Always Kiss the Corpse (20 page)

“Is that your client's assumption? That he killed himself?”

“No.”

Jones prayered his hands, leaned his chin on them. “We assume it was a complete accident. He overdosed himself. No grounds to suggest suicide, no note, no word to others.”

“Did you know Sandro was a heroin user?”

“We wouldn't have taken Sandro as a client if we'd believed he was addicted.”

“Maybe a recreational user?”

“Not that we knew.”

“Yet Sheriff Vanderhoek says there was a row of needle marks in the corpse's arm.”

“I know nothing of that.”

“Wouldn't you have checked, examined him regularly?”

“We have our procedures and we follow them carefully.”

“But specifically here, in Sandro's case?”

Dr. Jones' eyes narrowed. “Ms. Rachel, who is your client?”

Kyra answered automatically, “I'm afraid that's confidential.” The words spoken, she knew what was coming.

“Just so. Therefore you can appreciate that we cannot divulge information to you about Sandro Vasiliadis. I've already told you more than I should. I'm sure you understand.”

“I'd just like to know if he was acting strangely before he died.”

“I'm sorry. That would fall into the category of confidential.” He glanced at his watch. “And that's all the time I can give you. I ask your pardon but I can't help you further.”

Such a serene tone to Dr. Jones' words. How polite it would be to smile, to thank Dr. Jones and walk quietly away. Out of Jones' sight she clenched her fists—and mentioned Ursula's fear. “Maybe someone else doped him.”

“Nonsense.” Jones stared at her, his round face shiny. “It was an accident.” Kyra stared at him. For eight seconds, complete silence. “Who would want him dead? And why do you think such a thing?”

Kyra shrugged. “It's a hypothesis. When the facts of his death are badly answered by the suicide or the accident hypothesis, we try to come up with others.”

Slowly Jones nodded. The flat line of his mouth made him appear grave. “You posit that someone killed him. You find that a better hypothesis than accidental death?”

What the hell, be honest. “Can't say I do, actually. But our client would like to be sure.”

“We were all shaken here, perhaps that's why we prefer to think that it was an accident and not suicide. But—”

Jones was wrestling with himself. About what? “But?”

“There was no reason for him to kill himself. He was about to release the person who had been imprisoned inside his body.”

“Is that what you do, Dr. Jones, release the imprisoned person?”

Jones smiled. “One of the many things.” He stood. “I do apologize, Ms. Rachel, I'm already late for my appointment.” He reached for his suit jacket and slipped it on. “Perhaps my partner Dr. Haines can give you a few minutes for an overview of what we do here?”

“Sure. Thanks.” What choice.

Back in the reception room Dawn Deane smiled at them both. Dr. Jones marched down the opposite hall, knocked, opened a door and entered. The reception space again soothed her. Dr. Jones would now be explaining to Dr. Haines— Wait, the doctor who prescribed those pain pills, the name of the doctor on the vials, the endocrinologist— And that chilling fact about Sandro before he died, Kyra had tucked it out of mind, his balls so flooded with semen he had to jerk off who knew how many times a day. Hormone problem? The endocrinologist's name?

Suddenly Dr. Jones stood beside her. “Dr. Haines can give you five minutes. I'll take you over.” He led her along the hallway and ushered her into his colleague's office.

A cooler and more Spartan version of Jones' own. As many lithos, another garden view, two bookcase walls equally impressive. But the paint was dead white, the carpet thinner and paler. Some kind of scent hanging in the air. Gary Haines, maybe ten years younger than Stockman Jones, the gray at his temples creating a distinguished border to a handsome jagged face above blue shirt, bird of paradise tie and black suspenders, got up from his teak desk. Jones introduced them. Haines nodded. No handshake. “Ms. Rachel is working on a strange hypothesis about Sandro Vasiliadis, that perhaps someone killed him.”

Kyra wished he hadn't mentioned that.

Haines' eyebrows knotted into a single line. “Why do you think that, Ms. Rachel?”

“Precisely what I asked her. Excuse me, I have an appointment. Nice meeting you, Ms. Rachel.” He turned and left.

