Once again, he gave me a strange, almost pitying look. I wondered what he knew about Elissa Daniels’s murder that I didn’t.
“Did you guys find anything at the scene?” I asked. “Anything in the trash you collected? Any clue to who might have done this?”
He shook his head. “Nope. Nothing obvious. Just a bunch of soggy cardboard boxes, empty bottles, and broken glass, which isn’t unusual, given the location. Bria and I will go through all the trash again later, but I’m not holding out much hope of finding anything useful.”
I nodded. “Thanks for trying, though.”
Xavier shrugged his massive shoulders. “Just doing my job.” His gaze flicked over to the detectives, who were still standing around the water cooler, watching a video on one of their phones. “Someone around here has to, right?”
“Right.”
Xavier jerked his thumb over toward the elevators. “You go on down to the coroner’s office. I’ll stay here and keep an eye out for Sophia and Jade.”
“Thanks, Xavier.”
He nodded at me and picked up his phone to make another call.
I got into one of the elevators, punched the button, and rode down to the basement. The elevator doors opened, revealing a long, empty hallway. After the constant noise and motion upstairs, the lack of sound and people was a bit jarring, as if I’d been transported to a distant, deserted planet, instead of just another floor in the same building.
I walked down the corridor, my boots whispering against the floor, and opened the door to the waiting room that fronted the coroner’s office. Padded chairs against the walls, dusty plastic palm trees in the corners, a glass table topped with several tissue boxes. The functional furniture was nice enough, but it was still a thoroughly depressing place. Even worse, I could hear the walls wailing with the cries of everyone who’d been unfortunate enough to come here and identify a dead loved one. Soon Jade’s sobs would be added to the ones already here. The mournful notes made my own heart squeeze tight.
The frosted-glass door at the back of the waiting room buzzed open, and Bria stuck her head out. “There you are. Ryan’s ready for you.”
I walked through the opening and stepped into a room that was mostly made of metal. Stainless-steel vaults, each one fronted with its own door, lined two of the walls, while several long metal tables took up the center of the room, each positioned above a drain in the floor. It was several degrees cooler in here, and goose bumps rippled down my spine, despite my heavy winter clothes. A sharp tang of lemony antiseptic hung in the air, as though someone had just cleaned out a refrigerator.
Dr. Ryan Colson, the coroner, stood beside one of the tables, his blue scrubs looking shockingly bright against the dull metal. The soft lights made his black hair and goatee gleam like wet ink against his ebony skin, and his dark hazel eyes were kind and sympathetic behind his round silver glasses.
“Dr. Colson.”
“Please,” he said. “Call me Ryan.”
“Okay, Ryan. But only if you call me Gin.”
He nodded. “Gin.”
My gaze flicked past him to the table. Elissa’s body had already been stretched out on the metal, with a blue sheet draped over everything but her face and her toes, whose nails were painted a fun, flirty pink. My stomach turned over again.
“I haven’t started my official autopsy yet, but the causes of death are pretty obvious,” Ryan said in a low, somber voice. “Blunt-force trauma to the head, face, and torso, along with manual strangulation. One of the blows to the head probably knocked her out before the strangulation occurred. That’s my hope, anyway.”
He reached out and rested his hand on the table beside Elissa’s head, almost as if he were trying to comfort her, even though she was far beyond anyone’s reach now.
“It’s a bit hard to tell with the cold weather, but I’d estimate that she’s been dead at least twenty-four hours. I’ll know more when I do the full autopsy, but that’s not why you’re here.”
I shook my head. “I wish none of us were here tonight.”
A sharp knock sounded on the door, and we turned toward the frosted glass. Ryan went over and opened the door. Jade stood in the waiting room, with Sophia hovering behind her.
Jade was wearing the same crimson coat she’d had on at the Pork Pit earlier today, but her face had been scrubbed free of its usual makeup, and her blond hair had been pulled back into a messy ponytail, making her look younger and far more vulnerable than she had at the restaurant. Her puffy eyes were bloodshot, and she twisted a white silk handkerchief around in her hands. She’d probably been crying ever since I called.
Jade looked at me a moment before her green gaze locked onto the body on the table. She froze, as if she were as dead as Elissa. No one moved or spoke, giving her time to process the ugly, ugly scene. Jade stayed ramrod-still for the better part of a minute before a single, violent tremor shook her body. Then she started shaking and couldn’t stop. Her lips trembled, her fingers spasmed, her legs wobbled, and she would have crumpled to the floor if Sophia hadn’t reached out and steadied her.
To my surprise, Ryan stepped forward and gently took hold of Jade’s elbow. “It’s all right,” he said in a soft, soothing, sympathetic voice. “I know how hard this is. Whenever you’re ready, Ms. Jamison. Just take your time.”
Jade stared back at him with a blank expression, so far down in her grief that she wasn’t really seeing him. After several seconds, she nodded and let him slowly lead her over to the table. Sophia stayed by the door, while Bria and I both stepped back away from the table.
Ryan had combed out Elissa’s long blond hair and had cleaned the blood off her face, trying to make her look as normal as possible, but her features were still a bruised, battered mess.
Jade gasped and pressed her fist to her mouth, shocked by the sight of her dead, beaten, strangled sister. Another violent tremor ripped through her body, as though she was going to collapse under the weight of her emotions. Jade reached out and grabbed Ryan’s hand, squeezing his fingers as if to push back her own feelings and steady herself. Ryan winced at her tight, bruising grip, but he didn’t remove his hand from hers.
“Can—can I see a little bit more of her?” Jade whispered. “Just down to her shoulders? Please?”
Ryan nodded. “Of course.”
He gave Jade’s hand a little pat with his free one, and she finally realized that she was still holding on to him. Jade grimaced and let go. Ryan nodded his thanks, then stepped forward and lowered the blue sheet a few more inches, revealing Elissa’s collarbones and the curve of her shoulders.
Jade leaned over the table, her gaze roaming over Elissa’s face, trying to see her sister through all the bruises, swelling, and broken bones.