Cruel and Unusual (Kay Scarpetta Series #4) by Patricia Cornwell

From the Publisher

When convicted killer Ronnie Joe Waddell is executed in Virginia's electric chair, he becomes what should be a routine postmortem case for Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Kay Scarpetta. But after Waddell's execution, the murders continue, as everyone connected to him begins to die-including a member of Scarpetta's staff. Then, when crucial records begin to disappear from her files, Scarpetta comes under fire for incompetence. Caught in a web of political intrigue, betrayed by those she trusted, Scarpetta must fight to free herself from murderous insinuations—and threats to her own life, To save her career, Scarpetta soon finds herself retracing Waddell's bloody footprints, following a trail that might lead to long—hidden secrets deep within the state government. Either the truth will set her free—or unleash upon her a punishment both cruel and unusual.

Preformed by C.J. Critt

Larry King

A page-turner...I dare you to start reading Patricia Cornwell's new book and then be able to put it down. —USA Today

Newsweek

Taut, high tech and eerily credible...with each book, her scalpel is getting sharper.

People

A knockout...the best work yet from Cornwell...disturbing...compelling...the most successful case thus far for Dr. Kay Scarpetta.

Baltimore Sun

A first-rate thriller...as taut and terrifying as Silence of the Lambs...Cornwell's boldest, darkest work yet.

Richmond Times-Dispatch

Classic Cornwell...chilling...riveting...utterly convincing.

Publishers Weekly

The fourth mystery to feature Virginia's Chief Medical Officer Dr. Kay Scarpetta (after All That Remains ) is the most intricately plotted and fully characterized novel yet in Cornwell's admirable series. From its opening at the autopsy of convicted killer Ronnie Joe Wadell--after his execution in the electric chair--to its final moments with Scarpetta facing a special grand jury indictment, the novel connects old crimes and cover-ups to current politics in an intriguing puzzler. On the eve of Wadell's death, a teenage boy in Richmond, Va., is mutilated in a murder that echoes the killing of a TV news anchorwoman 10 years before, the crime for which Wadell was convicted. Next, a fingerprint at the home of a recently murdered psychic is identified in FBI files as the executed killer's, suggesting to Scarpetta that tentacles from the first murder may be reaching out from the past. The Christmas Day murder of her own morgue supervisor suggests those tentacles may have penetrated her office. Scarpetta's computer-whiz niece Lucy, Richmond homicide investigator Pete Marino and an old FBI friend help Kay save her reputation. That this complex case seems to end abruptly is surely due in part to the reader's reluctance to come to the last page. Literary Guild, Mystery Guild and Doubleday Book Club selections. (June)

Library Journal

Outstanding medical crime writer Cornwell offers yet another Dr. Kay Scarpetta thriller, in which the fingerprints of an executed killer turn up at the scene of a new murder. Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 2/1/93.

School Library Journal

YA-In this fourth Kay Scarpetta mystery, the chief medical examiner for the state of Virginia is once again challenged by gruesome murder and confusing evidence. How could the fingerprints of Ronnie Joe Waddell appear at the scene of a murdered psychic after Waddell was executed in the electric chair? In the midst of many puzzling matters come other difficult issues to confront Kay as she tries to do her job. She becomes the object of hysterical media attention, and finds that she herself might be indicted for the very crimes she is trying to solve. Someone is sabotaging her efforts by hacking into her computer files and leaking information. Exasperated, she calls upon her niece, Lucy, a 17-year-old computer whiz, whom readers will remember from earlier ``Scarpetta'' novels. Along with FBI agent Benton Wesley and police chum Pete Marino, Lucy helps Kay solve the murders and ferret out the traitor in her office. YAs will enjoy the teen's angst and the exciting twist at the book's end.-Carolyn E. Gecan, Thomas Jefferson Sci-Tech, Fairfax County, VA

BookList

Popular Kay Scarpetta, chief medical examiner of Virginia, is back in Cornwell's latest, which will no doubt rocket onto the best-seller lists, as have "Postmortem" (1990), "Body of Evidence" (1991), and "All That Remains" (1992). This time Scarpetta's involved in the strange case of Ronnie Joe Waddell, a convicted killer. Waddell is executed, and Scarpetta performs the autopsy. Then she is called to the scene of an apparent suicide. When the death begins to look suspiciously like murder and the dead Waddell's distinctive fingerprint turns up at the scene, Scarpetta's determined to solve the mystery. But she quickly finds that her job, her reputation, and even her life, are on the line in a complex and sensitive case involving prominent officials who have everything to lose if the truth is uncovered. Cornwell has written a gripping, intense story full of the graphic details of death. She obviously knows her forensic stuff, and she's got a knack for inventing tricky, attention-getting plots. But this time out, she takes so long to develop all the disparate plot pieces that the complicated climax, crammed into a few short pages, leaves the reader feeling slightly cheated and wondering why all the loose ends don't quite get tied up. All in all, though, it's an "edge-of-your-seat" read that's sure to be extremely popular. Buy plenty of copies.

