“This here’s Tyrone,” he said angrily. “Where do we go?”
“Shoreline Clinic on Route 153 between Westbrook and Essex.”
“Will you be there?”
“I’m on my way right now. Tyrone, you need to find Kinitra’s wallet with her driver’s license and other forms of I.D. Bring it with you, okay?”
“Is this an insurance thing? Because I got her covered no matter how much it costs.”
“It’s not an insurance thing. It’s an age of consent thing. They need to verify that she’s eighteen.”
“Why’s that?”
“They’ll explain everything to you when you get there.”
Shoreline Clinic was a small, highly efficient emergency response facility affiliated with Middlesex Hospital up in Middletown. Des accessed the emergency room directly from the driveway through the ambulance doors and found herself in a bustling bullpen of nurse’s and doctor’s stations. The examining and treatment rooms formed a big U around the bullpen.
The Jewett girls had come and gone by the time she got there. Kinitra was being examined by a doctor. The door to her room was closed. Des, who was several hours shy of sleep, fetched herself a cup of coffee from the nurses’ lounge. Sipping the coffee gratefully, she returned to the E.R. and peeked through the glass door to the admitting desk and waiting area. Tyrone and Jamella were seated out there with Rondell, all three of them looking tight-lipped and grim. There were only a few other people out there at this early hour. By nine o’clock the place would be mobbed.
The door to Kinitra’s room opened now and the SANE, a chubby young redhead, came out clutching the results of the CT100 Sex Crimes Kit-Kinitra’s T-shirt and panties, the vaginal swabs, all trace and biological samples and photographic evidence. Every item was bagged and tagged separately. She led Des over to the nearest counter so that Des could sign for it, thereby maintaining the chain of custody.
“Dr. Tashima will be out in a minute,” the young nurse informed her before she went bustling off.
Des used that minute to lock the evidence bags in the trunk of her cruiser. When she returned Dr. Cindie Tashima was coming out of Kinitra’s room, closing the door softly behind her. Des had worked with Cindie on numerous occasions. She was a Harvard-trained Japanese-American whose parents had been born in an internment camp in Utah during the Second World War.
Right now, she had a very unhappy look on her face. “The Jewett girls told me to expect you.”
“How is she?”
“Stable, comfortable and lucid. Also quite adamant that she wasn’t raped last night. I advised her to consent to a rape kit anyway just for her personal safety. She consented even though she swore it wouldn’t show anything. And it didn’t.”
“Her being in the water like she was would wash away all of the evidence, wouldn’t it?”
“That’s a ‘yes’ as to someone else’s pubic hair. And a ‘no’ as to semen. There should still be traces of it in her vagina even after two hours in the water. But we found nothing when we swabbed her.”
“Say he wore a condom.”
“We found no fresh internal or external vaginal abrasions. Kinitra wasn’t raped.” Cindie let her breath out slowly. “Not last night, anyhow.”
Des frowned at her. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means that I found extensive scarring. Someone has been sexually abusing this young woman for months. I’m talking about repeated, forcible vaginal and anal penetration.”
“Damn, this just keeps getting better and better.”
“Oh, I’m just getting warmed up,” Cindie warned her. “Kinitra’s also pregnant. Eight weeks along, I’d say.”
“Did she know about it?”
“She knew. Took a home pregnancy test.”
“Does her sister know?”
“Would that be Jamella?”
“Yes.”
“The answer is no. She’s been keeping it from her. Afraid she’ll go nuts. Not exactly mature behavior but Kinitra is a teenager. And Jamella is the mother figure in her life, I gather.”
“You gather right. Exactly what does Kinitra say has been going on?”
“She told me that she’s been in a consensual relationship with a young man and that they happen to enjoy rough sex.”
“Do you believe her?”
“No, I do not. But her sister provided us with valid I.D. that verifies Kinitra is eighteen and, therefore, an adult under the law. If she says she and her boyfriend like it rough then that’s how it is. What happens next is entirely up to her. She would not grant me consent to discuss her condition with members of her family. If I do I’ll be violating her privacy under the HIPPA laws. You and I can discuss it because this is a potential criminal investigation. Or I should say was. If she keeps insisting that no crime took place…”
“Then no crime took place. And I’m out of here. Cindie, she had to know what your exam would turn up. Why did she agree to it?”
“My opinion? It was a cry for help. But don’t ask me from whom or what because I truly don’t know.”
“Well, how is she explaining the events of last night? How did she end up half-drowned on Big Sister Island?”
“She’s refusing to say a word about it. The subject’s off limits. I did take blood samples for the presence of alcohol and drugs in her system. If nothing else, we’ll be able to determine if she was high. I should have those results back from the lab in a few minutes.”
“Are we looking at a suicide attempt here?”
“We could be. Or she may have been trying to terminate. An acute physical trauma such as a near drowning can trigger a miscarriage-although it didn’t in her case. The fetus is fine.”
“How about the identity of this boyfriend of hers?”
“Won’t say a word about him either. Otherwise, she’s a regular chatterbox.”
“You can do a fetal DNA test at this stage, can’t you?”
“Absolutely. We can determine paternity with no risk to the mother or the baby. But she has to agree to it. We can’t compel her. Not even if a crime took place. And she refuses to acknowledge that one has.”
“Does she know that her family’s outside?”
Cindie nodded. “Doesn’t want to see them.”
“Not even her sister?”
“Especially her sister.”
Des opened the door to the small, windowless examining room and went in, Cindie trailing close behind her. Kinitra was sitting up in bed drinking from a Styrofoam cup of what appeared to be a hot tea. Her hair was wrapped in a towel. Her fresh-scrubbed face gleamed in the overhead lights. She looked thirteen.
“Hi, Trooper Mitry.” Sounded thirteen, too. Her voice was all sing-songy and girlish. “Sorry to put you to so much trouble.”
“No trouble at all. It’s my job. But Dr. Cindie told me you don’t want to see your sister. How come?”
Kinitra lowered her big brown eyes. “She’ll be mad at me.”
“No, she won’t. Jamella loves you. She’s worried sick about you.”
Kinitra thought it over, her lower lip stuck out. “Who else is out there?”
“Tyrone and Rondell.”
“Well, I don’t want to see them. But I guess it’s okay for Jamella to come in.”
“Is it okay if Dr. Cindie talks to her about your medical condition?”
Kinitra shrugged. “If she wants to.”
Cindie riffled through the forms that were attached to her clipboard. “I need your autograph to that effect right here.”
