“Possible. If he was lying on the altar and someone was behind him, he might not have known what was about to happen.” Val just shook her head, though plausible, it was just unlikely. “What about Gabrielle. Was she poisoned?”

“You’re not going to like this even more.”

Val cringed a second time. “Give it to me too.”

Zoe picked up several reports which were strewn on her table, sorted through them, and selected the one she wanted. “There is no yew poison in Gabrielle Morgan’s system.”

Val stood up. “That’s impossible. She had the seeds in her mouth.”

“Yes, the seeds were in her mouth, but they’re not toxic in this form—as whole seeds. They need to be chewed, or digested by stomach acids, to release the poison. She had no seeds in her stomach according to Dr. Maddox’s report, which I have right here.” Zoe held up the papers.

Val opened her mouth to speak but Zoe put one finger in the air, signaling for her to stop.

“Hear me out.” Zoe pointed to one paragraph in the report. “The majority of the seeds were in her mouth and a small amount were behind the soft palate. There is no evidence that she swallowed.” Zoe looked up at Val. “This is an important line. Not that she didn’t digest any of the seeds or swallow any of the seeds. But that she swallowed at all.”

Val saw the obvious and slid back down into her chair. “There’s no way she wouldn’t have had an urge to swallow with those seeds in her mouth. The amount of saliva generated from them simply being in her oral cavity would have done it. If she didn’t swallow, she would have salivated all over herself.”

“Yes, she would have and I took a look at the report from the crime lab. The tape across her mouth had minimal saliva on it,” Zoe said plainly.

The significance was clear. Val absorbed the news, overwhelmed and excited by a bit of true evidence that pointed to the likelihood of Gabrielle Morgan committing suicide as pure and utter crap. “This is all consistent with the seeds being placed in her mouth after death and gravity took a few down the upper part of the oropharynx, but she didn’t swallow so none entered the esophagus. How did she die, then?”

“According to Dr. Maddox, cause of death is more than likely cardiac or respiratory arrest secondary to some other event—meaning either of these happened after something else caused it. There were no pathological findings, other than the cancer and that wasn’t advanced enough for the tumor to start causing organ failure. So, in my opinion, a drug caused her death, I just don’t know which one yet. The one thing I can tell you is that yew poison was not the culprit.”

“Jesus, where do we start?”