but she could appreciate the peace found in the quiet resting place of those who’d come before her and hopefully moved on to a better place.

But that had been before she’d experienced the icy touch of death.

She couldn’t argue that cemeteries held history and were often places of beauty, art, and poetry, but to Dana, they were a reminder of how fleeting life was and how much she still had left to lose.

34

Dana foundherself standing next to a tombstone adorned with two sullen cherubs. Their stone tears forever staining the burial plot they watched over. Moving respectfully to the side, she gave the angels a wide berth, planning to hang back so as not to be in the way of the investigation. But George had other plans. He beckoned her over to where he stood by the motionless body.

Straightening her spine, Dana steeled herself and joined him.

“What do you see?” George asked.

Dana focused her senses, forcing herself to look beyond the lifeless body displayed in front of her. The victim was female, young—barely twenty, if Dana had to guess. She wore a gauzy white knee-length dress that exposed the unnaturally pale skin of her shins and bare feet. Her equally pale arms were crossed, resting on her stomach, hand over hand—a sign of reverence and remorse.

Dana always found it strange that after extinguishing a life, a killer could be compelled by compassion.

Her astute gaze continued over the body, stopping at the ivory death mask covering the victim’s face. Even from a distance, Dana could tell it wasn’t authentic, but still she moved closer, drawn in against her will.

“May I?” she asked, gesturing to the mask.

George handed Dana a pair of latex gloves. Donning them with practiced ease, she crouched next to the victim. The sterile scent of antiseptic burned her nostrils. Dana carefully lifted the mask from the woman’s face. Beneath it, the victim’s expression was eerily serene. The only trace of trauma was a small trickle of dried blood from her left nostril.

With the mask removed, the scent of disinfectant grew stronger. “Was the last victim embalmed?” Dana asked.

“Why do you ask?” George countered.

“The smell.” Dana motioned him closer. “It’s unmistakable.”

George leaned in, taking a whiff. “Smells like pickles,” he admitted.

“Exactly. The pickle-like odor is a common side effect of the embalming process. As the liquid leaches from the body it becomes a gas, expelling the odor. It’s part of a volatile organic compound,” she said, standing.

George stood too, nodding though he looked lost in thought. “I didn’t notice the scent on the first victim, but it took us longer to get to the scene. Plus, with the heat of the day …” He shook his head. “I’ll make a note to ask the coroner to look into the embalming angle.”

“Ask if the first victim was drained of blood, too,” Dana added.

George frowned. “How did you know that?”

Dana pointed to the blood near the victim’s nose. “The Egyptians used to begin the embalming process by piercing the anterior skull base through the nasal passage to remove the brain before then inserting a tube through the nasopharynx to siphon the blood before extracting the organs to place in jars as offerings to the gods.”

“A little nosebleed tells you all that?” Neville asked.

Dana shrugged.

“Any number of things could’ve caused a nosebleed,” LaSalle argued.

“True,” Dana admitted. “But based on the fact that your first victim was also drained of blood, and this victim’s lividity, thenosebleed was most likely caused by a transnasal craniotomy prior to embalming.”

Dana waited for further objection, but the air around her hung with astonished silence. Looking around, she noticed LaSalle, Neville, and the rest of the NOPD officers looking at her the way Jake used to when they’d first started working together—like she truly was thewitch doctoreveryone claimed. The only one who didn’t seem bothered by her extensive knowledge of the dark arts of death was George. Instead, he appeared to be fighting his amusement.

“What?” she challenged. “You asked me what I saw.”