Read The Grass Tattoo (#2 - The Craig Modern Thriller Series) for Free Online

she’d dumped him after a week, saving Craig’s protective brother intervention from jeopardising their close bond.
    They were very different. Craig’s warm, half-Italian fieriness balanced John’s placid shyness perfectly and it had worked for thirty years, although Craig had lived in London for fifteen of them. It worked even better now that he was home.
    John cleared the chessboard abruptly, declaring it a draw. “I was playing Des but he’s on holiday until Monday. I’m not much of a challenge” adding with a smile, “I always know my opponent’s next move.”
    Des Marsham was the lab’s Head of Forensic Science and he worked closely with both of them. He was bearded, benign and a father twice over, contrasting with their terminal bachelorhood. And he was almost as eccentric as John, almost.
    “Your body is very interesting, Marc.”
    Craig laughed loudly. To anyone else the remark would have sounded strange, but he knew exactly what John meant. Irene Leighton’s body was very interesting, but until they’d solved her murder, it would feel like theirs.
    “What have you found?”
    John took a hurried bite of his sandwich and motioned Craig towards the cold dissection room, where their victim’s body was lying covered, on the lonely, steel table. He pulled on a pair of sterile gloves, motioning Craig to do the same, and then lifted a pointer and moved to the body, gently lifting the sheet down to the woman’s neck, revealing only her face.
    He started reporting concisely and quickly, knowing that they were both uncomfortable in the presence of their innocent victim.
    “I’ll just give you the main points.”
    “Thanks.”
    “Starting from the top. There are no marks, abrasions or bruises on her face, or in the mouth, pharynx or neck. There’s nothing on the scalp or in her hair. She’s a generally well-nourished female of between thirty and forty.”
    “Nearer forty would fit; they’d been married for twenty years.”
    “OK, fine. Moving down the body - I won’t lift her but there’s the entry wound of a bullet on her back, just beneath the left shoulder blade, co-linear with her heart. There was no exit wound because the bullet lodged in her fifth rib anteriorly.”
    Craig nodded. Shot. At least it had been quick.
    “What’s the bullet like?”
    “Unusual. Not one that I’ve seen before. Des is away so I’m getting the north-west labs to look at it, but it’s certainly not standard issue. The bullet penetrated the trapezius muscle on her back and went through the interim structures. It ruptured the pericardium, the heart envelope, on entrance and exit, traversed the heart, and lodged anteriorly in the rib. Most of the blood tracked down internally.”
    “The mark we saw on her back was the entry wound? And bruising?”
    “Yes, but not only that.” He paused and a mix of disgust and confusion flickered across his face. “There was a tattoo at the entry site.”
    “What?”
    “Around the wound. Healing indicates that it was about two to three days old.”
    Craig was taken aback; this was something new, even for them. “What sort of tattoo?”
    John turned to him, the professional now. “If you let me finish, Marc, I’ll show you. I have photographs of everything.”
    Craig nodded, conceding that he wanted everything yesterday. John smiled benignly and moved on.
    “There was no sign of sexual assault or recent intercourse. She’d had at least one pregnancy, and I’d say probably more. Normal deliveries. The rest is unremarkable, apart from her right foot and left hand.
    First, her hand. We saw that she had abrasions on the left knuckles and that one of her nails was torn away, almost from the nail bed. The angle of its avulsion would say that it was torn in a struggle, rather than deliberately, with pliers, for instance.”
    Craig winced, reminded of nails that he had seen ‘pliered’ in London, during gang disputes. It required a particular sort of callousness. At least Irene