Dead Past

Izzy, until the DNA comes back . . . We aren’t a hundred percent certain it’s Daniel.”
    “I know. But where is he? Why can’t we find him?”
    When Izzy and Archie left, Diane wanted to sit down and have a good cry. Instead, she took a deep breath and walked to her office to see how Juliet Price was. This ought to have set her back, thought Diane. If she wasn’t already having nightmares, this day should surely bring them on.

    Juliet, drinking from a bottle of orange juice, was sitting on the stuffed red sofa in Diane’s office. The guard was sitting in the easy chair. He looked up, relief evident in his face. Diane guessed he had been trying to engage Juliet in conversation. Diane thanked him. He eagerly got up, nodded a good-bye to Juliet, and left.
    Juliet set down her drink, looked at her hands a moment, and twisted her ring, an aquamarine in a gold setting. “I—I’m sorry. I disappeared on you when we were in real trouble. I’m sorry.”
    What an odd way of putting it, thought Diane as she pulled up a chair and sat across from Juliet.
    “There was nothing you could have done. We were lucky the police and my security came when they did. This was not your fault.”
    She looked up at Diane, her ice blue eyes swimming in tears. “I’m useless. I just disappear when things get hard.”
    Diane noticed blood seeping through the fabric on the arm of Juliet’s shirt.

Chapter 18

    “Were you hurt?” Diane reached over to look at her arm.
    Juliet pulled it back. “It’s nothing.”
    “Did you cut yourself?” asked Diane. Juliet was silent. “Dr. Price.” Diane used her title and a firm voice. “Let me help you. It looks like you need it.”
    “There is no help,” she whispered. “I’ve tried.”
    “What if there is help to be had? Isn’t it worth it to try again?”
    “I’m sorry I deserted you.”
    “You didn’t desert me. You were faced with maniacs with bats. Half the people in the museum would have collapsed in the face of that. I’m concerned about your cutting yourself. That is what you’re doing, isn’t it?”
    Diane saw that the door to the bathroom was open. She usually left it closed. She guessed that Juliet had cut herself when she came in from the episode in the parking lot. Some kind of strange coping strategy that Diane didn’t understand.
    Juliet was rubbing her hands, as if washing them, almost wringing them. Her face looked panicked.
    “I know that seems strange, but I have to.”
    “Doesn’t it hurt?” asked Diane.
    “Now it does. That’s the point. It doesn’t at first. It’s as though I’m disappearing—I can’t even feel anything. The cutting brings back the feeling. It anchors me back to the ground. Without it, I’ll just fade away.”
    Odd, thought Diane. Fading away was the way she saw Juliet.
    “I said it was not my intention to mind your business, but I feel like you’re in this current situation because of me.”
    “You? How?” asked Juliet.
    “The men were more than likely after me, and you were just an innocent bystander.”
    “Really?” She seemed surprised.
    Diane wondered why. Did Juliet see everything as her fault?
    “Yes, and I’m sorry. However, since I have a responsibility, I feel like I need to urge you to see someone. It doesn’t have to be Laura, and your job doesn’t depend on it. But for your own sense of self, give it a try.”
    Juliet nodded, but Diane wasn’t sure she was even listening.
    “Maybe,” she whispered.
    “That’s good enough,” said Diane. “Now let me drive you home.”
    “I can drive. I’m here now. I’m fine.”
    “I’ll have the guards walk us out.”
    “I’ll agree to that.”
    It was good for Diane to be home in her own apartment. “I need a vacation,” she said to herself as she stripped off her clothes and got into the shower.
    After a long shower, she slipped on a nightshirt and got into bed, hoping for no midnight phone calls or explosions. She fell asleep wishing Frank were here in bed with her.
    It was her clock that awoke her and not the phone. Diane thought that was a good sign. She breakfasted on peanut butter on raisin bread and an apple and dashed off to the museum. As she was getting in the car, she looked through the woods at the tent city being disassembled. She was glad to be working in her own lab from now on. She got in the car and drove off.
    After Diane checked in with Andie, she went straight to the Security office. Chanell Napier, her head of Security, was on