Promises are meant to be broken

Chapter 8

Sorry for the late update.

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July 17, Monday
10pm

"Doctor." Annika greeted without smile. Mrs.Mehta was forty eight years old grey haired doctor who was leading the autopsy team of police department. Vikram silently followed Annika inside the cold room.

Dr.Mehta gestured both of them to stand in front of her with her gloved hand. Sameera's body was lying on the autopsy table between them.

"I need to leave soon, so let's skip the formalities." The doctor said, pulling the mask off her her face. Annika nodded at her suggestion.

"I've done the preliminary test. Death time is around seven today in the evening. She might be in her early thirties."

"Thirty year old." Annika informed the doctor. Vikram silently kept recording everything, while attentively hearing out the doctor.

"Okay. She died because of shortness of breath. Traces of cocaine were found in her blood and traces of poisonous volatile oil were found in her respiratory track. They possibly could've made it difficult for her to breath, but right now, I'm not confirming it at the cause of death."

The doctor's revelation surprised Vikram while confused Annika. But one thing was clear to her that, someone went to an extreme length to kill Sameera. She was expecting Sameera to be poisoned with the help of coffee since her skin had started turning sightly blue.

"Can someone be killed using poisonous volatile oil?" Annika asked.

"Normally, poisonous volatile when accidentally inhaled only causes the person to feel nauseous, migraine or feel too sick. But in case of asthma patients, they might be severely affected. If inhaled by asthmatics for half an hour then death is possible."

Annika muttered an 'oh' at the new information she'd gained. So that asthma pump she'd found in Sameera's apartment actually belonged to her.

"But how can volatile oil kill anyone? I'm asking about the method doctor. There was nothing there indicating any oil stored!" Annika questioned, to which the doctor and Vikram gave her are you serious look.

Compared to other subjects, Annika was really weak in chemistry. So such distinctive and creative way of dying were sightly difficult for her to understand.

"They are usually gaseous. Even flowers have volatile oil, which spreads in surrounding that we can smell." Vikram's informed Annika with a smug look since this was place where he was better than her just like he was better in tracking people.

"Oh." This was all she replied, again.

"Are there any marks indicating abuse?" Vikram asked to which the doctor shook her head.

"No, nothing at all of such sort. No marks of struggle. No other persons DNA in her nails or on her clothes. Its almost like she willingly died. Other than this, I've nothing else to say right now. You will get her autopsy reports by tomorrow morning." Dr.Mehta concluded.

She was really in hurry, Annika guessed. After they walked out, both of them read out the answers the doctor had given them, trying to understand root cause of Sameera's death.  Vikram even couldn't understand why Annika was so sure that it was a murder. In his four years of service, he'd worked for cyber crime and narcotics. Such complicated homicides and MO cases was really out of his usual way and new to him.

Leaving the morgue together, they came back to their table.

"I'll go through the call records. Till then check her bank statements. At least find out how she paid for the drugs." Annika suggested to Vikram, before focusing on the file in her hand.