Dena Miller was on the table, her nude body icy white against the stainless steel. Large ugly stitches across her torso said Frank had been busy.

He motioned Stella to the lightboard and pointed at rows of X-rays. “This is the victim’s right hand. As you saw at the scene, all of her fingers were broken. With the damage to the skin and the way the bone is impacted, I suspect he used a hammer.”

Stella felt sick.

The next X-ray showed Dena’s skull and neck. “I found the vertebrae fracture her husband told you about.” He waved at the board, where images of Dena’s bones were displayed. “I found four more recently broken and healed bones: one wrist, an elbow, and several ribs. The Scarlet Falls hospital only has records showing Dena’s neck injury, so I had my assistant check with the three other hospitals in the area. Dena had records at all of them. Each emergency room treated her once. Each time she claimed to have fallen down the stairs.”

“Classic abuse history.”

“Repeat visits to the same ER would spark suspicion,” Frank agreed. “She was careful not to use hospitals in the same network to avoid the possibility of digital records automatically cross-referencing.”

Poor Dena.

Stella put aside her anger and sadness. Justice was all she could offer Dena now. “What else did you find?”

“She’d been recently washed and her fingernails were clipped.” Frank tossed the file back on his desk. “There was no sign of sexual assault. Tox screens are being rushed. The lab has promised to get Missy Green’s done by Monday morning as well.”

Stella left the medical examiner and hurried across the lot to the forensics lab. She still didn’t have enough to convince anyone that Adam Miller was a killer. The fact that his wife had multiple broken bones didn’t prove he murdered her.

Darcy Stevens, the county latent fingerprint analyst, leaned over her desk. Her coffee-colored skin looked too smooth for her to be a grandmother.

“How’s your grandson?” Stella picked up a framed snapshot of a two-toothed baby.

“Perfect.” Darcy smiled, then sobered. “I have something for you.”

“Is it going to make me happy?”

“I think so,” Darcy said in her rich, deep voice.

Stella dropped into a chair facing her desk.

“I found several sets of fingerprints on the envelope of cash you found in Missy Green’s apartment.” Darcy opened a file on her computer. She pointed to the envelope, encased in a protective plastic sleeve. “Missy Green’s matched right away. That was easy. But then I had an idea, and I pulled Dena Miller’s prints. Perfect match.”

“You matched prints from Dena Miller and Missy Green?”

“I did.”

“You are a genius.”

Darcy rubbed her fingernails on her black suit jacket. “I know.”

Dena was keeping cash at Missy’s house.

“Do you know if Vinnie’s in?” Stella asked.