Unnatural Exposure by Patricia Cornwell Read Free Book Online Page B

it.
    'He wouldn't want us to get the clothes. There might be too much information there,' I said.
    'Then why didn't he undress her, unwrap her or whatever to begin with?'
    'Maybe he didn't want to look at her while he was dismembering her,' I said.
    'Oh, so now he's getting sensitive on us,' Wingo said, as if he hated whoever it was.
    'Make a note of the measurements,' I told him. 'Cervical spine is transected at the level of C-5. Residual femur on the right measures two inches below the lesser trochanter, and two and a half inches on the left, with saw marks visible. Right and left segments of humerus are one inch, saw marks visible. On the upper right hip is a three-quarters-of-an-inch old, healed vaccination scar.'
    'What about that?' He referred to the numerous raised, fluid-filled vesicles scattered over buttocks, shoulders and upper thighs.
    'I don't know,' I said, reaching for a syringe. 'I'm guessing herpes zoster virus.'
    'Whoa!' Wingo jumped back from the table. 'I wish you'd told me that earlier.' He was scared.
    'Shingles.' I began labeling a test tube. 'Maybe. I must confess, it's a little weird.'
    'What do you mean?' He was getting more unnerved.
    'With shingles,' I replied, 'the virus attacks sensory nerves. When the vesicles erupt, they do so in a swath along nerve distributions. Under a rib, for example. And the vesicles will be of varying ages. But this is a crop, and they all look the same age.'
    'What else could it be?' he asked. 'Chicken pox?'
    'Same virus. Children get chicken pox. Adults get shingles.'
    'What if I get it?' Wingo said.
    'Did you have chicken pox as a kid?'
    'Got no idea.'
    'What about the VZV vaccine?' I asked. 'Have you had that?'
    'No.'
    'Well, if you have no antibody to VZV, you should be vaccinated.' I glanced up at him. 'Are you immunosuppressed?'
    He did not say anything as he went to a cart, snatching off his latex gloves and slamming them into the red can for biologically hazardous trash. Upset, he snatched a new pair made of heavier blue Nitrile. I stopped what I was doing, watching him until he returned to the table.
    'I just think you could have warned me before now,' he said, and he sounded on the verge of tears. 'I mean, it's not like you can take any precautions in this place, like vaccinations, except for hepatitis B. So I depend on you to let me know what's coming in.'
    'Calm down.'
    I was gentle with him. Wingo was too sensitive for his own good, and that was really the only problem I ever had with him.
    'You can't possibly get chicken pox or shingles from this lady unless you have an exchange of body fluids,' I said. 'So as long as you're wearing gloves and going about business in the usual way, and don't cut yourself or get a needle stick, you will not be exposed to the virus.'
    For an instant, his eyes were bright, and he quickly looked away.
    'I'll start taking pictures,' he said.
    MARINO AND BENTON WESLEY appeared midafternoon, when the autopsy was well under way. There was nothing further I could do with the external examination, and Wingo had taken a late lunch, so I was alone. Wesley's eyes were on me as he walked through the door, and I could tell by his coat that it was still raining.
    'Just so you know,' Marino said right off, 'there's a flood warning.'
    Since there were no windows in the morgue, I never knew the weather.
    'How serious a warning?' I asked, and Wesley had come close to the torso, and was looking at it.
    'Serious enough that if this keeps up, somebody'd better start piling up sandbags,' Marino replied as he parked his umbrella in a corner.
    My building was blocks from the James. Years ago, the lower level had flooded, bodies donated to science rising in overflowing vats, water poisoned pink with formalin seeping into the morgue and the parking lot in back.
    'How worried should I be?' I asked with concern.
    'It's going to stop,' Wesley said, as if he could profile the weather, too.
    He took off his raincoat, and the suit beneath it was a dark blue