Songbird (completed)

chapter eleven

        Delia and Thomas walked into the hospital, showing their badges to the receptionist who pointed them down the hallway to the morgue. As they walked down the hallway, Delia caught Thomas looking at her multiple times. All out of the corner of her eye, of course.  When they knocked on the ME's door, an unwelcoming face opened the door. The mortician raised his eyebrows at them until they pulled out their badges. "You must be the ladycop i spoke on the phone with." he grunted. Delia flashed a polite smile at him and he stepped back, letting them in the room. 
       "Did you find anything else on the body?" Thomas asked, stepping in the room and tucking his badge back in his coat. "Not much, but I do have reason to believe that the other guy didn't do a great job of examining Ms. Harlem." the grumpy man said. "My name is Kurtis Livingstone by the way." Kurtis added. Delia and Thomas nodded and Kurtis went to work on grabbing the girl's body. "I figure after this, she'll be sent home to be buried." Thomas muttered. Delia nodded in agreement and started to pull back the sheet. "Uh, before you do that," Kurtis started. Delia dropped the sheet and raised her eyebrow. "I'd like to talk to you first about what I found." The mortician sighed and pulled out a clipboard. "The other ME said that the cause of death was strangulation and blunt force trauma. There were signs of sexual assault, as he may have told you. But upon further examination, we found something else." Kurtis sucked in his lips and glanced at the detectives. "Ms. Harlem was pregnant."
       The words hit Delia like a brick. This was a new problem. "How far along was she?" Thomas asked, gravely. Kurtis tapped his pen against the clipboard, and gave a shrug. "Not sure exactly but most likely around 4-5 months." Kurtis's face lightened up a little as he said, "We did find semen on the body, it's been sent to a lab for further testing. And what she was poisoned with was rat poisoning. So my guess is  while she was taking the poison, whether it was injected into her or taken orally, she was hit across the head. I'm not really sure why. The poison would have killed her in seconds." Kurtis's face was twisted up and he looked just as lost as the detectives. While he was saying all of this, Delia had filled up two pages in her notepad. Thomas was dumbfounded, looking at the body. This was groundbreaking evidence. She needed to call Riggs. 
        When they were finished looking over the body again, Thomas and Delia stepped into the hall and looked at each other. "This is pretty serious evidence." Thomas rubbed his hands along his mouth. "I'll call Chief, and then we'll grab breakfast and head to the police station." Delia planned as she pulled out her phone and walked down the hallway, Thomas heading the other direction towards the door. 
     "Cordelia." Riggs answered. "So we just spoke to the ME. Turns out the other mort may have missed some pretty damning evidence." Delia sighed into the phone. She could practically hear the exasperated face on her father. "Tell me what you got." Delia looked down at her feet and started to tell him what they found out. "Jesus Christ." Riggs groaned on the other end. Delia nodded and sighed. "Yeah, we're heading to the Seattle PD now. I'll see if they got a match on that semen." Riggs grunted an okay on the other end of the line and hung up the phone. 
       Thomas and Delia sat in the McDonalds parking lot, eating and going over what all they were just told. "How did the other ME just not notice that she was pregnant?" Thomas said through a mouthful of sausage mcmuffin. Delia shook her head and looked out the window. Beatrice Harlem, daughter of Montana's most powerful senator, dead at sixteen and 5 months pregnant. This would be life shattering for the Senator. If it ever got out, it may even ruin her chances for running again. Not that Delia even really cared, that asshole could be on the streets for all she gave a shit. 
      As they headed to the police station, Delia looked over at Thomas who was driving. He must have noticed because he cleared his throat and looked at her back. "You know, you're a bit of a creep." He made a face at her and Delia rolled her eyes and looked back out the window. 
       After showing the officer at the front desk their badges, they were led to an office where the Seattle's police chief sat playing with a fidget spinner. Delia knocked on the doorframe, pulling him out of his trance. "Agents, come in please." The chief stood and motioned to the chairs in front of him. Delia and Thomas shook his hand and introduced themselves. "Lohan. Gary Lohan." The chief gave them a welcoming smile and the agents sat down. "Mr. Lohan," Delia started. Lohan raised his hands and smiled kindly. "Please, call me Gary." Delia nodded and smiled back. "Okay, Gary. We just came from the ME's office and found some new evidence regarding this case." Delia went to hand him the notepad, but Gary started nodding. "Yes, we were the first to know. That's why we wanted you guys to come back. Unfortunately though, the results on the semen haven't come back yet. Lab says it'll be a few more days. We also don't even know if the person it belongs too is going to be in the database." Gary rubbed his eyes. He was a handsome man and could have been guessed younger than he was, but his wrinkles and grey hairs betrayed him. Gary sighed and clasped his hands together, his face getting serious. "Detectives, this case is about to go cold. And I am one more dead-end away from just telling the Senator she's SOL.  We need all the help we can get, and I think you two are our best shot." He said, looking at both of them. Thomas nodded and glanced at Delia. "Our plan is to send the sample back to you're guys's lab so that you can run it too. Maybe our guy will be in there." He gave a tired smile and Delia nodded. "That'll work. We appreciate your help with this and we'll do the best we can to get you more leads." Thomas said as he handed Lohan his card. "Please call if anything comes up." Delia said, smiling at Lohan as her and Thomas stood.