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Jack suddenly stopped in his tracks. Until now, he had deliberately kept the morning's confrontation from his mind. Thoughts of his relationship with Laurie as well as memories of horrific events of his own past flooded into his consciousness. Irritably, he wondered why she had felt compelled to end a beautiful weekend on such a downer note, especially since things had been going so well between them. In general, he almost felt content, a remarkable state of mind, considering he didn't feel he deserved to be alive, much less happy.

A wave of anger spread through him. The last thing he needed was to be reminded of his smoldering grief and guilt about his late wife and daughters, which happened with any talk of marriage or children. The idea of commitment and the vulnerability it entailed, especially starting another family, was terrifying.

"Get a grip," Jack murmured to himself under his breath. He closed his eyes and roughly massaged his face with both hands. Behind his irritation and frustration with Laurie, he felt the stirrings of melancholy, an unwelcome reminder of his past struggles with depression. The problem was, he truly cared for her. Things were great, except for the gnawing issue of children.

"Dr. Stapleton, are you all right?" a woman's voice asked.

Jack peeked out through his fingers. Janice Jaeger, the petite night-shift forensic investigator, was staring up at him while pulling on her coat, on her way home and apparently exhausted. Her legendary dark circles made Jack wonder if she ever slept.

"I'm fine," Jack said. He took his hands away from his face and shrugged self-consciously. "Why do you ask?"

"I don't think I've ever seen you standing still, especially in the middle of the corridor."

Jack tried to think of a witty retort, but nothing came to mind. Instead, he changed the subject by lamely asking if she had had an interesting night.

"It was wild around here!" Janice said. "More so for the tour doctor and even Dr.

Fontworth than me. Dr. Bingham and Dr. Washington are already here doing a post, with Fontworth assisting."

"No kidding!" Jack said. "What kind of case?" Harold Bingham was the chief, and Calvin Washington was the deputy chief. Generally, neither appeared until well after eight in the morning, and it was rare for them to do an autopsy before the normal day began. There had to be political ramifications, which explained the media presence.

Fontworth was one of Jack's colleagues, and had been on call for the weekend. Medical examiners didn't come in at night unless there was a problem. Pathology residents were hired as "tour doctors" to cover routine calls requiring a physician.

"It's a gunshot wound, but it's a police case, which is why Font-worth had to take it.

As I understand it, the police had surrounded a suspect in his girlfriend's care. When they tried to arrest him, a barrage of shots was fired. There's the question of unreasonable force. You might find it interesting."

Jack inwardly winced. GSW cases could be tricky with multiple shots. Although Dr.

George Fontworth was Jack's senior by eight years at the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, or OCME, he was, in Jack's opinion, perfunctory. "I think I'll stay clear with the chief involved," Jack said. "What'd you handle? Anything of note?"

"The usual, but there was one at the Manhattan General that stood out. A young man who'd just been operated on yesterday morning for a compound fracture after a fall while in-line skating on Saturday in Central Park."

Jack winced anew. With his sensitivities aroused, thanks to Laurie, he had a negative response at the mere mention of the Manhattan General Hospital. Once an acclaimed academic center, it was now an AmeriCare flagship hospital after having been targeted and taken over by the cash-rich managed-care giant. Although he knew that the overall level of medicine practiced at the institution was good, such that if he took a bad flop on his bike and ended up in their trauma unit, which is where they would probably take him with the new city contract, he'd be well taken care of. At the same time it was still a managed-care establishment run by AmeriCare, and he had a visceral hatred for the company. "What made the case stand out?" Jack asked, trying to conceal the emotion he felt. Reverting to sarcasm, he added: "Was it a diagnostic conundrum, or was there some sort of scurrilous hanky-panky involved?"

"Neither!" Janice sighed. "It was just the way the case struck me. It was just... rather sad."

"Sad?" Jack questioned. He was taken aback. Janice had been working as a forensic investigator for more than twenty years and had seen death in all its inglorious permutations. "For you to say it's sad, it's got to be really sad. What's the scoop in a nutshell?"

"He was only in his late twenties and had no medical history— specifically, no heart trouble. The narrative I got was that he'd rung his call button, but by the time the nurses got around to him five to ten minutes later—that's according to the nurses—he was dead. So it must have been cardiac."

