Tirone was in his early thirties, a strong guy gone to fat with straw-colored hair, iron-gray eyes, and apparently, a sensitive nose. Vicks VapoRub glistened on his upper lip.

LaManche stood beside the bay window talking to Gilles Pomier, an LSJML autopsy technician. Both looked grim and spoke in hushed tones.

I had no need to hear the conversation. As a forensic anthropologist, I’ve worked more death scenes than I care to count. My specialty is decomposed, burned, mummified, dismembered, and skeletal human remains.

I knew others were speeding our way. Service de l’identité judiciaire, Division des scènes de crime, Quebec’s version of CSI. Soon the place would be crawling with specialists intent on recording and collecting every fingerprint, skin cell, blood spatter, and eyelash present in the squalid little flat.

My eyes drifted back to the vanity. Again my gut clenched.

I knew what lay ahead for this baby who might have been. The assault on her person had only begun. She would become a case number, physical evidence to be scrutinized and assessed. Her delicate body would be weighed and measured. Her chest and skull would be entered, her brain and organs extracted and sliced and scoped. Her bones would be tapped for DNA. Her blood and vitreous fluids would be sampled for toxicology screening.

The dead are powerless, but those whose passing is suspected to be the result of wrongdoing by others suffer further indignities. Their deaths go on display as evidence transferred from lab to lab, from desk to desk. Crime scene technicians, forensic experts, police, attorneys, judges, jurors. I know such personal violation is necessary in the pursuit of justice. Still, I hate it. Even as I participate.

At least this victim would be spared the cruelties the criminal justice machine reserves for adult victims—the parading of their lives for public consumption. How much did she drink? What did she wear? Whom did she date? Wouldn’t happen here. This baby girl never had a life to put under the microscope. For her, there would be no first tooth, no junior prom, no questionable bustier.

I flipped a page in my spiral with one angry finger.

Rest easy, little one. I’ll watch over you.

I was jotting a note when an unexpected voice caught my attention. I turned. Through the cockeyed bedroom door, I saw a familiar figure.

Lean and long-legged. Strong jaw. Sandy hair. You get the picture.

For me, it’s a picture with a whole lot of history.

Lieutenant-détective Andrew Ryan, Section de crimes contre la personne, Sûreté du Québec.

Ryan is a homicide cop. Over the years, we’ve spent a lot of time together. In and out of the lab.

The out part was over. Didn’t mean the guy wasn’t still smoking hot.

Ryan had joined LaManche and Pomier.

Jamming my pen into the wire binding, I closed my spiral and walked to the living room.

Pomier greeted me. LaManche raised his hound-dog eyes but said nothing.

“Dr. Brennan.” Ryan was all business. Our MO, even in the good times. Especially in the good times.