Kirkus Reviews

On the eve of longtime Death Row inmate Ronnie Joe Waddell's execution, Virginia chief medical examiner Dr. Kay Scarpetta (All That Remains, Body of Evidence, etc.) gets a call about the kidnap-murder of young Eddie Heath—a homicide that has uncanny similarities to Waddell's handiwork. And the eeriness continues after the execution—when Waddell's fingerprint is found in the home of a second murder victim, and when Susan Story, Kay's morgue supervisor, spooked by the autopsy on Waddell, is killed with the same gun that shot Eddie. Kay has to deal not only with the specter of Waddell again at large (escaped? switched with another inmate? misidentified through his prints for someone else?) but with a security leak in her own office, as a breach in her computer files and the theft of her records put her on the spot as a suspect in Susan's murder—and point to corruption that reaches further than Kay can imagine. Cornwell's accustomed forensic flair, plus the bonus of an unusually baffling and intricate plot, make this her best book yet—and a new high point in her meteoric rise. (Literary Guild Dual Selection for August)

Product Details

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Table of Contents

Read an Excerpt

Chapter One

The Monday I carried Ronnie Joe Waddell's meditation in my pocketbook, I never saw the sun. It was dark out when I drove to work that morning. It was dark again when I drove home. Small raindrops spun in my headlights, the night gloomy with fog and bitterly cold.

I built a fire in my living room and envisioned Virginia farmland and tomatoes ripening in the sun. I imagined a young black man in the hot cab of a pickup truck and wondered if his head had been full of murder back then. Waddell's meditation had been published in the Richmond Times-Dispatch and I had taken the clipping to work to add to his growing file. But the business of the day distracted me and his meditation had remained in my pocketbook. I had read it several times. I supposed it would always intrigue me that poetry and cruelty could reside in the same heart.

For the next few hours I paid bills and wrote Christmas cards while the television played mutely. Like the rest of Virginia's citizens, whenever an execution was scheduled I found out from the media whether all appeals had been exhausted or the governor had granted clemency. The news determined whether I went on to bed or drove downtown to the morgue.

At almost ten P.M. my telephone rang. I answered it expecting my deputy chief or some other member of my staff whose evening, like mine, was on hold.

"Hello?" asked a male voice I did not recognize. "I'm trying to reach Kay Scarpetta? Uh, the chief medical examiner, Dr. Scarpetta?"

"Speaking," I said.

"Oh, good. Detective Joe Trent with Henrico County. Found your number in the book. Sorry to bother you at home." He sounded keyed up."But we've got a situation we really need your help with."

"What's the problem?" I asked, staring tensely at the TV. A commercial was playing. I hoped I wasn't needed at a scene.

"Earlier this evening, a thirteen-year-old white male was abducted after leaving a convenience store on Northside. He was shot in the head and there may be some sexual components involved."

My heart sank as I reached for paper and pen. "Where is the body?" I asked.

"He was found behind a grocery store on Patterson Avenue in the county. I mean, he's not dead. He hasn't regained consciousness but no one's saying right now whether he'll make it. I realize it's not your case since he's not dead. But he's got some injuries that are real odd. They're not like anything I've ever come across. I know you see a lot of different types of injuries. I'm hoping you might have some idea how these were inflicted and why."

"Describe them for me," I said.

"We're talking about two areas. One on his inner right thigh, you know, up high near the groin. The other's in the area of his right shoulder. Chunks of flesh are missing ' cut out. And there's weird cuts and scratches around the edges of the wounds. He's at Henrico Doctor's."

"Did you find the excised tissue?" My mind was racing through other cases, looking for something similar.

"Not so far. We've got men out there still searching. But it's possible the assault occurred inside a car."

"Whose car?"

"The assailant's. The grocery store parking lot where the kid was found is a good three or four miles from the convenience store where he was last seen. I'm thinking he got into somebody's car, maybe was forced to."

"You got photographs of the injuries before the doctors started working on him?"

"Yes. But they haven't done much. Because of the amount of skin missing, they'll have to do skin grafts ? full grafts, is what they said, if that tells you anything."

It told me they had debrided the wounds, had him on intravenous antibiotics, and were waiting to do a gluteal graft. If, however, that was not the case and they had undermined the tissue around the injuries and sutured them, then there wasn't going to be much left for me to see.

"They haven't sutured his wounds," I said.

"That's what I've been told."

"Do you want me to take a look?"

"That would be really great," he said, relieved. "You should be able to see the wounds real well."

"When would you like me to do this?"

"Tomorrow would work."

"All right. What time? The earlier the better."

"Eight hundred hours? I'll meet you in front of the ER."

"I'll be there," I said as the anchorman stared grimly at me. Hanging up, I reached for the remote control and turned up the sound.

"...Eugenia? Can you tell us if there's been any word from the governor?"

The camera shifted to the Virginia State Penitentiary, where for two hundred years the Commonwealth's worst criminals had been warehoused along a rocky stretch of the James River at the edge of downtown. Sign-carrying protesters and capital punishment enthusiasts gathered in the dark, their faces harsh in the glare of television lights. It chilled my soul that some people were laughing. A pretty, young correspondent in a red coat filled the screen.

"As you know, Bill," she said, "yesterday a telephone line was set up between Governor Norring's office and the penitentiary. Still no word, and that speaks volumes. Historically, when the governor doesn't intend to intervene, he remains silent."

"How are things there? Is it relatively peaceful so far?"

"So far, yes, Bill. I'd say several hundred people are standing vigil out here. And of course, the penitentiary itself is almost empty. All but several dozen of the inmates have already been transported to the new correctional facility in Greensville."