Between a Grizzly and Her Cub: Part Two

A young man in a blue lab coat led Chad Heel down a cold, concrete hall and into the even colder autopsy room beyond it. A corpse (not David’s) rested on its back atop a metal table. A doctor in another blue coat stooped over the cadaver.

The doctor spoke into a tape recorder, which hung from the ceiling on a length of string. “Severe trauma to the frontal lobe. Murder weapon must—”

Chad cleared his throat louder than necessary.

The doctor glared over her glasses at Chad, who stared back at her.

She reached up, clicked off her tape recorder, and strolled towards Chad. She slid off her bloody, latex gloves. “Can I help you?” She tossed the gloves into a red trashcan.

Chad glanced at his wristwatch. “Detective Redwood asked me to come here and identify my brother.”

The doctor’s expression deflated. “David Heel? The suicide?”

Chad almost argued. He still couldn’t accept that David killed himself. Such an act made no sense. “That’s me. Let’s get this over with.”

She waved him towards a wall covered with wide drawers. She opened one near Chad’s knees, pulled out a steel slab upon which David’s corpse rested.

The air in Chad’s lungs froze.

David’s eyelids, obviously glued shit, seemed the only part of his face that hadn’t turned blue and bloated. Had the doctor sewn shut David’s lips? Chad couldn’t say for certain.

“What . . . happened?”

The doctor (whose nametag, Chad finally noticed, read “Dr. Marshal”) wandered towards a set of organizers set atop a steel desk. She removed from them a file folder.

“His wife found him in their master bathroom,” Marshal said. “He duct taped a plastic bag over his face. Their son was still at school, thank goodness.”

An image of David’s ten-year-old boy, Matthew, surfaced in Chad’s mind. He shoved away the image, focused on the moment at hand. “How do you know he wasn’t murdered?”

Marshal thumbed through her folder. “His body doesn’t display the slightest suggestion of a struggle. Neither did his house. No drugs in his bloodstream. He either killed himself or let someone—”

“Mister Heel doesn’t require the details of our investigation,” someone said.

Marshal and Chad turned to discover Detective Redwood. The man stood outside the autopsy room, in the concrete hall. His hands stuffed his pants’ pockets. He wore sunglasses for no apparent reason.

Chad marched towards the detective. “I beg to differ. I require details.”

Redwood shook his head. “You need only to identify the body.”

Chad swallowed back the seed of a volcanic retort. “It’s him. It’s David.”

“Good.” Redwood pointed behind Chad. “Sign that, please.”

Marshal removed a sheet of paper from the folder. She, with an apologetic expression, handed the sheet, a clipboard, and a pen to Chad.

Chad accepted, read, signed, and returned the paper that confirmed David’s demise. “David had no reason to commit suicide.”

“Perhaps he didn’t want to outlive his wife,” Redwood said. “It seemed that her losing battle with cancer came as a surprise to you.” He tilted his head and actually grinned. “Perhaps you didn’t know as much about him as you thought.”

Chad ground his teeth. “Are you trying to upset me?”

Redwood slid his sunglasses from his face. Chad nearly gasped at the sight beneath them. A vicious, diagonal scar sliced Redwood’s right eye, which sat as a milky, sightless orb of smoke in his skull.

“Forgive me,” Redwood said. “I tend to act rather crass under these circumstances. Every time someone decides to . . . remove him- or herself from the grade equation, the family refuses to accept it. They want a murder investigation.”

“I do,” Chad said.

“I assure you, Mister Heel,” Redwood said. “No one murdered your brother.”

Chad frowned, unconvinced. He thanked Marshal for her time and turned to leave. He had to pay his sister-in-law and nephew a visit, offer his condolences, and try to make sense of all of this.

Marshal caught up with him in the parking lot.

“Redwood’s an ass,” she whispered, “but he’s a dangerous one.”

Chad treated her to a curious expression.

“Do you keep up with current events?” Marshal asked.

“I write about national politics. Health care issues.”

Marshal fixed him with a gaze that dripped concern. “You should pay more attention to local politics. The police around here are corrupt. Redwood’s the worst. He—” she glanced around to ensure they stood alone.

Chad’s foot tapped. “He what?”

She returned her attention to him. “No one performed an investigation into your brother’s death. Redwood saw to that.”

“Why?”

Marshal shrugged. “My advice? Let it go.”

Chad frowned. No way in hell.

To be continued . . .