“No.” Elin’s not offended by her bluntness. It’s one of the things that makes Rachel so good at her job. That, and an inexhaustible ability to go the extra mile.
Farrah stops to direct the medics to the body. When she reaches the dock she greets Elin: “I didn’t realize it would be you.”
Elin nods, skimming over a reply by making introductions. “This is DC Steed, and these are the crime scene investigators.”
Farrah gestures at the medics, scrambling over the rocks to the left. “I told them where she is, but I don’t know if there’s much chance . . .” She trails off. “Our first aider said as soon as he got there he knew.”
“The paramedics still need to check.”
“Of course.” A fleeting frown crosses Farrah’s brow as if she’s questioning Elin. She’s done this before. It makes her feel that Farrah doesn’t take her seriously. “I’ll walk you over.”
“Do you know who she is?” Elin says as the group falls into step beside Farrah.
“No, she’s not a member of staff, and as yet, none of the guests have been reported missing, but it’s still early. People might not be awake yet.”
“Where exactly did she fall from?”
“Yoga pavilion.” Farrah points up at the wooden structure perched atop a sheer cliff face that looms dizzyingly high above them. Elin can make out a glass balustrade circling the front of the pavilion: the only barrier to the rocks below.
“She fell over the balustrade?”
“Yes.”
“How high is it?” Steed asks.
“Maybe waist height on me.” Farrah shakes her head. “I’m still not quite sure how it could have happened.”
But Elin knows it’s possible to fall over a balustrade of almost any height. She’s seen a couple of catastrophic balcony falls—one residential, one in a hotel. On both occasions, alcohol was involved, but she can’t make that assumption here. Not yet.
Farrah seems ill at ease as she glances toward the rocks. “Michael, the cleaner who found her, said he saw a wrap on the other side of the barrier. Maybe she leaned over to get it and lost her balance.”
“Perhaps, but until we know more, we have to look at every possible explanation.” The golden rule in an unexplained death: treat as suspicious until proven otherwise.
“Where’s Michael now?”
“At the yoga pavilion. The officer on the phone said he should stay there, stop anyone getting too close. We’ve put a rough cordon up with some rope, put a member of staff outside to guard it as he instructed.”
“Good.” Elin thinks on her feet: she’s going to have to divide and conquer, split Rachel and Leon up so they can examine both scenes simultaneously. “Leon, can you head up to the pavilion with Farrah, start there? Steed and I will go with Rachel.”
“Of course. Lead the way.”
13
Elin and Steed follow Rachel, clambering over the rocks at the base of the cliffs. Small, flatter stones are interspersed with huge boulders piled on top of one another; an old cliff fall.
Elin, already sweating, wipes her forehead with the back of her hand. Rounding the cliff, she can see the paramedics leaning over the body, talking quietly.
She absorbs the scene: a slim, fair-haired woman in her early thirties, sprawled across the rocks. She’s in a black dress, her arm bent backward at an unnatural angle. The side of her head closest to the rock is caved in, the massive trauma shattering a large section of her skull. Brain matter and white bone fragments are visible against the pale gray of the rock and the dark pool of blood under her head.
Disturbed, Elin swallows hard. Some scenes, like this one, are so graphic that you can never be prepared. She knows it will stay with her long after the case has been closed.
“Wouldn’t have stood a chance from that height,” Steed says thickly.
The older medic, Jon, a tall, stocky man, says, “She’s dead.” He turns his wrist. “Life extinct at 7:33 a.m.” Turning to Elin, he peels off his glove. “She’s already in rigor. Obviously massive head injury, multiple injuries to spine and pelvis. Surface wounds consistent with a fall from that height.”
Elin turns her head up, struck by an awful, vertiginous sensation as she looks at the jagged ridges of the cliff. She can’t help but imagine the fall: the woman’s body twisting and turning in midair, skull loudly cracking on the rock below.
Looking back to the woman, Elin’s eyes track up to her face. Her eyes are closed, the right one obscured by a bloody abrasion. Her full mouth is slack, drawn downward.