Already His, page 10
The front of a ship?
It was only seeing the real ship in front of her and then the vision that gave her the connection. The illustration was the front part of a ship, cropped off so that only the figurehead and a small part of the hull was visible, inked in colors on the page. Maybe it was a print, or maybe it had been painted right on the page—she couldn’t tell.
Her sight slid to the carving as it always did. The carving. Could it be…?
Was it a figurehead too?
She tried to focus, but as always, the ‘camera’ of her vision didn’t obey her. She was left uselessly trying to focus, only able to make out the vague outlines of the wooden shape as the darkness swirled around what she could see, but yes, she thought—it could be a figurehead.
It was all linked.
All figureheads.
They were the link now, not the water. The boats, the figureheads themselves.
Her vision swung upward as before, showing her the window. Beyond it, the ships. The harbor. The docked vessels with their masts…
And their figureheads.
She found herself rising higher in the vision, as though the person whose eyes she saw through was getting up. As though they were moving closer to the window. There was a reflection in the glass. Blurred, indistinct, and shifting through the unraveling edges of the vision, but a reflection of a figure looking back—
Laura blinked, finding herself back with her hand on the ship, looking upward and seeing more potential handholds and footholds. He could have climbed up this way, even with a body.
“His back,” she said, thoughtfully. The vision hadn’t showed her much new, though the realization she was looking at figureheads was a breakthrough. She didn’t know what that meant or how it helped yet, but somehow the feeling had energized her to realize something new.
“What?” Nate asked, moving closer.
“He could carry them on his back to get up there,” she said. “We’ve been wondering how he moves around. Maybe he ropes them to himself, climbs up, and then uses that same rope to tie them to the figurehead.”
“That makes sense,” Nate said, tilting his head and nodding. “In which case, we should be expecting even more forensic evidence from the ropes. And we’re looking for someone with a lot of upper body and core strength.”
“I think we should get them sent to an FBI lab,” Laura said. She didn’t add the part about not having them examined here because nobody was able to do their jobs well enough, but it was implied enough.
“Me too,” Nate agreed. “We can send the other samples too. Sheriff, did they give you any timeline for the victim?”
“Hours,” the Sheriff shrugged. “It won’t be right away. Her name is Alana Garland, by the way. And before you ask, I don’t know of any connection between her and the others. I don’t see how they would have interacted much.”
Laura shot him a look with narrowed eyes. “Have you spoken to Garland’s family yet?” she asked.
“No,” he shrugged. “They don’t know yet.”
Laura could only stare at him.
How long had it been, and no one had told the family yet that their daughter, wife, or whatever she was to them was potentially fighting for her life in the hospital?
“Have them meet us at the hospital,” she snapped, heading back to the car quickly. “And Sheriff? No one touches this crime scene. I mean no one. You keep everyone back, don’t let your deputies or your coroner or anybody else do anything, and you wait. We’re sending a new team.”
“We are?” Nate asked in a lowered voice as they returned to their car.
“We are,” Laura confirmed. “You can call Rondelle on the way. We need a full forensic team down here to do this properly. I’m not letting them blame it all on a washout. No more incompetence—we’re nailing him on this one.”
“Yes, boss,” Nate said, seemingly stunned at her fierceness all of a sudden. Laura grabbed the driver’s side door and ignored him, wanting to get to the hospital as quickly as possible now that a life could still be on the line.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
“For Christ’s sake,” Laura muttered, almost hitting the steering wheel in frustration and only managing to hold herself back because she didn’t want to activate the horn by accident. The slow-moving truck in front of her put on its hazard lights and slowed down, letting them pass, perhaps sensing her frustration although the driver couldn’t have known that they were law enforcement.
“Just calm down,” Nate said, which made Laura want to snap his head off even more than the driver’s.
“I want to get there in case she wakes up,” Laura said. “If she saw him, we’re done. We can wrap this whole thing up. But if no one’s there to ask, and she slips away…”
“I know the frustration,” Nate said, shifting in his seat and holding onto the overheard handle. “I would just like to get there in one piece. Not collected into the back of a truck which, by the way, would definitely win in a fight with this car.”
“I keep seeing the same damn thing,” Laura said, which wasn’t really a reply but was related all the same. “The same table, the book, the carving. I think I’m looking at figureheads. But how does that even help? It’s not like we can check every single residence or building for a room with a book in it that has an illustration on one page of a figurehead.”
“You must be seeing things from his perspective, though,” Nate argued. “That’s good. That gets us closer.”
“Does it?” Laura scoffed in frustration. “All it gets me is a headache.” The pain throbbed behind her eyes even more as she said it. She felt like she’d hardly slept at all now. The pain of the vision as well as the headache from the tiredness combined into one supercharged attack on her skull. She just wanted to go back to bed, except she didn’t. She wanted to catch a murderer and see a girl who had been expected to die wake up. She wanted a happy ending, or as happy as you could get when two people were already dead anyway.
