Killer Calories

a curt nod and she wasted no time stepping over the tape. The other civilians would assume she was one of the investigating team. The other cops knew her and welcomed her presence. The brass would throw a tizzy fit if they knew, but Dirk was the highest-ranking official present.
    “If Captain Bloss or the chief shows, disappear,” Dirk muttered as he directed her toward the door of the cottage.
    “No-o-o-oo problem. Whatcha got?”
    “Don’t know yet. Doc Liu’s here. I suppose she’ll figure it out.”
    “She usually does.”
    It took a moment for Savannah ’s eyes to adjust to the relative gloom of the inside of the bath, compared to the glare of the outside sunlight. When she finally focused, she saw the medical examiner, Dr. Jennifer Liu, kneeling on the blue-and-white tile beside the mud-smeared body of a woman.
    Savannah never would have recognized Kat Valentina, darling of the disco generation. Her famous long, blond hair was hanging in muddy strings over her once-pretty face. Her body was covered with mud that was beginning to dry, giving her a mottled, rotting look.
    Kat Valentina had been a vain woman; she wouldn’t have wanted to end up this way. But then, Savannah reminded herself, who would?
    “Hey, Dr. Jennifer,” Savannah said as Dirk led her over to the medical examiner, who had just finished making a small incision in the body’s abdomen and was inserting a long thermometer into the liver.
    “Hi, yourself, sassy.” Jennifer’s smile was warm as she looked up at Savannah . The two women had become good friends over the years, sharing a love for crime-solving, moderate male-bashing, and German chocolate. The ingredients for perfect female bonding.
    Although Jennifer Liu was a stunningly attractive Asian woman with a trim, petite figure and long, flowing black hair— the least likely suspect for a county medical examiner— Savannah had heard her tell some pretty morbid jokes from time to time, and there was that rare, Vincent Price cackle that sent shivers down the backbone. Yes, there was more to Dr. Jennifer than met the eye.
    “What does it look like, Doc?” Dirk asked, kneeling on the other side of the body. “Accident, suicide, or...?”
    “Can’t tell yet.” Jennifer checked her thermometer and jotted the results on her clipboard. “ Drownings are the toughest.”
    “Drowning?” Savannah clicked into analytical mode and tried not to think about how this lifeless piece of flesh had been a functioning human being a few hours ago. She hadn’t liked the woman, but she hated to see anyone’s life end prematurely.
    “Don’t even know that for sure.” Doctor Liu wiped the blood from the thermometer, shook it down, and thrust it into the tub filled with mud. “ There’s no obvious perforations, other than the one I just made,” she said. “No bullet holes or stab wounds. Though we can’t be certain until we get her back to the morgue and hose her down. I don’t see any strangulation marks on the neck or other contusions. But, it’s hard to see anything through the mud.”
    “What’s in it?” Savannah asked, nodding toward the bath. ‘I smell something like mint and flowers... maybe honeysuckle.”
    “Stinks to me,” Dirk said with a sniff. “These people are nuts, sittin ’ in mud like a bunch of pigs. And they call that a bath.”
    “Don’t knock it ‘til you’ve tried it,” Jennifer said with a smirk that bordered on lascivious.
    “You have?” Dirk seemed genuinely shocked.
    “Sure. I’ve tried everything once, and most things twice,” she replied.
    Yes, Savannah decided, the grin is definitely lascivious. Sometimes Savannah wondered about what lives Jennifer Liu had led before becoming the respectable medical examiner of San Carmelita County .
    “I see that rigor has set in, big time,” Savannah observed, seeing the stiff, unnatural, outward extension of the body’s arms. “I guess that means eight to twelve hours ago, huh?”
    “Normally, yes.” Jennifer read her thermometer and noted that result, too. “But the mud is over one hundred degrees. The heat would speed up rigor, plus the feet that the victim is so thin. She would set up pretty quickly.”
    Savannah watched Dirk as he walked slowly around the edge of the bath, taking note of the few items lying on the tiles. “Looks like she was drinking margaritas,” he said, pointing to the nearly empty pitcher and the glass with salt around half the rim.
    “Yeah.” Jennifer slipped a