medical examiners. According to the shift supervisor, this Barbara Wilkes person who did Pop's ME report has only been on the job for six months.'
'So she could have missed something?' Jack said, smiling, looking triumphantly at Seriana, who, as usual, had no expression.
'I didn't say that. I just said she was new. Not a lot of experience.'
'And that means she could have missed something,' Jack repeated. He leaned forward, bringing the two chair legs down abruptly.
'It's possible but not probable,' I said.
They all looked at me, waiting. For some damn reason, it made me edgy. Or maybe I was just feeling guilty. The moment simmered
'Whatta ya want!?' I snapped angrily. 'Stop looking at me. It doesn't mean anything. Besides, I can't work on this. It's not even a case. I spent a couple a hours and got my hands on a few things, but that's all I can do. No case, no crime. No crime, no investigation!'
'Shane, if you were going to do something… if you could take one more step, what would it be?' It was a good question, asked in a quiet voice by Seriana Cotton. Her voice might have been soft, but her black irises were stuck on mine like laser-gun sights.
'I'd try to get an exhumation order and reautopsy the body,' I finally admitted. 'Sometimes, if an examiner is certain of what the outcome will be before he or she does the autopsy, they could jump to an inaccurate conclusion, especially somebody with little experience. If they already think they know what the finding will be, or if they're rushed and doing it in a hurry, it's possible they might do a quick slapdash job. I'd redo it and look for something that would get Walt's death classification changed from suicide to homicide. Then the department will assign a homicide number to it and a proper police investigation would take place.'
'Let's do that then,' Vicki said.
'How you gonna do that?' I replied. 'I said I'd try for an exhumation, but it's not gonna happen. We have no new facts to submit to force one. The coroner doesn't have time to redo this stuff on a whim. They're way too busy over there as it is.'
'There are private firms we could hire that perform independent autopsies,' Sabas Vargas said. 'I've used them to gather my own medical evidence for trials.'
'And who's gonna pay for that?' I asked.
'I will,' Vicki said. 'I'll put up my piece.'
'Me too,' Seriana said. Jack nodded, so did Sabas Vargas. They were circling the wagons.
'I know who we could get to do it for us,' Vicki Lavicki said, smiling. 'One of our clients at Kinney and Glass is Oakcrest Pathology and Medical Group. They do that kind of thing. It's my account and I'm friends with the executive director. I'm sure I could get us a quick job at a good price.' She glared at me. 'I assume you'll also step up for your end of the exhumation and autopsy costs, Shane?' she challenged.
'Yeah, sure,' I flustered. 'I'm good for my piece.'
I couldn't believe how completely I'd been sucked in. Somehow I'd just joined this silly Pallbearers' Murder Club.
'I'll use the phone in the other room. Maybe the director of Oakcrest hasn't gone home yet,' Vicki said, getting up and leaving the den.
Jack asked, 'How do we get Walt's body exhumed? Isn't that going to be kinda tough to accomplish?'
'Walt didn't have any living relatives,' Sabas said. 'Nobody but us. I guess whoever signed the final agreement with the mortuary to have him picked up would be the one to authorize it.'
'That was me,' Diamond said. We all turned and saw her standing in the doorway. She'd finally made it.
'We're thinking we should pass the hat among us and exhume and reautopsy Walt's body,' Jack told her. 'Shane thinks that the L. A. coroner missed something.'
Of course, I didn't say that. But this had already developed a life of its own.
'We can't do that,' Diamond said softly. 'I thought you guys knew. That's why we didn't have a graveside ceremony. Walt stated in his will that he wanted to be cremated. The body's been destroyed.'
Chapter 17
We all sat there in that small den overlooking Vargas's empty pool in East L. A. trying to come to grips with that.
'Maybe it hasn't happened yet,' Seriana suggested. She had risen to her feet and was now standing at the head of the table, her bodv a coiled spring.
'It's been over twenty-four hours since the funeral when we released the body to Forest Lawn,' Diamond answered. 'I think they always do cremations pretty much immediately after the service.'
'Not always,' Sabas said. 'They usually wait a day for legal reasons, to make sure there are no problems or disputes over the last-wish provisions. I've also seen situations where, because of backlogs, it's taken almost as long as a week. Somebody should call Forest Lawn and see what the deal is.'
'I'll do it,' Seriana said. She quickly left the room. Jack was again leaning back in his chair, an insolent, judgmental little smirk on his lips. I wanted to kick the chair out from under him. I wanted to knock that smirk off his face. Obviously the guy didn't have to do much to piss me off.
'You should not get your hopes up,' Sabas said. 'Since it's been more than a clay, the odds are the cremation already happened.' After he said that, he immediately shifted gears. 'On the other hand, maybe Walt's body is still sitting in back in some embalming room or something. You never know. I don't think they'd burn the body until full payment's been made. Maybe there were payment problems.'
'Walt had his mortuary services prepaid,' Diamond said. 'He knew he didn't have anyone to handle that for him, so he took care of it in advance.'
We all sat there and fidgeted while Vicki and Seriana made their calls. Seriana was back first.
'Mortuary office is closed. Nobody to ask. Can't find out anything until eight or nine tomorrow.'
Vicki came back a few minutes later and told us she couldn't get through to Oakcrest either. They'd also closed. She'd left the room before Diamond arrived and didn't know about the cremation. When we told her, her shoulders slumped. 'When are we gonna catch a fucking break?' Vicki scowled.
It wasn't going to happen tonight, so we all agreed to meet back at Sabas's office first thing in the morning.
'If the body is still there, I'm gonna have to file papers with the court so Forest Lawn will release Walt's remains to us,' Sabas said. 'Diamond, didn't you say that Walt left the benefits of his life-insurance policy to the home?'
'Yes, but we can't collect it because of the suicide.'
'Doesn't matter,' Vargas said. 'That's our legal hook. If the body's still there, I'll file papers with the court claiming that a bad city autopsy has potentially denied Huntington House its insurance benefit. As the party at loss, Huntington House can demand a new autopsy.
With no family to object, I don't see how the court could deny it as long as we foot all the expense. Diamond, you're the new executive director. I'll need you to be the one to file the papers on behalf of the home.'
'Okay,' she agreed. 'I can do that.'
Til write up the documents tonight, so we'll be ready to pounce on the off chance that we can still do this. In the morning, we'll know one way or the other.'
We left Sabas's office, none of us thinking we had much of a chance. What were the odds that the body was still lying around someplace waiting to be cremated? Pretty slim was my guess.
I walked Vicki back to her car, a Toyota Camry that was parked a short distance away. It had somehow escaped theft or vandalism, which was strange because our auto-theft division lists Toyotas as one of the three most frequently stolen vehicles in L. A. When I opened the door, she turned to me.
'Walt's remains are toast, excuse the pun,' she said somewhat harshly. 'You and I already know that, even if the others don't. We're majorly fucked.'
'Even if Walt's body is gone, there are still other ways to work on this.'
