She felt useless. A criminologist could tell you why people did horrible things, not where they were doing them. And she wasn’t really making any headway with Drew’s paper. All she had were more questions.
If she had spoken with him before, maybe… Grief welled up inside her. She blinked back the tears. How could he be gone?
Looking to distract herself, she focused on the family of deer again. Four of them stood eating grass, occasionally glancing around before returning to their meal. A rabbit skittered across the ground not far from them and birds called to each other from the trees. She smiled at the innocence of the scene.
All that was missing was for the woodland creatures to join hands in a sing-along, and then the movie scene moment would be complete. I’ll have to get Max out here. He’ll love it.
Her smile faded. The baseball-sized hole that had taken up residence in her chest reminded her that wouldn't be happening. She couldn't go near Max, or Kati, right now without endangering them.
Dropping her head into her hands, she thought of Drew, his smile and excitement whenever he spoke of his work. Unbidden, the image from her dream returned, followed by what she imagined Tom was probably going through. It was all just so evil.
Unburdened, the family of deer continued to munch away. What a simple life. No gun battles, kidnappings, murders. Just meandering through green fields all day.
“Can I join you?”
She glanced up, surprised to see Jake behind her. “I didn’t hear you come up.”
“It’s my military training. It teaches us how to sneak up on pretty girls.”
She grinned. “What an incredibly useful expenditure of taxpayer money.” Although her tone was light, his words gave her a thrill.
She pointed at the family of deer in the distance. “I was just thinking about how idyllic their life must be.”
Sitting in the chair next to her, he said, “Maybe for those guys. But most deer spend their time avoiding hunters, desperately foraging for food, and trying to keep from freezing in the winter.”
She looked at him for a long moment. When she spoke, her tone was dry. “You know, you’re really ruining my Disney moment here.”
He let out a chuckle. “Sorry. I’m sure Bambi and his friends are living the high life.”
She smiled. They sat in companionable silence for a few moments, enjoying the peace.
“Any luck upstairs?” she asked.
Jake sighed. “No. If there’s a dig site, no one seems to have heard anything. The other three are still looking for some leads, but I’m not hopeful.”
“I’m sure we’ll find something soon.”
“Maybe.” The sound of Laney’s cell phone interrupted her reply. She glanced down at the caller ID before answering. “Hey, Rocky. How are you? How’s Mike?”
“I’m good,” Rocky answered. “Just a couple stitches and a few pints of blood. Mike’s in the ICU, but they’re talking about moving him to a regular room soon. He’ll have to take it easy for a while, but they expect him to make a complete recovery.”
“Thank God. At least that’s one piece of good news.”
“Well, I also have some news from Dr. Nichols. Although, I’m not sure it fits in the ‘good’ category.”
“Hold on a sec. Jake’s here with me. I’m going to put you on speakerphone.” She punched the speaker phone button and placed it on the table. “Okay. Go ahead. You said the M.E. came back with some results. Let me guess, Paul’s not human.”
Rocky was silent.
Laney glanced at Jake. “Rocky? I was kidding about that not-human thing.”
“Well, you might not be that far off. The Doc explained it to me and, to be honest, I don't understand all of the science behind it. Hold on. I wrote this down.”
The sound of shuffling papers could be heard through the phone. “Okay, let’s see. She said something about healing involving a rush of platelets that create something called a fibrin clot. That happens within minutes. Followed by um, angiogenesis, collagen deposition, granulation tissue formation, epithelialization, and wound contraction.”
Jake glanced at her, one eyebrow raised.
She shrugged. “Uh, Rocky? Any chance you could dumb all this down for us?”
Rocky chuckled. “Yeah. I had the M.E. do that for me, too. Long story short, the entire wound healing process works exponentially faster in our boy. His platelet count is off the charts, which means he creates a fibrin clot almost instantaneously. He heals at lightning-fast speeds. In fact, the M.E. said that some of the shots to his heart already showed evidence of healing.”
“Then how did he die?” Jake asked.