Author Note: I'm not too sure how I feel about this chapter to be perfectly honest. I'm new to writing this side of a story, so bear with me. Any and all advice would be greatly appreciated. :)
And thanks again for reading and reviewing! :)
Chapter 3
Greg Lestrade stood outside the door to the Morgue at St. Barts and checked his watch for the 4th time. It was now 8.12. He had texted the consulting detective 45 minutes earlier, and was growing impatient. He had just pulled out his phone to text him again when Sherlock came storming through the door.
"Why did you not call me to the crime scene?" He said in his baritone voice, anger slipping through. He walked through the door of the morgue, Molly and Lestrade following behind, and up to the body which lay on the slab and began to examine her.
"We uh, we thought it was just a standard strangulation case." Lestrade said with a shrug. "And Mycroft told us not to call you unless it reached a 7 on your scale."
Sherlock growled. "Mycroft," He said his brother's name as if it was a cuss word, "Does not determine what cases I am to see or not."
"He just thought, that with Alex and all, that you should focus more on her." Molly said with a smile. "But it doesn't matter now, does it? You're here and I'm at a loss. We can't find a cause of death. She was strangled, but it wasn't what killed her. The tox screen hasn't come back yet either."
Sherlock allowed his eyes to move over the body, it was apparent that the woman had been strangled, and with something smooth, such as a tie. The woman's fingernails caught his attention; he leaned down pulling out his magnifying glass. The woman, a 43 year old CEO of Dorpal Industries had fake nails on. One of them however was missing. It was the white line across said nail that interested him. He felt the nail; it was smooth so the lines which crossed her fingers were Mees' lines.
Mees' lines happen with renal failure, chemo patients and heavy metal poisoning. Sherlock walked over by her mouth, leaned down and sniffed. Garlic. He observed her skin closely; however with the amount of visits to tanning beds that the woman had made he could find no hyperpigmentation. He stood up, straightening his back and put his magnifying glass back into his pocket.
"She was poisoned, heavy metal. Most likely Arsenic. Of course since you have moved her from the scene and no doubt Anderson and all of the other clowns have trampled over all the evidence, you have most likely ruined any chance of finding the killer." Sherlock told the detective, still cross that he had not been called in earlier. "She was strangled with a tie, not too uncommon of a weapon in a corporate building. The question is, why would someone strangle her when she was already dying? Was the poison too slow? What changed?" Sherlock spoke more to himself than the others in the room, pacing the room with his hands behind his back.
"Maybe there were two different perps? The poisoner and the strangler?" Lestrade asked.
"The possibilities of that are slim." Sherlock said twirling around and sitting upon a chair nearby. He steepled his fingers in front of his face and thought. "Something happened. Something that caused the killer to want to end it quickly. And I suppose that the security camera showed nothing?" He asked briefly, already knowing the answer.
"No security camera in the stairwell. No one even reported her missing. The janitor found her this morning. " Lestrade explained.
Sherlock sighed. "Where's her day planner?"
"What?" Lestrade asked.
"Her day planner. A CEO of a company must have a day planner. Bring in her secretary and her day planner as well. Something changed and her killer did not like it." Sherlock stood up. "As for who her killer is, you have already gotten rid of far too much of the evidence; however I would say that we are looking for a man, one whom she trusted."
"A man?" Lestrade asked with surprise in his voice. "Most poisoners are women."
"Yes, but do most women wear ties?" Sherlock asked as he stood up and walked back through the doors out of the morgue.