"There was no resuscitation attempt?"

"Oh, they definitely tried to resuscitate him, but with no success whatsoever. They never even got a blip on the EKG."

"What made it so sad? The man's age?"

"The age was one factor, but it wasn't the whole story. Actually, I don't know why it bothered me so much. Maybe it has something to do with the nurses not responding quickly enough and my thinking the poor guy knew he was in trouble but couldn't get help. We can all relate to that kind of a hospital nightmare. Or maybe it has something to do with the patient's parents, who are very sympathetic. They came in from Westchester to go to the hospital, then came over here to stay near the body. They're really broken up. I get the impression their son was their whole life. I think they're still here."

"Where? I hope they're not stuck out there in that mob of reporters?"

"Last thing I knew, they were in the ID room, insisting on another ID even though it had already been established. To be considerate, the tour doctor told Mike to go ahead and do another set of Polaroids, but that was when I was called back to the General for another case. When I got back here, Mike happened to mention the couple was still spaced out in the ID room, sort of emotionally adrift, while clutching the Polaroids. And, as if still hoping the whole affair was a mistake, they insisted on viewing the body itself."

Jack felt his pulse quicken. He knew all too well the emotional devastation of losing a child. "That case can't be what has the media people all stirred up."

"Heavens, no. The kind of case I'm talking about never reaches the public. That's part of the reason it's so sad. A life wasted."

"Is it the police case that's brought in the media?"

"It's what brought them originally. Bingham announced he would make a statement after the autopsy. The tour doctor told me the Spanish Harlem community is up in arms about the incident. Apparently, there were something like fifty shots fired by the police.

Echoes of the Diallo case in the South Bronx some years back. But to tell you the truth, I think what the media is now mostly interested in is the Sara Cromwell case, which came in after they were already here."

"Sara Cromwell, the syndicated psychologist in the
Daily News?"

"Yeah, the advice diva, capable of telling anyone and everyone how to get his or her life back on track. She was also a TV personality, you know. She hit most of the talk shows, including
Oprah.
She was pretty darn famous."

"Was it an accident? Why the fuss?"

"No accident. She was apparently brutally murdered in her Park Avenue apartment. I don't know the details, but it was on the gory side, according to Dr. Fontworth, who had to handle that case as well. I tell you, he and the tour doctor were out all night. After Cromwell, there was a double suicide in a mansion on Eighty-fourth Street, then a nightclub homicide. After that, the tour doctor had to go out for a hit-and-run on Park Avenue and two overdoses."

"What about the double suicide? Old or young?"

"Middle-aged. Carbon monoxide. They had their Escalade running with the garage door closed and a couple of vacuum hoses from the exhausts into the cab."

"Hmmm," Jack murmured. "Any suicide notes?"

"Hey, no fair," Janice complained. "You're grilling me about cases I didn't handle. But as far as I know there was only one note, from the woman."

"Interesting," Jack commented. "Well, I better get down to the ID room. Sounds like it's going to be a busy day. And you better get home to get some sleep."

Jack was pleased. The anticipation of an interesting day swept away some of the irritation that had resurfaced about the morning. If Laurie wanted to go back to her own apartment for a few days, it was fine with him! He'd just bide his time, because he wasn't going to be emotionally extorted.

Jack sped by the forensic investigators' office, cut through the clerical room with its banks of file cabinets, and entered the communications room just beyond. He smiled at the day-shift telephone operators but got no response. They were preoccupied with getting themselves organized. He waved to Sergeant Murphy when he passed the NYPD

detective room, but Murphy was on the phone and didn't respond, either. Some welcome, Jack mused.

Entering the ID office, Jack got the same treatment. There were three people in the room, and all three ignored him. Two were hidden behind their morning papers while Dr. Riva Mehta, Laurie's office mate, was busy going over the sizable stack of potential cases to make up the autopsy schedule. Jack got a cup of coffee from the communal pot, then bent down the edge of Vinnie Amendola's paper. Vinnie was one of the mortuary techs and Jack's frequent partner in the autopsy room. Vinnie's regular and early presence meant Jack could start in the autopsy room well before anyone else.

"How come you're not down in the pit with Bingham and Washington?" Jack asked.

