Page 53 of Brimstone Bound
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The young bespectacled man at the hospital morgue’s front desk, who I assumed was Dean, sat bolt upright when he saw me approach. He didn’t smile, but his expression was friendly and empathetic. I could only imagine that he’d been working here for some time and he’d perfected the look. I was surprisingly grateful for it.
‘Hi. I’m Emma Bellamy. I’m looking for Dr Hawes.’
‘She’s expecting you. Right this way.’
I followed him down the same corridor I’d been in just a couple of days earlier. Somehow it seemed different, and I wondered if that was because I was coming to terms with the fact of my own death. Fortunately, I didn’t have too long to dwell on that thought.
Dean took me into the room where I’d woken up. Laura was waiting in front of a gurney occupied by a sheet-covered body. She looked up from her clipboard and smiled. ‘Thank you, Dean.’ She walked over and hugged me.
At first the action surprised me then I began to appreciate it. I hugged her back, as if we were old friends who’d known each other for years.
‘How are you doing?’ she asked softly. ‘Everything the same?’
‘Yeah.’ I shrugged. ‘I feel the same as always. Apart from up here, of course.’ I tapped my temple.
‘That’s only natural, Emma. This isn’t something you just get over.’
No, I supposed not. I rubbed the back of my neck awkwardly and gestured at the gurney. ‘Is that him?’
‘Anthony Brown? Yes. His identity was confirmed by a DSI Lucinda Barnes earlier this morning.’ Laura gave me a sidelong look. ‘She has put us under strict orders not to reveal anything about his death to anyone except you. Is this related to your murder?’
I wrapped my arms around my waist. Being in this room where I’d lain dead was incredibly discomfiting. ‘It would be too much of a coincidence to assume otherwise.’
Laura grimaced in sympathy. ‘That’s what I thought.’ She leaned down and carefully lifted the sheet.
It took me a moment to look directly at Tony’s corpse. When I did, I breathed out in relief. He didn’t look like he had in the hotel room. Now, with his eyes taped shut, he seemed at peace. This was his shell, not the man himself. Not any longer.
I gazed at him. He wasn’t coming back to life. I couldn’t have explained how I knew that for certain. It was simply what my gut told me.
Laura pulled the sheet further away. ‘You can see the ligature marks and bruising around his neck.’
I forced myself to look.
‘On the face of it, this is an open-and-shut case of auto-erotic asphyxiation. There’s no history of depression, and initial bloodwork shows no traces of anti-depressants in his body. Actual cause of death is almost definitely strangulation. However, there’s no evidence of either ejaculate or sexual arousal. On its own, that’s not necessarily proof of anything but, after I spoke to DSI Barnes and took a closer look, I found this.’ Laura carefully brushed back a section of hair from Tony’s neck.
I peered more closely. There was a tiny mark, barely visible.
‘I wasn’t sure at first,’ Laura admitted, ‘but when I examined it more closely with a portable microscope, it became very clear. Anthony Brown was injected with something shortly before his death. At this angle, it would have hit his bloodstream directly.’
‘Tony,’ I murmured. ‘He preferred to be called Tony.’ I stared at the little blemish. ‘Is there any chance he did it to himself?’
Laura shook her head. ‘The angle means that it was administered by someone else. When more blood test results come back, I think we’ll find evidence of a paralytic. He was rendered immobile so that his assailant could position him for strangulation and make it appear self-inflicted.’
A deep, dark, yawning chasm of emptiness opened up inside me. ‘How long will it be until you know for sure?’
Laura grimaced. ‘A few days. And it’s entirely possible that the drug has already broken down in his bloodstream and is already undetectable.’
‘So there might never be proof that he was murdered?’
‘Yes. I’m sorry.’
‘It’s not your fault,’ I said distantly, damning to hell and back the bastard who’d done this.
‘That’s not the only thing,’ Laura said, more cheerfully this time. ‘There’s something else.’
I glanced at her.