“We’ll get there,” Nate reassured her. “We always do.”
“Yes, but we don’t always manage to do it before another person dies,” Laura snapped. She took a breath, having to brake as she nearly went out into the path of an oncoming vehicle when she tried to overtake. She flexed her hands on the steering wheel in an attempt to make herself slow down. “Sorry. I’m stressed.”
“I can see that,” Nate said wryly. “It’s not just the case, is it?”
“No,” Laura admitted. The GPS said they were almost at the hospital. She slumped back slightly in her seat, knowing they were nearly there. “It’s Chris too.”
“Did you talk to him last night?”
“Tried to,” Laura said. She shrugged. “He didn’t answer.”
“Just let him go, Laura. You’ll be better off. If he’s too much stress, then look after yourself, and let him go.” Nate’s tone was kind, even if his words stung. Laura knew he was trying to look out for her, trying to be her friend, but the advice didn’t feel like something she could take.
“It’s not just our relationship though, is it?” Laura asked. “There’s Amy. And she’s become such good friends with Lacey. And anyway, that’s not all. I had a dream about him.”
“A vision dream?” Nate asked.
“No, just your regular run of the mill nightmare,” Laura said, taking the turning for the hospital. A sign beckoned, telling them which way to go for guest parking. “I think it was because of what you said before. I dreamed he had me sectioned when I told him I was psychic.”
Nate sucked in a breath. Laura spared a glance toward him as she drove up toward the parking spaces. He was shaking his head slightly, almost to himself.
“And you’re sure it was just a dream?”
“Unless he’s going to have a team of white-coated psych ward goons waiting outside his house at all hours to take me away, on the recommendation of you and the Chief, I think it was a dream,” Laura said drily.
“I would never—not even when I thought—” Nate started, but Laura cut him off with a wave of her hand as she parked.
“I know,” she said. “I know. That’s why I said I was sure it was a dream. We need to go find out what ward she’s on.”
“Right,” Nate said, opening the door before she’d even finished parking. “But, Laura, I really do want you to consider just letting Chris go. It’s not worth this level of stress.”
“Love isn’t?” Laura asked, before she could stop herself.
Nate gave her one more glance through the open door, then slammed it shut as he walked away toward the hospital entrance.
Laura swore under her breath. What was Nate’s problem? Just because he was unlucky in love, she had to be alone too?
She hadn’t meant to say love. Not really. She wasn’t sure if she was there with Chris yet. Sometimes she thought she was, but other times…
Other times she knew that if she really loved him, she would have told him the truth already to prevent things going the way they had with Marcus.
She turned off the engine and wrenched off her seatbelt, following after Nate as rapidly as she could without actually breaking into a run and thereby potentially running into someone in the hospital or causing some kind of accident. Where did he get off telling her what to do with her life, anyway? Just because he’d been mostly single for all the time she knew him, barring one serious relationship that also ultimately went nowhere, did he think he was qualified to give relationship advice?
Laura found herself storming through the hospital with an angry stomp—angry at Nate for trying to make her break up with Chris, angry at herself because she had to keep lying, angry at Chris for being a doctor and a man of reason, angry at the Sheriff for not doing his job right, at the killer for taking these lives, and at herself again for not catching him and stopping him before this victim was injured.
At everything and everyone, but most of all at herself, and on top of all that—angry that she was an alcoholic and so still could never, even at a time of this much stress, have another drink again.
She found Nate already moving away from the front desk, clearly having been given instructions on where to go. Laura jogged slightly to catch up with him. He glanced over his shoulder to check that she was there and then sped up. Laura appreciated the urgency of the situation—she’d almost crashed the car to get here faster, after all—but the fact that he sped up when she was clearly already struggling to catch up just irked her more.
She arrived breathlessly at the doors of the ward at the same time as him, and he pushed through, holding one of them open for her.
Nate was the kind of person who made it hard for you to stay mad at him because he was always so fair and consistent, but that also only served to make you feel even more mad.
“She’s in a private room down here,” he said. “Out of the way of the press, they said at the desk. You know, you’d have to be kept out of sight as well if they wanted to study you. They would have to make sure no one knew where you were at all, to avoid accusations of violating your human rights.”
“Stop,” Laura told him crossly, shaking her head. “You’re basing this on nothing.”
“I’m basing it on knowing what it’s like to be a minority,” he said. “To be treated like a freak.”
Laura shook her head. “Don’t be melodramatic. Being Black is nothing like being psychic. There’s a lot more people like you, for a start.”
“That makes it worse,” Nate insisted. “When there’s only a few of you and no one even knows you exist, they could get away with doing anything to you. Anything at all.”
Laura shook her head. “I’m not talking about this anymore,” she said. “Stop trying to scare me for no reason. We’ve got a job to focus on.”
Nate looked like he wanted to say something else, but he looked past her, and his gaze changed, his features becoming more professional, smoothed, less frustrated. “She’s there,” he said, nodding at the room they were just about to pass.
