Dead Past

than his partner. Bundled up in winter coats and earmuffs, they looked very much alike.
    Diane shook her head, looking at his face again. “I’ve never seen him before.”
    “Some guy—Shawn Keith—called it in,” said the other patrolman. “He said something about a woman being in trouble. Didn’t say it was you, Dr. Fallon.”
    “Keith may not have known it was me. The kid tried to stop him first.”
    As the EMTs worked getting him stable for transport to the hospital, Diane gave the police details on her encounter with the youth.
    “You’re lucky he had only one hand. Punk kids are dangerous. He’s probably the meth cook who blew up the house,” the patrolman added, nodding in the direction of the fire.
    Diane doubted it. Whoever was cooking the meth was probably dead in the explosion. But more than likely, the kid was connected in some way.
    “Could I get a ride to the crime lab?” she said. I’ll have my forensic people process my car when we’re allowed back in the area.”
    “Yeah, sure.” Both of them looked in the direction of the fire as if they had just remembered it and the evacuation order. “We’d better get out of here.”
    They saw the ambulance off and, after retrieving Diane’s suitcase, the three of them piled into the police car. She was glad she had put her suitcase in her trunk instead of the backseat where he would have bled all over it. On the way to the crime lab, the two of them took turns admonishing her for not having snow tires in the middle of a North Georgia winter.
    They let her out at the entrance to her crime lab. Diane smiled and thanked them, glad to get away from their banter. The sick dread in her stomach, which she had awakened with because of the fire and the fear inspired by the gun-wielding kid, was still with her. Instead of going up to the lab, she walked around the building to the entrance to the RiverTrail Museum of Natural History.
    Chanell Napier, head of museum Security, was on night duty and opened the door for her before she had a chance to fish out her key.
    “Cold night out there, Dr. Fallon,” the slender, round-faced African-American woman said as Diane entered. “What you doing out here so late?”
    Diane explained about the explosion of the house on the street near her apartment and the mandatory evacuation. She left out the part about the carjacker because she felt too tired for the questions that were sure to follow.
    “Oh, no. There’s students from Bartram living in those houses, aren’t there?”
    Diane nodded. “I’m going to stay in my office the rest of the evening,” she said.
    Juliet Price from Aquatics, who managed the seashell collection, came across the lobby toward the doors. She looked like a waif or a wood sprite with her wispy blond hair and slender figure. She fumbled in her purse and pulled out her car keys as she reached Diane and Chanell.
    “You working mighty late,” said Chanell.
    “I don’t need much sleep,” said Juliet. She nodded at Diane and Chanell as she hurried out the large double doors.
    “She’s a scared little thing, isn’t she,” said Chanell.
    “Juliet’s a shy one,” said Diane. “She’s good at her job, though.” Diane looked at her watch. “I wish I didn’t need much sleep. Don’t call me unless the museum’s on fire.”
    “Sure thing,” said Chanell.
    As Diane made her way through the large double doors of the east wing and to her private conference room adjoining her museum office, she expected her cell phone to ring at any moment. It didn’t. She took off her wet boots and socks and lay down on the stuffed sofa. A brown suede and cotton jacket of Frank’s was lying across the back. She picked it up and folded it into a pillow. It smelled of his cologne. He’d been gone only three days, chasing a fraud lead to Seattle. It seemed like a month.
    Frank was a rock—always reasonable, always logical, and always loving. She thought about calling him, but he was probably asleep—or maybe playing poker with his detective friends in Seattle. He would ask her how her day was and she would say great, but tomorrow wouldn’t be a good day at all. Tomorrow she’d have to identify charred bodies. Frank would sympathize and say some right thing; then he would tell her how fortunate that the dead have her to speak for them, and he’d tell her he would be home as soon as he could. She wished he were here now. Frank liked to cuddle and she would like to have him here to warm her.