Page 11 of Fallen

“I don’t want her to be just another young woman who ended up dead because she made some bad decisions. She wasn’t perfect, but she deserved the chance to live her life.”

He watches a state trooper get into his vehicle and pull out, gives me a moment to settle. It’s a small thing. But it’s one of a thousand reasons why I love him. John Tomasetti knows my weaknesses. All of them. He gets it. He gets me. And he’s good at letting things be.

“Are we talking about a specific bad decision?” he asks.

“Domestic violence incident aside.” I tell him about the book. “It made quite a stir here in Painters Mill. Some people weren’t happy with her.”

“Anyone in particular?”

“The Amish. Others, I’m sure. I’ll do a little digging and let you know when I get a name.”

He nods. “So she’s likely made a few enemies over the years.”

“Probably.”

He nods toward the motel. “The manager came through with the CCTV. It’s not good. Too dark. Too far away. Angle is bad.” He shrugs. “I put our IT guys on it, so we’ll see.”

Movement at the door of room 9 draws my attention. A technician with the coroner’s office clad in protective gear is wheeling a gurney from the van to the walkway outside the room.

“Before I go…” I tell him about the piece of paper in the vehicle with the scrawled address. “It’s a bar in Wooster. The Pub. I thought I’d run up that way as soon as I get some time.”

His eyes narrow on mine. “Wooster is about the midway point between Cleveland and Painters Mill. You thinking she met someone on her way down?”

“Maybe.”

I’m only giving him part of my attention now. Doc Coblentz is standing just inside the doorway of the motel room, typing something into his iPad. The last thing I want to do is go back in there. But my need for information—my need to hear the coroner’s preliminary thoughts—overrides my misgivings.

“I’ve got to go.”

He looks past me, watches the technician kick down the brake on the gurney. “You’ve got this, right?”

The smile I give him feels tight and phony on my face, so I lose it, let him see the truth—that this has me a hell of a lot more shaken than I want to be.

“I just want to get this right,” I tell him.

“You will.”

There are too many people around for a kiss goodbye or any such nonsense, so I brush my fingertips across his hand and start for the door.

I nod at the deputy as I duck beneath the crime scene tape. My boots crunch against gravel as I walk toward room 9. I pause at the doorway and find Doc Coblentz standing over Rachael Schwartz’s body. Clad in protective gear—face mask, disposable gown, a hair cap even though he’s bald, and shoe covers—he looks like a cross between the Michelin man and the Pillsbury doughboy.

His technician, also clad in protective gear, punches something into an iPad.

“Doc,” I say.

Doc Coblentz turns, looks at me over the top of his eyeglasses, and I can’t help but notice that even in the face of such a heinous crime, his expression is serene. Unlike me, he’s not shaken or angry or outraged. Not for the first time I wonder how he does it, dealing with the dead as often as he does, and I’m reminded that he is first and foremost a man of medicine. A pediatrician—a healer of children. When it comes to his role as coroner, he is a scientist with a puzzle to solve.

“Come on in, Kate,” he says. “I’m about to release the scene to all those anxious-looking BCI boys out there and all their high-tech gadgets.”

I cross to him, trying not to notice the stink of blood and urine and other smells I don’t want to think about. “Can you tell me what happened to her?” I ask.

“I can speculate.”

“I’ll take whatever you can give me.”

He looks down at the victim and sighs. “Preliminarily, and simply judging by the trauma, I would say she was beaten to death.”

“Fists? Weapon?”