Laura spun. Through the small window in the door, she could see the patient with a couple of doctors working around her. Someone else rushed by, and Laura took advantage of that moment to step inside the room after her.
“Family members need to wait down the hall,” someone said without really looking at her or Nate.
“Not family,” Laura said, holding up her badge in case anyone wanted to look at it. “FBI. We need to speak with her if she wakes up at all, even if it’s just for a moment.”
“Fine,” one of the team around the bed, probably a senior doctor given his age, barked. “But for now, get out. Go down the hall to the waiting room. We’ll call you.”
Laura didn’t need to be told twice—not if her staying there was going to interfere with their efforts to save her. She backed out of the room and moved down the hall instead, casting around until she saw an overhead sign which indicated a door that led to the waiting room.
“Over there,” Laura said. She glanced over her shoulder, seeing Nate hesitating.
“We can’t just sit and wait all day,” he said.
“No, but if her family are in there, then we can get some interviews done while staying nearby,” Laura replied. “Come on.”
Nate gave a shrug of his shoulders in agreement and began to lope after her, catching up so much easier than she had. She was the one to push open the door this time, studiously making sure that he could come through after her without needing to touch it at all.
The scene that greeted them was one of obvious anxiety: fear and worry were carved deep on the faces of all three people in the room, each of whom looked up as they entered. They had that strange mix of hope and terror that settled on those waiting for news of their loved ones. They welcomed news and progress, but at the same time did not want to hear the worst news that was possible.
“I’m Special Agent Laura Frost,” Laura said, since she had all of their attention. “This is my partner, Special Agent Nathaniel Lavoie. I believe you’re the family members of Alana Garland?”
“We are,” someone else spoke up. A man in a long trench coat who had obviously not yet had the presence of mind to take it off, slightly balding on the top of his head. “I’m her brother, Andrew. This is my wife, Maggie.”
“I’m Andy and Alana’s sister,” the other woman in the room, who looked maybe five or even as many as ten years younger than Andrew. Laura quickly worked out the order of the siblings: Andrew was the oldest, then Alana, and then… “I’m Alexis.”
Laura stifled a smile at the naming conventions of families, which were often more predictable the more children they had. It was far too serious a situation for her to smile now. She would give the wrong impression. “We’re trying to find out who did this to your sister, but it’s going to require your cooperation. Will you all be able to answer some questions right now to help us get to the bottom of this?”
“Fine,” Andrew said, with a kind of resigned determination—which was an odd mix, but then, these kinds of situations were always odd all around. “At least we’ll be doing something and not just sitting here and waiting.”
“It’ll be alright,” Maggie murmured, squeezing her husband’s hand. She looked a little younger than him, too, with blonde hair worn in a just-so style that must have taken a lot of time and expensive treatments to perfect. She was carrying a designer purse and her shoes were stiletto heels, which was the kind of morning hospital trip choice you didn’t expect. It was clear that her husband had money, and Maggie didn’t mind spending it.
“Whatever you need,” Alexis added. She was the spitting image of her brother but female, her hair cropped short around her ears in a boyish style. “Whoever did this to Lana needs to pay.”
“We’ll do our utmost to make sure that they do,” Laura replied, stopping short of promising they would catch him out of the caution that came with experience. Still, she believed that they would. She had to believe it. She couldn’t leave this state with a killer still running around and continue to call herself an FBI agent.
“We need to know if your sister had any connection at all to either of the other two victims,” Nate said. “Elias Makks and Dina Grey.”
“I don’t know of one,” Andrew frowned. “I didn’t know Dina, but I knew Elias in passing. I’d been on one of his tours. I don’t think Alana has been, though, and she’s never mentioned him to me. He could have gone around the museum, I suppose.”
“The nautical museum,” Laura said, seizing on that. “Was it popular around here?”
Alexis made a face. “It’s more for tourists,” she said. “To be honest, when you have that kind of thing on your doorstep, you sort of forget about going to it. It’s just part of the scenery. Alana worked hard at getting the local schools to send their kids, and she also wanted the fishermen and tour guides to donate whenever they found something interesting or a bit of kit had to be retired, but she wasn’t very successful in raising the visitor numbers.”
“Don’t talk about her in past tense,” Andrew snapped. “She’s still alive.”
“Didn’t you listen to what they said?” Alexis asked, turning on him. “She’s not! They don’t even know if she died hours ago! They’re just doing what they have to do in order to be legally allowed to declare her dead!”
“How do you expect her to fight it if you won’t even believe in her?” Andrew retorted, Maggie’s hand closing tighter on his arm.
“Alright,” Laura said, holding up a hand quickly and exchanging a glance with Nate. “Please. I know that this is a tense time, but it’s really important that we stick to the questions and get as much information as we can.”
“It’s not going to help her,” Alexis muttered.
“But it could,” Laura began, although Alexis already had her beaten.
“It could help save someone else,” the younger sister said, looking up with fire in her eyes. “Ask your questions.”
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