Find Her Alive (Detective Josie Quinn #8) - Lisa Regan Page 0,26
small, and sad.
Was it Trinity? Was this all that was left of Josie’s dynamic force of a sister?
Josie looked up to see Dr. Feist staring at her. “As I told you at the scene, this is a woman. She’s over thirty, based on the fact that all of her growth plates are fused, including the medial aspect of her clavicles.”
Gretchen said, “You mean the end of the collarbone that goes into the shoulder?”
“Right,” said Dr. Feist. “As you will recall, the long bones in the body have three parts: the diaphysis—that’s the shaft—the metaphysis, which is the part where it widens and flares at the end—the knobby end—and then the epiphysis, which is basically the end cap of the bone or the growth plate. In children, there is a gap between the epiphysis and the metaphysis but in adults, the epiphysis and the metaphysis are fused together.”
Josie said, “So, in adults, the knobby end of the bone fuses with the cap on the end of it.”
“Right. The clavicles are the last to fuse and that happens between nineteen and thirty at the latest. In this woman we see that fusion. I actually think she may be much older than thirty.” Dr. Feist moved to the head of the table, her gloved fingers hovering over the top of the skull. She indicated very faint traces of squiggly lines running from front to back of the skull and also horizontally across the back of the skull.
“See these cranial sutures? They’re openings in the skull that remain open and stretch as our brains grow from birth to adulthood. Some close in childhood but these two that you see here—well, you can barely see them since they’re closed now—usually they’re open well into adulthood. This one running along the center of her skull from front to back is the sagittal suture, and this one running across the back of the skull is the lambdoid suture. Both are almost completely closed which doesn’t normally happen until between ages thirty and forty, although sometimes the sagittal suture can remain open into the fifties.”
She moved down to the pelvis, pointing to the planes of the large curved bones. “Examination of her pelvis indicates she likely had children. When the pubic bones separate to allow the baby to fit through, the ligaments pull away from the bone and can sometimes cause scars. I see some pitting scars here which are sometimes an indicator of that. Again, it’s not an exact science, but it’s a good indicator.”
With each word, Josie felt a spasm of relief until her limbs felt weak and jelly-like.
Gretchen leaned over, peering at the pubic bones, glasses sliding down to the end of her nose. Josie, too, leaned forward to get a closer look. “The bone looks almost spongy,” she noted.
Dr. Feist nodded. “That’s another reason I believe she is over forty, possibly in her fifties. When a person gets into their forties, the pelvic bones take on a more porous look.”
Josie said, “This woman can’t possibly be Trinity. She’s had a child and she’s much older.”
Dr. Feist replied, “I believe so, yes, but I would prefer to wait until I’ve got Trinity’s dental records before confirming that definitively.”
Josie thought she might need to sit down. So profound was her relief that every inch of her body felt unsteady. Yet, the longer she stared at the bones, the more that relief receded, leaving her back in a state of high anxiety. Trinity could still be alive, but the woman before them was not. Somewhere she had loved ones—a child or children. Surely, they were looking for her, wondering what had become of her? Josie ached with the thought of the devastation that lay ahead of them.
Gretchen asked, “Can you determine her race?”
Dr. Feist moved back toward the skull. “I’m not a forensic anthropologist, but I can make an educated guess based on what I know and what I’ve seen in my career.”
“Which is what?” Josie coaxed.
“I would say that this is a Caucasian female based on the narrow nasal opening and the fact that the nasal bridge is so pronounced and high up on the face. Also, if you look at the eye sockets—”
Josie had to force herself to look at them again.
“—they’re quite circular but their margins are squared. That’s consistent with Caucasoid skulls.”
Josie looked away from the skull once more.
With a nod, Gretchen said, “Let me call Noah and see if he’s gotten anywhere with the warrant for Trinity’s dental records.”