Chapter 9 - The Toxicology Report
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At midnight, long after Vivien had kissed Dominic goodnight in the portico and driven back to her parents’ townhouse on Bellevue Avenue, the lights in Isabella Varelli’s third-floor sitting room remained on.
Dr. Julian Mercer, a sixty-year-old internist who had served the Varelli family since Dominic was in prep school, stood beside a portable spectrometer case on the mahogany table. Beside him sat the crushed glass ampoule Dominic had retrieved from the wastebasket and the porcelain teacup Vivien had brought upstairs at four o'clock.
In the corner of the suite, Isabella slept peacefully under the watchful eyes of Marin, who had refused to stay overnight in the guest cottage once Eli was tucked into bed down the hall with Mrs. Gable.
Dominic stood by the fireplace, his suit jacket off and his white shirt sleeves rolled up to his forearms.
"Give it to me straight, Julian," Dominic said quietly.
Dr. Mercer took off his wire-rimmed glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose, his expression shaken.
"The crushed ampoule and the residue inside that teacup contain a compounded veterinary derivative of succinylcholine combined with a slow-release digoxin glycoside," Dr. Mercer said in a low voice so as not to wake Isabella. "In small, repeated doses—like the ones administered in her tea twice a week over the past month—it causes progressive muscular weakness and bradycardia, mimicking natural post-stroke decline."
Dominic’s hands curled into slow fists at his sides. "And the concentration in the crushed vial from today?"
"Five times the previous trace level," Dr. Mercer said grimly, tapping the printout from the spectrometer. "If she had drunk that cup of chamomile tea this afternoon, or if a second dose had been administered tomorrow night after the gala, her diaphragm would have quietly paralyzed within four hours while her heart stopped. On a standard autopsy of a seventy-two-year-old stroke survivor, every coroner in the state would have signed the death certificate as natural cardiac arrest without running a specialized veterinary tox screen."
Across the room near the doorway to Isabella’s bedroom, Marin pressed a hand over her mouth, her eyes wide with horror.
"That’s why she dropped the teacup when Mrs. Varelli tapped the wheelchair," Marin whispered, stepping into the sitting room. "When Miss Morrow brought the tray up at four o'clock, she tried to hold the cup to Mrs. Varelli’s lips herself using the straw. Mrs. Varelli clamped her teeth shut and knocked the tray sideways with her right forearm before Miss Morrow grabbed the letter board."
Dominic looked past Marin into the dim bedroom where his mother lay breathing steadily beneath the oxygen cannula. His mother hadn't just tapped Enough because Vivien was threatening Marin’s child; Isabella had already fought off her own murder minutes before Vivien’s phone hit the table.
"Did she ingest any of it today, Julian?" Dominic asked sharply.
"None," Dr. Mercer confirmed, closing his leather medical bag. "And now that we know what glycoside has been suppressing her system over the past four weeks, I’ve started an intravenous chelation drip to flush the cumulative residue from her bloodstream. Honestly, Dominic, once this poison clears her liver over the next few days, her motor strength on that right side should improve dramatically."
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Dominic nodded once to the doctor.
"Keep this report sealed under attorney-client medical privilege until eight o'clock tomorrow night, Julian," Dominic said. "Tomorrow, Vivien wants a wedding announcement. We are going to give her a courtroom."