“Sit down.” Kyra did, again a comfortable leather chair. Dr. Haines sat, right buttock on the edge of his desk, left leg crossing at the knee, forcing Kyra to look up at him. “Dr. Jones asked me to tell you about the clinic. But what's this about someone killing Sandro?”

Kyra forced a smile. “Dr. Jones exaggerated. I told him I'm trying to find a possible alternative hypothesis for Sandro's death. If you doubt suicide, and accident seems improbable, it may be something else.”

“Why not an accident?”

“Was Sandro a regular heroin user?”

Dr. Haines folded his arms and stared at Kyra.

He's going to break Jones' record of silence. Well, damned if she'd speak before he did. Or smile. Or look away. She waited for a quarter minute of torturous restraint.

He shifted his hips to sit on both buttocks. He glanced down at Kyra as if about to dismiss her. “I'll speak to you briefly about this if I can have your word that you'll take it as confidential.”

“Of course.” She forced herself to lean back, increasing Dr. Haines height above her.

“I'm sure he wasn't a regular user, but I believe he used heroin occasionally. We wouldn't have treated a regular user. Whatever, it wasn't getting in the way of his transformation, so— Honestly, I don't know. I suppose it's possible . . .” Haines blinked. “Perhaps his use had increased recently, but I'm dubious. Occasionally?” He shrugged. “Regularly, no.”

“I see.” She didn't.

“Which is why his death was accidental. Injecting too much, never coming back.”

“And you don't believe it was suicide.”

Dr. Haines smiled, without humor. “No reason. He was about to become the woman he wanted to be. Everything was progressing wonderfully.”

She squinted up at him. “A happy person taking heroin.”

“Well. Occasionally.”

“Why does a happy person take heroin?”

Haines dropped his feet to the floor and stood. “I've seen it in a number of patients, Ms. Rachel.”

A waft of sweet, acrid cologne suddenly socked her in the nostrils.

“The euphoria of achieving the desired transgendered state comes in waves. On the crest, the fact of the process itself creates great happiness. In the trough, doubt sets in. We have medicines which can blot that doubt, and we monitor our patients carefully. Sometimes the doubt is greater than the patient can stand, even with medication. So the patient turns to an artificial process for bringing the euphoria back. Some use alcohol, others marijuana or cocaine. One or two have tried heroin. With Sandro,” he shrugged. “I wouldn't have been able to tell, not with certainty, before he died. But the evidence of his body—It speaks for itself.”

That made sense. Or did while he was speaking. She got up. “Thank you for your analysis.”

“You're welcome. And if there's anything else?”

“One more question. What about his swollen testes? Is that the result of these treatments?”

Haines' eyebrows knotted into a single line. “I know nothing about Sandro Vasiliadis' genitals, Ms. Rachel. I'm a psychiatrist.”

“He never spoke with you about it?”

“Now you're into doctor-patient confidentiality.” A warning smile came to his lips.

“Thank you.” She reached out her hand. He brought his forward slowly. It felt soft and cool. “Goodbye.” She headed for the door.

From Haines a quiet, “Goodbye.”

In the pleasant reception room, the tension from Dr. Gary Haines' office draining, she smiled at Dawn Deane, who smiled back for a moment before picking up the phone. “WISDOM Clinic, good afternoon.”

Kyra let herself out into gray light. She glanced at four names on the door, gilt outlined in black. The two she'd just met, plus Dr. Richard Trevelyan, Endocrinology. Dr. Lorna Albright, Gynecology. She went back inside.

Dawn Deane raised a single index finger, one minute. She set the phone down, and smiled at Kyra. “Yes?”

“Could I speak with Dr. Trevelyan as well?”

“He's gone for the day. Would you like to make an appointment?”

“When?”

Dawn Deane glanced through her appointment book. “Wednesday would be the earliest. Two o'clock?”

“Sure,” said Kyra. Damn.

≈  ≈  ≈

In his office, Stockman Jones picked up the phone. “Yes, Mr. Vasiliadis. What can I do for you?”

“We met at the viewing of my nephew, Sandro Vasiliadis.”

“I remember.”

“You were his doctor.”

“Several of us at the clinic were his doctors.”

