Read Betrayed: A Rosato & DiNunzio Novel (Rosato & Associates Book 13) for Free Online Page B

“This is our case log, which shows who visited the scene and when. It’s for our records.”
    “No problem.” Judy wrote her initials in the block and handed the clipboard back to Officer Hoffman.
    “Ladies, you won’t be permitted inside the perimeter. Just stay with me, outside the flares.”
    Aunt Barb frowned. “But that’s so far from the car.”
    “No civilians inside the perimeter, that’s our procedure. We didn’t ask you down here, the ID is already made. If you want to be here, you have to follow procedure. Ladies, follow me and stay with me.”
    Officer Hoffman turned away, Judy took Aunt Barb’s arm, and they walked together outside of the flares, past the group of police and administrative personnel, then farther down the road. A uniformed police officer stood off to the side of the street, his orange flashlight in hand, ready to redirect traffic, but the only cars and people were official. They got closer to the Honda, and a fire-department truck was parked at its front, where several sets of bright white klieglights had been set up, top-heavy on spindly metallic stalks, with tripod feet.
    A gleaming blue van with the white symbol for the county coroner sat behind the Honda. Its back doors had reflective chevrons and were hanging open, so Judy assumed that the van hadn’t been loaded yet. Iris’s body must still be inside the Honda. A photographer took pictures inside the car, and his electronic flash fired at irregular intervals, visible through the windows, which were rolled down on the driver’s side. Shadowy silhouettes moved around inside the Honda, but it was too far to see anything clearly.
    Judy sighed inwardly, the sight making her profoundly sad. It seemed wrong that someone could die in such a mundane way, a heart attack while driving, sitting for hours strapped into a car seat, surrounded only by people whose job it was to see to it that she was examined, investigated, photographed, documented, and carted away in a van, to be taken to a morgue. Judy guessed that there would have to be an autopsy because it was an unattended death, and somehow that made it worse, that in a few hours or maybe even the next day, another stranger would invade the very corpus, slice a Y-incision into her chest, then extract, examine, measure, and weigh her organs, record her demise in triplicate, and issue a death certificate.
    They reached the point directly across from the Honda, so that they were lined up with a clear view of the front seat. They stopped, and Aunt Barb’s attention riveted on the Honda, where silhouettes were still moving around inside the car. There did appear to be a figure in the front seat, but it was too far away to see clearly, for which Judy was secretly grateful.
    Aunt Barb craned her neck, standing on tiptoe. “What’s going on, Officer? What are they doing in there?”
    “That would be the coroner and the deputy coroner, performing the last stages of their investigation. They and the evidence technicians examine the body and make sure it gets photographed the way it was found.” Officer Hoffman gestured to the group of police officers. “The department already has uniformed officers interviewing neighbors, to see if they saw the vehicle pull over or anything else unusual or out of the ordinary. We ask them if they know the deceased or recognize the vehicle, and if they’ve had any strange events in the area.”
    Aunt Barb frowned, but didn’t look away from the Honda. “There are no neighbors.”
    Judy nodded. “And it’s not as if it’s a crime scene.”
    “No matter, crime scene or no.” Officer Hoffman shrugged in his heavy Windbreaker. “We follow the same procedure. It’s an apparently natural death, but we still investigate as if it’s a crime scene. An assistant from the D.A.’s Office is here, and so are two of the county detectives.”
    Judy eyed the clump of men. “Are the detectives the ones in suits and ties?”
    “Yes. In addition to the