This wasn’t just about the date. I had no doubt this little display was part ego, part power play. He knew I needed something, and he was letting me know he knew. Cops, detectives, desperate therapists—medical examiners wereused to being hounded for favors. Andrew wasn’t the first intern to realize he held leverage, but he was clearly learning how to use it.
What he didn’t know?
No one worked a system better than I did.
I squared my shoulders.
“Ol’ Crazy Carl here sure liked his Bordeaux. Didn’t know a liver could turn that shade of green.”
“Who?”
“Crazy Carl Higgins.”
I frowned and took a good look at the grey face on the table.
My eyes rounded. “I know him. He was a client. I actually called the cops on the guy a few weeks ago.”
Andrew’s brow cocked. “Yeah? For what?”
“Oh, nothing, it was stupid. I regret it.”
“What’d he do?”
“He’d linger around for hours after our appointments. I’d catch him watching me through the windows.”
“You must have that effect on men.”
I ignored the quip and asked, “How’d he die?”
“To be determined, but…” He nodded to Carl’s legs. “I’m guessing it wasn’t pretty.”
I followed Andrew’s gaze to the flakey, blackened, rotted circles of skin that dotted the man’s legs and arms. My stomach did another nose dive.
“What are those?”
“Burns.”
My mouth dropped. “You mean, someoneburnedhim?”
Andrew nodded and focused back on the man’s gaping chest.
I stared down at the burns on Carl’s arms. “The circles are too big to be cigarette or lighter burns.”
“That’s because they aren’t.”
“What, then? What was he burned with?” I was grotesquely interested all of the sudden.
“I found electrode gel on his skin.”
It took a second, but when it sunk in, I gasped.
“He was electrocuted,” Andrew continued. “Some sick bastard tortured the guy. Think ‘death-row-inmate’ electrocuted.”
A solid minute ticked by as I stood there in disbelief. I looked across the room to Jessica, who was flickering a glance in our direction.
Andrew switched out his scalpel for a pair of tweezers. “Maybe our local chicken snatcher started to get bored.”
“Chicken snatcher?”