“I speak of this to ask for your help.”

“If I can, Mr. Vasiliadis.”

“I rarely ask for help, Doctor.”

“Yes?”

“You must understand. Sandro, his parents, I and my brothers and sisters and their families, we are part of a community. Much of our life revolves around our Church. Our good acts and our good names are our greatest riches.”

“I do understand. My own Church is very much part of my life. I'm an elder. My responsibility is ethical counseling.”

“This makes it easier for me, Doctor. We're concerned, Sandro's mother and I, that the procedure Sandro was undergoing not become public. This isn't information the community needs to know.”

“Yes, I fully agree.”

A moment of silence, then: “Thank you.”

“I am not doing you a favor here, Mr. Vasiliadis. It's our policy at WISDOM to be completely discreet about all our clients. For their protection and for ours.”

“I understand. I thank you. And Sandro's mother thanks you.”

“I hope she's begun to recover.”

“It will take time.”

Should he tell Vasiliadis? He glanced at Kyra's card. “Did you know, sir, that a detective is trying to find out more about Sandro's death? A Kyra Rachel of Islands Investigations International.”

A sigh. “Two of them, I think. You've met the woman?”

“She was here fifteen minutes ago, asking questions.”

“And you told her—?”

“Nothing. Discretion and confidentiality are essential to our work.”

“Very good.”

“Then could I ask you to do all in your power to keep these detectives from pushing harder?”

“I'm doing everything I can. So it won't be a favor at all.”

“Thank you.”

“And I thank you.”

TWELVE

At Toby's, Kyra ordered the hamburger platter, Noel fish and chips. They sipped mugs of foamy beer.

Kyra said, “So it was better, right?”

“I don't see—”

She interrupted him: “Without your cellphone I'd've had to get out of the car and come to get you, then back through the rain to the car. Or you'd have had to stand in the rain.”

“It's practically not raining anymore.”

“Getting very wet. This way you only got a little wet and I stayed dry.”

“Okay, I'm glad you didn't get wet.”

“It's an economy of comfort. That's what these phones are good for.”

“I guess so,” Noel conceded. “Okay, what do we know?”

Kyra described her visit with Drs. Stockman Jones and Gary Haines, that both were guarded but did concede Sandro might have been upset. Haines suspected Sandro used heroin occasionally.

“Against anybody else's sense of Sandro.” Noel had even less to report. They should get to the hospital early to meet with the coroner, Ferrero. Noel had called from Brady's office for an appointment. The man was out, back by mid-afternoon. Some woman's voice had set a meeting for three-thirty.

“At the hospital,” Kyra said, “we should take a look at the pharmacy, check security.”

“Why?”

“Maybe Sandro got the heroin there.”

“Except Ursula already told us hospital pharmacies don't keep heroin.”

“Ursula does X-rays so how would she know. Maybe they use heroin for detoxing.”

“More likely methadone.”

“We have to follow the heroin trail. That's what killed him, however it happened, accident, suicide or murder. So what do we know we don't know about heroin?”

“You mean, was he high when he left home? Or did he buy the heroin later?” Noel frowned. “The sheriff implied that Sandro OD'd, got in his car, drove to cemetery and died. When you say it flat like that it doesn't make sense.”

“Yeah. And where did the heroin come from? A dealer on the street? A bar? Maybe the hospital. I'm not ruling that out yet, Noel.”

“Maybe the Navy base.”

“Maybe.”

“His friends keep saying they can't see him with heroin.”

“Maybe they know something they don't know they know.”

The waiter, a man with a bulldog face who might have been Toby himself, plunked down a thick hamburger open on a big bun, red onions and sliced tomatoes on the side, surrounded by a four-inch heap of fries; and two pieces of crisp golden-battered halibut on fries. Noel and Kyra paused for first bites. Very good.

Kyra wiped sauce off her lip. Noel stared through the window. In the mist, only the near water was visible. He said, “You think he bought the heroin dressed as Sandra?”

Kyra shrugged.

“What was he wearing when he was found?”

“Good question.” Kyra caught Noel's eye. “Oh no. No way. You should've asked when you were in his office. You go back.”

“Okay, okay.”