Page 14 of Crime Lab Cold Case (Pacific Northwest Forensics #2)

Natalie’s hands dropped from Michael’s chest, and she took a step back from him and all the promise that had been in his eyes a minute earlier. “What do you know? Does everyone know?”

Folding his arms, he perched on the edge of the desk behind him. “Why don’t you just tell me?”

“You know my maiden name, so you must know about my connection to this area.” She fell onto the bed and crossed her arms behind her head. “You must know about Katie Fellows…and that I was with her the night she disappeared.”

“No thanks to you. I had to sleuth around to find out—not because I wanted dirt on you. I want to know you—the real Natalie.” He swung the chair around and straddled it, crossing his arms over the back and resting his chin on them. “Tell me what happened and tell me why you’re hiding it.”

He wanted to know the real Natalie? If he did, he’d probably run away, like Joe had.

“The why is easy. If the Bureau knew about my history here, they never would’ve sent me to look into the lab. I need to look into the lab. I think the muddling of evidence here is the reason Katie’s case got short shrift.”

“And maybe the fact that her body was never found.” He licked his lips. “Is the first part harder to talk about?”

“Not really. I’ve been over it in my head a million times. I’ve talked about it and analyzed it from every direction with my therapist.” She lifted her head. “Don’t.”

“Therapy is good. You need it for…trauma?”

“It happened fourteen years ago, when I was a teenager. You’d think I’d be over it by now, but I can’t shake the memory of it. Maybe, and I know this sounds bad, but maybe if Katie’s body had been found and someone had been tried and convicted of her murder, I could move on.”

“Doesn’t sound bad. It makes sense. That’s why you’re here. So you can move on. Maybe you can start that process by telling me what happened that night.”

She scooched up to the top of the bed and plumped some pillows against the headboard.

Might as well get comfortable. “It was all my fault. I was into Wiccan stuff and all that nonsense. I was the new kid my junior year of high school. I was a Goth girl at a school that didn’t have Goth, so Katie glommed on to me from the start.

I piqued her curiosity, I guess. Anyway, we kind of formed a clique with another girl, Bella Owens. ”

“Is she still in town?”

“She’s in Seattle, but her family still lives here. They wouldn’t be too pleased to see me show up on their doorstep.” She drew her knees to her chest and wrapped her arms around her legs. “Bella couldn’t make it that night, but Katie and I snuck out to the woods to conjure spirits.”

“Let me guess, at midnight?”

“Not quite, but late enough that it was pitch-black. We had our little offering on the floor of the forest, and then we started hearing noises from the trees. Once we figured out the noises were human, not animal, that’s when we made a run for it.

” She leaned her chin on her knees. “I figured she’d run toward the campsite area, like me, but she took off toward the drop-off at the end of Devil’s Edge. ”

Michael asked, “Did you call the police?”

“Not right away. I made my way home and texted Katie the rest of the night, but she never answered. I didn’t get a wink of sleep and when Katie’s mom called our house that morning to ask if Katie was with me, I went into a panic.

I told my parents what happened, and they marched me down to the sheriff’s station in town—right into Deputy Reynolds’s office. ”

“Did you see anyone that night? Hear a voice? A smell? Anything?”

“The voice was distorted, just like out of a horror movie. That’s what sent us fleeing through the woods. Didn’t see or smell anything but woods and pine.” She scooped the bedspread in her hands, curling her fingers into the material. “And I didn’t tell them the entire truth.”

“You left out the Wiccan ritual.”

“I didn’t want everyone blaming me more than they already did. Katie was a good girl before I showed up. I led her down a dark trail—one that literally got her killed.” A tear leaked from the corner of her eye, and she brushed it away.

Michael sprung from his chair and sat on the side of the bed, next to her.

He took her hand and rubbed his thumb in a circle on her palm.

“You were a dumb kid. You both were. My friends and I could’ve died a half a dozen times with the stunts we pulled in high school—and that really would’ve been our faults.

But what happened to Katie isn’t your fault or hers—just the deviant who snatched her. ”

“I have to uncover what happened to Katie, Michael. It’s the only way I can live with this. There had to have been more and better evidence collected from the woods. The forensic lab’s mishandling of that evidence allowed a murder to walk.”

“Wait, wait.” He lunged for his jacket, which was hanging on the back of a chair, and plunged his hand in the pocket, withdrawing his phone. He swiped across the display. He held out his phone. “Wiccan pendant.”

She stared at the picture of her necklace on Michael’s phone. “How did you even figure that out?”

“I saw you looking at something in a baggie when I showed up for lunch today, and I noted the case you had spread out before you. Didn’t take me long when I researched that case to figure out this was what you were looking at. Is it yours? Is that what freaked you out?”

“It’s mine. I gave it to Katie that night when we started hearing sounds from the woods. It was supposed to ward off evil spirits, but I guess I should’ve given her something to ward off evil humans.”

“Your pendant that Katie had when she disappeared ended up around another murder victim’s throat.

Unless a random killer came across this pendant in the woods, picked it up and decided to use it in his next murder, the person who abducted and probably killed Katie is the same person who killed Sierra Conchas. ”

“Exactly. And Sierra Conchas is one of my assigned cold cases.”

