Free Dead Guilty by Beverly Connor

bureau. It’s been pretty redun
dant
for
the
past
couple
months—dry
and
hot.
I’ve
duplicated the environment for my babies here.’’ He
pointed to his rearing chambers.
‘‘Here’s some more insects. Larva and bug parts.’’
She handed them over and began logging in the cloth
ing and rope she had collected from the autopsies.
‘‘Discover anything new?’’ David asked.
Diane sat down in a chair and stretched out her legs
in front of her. ‘‘Some. Right now the vics all look to
be in their twenties. Blue is a female and has a tattoo
of a butterfly on her ankle. Green’s a male. He’s had
his appendix out and has a heart condition. Not seri
ous. Red’s another female. She has a tattoo of a hum
mingbird
on
the
right
side
of
her
lower
back
and
another one of a rose on the upper part of her left
breast.’’
‘‘Good tattoos?’’
Diane
thought
a
moment.
‘‘Yeah,
they
are.
Very
intricate.’’
‘‘Expensive, then.’’
‘‘Could be.’’
David ran his hands through what was left of his
hair—a
thick
curly
fringe
around
his
head.
‘‘That’ll
help.’’
‘‘Did
you
happen
to
find
any
fingertips?’’
Diane
asked him. ‘‘None of the bodies had theirs.’’
‘‘Nope.
We
did
find
where
a
truck
was
parked.
From the cable marks on the tree branches, I’d say
he hoisted them up with a winch.’’
‘‘How’s Neva doing? Jin said you took her out for
a walk-through.’’
He wavered his hand from side to side. ‘‘She’s about
fifty-fifty.
Hasn’t
decided
if
she
likes
this
work
yet.
They just assigned her here, you know, didn’t ask her
if she wanted it. But she’s no different than any other
newbie I’ve trained.’’
‘‘How are you doing?’’ asked Diane.
‘‘You
don’t
have
to
watch
me.
I’m
not
going
to
self-destruct.’’
‘‘I’m
not
worried
about
your
sanity,
just
your
happiness.’’
David Goldstein had shown up literally on Diane’s
doorstep,
asking
for
a
job.
The
massacre
of
their
friends at the mission in South America had left him,
like her, on the edge of sanity—burnt out and with
no place to go. Diane’s loss of her daughter had so
overwhelmed
her
she
didn’t
really
see
the
grief
the
others
were
feeling
from
losing
their
friends.
David
was adrift when he arrived in Rosewood. Diane was
glad to be able to give him a job. It surprised her that
he requested to work in her new crime lab.
‘‘Are you sure you want to do that?’’ she had asked
him.
‘‘Don’t
you
want
to
get
away
from
everything
we’ve seen?’’
‘‘Don’t
you?’’
It
was
a
reasonable
question.
‘‘Diane—you
know
how
it
was.
You
stand
in
those
concrete rooms splattered with dark stains you know
are going to be blood, and you look at the shackles
and dirty rusted tables and you know that no matter
how
many
people
you
interview,
how
many
deposi
tions you get, those responsible will never be put on
trial.
Most
of
the
time,
the
best
we
could
hope
for
was to have some poor schmuck arrested who was just
guarding the place.
‘‘But
this
here...abig
percentage
of
the
time,
we’ll
bring
the
killers
to
justice.
I
need
to
do
that.
Bring killers to justice. I need to know that what I’m
doing will make a difference.’’
‘‘Our record out there was a little better than that,’’
Diane had whispered almost to herself, but she knew
what he meant. Rarely did they get to the top of the
food chain.
‘‘I’m
doing
okay,’’
he
said
finally.
‘‘What’s
nice
about the museum here is when things get tough with
the crime evidence, I can go look at rocks, or shells
or the big dinosaurs. I particularly like the shells. The
colors and the curved shapes are very soothing. Re
member
how
Gregory
paintings,
particularly
liked
to
go
look
at
beautiful
the
Vermeers,
whenever
we
were near a museum? It’s like that.’’
Gregory had been their boss at World Accord Inter
national and a mentor to Diane. Gregory even carried
postcard-sized
representations
of
famous
paintings.
The