Page 16 of She Didn’t See It Coming

Brutus, having done his job, is now quiet, and Jayne sees Bremmer pass him a treat from his pocket, which the dog gulps down. It makes her feel slightly sick.

She turns and sees Ravi standing stiff with alarm farther back. She asks him, “Who does the locker belong to?”

“The empty unit on the eighth floor. They moved out a couple of months ago,” Ravi says, his voice shaky.

She turns to Ravi and tells him, “You let the forensics team in when they arrive. And not a word about this to anyone, do you understand? Those news teams out front will know something’s up soon enough. But you’re to say nothing about this. Okay?”

He nods quickly. He looks overwhelmed, Jayne thinks. She watches him leave, then takes a deep breath, preparing herself. She nods to Bremmer. “Good work.”

The forensics team soon arrives, the white van parking in the underground garage near the elevators.

Jayne briefs them and then leads them through to the storage lockers.

The forensics team quickly gets to work, its members moving about in white bodysuits and booties, methodically doing their jobs.

The area around the storage lockers has been cordoned off with yellow police tape.

Jayne dons the little paper booties now available to her.

She approaches Detective Kilgour, standing outside the open locker.

Together they watch what is going on inside it, both lost in their own thoughts.

Someone is taking photographs. The fingerprint people are hard at work.

Jayne knows that they and the dog have already contaminated the scene to some degree, but that can’t be helped.

“How much longer until they can open it?” she asks Kilgour.

“Not long. About another half hour or so.”

As she waits, Jayne starts to think about everything that’s ahead of them if Bryden Frost’s body is in that suitcase.

Finally, one of the team approaches her and says, “We found a lot of fingerprints on the door to the locker and on the suitcase. They aren’t necessarily those of the perpetrator.

But lots to process. No discernible footprints on this cement floor.

Do you want to open it now or have it taken back to the lab? ”

“Let’s do it now.” She follows him into the locker, and Kilgour comes with her. They watch carefully as the technician now moves the cardboard boxes out of the way and squats down beside the suitcase. She can see it’s got a combination lock on it. Jayne finds herself hoping it isn’t locked.

He presses the mechanism, and she hears a click. He carefully tries to lift the lid, meeting some resistance. Then he gives it a yank, the lid gives, and he folds it back and steps to the side.

Jayne finds herself staring at the pale, contorted body of a woman, wearing only bra and panties.

She’s in the fetal position, on her side, her legs pulled up to her chest, her neck and head curved inward.

Jayne can see thick blond hair, and she can see enough of the dead woman’s face to identify her.

Jayne knows they have found Bryden Frost’s body. And this has just turned into a homicide case.

···

Sam thinks he hears someone saying his name.

He turns toward the sound. It’s Lizzie. He sees her in front of him, staring at him, repeating his name.

Now she has her hand on his shoulder and she’s shaking him a little.

He looks at her vacantly, unable to process the enormity of everything he’s facing. Lizzie’s eyes look a little wild.

“Sam, I’m going to Angela’s to let her know what’s going on. I’ll make sure she keeps Clara for the time being. Okay? I won’t be long.”

Sam thinks of the dog searching the building while they sit here, terrified.

What’s taking them so long? It’s been hours.

He glances at his watch; it’s after eight o’clock.

He desperately needs something to take the edge off.

Suddenly he can’t face any of it. He feels genuine, physical panic.

It grips him like a vise. He feels like he is being squeezed so tight he can’t breathe.

The vise is getting tighter and tighter.

He can’t catch his breath. His anxiety is overwhelming.

He hears himself making a strangled sound and is aware somehow of Jim noticing and turning toward him.

“Sam?” Jim says, looking at him now with alarm. “Sam?”

Lizzie hears from the foyer and comes running back. They’re all staring at him.

“Breathe, Sam,” Lizzie says, kneeling down beside him. “You’re having a panic attack. That’s all it is. Breathe.” She takes deep breaths beside him, and he breathes with her, and slowly the feeling of being clamped in a vise subsides.

“You’re okay,” Lizzie says.

She goes out to check on Clara. Sam is grateful. How can he protect Clara from all this? What is he going to tell her?

What if they don’t find her mother?

What if they do?

···

As Jayne and Kilgour walk silently down the corridor toward unit 804, Jayne prepares herself for the difficult task ahead. It is never easy to tell a family bad news.

Jayne knocks on the door to the unit, opens it, and steps inside.

She immediately sees a tableau of the family, the moment before they hear the news.

Sam is still sitting where they left him, as if he hasn’t moved at all since they began to conduct the search.

Donna and Jim are with him, huddled together on the sofa.

Lizzie is standing nearby. All eyes immediately turn to her and Kilgour in fear.

“Lizzie, sit down,” Jayne says, and she obeys. Jayne and Kilgour sit as well. She leans in to speak to the family in a steady, solemn voice. “I’m so sorry. But I’m afraid we’ve found Bryden’s body.”

She watches their reactions. Disbelief, horror, shock, pain.

She focuses her attention on Sam. Nothing in his reaction suggests that he either is or is not the one who killed her.

No one says anything for a long moment. She waits for it to sink in, for them to absorb it.

Donna gasps and begins to sob, covering her face with her hands.

Jim puts his arms around her and hides his face from the rest of them.

Lizzie has gone strangely mute. She doesn’t cry.

Neither does Sam. But that means nothing, Jayne knows.

People process grief in very different ways. They are all in shock.

Jayne sits silently, waiting for someone to speak.

It’s Lizzie who finally breaks the silence. “Where did you find her?”

Jayne says carefully, “The dog found her in a storage locker in the basement. She was inside a large suitcase, hidden behind some cardboard boxes. I’m so sorry.”

As the meaning of this becomes clear, Donna lets out an awful, blood-curdling shriek.