Read Online Dead Angler by Victoria Houston - Free Book Online

staring down at the naked dead woman. Lew looked up at Osborne as if to see if he would change his mind. He would not. “Foul play, kiddo.”
    “Good,” said Lew. “The Wausau boys may argue but this is one autopsy I’ll log on their budget.”
    That said, she had marked the drawer holding the body, indicating it was to be sent to the forensic investigators in Wausau for an autopsy immediately following an ID from the family.
    “Let’s stop by Pecore’s desk,” she said before they left the building, “I’ll leave two notes. I don’t need that dimwit sending our Mrs. Marshall over to Johnson’s for embalming with the accident victims or have his dogs destroy any evidence. You and I both know he’s entirely capable of screwing this up. Pecore is one big reason I would love to have you on board to help me out, Doc.”
    The local coroner was not exactly respected in the town. A pathologist of questionable skill, he had irritated the townspeople when they discovered he let his two golden retreivers roam unrestricted in his lab. Truth was the dogs probably minded their own business but Loon Lake residents were appalled. Since every death in the community had to be run by Pecore, many families had taken to accompanying the bodies of loved ones through the entire process just to be sure the canines didn’t lick Grandma.
    Now the cruiser moved silently down a side street, turned right to pass the baseball park, then left onto Ojibway Drive. Osborne cracked his window for air. He stared out at the sleeping town. The storm had blown through Loon Lake around midnight, leaving a trail of broken tree limbs, some heavy with leaves, strewn across the street and yards. Loon Lake was used to violent weather. By mid-morning the evidence of howling winds would be gone.
    “Quiet out there,” he said softly, “I don’t even hear an owl hooting.”
    “Yep,” said Lew. He could tell she was thinking about something else. Probably how to break the news to the Rodericks.
    They passed the modest frame houses that lined the streets close to the hospital, their windows dark. The night was moonless, the only illumination the soft pools thrown by street lamps. As they neared the Rodericks’, the houses grew taller, the front yards deeper, wider and landscaped. This was the east side of Loon Lake, the prestigious side by Mary Lee’s standards. Here lived the doctors, the lawyers, and the paper mill executives.
    Osborne pointed off to their right, and Lew slowed to turn. An imposing stone manor anchored the corner of one of the town’s oldest and loveliest neighborhoods.
    “That’s it,” said Osborne. “See Peter’s Range Rover in the drive?”
    “I’ll turn around at the school and park in front,” said Lew.
    Directly across from the Roderick home was Loon Lake’s original elementary school, a two-story red brick building erected in 1910. The Rodericks’ front door faced a quiet street, bounded on the far side by a tall, dense hedge of lilacs that guarded the schoolyard, nearly blocking the building and its grounds from view.
    “Just look at those lilacs,” Osborne said in a low voice, making small talk to keep his mind off the pending confrontation, “they must be eighty years old, Lew. What a sight they are in the springtime.”
    “Umm,” Lew agreed. Everyone in Loon Lake agreed. The Carlton School lilacs were the pride of the entire town.
    “I think this is the biggest house in Loon Lake,” said Lew as she swung the cruiser around, pulled up to the curb, and turned off the ignition. “They must have a hell of a heating bill in January.” She had her way of stalling, too.
    “The old Martin house around the corner may be larger,” said Osborne. “I know this was originally built by old man Daniels in 1891.”
    “I thought he died in the twenties,” said Lew. Everyone in Loon Lake knew about the man who founded the paper mill, the life blood of the little town for fifty years.
    “Yes, you’re right. But his