Drained (Edgars Family #6) - Suzanne Ferrell Page 0,25

Brianna hated feeling like they were taking a test and she was the only one in the class without the answers.

“When the body dies,” Ramos went on to explain, “the cells immediately start to deteriorate, gravity pulls blood cells down to pool in whatever part of the body is the lowest. With our victim in the sitting position, we’d expect to see a great deal of this on the lower buttocks, thighs and legs. If he’d been lying on his back for any time after death, we’d see the lividity on his whole back.”

“So, you’re not seeing any of that?” Briana asked.

“Not as much as I’d expect to see,” Ramos said rubbing the back of her neck. “I think his blood was drained before he died.”

“Can you do that? Drain all the blood out of a body while they’re alive?” Brianna asked, shifting her gaze to Aaron then to Jaylon and finally back to Ramos.

“If you lose more than forty percent of your blood, more than two-thousand milliliters, you will die,” Ramos paused. “It happens rapidly with gunshot wounds, stabbings, severe auto accidents. But we’d still see a good amount of lividity. There is such a small amount of it this time. I think your man was slowly drained of blood until his organs gave out.”

“Shit,” both Jaylon and Aaron said.

“Oh, my God,” Brianna said, covering her mouth and tears filling her eyes. Stanley let out a low whimper and she hugged him a little tighter to her middle, comforting herself as much as him. “Was he in pain while this happened?”

“That I can’t answer. Depends on how fast or slow this guy bled him out.” Ramos stopped as the other technicians walked the stretcher containing Art’s body in the black zipped up body bag past them. “The autopsy will tell us more, but there were only three small wounds on his body. Two on the back of his neck.” She pointed to the spot on her own body. “Looks like burn marks from a taser or stun gun of some sort.”

“And the other one?” Aaron asked.

“That one was in his left brachial area,” she said, pointing to her own inner left elbow. “Like where you’d put a big bore IV needle to give or get blood.”

“You think someone was harvesting his blood?” Aaron asked, shock and anger lacing his voice.

“If his blood was harvested, his death wasn’t an easy one. His heart rate would pick up and a sense of panic would ensue. Then his extremities would grow cold as the body shunted the circulating blood to his vital organs, brain, heart and lungs. Eventually, he’d become woozy, he’d have trouble breathing. And eventually his heart would stop beating.”

“Oh man,” Jaylon said. “That’s sick.”

“You’ll have to wait for the coroner’s official report, but my guess is, whoever did this? He or she knew exactly what they were doing,” Ramos said with a nod as she left the group to go back into the small office and gather her equipment.

“So, Ramos thinks whoever did this is in the medical field?” Brianna asked, finding it hard to believe that someone whose job it was to save lives would take Art’s in such a cruel fashion.

“Or else they’re a modern day vampire,” Jaylon said without any humor.

Aaron shook his head. “I don’t think so, and let’s not go saying that to anyone. We don’t want that idea getting into the media.”

“Because it would bring out all the sci-fi and paranormal freaks?” the younger detective said. “I get it. But you have to admit it feels just as weird to think a doctor might have done this.”

“If not,” Aaron looked around the space, the muscles on his face tight with concern, “then given how little evidence we found and how little this place was disturbed, I’d say we have a bigger problem than an off-his-rocker doc.”

“What’s that?” Brianna asked, not liking where he was headed.

“Someone who’s perfected this style of killing.”

8

Aaron didn’t like how this situation was shaping up. He looked at his wristwatch. Nearly three.

Halloway gave him grief daily about still wearing an old school watch. “Man, you don’t need one anymore. Your phone can tell time, as well as the weather, check your email, take pictures. Why do you insist on wearing a watch?”

He never answered. It was a personal thing for him. The weight of the heavy metal band on his arm felt reassuring. His grandfather had always worn a wristwatch, a military one that had a compass and stopwatch