LITMIR.BIZ

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hard to disprove unless a witness could put him elsewhere. Gundersund would leave his travel tale unchallenged for now. He motioned toward the living room. “You might want to sit down and wrap yourself in a blanket. I have some news that is going to be difficult.” He hated this part of the job. Delaney might have killed his wife and daughter, but if not he was going to be devastated by Gundersund’s next words.

      Delaney shut his eyes and his body swayed as if he was going to fall down. Gundersund reached out an arm to steady him.

      “Tell me now.” Delaney’s voice was low and wretched. “Just tell me.”

      “The body of a woman was found a few hours ago on the side of the 401 just outside Kingston on the way to Gananoque. We believe it to be Adele.”

      Delaney’s body jolted as if a fire had been lit under him. His eyes widened, a crazed expression making his features grotesque. “My wife? Dead on the 401? How can that be? You told me that she’d drowned Violet and then herself. Now you tell me that she was killed on the highway? I could have been out looking for her all this time instead of answering your damn questions? You could have been out there doing your job.” Delaney pushed himself away from the staircase and began pacing, his arms rising and falling like a bird trying to take flight. A guttural growl came from deep in his throat.

      Gundersund and Halliwell stepped forward in unison and somehow got their arms around him. He fought them for a moment before slumping against Gundersund. Between them they walked him into the living room and angled him onto the couch, his body limp, all resistance gone. Gundersund reached for the blanket lying across the back of the couch and wrapped it around Delaney’s shoulders while Halliwell kept a firm grip. Gundersund spoke to Halliwell as they worked Delaney into a reclining position. “We’d better get the paramedics out here. Call them and then see if there’s some brandy in one of the cupboards. He’s going into shock.”

      “I’m on it.” Halliwell let go after Delaney sunk into the cushions and closed his eyes. He crossed the floor to the hallway already speaking into his cellphone.

      Not for the first time since they stepped through the front door, Gundersund wished for Kala Stonechild’s silent presence next to him. He knew for a fact that she would have handled his botched interaction with Delaney with greater skill and compassion. Delaney had instinctively trusted her on their first visit. He wasn’t the first person in trouble who’d reacted to something they saw in her eyes. Black eyes as layered and mysterious as the Canadian Shield. For all her prickly toughness, a humanity could be seen shining from their depths. Gundersund knew this as a certainty because for a short time he’d been allowed into her world. Now he was left on the outside looking in with the feeling that he’d utterly failed her. The problem was, he had no idea why.

      Chapter Ten

      Kala finished her Tim Hortons coffee and tossed the cup into the garbage can on her way to the morgue. She wasn’t looking forward to spending the next couple of hours with Fiona Gundersund, her partner’s on-again, off-again wife. The way Fiona watched her when nobody else was looking made Kala uncomfortable. Behind the direct stare was a barely hidden dislike and Kala had a good idea why. Fiona saw any woman connected to her husband as a threat. She was territorial. An emotional leech. A wife who wasn’t going to let go of him even if she was getting it on with other men. Kala had heard the rumours. She thought Gundersund might be a fool for his devotion but she wasn’t going to get involved in his pitiful personal life. She’d done the relationship thing with a separated married man once before and never again. Especially not with her work partner.

      Even if she found the kindness in the man attractive.

      She pushed open the door to Fiona’s workshop and crossed over to the slab where Fiona was preparing to cut into Adele Delaney’s corpse. Classical music provided a soothing background to the whirring sound of a saw. The air was chilly and the smells disturbing but Kala normally took autopsies in stride. She’d shot and dressed deer in a past life. Only the violence of what had been done to Adele made this a difficult viewing. Even in death, Adele’s face was strong-boned in perfect symmetry, light reflecting off the golden highlights in her long brown hair. She’d been a good-looking woman and Ivo Delaney was far from a catch. Kala tried to reconcile the idea of the two of them together, but failed.

      Fiona turned off the saw and looked at Kala through her protective glasses. Her long blond hair was tucked under a plastic cap. “Nice of you to join me, Detective. Your timing’s perfect. Ivo Delaney identified her this morning so everything is in order. The man could barely stand, he was so distraught. I think they took him directly to the hospital. I’m about to start cutting open her chest.”

      Kala nodded. “You’re not wasting any time on this one.”

      “Rouleau’s lucky it’s been a slow month. I have nothing else pressing at the moment.”

      “Do you know what killed her?”

      “You weren’t at the crime scene this morning with Paul?”

      “No.”

      Kala watched the expressions flit across Fiona’s face as she assessed this information before she spoke. “It was likely the knife wounds in her stomach. She bled out but not where her body was found. Her abdomen is a mess.” She whipped the sheet away from Adele’s body to show the jagged gashes that crisscrossed Adele’s stomach. It looked as if an operation had been performed without the final suturing to close the openings. “It would have taken a lot of stitches to close these wounds, as you can see. Not that any surgeon would have made a mess like this.”

      Kala frowned. Why had the killer carved up Adele’s stomach? Was there a message in choosing to brutalize this part of her body? To disfigure a woman so terribly seemed personal. Angry. The door behind Kala opened and she turned. Bennett nodded hello and came over to stand next to her. He took one look before averting his gaze from the table.

      “Rouleau sent me to observe.”

      “Your first time?”

      “Yeah. Does it always smell so bad?”

      Kala exchanged a glance with Fiona. Fiona’s lips curved up and she turned on the saw. The whirring noise cut off conversation. She lowered her head and began cutting into Adele’s ribs.

      Kala nudged Bennett with her elbow. She leaned in and spoke loudly into his ear. “If you need to get some air, just step outside. I can fill you in later. The first time is always the hardest.”

      “I can handle it.” A muscle twitched in his square jaw.

      “Of course.”

      Fiona was skillful and methodical, Kala would give her that. She spoke into a microphone and recorded her findings as she went. By the time she’d removed and weighed Adele’s heart, Bennett was the colour of a pierogi.

      Kala took pity. “Ready to make a coffee run?”

      “Sure.”

      He didn’t need to be asked twice. Kala figured he wouldn’t be in any rush to get back. Twenty minutes later she got a text from Bennett that he’d been corralled by Rouleau. He was on his way to the Delaney house to help with the search for Violet. He was sorry about the coffee. Kala smiled to herself before turning her attention back to Fiona and the work at hand.

      “I’ve never seen anything like this before. Someone removed several of her internal organs, including her uterus, appendix, and spleen. I’ve heard of killers cutting off fingers so the victim can’t be identified, but never this. It’s … bizarre.” Fiona jumped up to unplug the whistling kettle. The autopsy had finished late in the afternoon. She turned her back on Kala and filled the teapot with water, then placed the pot and two cups on the desk between them. “I have sugar but no milk.”

      “Black is fine.”

      Fiona mashed the teabags with the back of a spoon before pouring. She handed Kala a mug with the words “Made in Canada” stamped on the side. Kala wondered if the double entendre was intentional. Fiona took a sip and sat back in her leather chair.

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