"Beats me," Vinnie said, pulling his paper free. "Apparently, they called Sal. They were already going at it when I got here."

"Jack! How ya doin'?"

A third person emerged from behind his paper, but the accent gave him away. It was Detective Lieutenant Lou Soldano, from Homicide. Jack had met him years ago when he had first joined the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner. Convinced of the enormous contributions of forensic pathology to his line of work, Lou was a frequent visitor to the OCME. He was also a friend.

With a bit of effort, the stocky detective heaved himself out of the vinyl club chair, clutching his paper in his beefy hand. With his aged trench coat, his tie loosened and the top button of his shirt open, he appeared like a rumpled character out of an old film noir. His broad face sported what could have been a two-day growth of beard, although from experience, Jack knew it was only one.

They greeted each other with a slapping, modified high-five, which Jack had learned out on the neighborhood basketball court and had jokingly taught Lou. It made both of them feel more hip.

"What's got you up this early?" Jack asked.

"Up? I haven't been to bed yet," Lou scoffed. "It's been that kind of night. My captain is worried sick about this supposed police brutality case, since the department is going to feel real heat if the involved officers' story doesn't hold up. I'm hoping to get an early scoop, but that's not looking good with Bingham doing the case. He'll probably be in there screwing around for most of the day." "What about Sara Cromwell's case? Are you interested in that, too?"

"Yeah! Of course! As if I had any choice! Did you see all the media out in reception?"

"They would have been hard to miss," Jack responded.

"Unfortunately, they were already here on the police shooting. Guaranteed there's going to be a lot of newspaper and TV hype for that skinny psychologist, probably more than she would have gotten had they not been hanging around. And whenever a murder gets a high profile in the media, I know I'll be getting lots of pressure from above to come up with a suspect. So, with that said, do me a favor and do the case."

"Are you serious?"

"Of course I'm serious. You're fast and you're thorough, both of which fulfill my needs. Also, you're okay with me watching, which I can't say about everybody around here. But if you're not interested, maybe I can get Laurie to do it, although knowing her GSW bent, she'll probably want to get involved in the police case."

"She's also interested in one of the Manhattan General cases," Riva said in silky, British-accented voice, which was in sharp contrast to Lou's New York twang. "She's already taken the folder and said she wants to do that one first."

"Did you see Laurie this morning?" Jack asked Lou. He and Lou shared an appreciation of Laurie Montgomery. Jack knew that Lou had even once briefly dated Laurie, but it hadn't worked out. From Lou's own admission, the problem had been Lou's lack of social confidence. Graciously, Lou had become a strong advocate for Jack and Laurie as a couple.

"Yeah, about fifteen or twenty minutes ago."

"Did you talk to her?"

"Of course. What kind of a question is that?"

"Did she seem normal? What did she say?"

"Hey! Why the third degree? I don't remember what she said; it was something like

"Hi, Lou, wassup?" or something to that effect. And as far as her mental state was concerned, she was normal, even bubbly." Lou glanced over at Riva. "Was that your take, Dr. Mehta?"

Riva nodded. "I'd say she was fine, maybe a little excited about all the fuss around here. She'd apparently had a conversation with Janice about the Manhattan General case.

That's why she wanted it."

"Did she say anything about me?" Jack asked Lou, leaning forward and lowering his voice.

"What's with you today?" Lou asked. "Is everything copacetic with you guys?"

"Oh, there's always a few bumps in the road," Jack said vaguely. Laurie being

"bubbly" added insult to injury, under the circumstance.

"How about assigning me the Cromwell case!" Jack called over to Riva.

"Be my guest," Riva said. "Calvin left a note saying he wanted it done ASAP." She took the folder from the "to be autopsied" pile and put it on the corner of the desk. Jack grabbed it and opened it, revealing a case worksheet, a partially filled-out death certificate, an inventory of medical-legal case records, two sheets for autopsy notes, a telephone notice of death as received by communications, a completed identification sheet, an investigator's report dictated by Fontworth, a sheet for the autopsy report, a lab slip for HIV analysis, and an indication that the body had been x-rayed and photographed when it had arrived at the OCME. Jack pulled out Fontworth's report and read it. Lou did the same over Jack's shoulder.