Michael got it, and with no judgment aimed at her. For the first time in a while, Natalie felt a lightness in her chest, the ability to take a full breath and release it. Why had she waited to tell him the truth?

She twirled a lock of hair around her finger. “I guess with all this knowledge, you could torpedo my audit here. But they’d probably just send someone else in my place.”

“Is that what you think I’d do?”

“You weren’t happy about my arrival.” She leveled a finger at him. “Admit it. Lou Gray is not the only one at the lab who resented my presence. He just didn’t hide it the way most of you did. If I’d told you all this at the start, you would’ve had me on the first plane back to DC.”

“Maybe. Is that why you—” he slid off the bed and pocketed his phone “—showed some interest in me?”

She stifled a laugh. “I’m not that devious.

I showed interest in you because I like the way that one lock of black hair keeps falling into your face.

I like the way your blue eyes light up your otherwise scowling complexion when something excites you.

I like the way your lips curve up every time you mention your daughter. And I like the way you look at me.”

“What way is that?” His eyes smoldered and his nostrils flared.

“Just like that.”

He hesitated before stuffing his arms in the sleeves of his jacket. “I’m not going to report you to the FBI. I’m not going to interfere with your investigation into the lab. And I might even be able to help you.”

She scrambled off the bed. “Really? You’d do that?”

“I know what it means to have questions, to want justice.” He cupped her face with one hand. “And I know what it is to feel guilt, even when everyone tells you it’s unwarranted.”

“Thank you, Michael. I don’t want to get you into any trouble at the lab.”

“What trouble? The lab collected and analyzed evidence for some cold cases, and two of them now seem linked through that witch’s-knot necklace. Sierra Conchas’s case is on your radar, and now the Katie Fellows case is, too.”

“But nobody knows about that pendant—nobody but us.”

“Maybe we should keep it that way for now.” He kissed her swiftly on the lips, as if any longer contact would ignite an inferno, and made a beeline for the door. “If you feel worse tomorrow, go straight to urgent care.”

When the door closed behind him, Natalie raised her fingers to her mouth and pressed them against her lips, imprinting his kiss there for the rest of the night ahead.

Who knew being honest had its perks?

She downed the last sip in the little wine bottle and tossed it in the trash. As she turned toward the bathroom to get ready for bed, a knock on the door stopped her.

A rush of warm, stickiness flooded her body. Had Michael changed his mind? She launched herself at the door and pulled it open. “I’m glad you…”

Her words trailed off as she stared at a man in blue scrubs, his blond hair tousled, as if he’d just spent all night in surgery. Her brain fogged over. Had the EMTs sent someone back here to check on her? Had they discovered something off in her vitals?

“Y-yes?”

“It is you. I wasn’t sure when I saw you at Thai Boat, but face-to-face, yeah. Nat Cooper.”

Natalie stepped back, hiding halfway behind the door, blood roaring in her ears. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. That’s not my name.”

“C’mon, Nat.” The man clawed through his hair with his fingers, making it stand on end even more. “It’s me. Zane. Zane Tolbert.”

Natalie clapped a hand over her mouth. Of course, it was Zane.

Hair had turned a dirty blond, but he still had a smattering of freckles across his nose, and he hadn’t added an ounce of fat on his tall, lanky frame.

Katie’d had the biggest crush on Zane, and they’d just started getting exclusive when she disappeared.

She hissed through her fingers. “What are you doing here?”

“I wanted until that guy left, Michael Wilder. Honestly, if he’d spent much more time in here with you alone, I was going to charge in here to save you.” He whispered. “He probably murdered his wife.”

“He did not murder his wife.” She grabbed Zane’s arm and pulled him into the room. “What do you want, Zane? I hope you haven’t told anyone I’m here. I’m, uh, here on official business.”

His eyes popped open. “I heard in town that you were some kind of cop here to look into Wilder at the lab. But if that’s not it, is the official business Katie’s disappearance?”

“N-no, not really. I’m with the FBI, and I’m looking into some cold cases—not Katie’s and not Raine Wilder’s homicide.” She pointed to the chair Michael had recently vacated, and she sat on the edge of the bed. “Is this a social call, or what?”

“Look, I understand why you wanna keep a low profile here. You were persona non grata when you and your family left. A lot of people blamed you for Katie’s disappearance.”

One of Natalie’s eyes twitched. Not more than she blamed herself.

“Not me. I never did. You didn’t make Katie do anything she didn’t want to do.” He scooped his hair from his eyes. “Do you have a beer or something? I just got off a twelve-hour shift, and I’m beat.”

“In there.” She aimed a toe at the minifridge. “Are you a doctor?”

He crouched in front of the minibar and pulled out a can of beer. “I’m a nurse.”

“Why did you follow me? What do you want, Zane?”

“I never got to talk to you after Katie went missing. The cops even thought I may have had something to do with it, but I know who did it.”

“You do?” Twisting her fingers in her lap, Natalie swallowed.

He dropped his chin to his chest. “I think it was a cop.”