Page 28 of X-Ray in the Xanth (Lovely Lethal Gardens Rewind #3)

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M ack sat with Doreen, watching her as she stared off to the side, as Elizabeth and her team worked. Mack noted, “You appear to be deep in thought.”

She nodded. “Don’t suppose you could get me a few answers to a few questions, could you?”

He frowned at her and asked, “What questions?”

“The senator’s daughter.”

He nodded. “What about her?”

“What was she doing here?”

“She went to school here.”

“But she came back, right? I mean, this visit when she went missing wasn’t from her school days, correct?”

“I don’t know,” he replied. “Is it important?”

“Yes, it is important,” she stated.

“You think it’s connected?” he asked, looking somewhat startled, then back over at the grave.

“Yes, I think it’s connected,” she said, keeping an eye on the bones.

Mack frowned. “Connected to Eli? Connected to the senator’s daughter?”

She nodded. “But nobody will believe me.”

“I don’t know about that,” he muttered. “It seems to me that everybody believes everything you say these days.”

“I don’t want that either. I’m just trying to get you the proof, so I know too. But I also need to know why she came back.”

“You want to tell me why?”

She looked at him and shook her head. “No, not really.”

“Okay, I will attempt to get you a few answers, but it’ll have to wait.”

She nodded. “I don’t think it would have to wait very long.”

“Then maybe you need to tell me a little more about what you’re thinking,” he suggested. “Why would you think that this second body, which we don’t even know anything about, is connected?”

She smiled. “I can tell you it’s connected, sure. However, I can’t prove it.”

“Ah, I love hearing those words out of your mouth,” he teased, with a grin on his face. She didn’t grin back, and his smile fell away. “You’re really sure of this, aren’t you?”

“Sure?… No. Worried that it is? Yes.”

“And yet”—he stared at her—“why worried though? Do you think we’ll find more bodies?”

“I hope not,” she said, “but it is a concern.”

“What, that there might be more bodies?” he asked, looking at her in astonishment.

“I would need to know why the senator’s daughter was up here first.”

Frowning, he went to his emails to see if anything helpful was there. “Not a whole lot in the emails regarding that case.”

“I hear you,” she said. “So really my question is, why was that not asked?”

“Because the witnesses would have just replied that she came back up for a visit.”

“Right, and what are the chances?” She looked around, lowered her voice, and added, “What are the chances that she came up to visit Eli?”

“Time frame’s wrong, at least according to what we know to date,” he noted, looking around the site. “And yet she might have known him, I guess.”

“What did she do for a job? Would she have crossed paths with him somehow?”

“I don’t know,” he admitted, staring at her, “but their age discrepancy makes that seem to be a huge stretch.”

She nodded. “But if, for some reason, this body turns out to be female, will you consider following up on that?”

“Of course I’ll follow up,” he confirmed, “if for no other reason than now you’ve got me wondering.”

She laughed. “I need you to do more than wonder though,” she added. “I know it seems far-fetched, but…”

“Yeah, not only far-fetched,” he interjected, “but it doesn’t help us if we’ve got two bodies here.”

“Actually it does.”

He groaned, closed his eyes, and asked, “So, do you want to enlighten me on just how it helps?”

“Because very few people would have known where the first body was buried.”

He opened his eyes. “So, you’re really thinking it’s the same killer.”

“I am thinking it’s the same killer,” she stated sadly.

He shook his head. “Please don’t tell me that you thinking you know who did it.”

“Pretty sure I know who did it. But again…”

“But again,” he pointed out, “we are leaping way too fast in advance of any facts.”

Just then Elizabeth straightened, arched her back in a stretch, then walked over toward them. “You just seem to have a nose for murder.”

“I know,” Doreen whispered. “So, it’s a woman, isn’t it?”

Elizabeth stared at Doreen and then slowly nodded. “Are you telling me you know who this is?”

“No, I’m not telling you that,” Doreen clarified. “I’m just afraid that I do.”

Elizabeth looked from her to Mack and back again. “If you can shorten my process of sorting this out,” she added, “that would help.”

“You may not like what I’m about to say, but I would suggest that you test the DNA from that finger against the DNA you have from the senator’s daughter,” Doreen suggested.

Elizabeth’s expression thinned, and she nodded. “That I can do. We have all that back at the office.” With that, she turned to Mack. “Is there any reason to suspect that we need to keep processing this field?”

Mack snorted, then turned to Doreen and asked, “Doreen, is there any reason to suspect that we need to keep processing the rest of this field?”

She looked down at the open gravesite and frowned. “As far as I know at this time, no. Yet I wasn’t expecting to see a second body here either.”

“Are you sure?” Elizabeth asked, staring at her, almost disgruntled. “You seem to be a step ahead of all of us, each and every time.”

“Don’t take it personally,” Mack told Elizabeth. “You’re just getting a dose of what we have to deal with all the time. Doreen with all the answers, while the rest of us are beating our heads against a wall.”

“And yet I don’t have all the answers,” Doreen admitted. “I wish I did. Just because I have a working theory doesn’t mean I have anything that’ll hold up in court. I don’t think I have anything at the moment that would make either one of you believe me.”

Mack sighed. “I highly suggest you come with me back to the office and tell me exactly what you think you’ve found here.”

“I will,” Doreen agreed, “tomorrow. After Elizabeth’s done her test.”

Elizabeth shrugged. “Normally I would go home and get this stench off me, but now you’ve got me curious. I’ll test it as soon as I get back to the lab.” And, with that, she headed back over to the grave site and organized the removal and the loading up of all the bones.

As soon as Elizabeth was gone, Mack turned to Doreen and asked, “Do you want to explain?”

“I’m not sure I can,” she said, frowning. “It doesn’t quite make sense just yet.”

“It never makes sense until we get the final pieces, but, if you would at least explain what you think is going on, maybe we can help you formulate a process.”

“Wouldn’t that be nice,” she muttered. “Let me think about it.”

“Doreen,” he muttered in frustration.

“I know. I know. I know,” she muttered in exasperation, “I’m really not trying to be difficult, Mack.”

He rolled his eyes. “The thing is, with you, being difficult seems to come naturally.”

She nodded. “I know, and I’m sorry. I appear to be a huge burden in your life.”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa now,” he cut in. “You don’t get to say things like that. You’re not a burden and never have been a burden, so stop.” He frowned at her. “You really think you know who did it?”

She nodded. “I really think I do.”