resting on the paneled floor beside a white chalk outline.
Jack’s mouth went dry as he crossed toward the outline. He tried to control the thoughts jamming through his head. It was just chalk, a picture, nothing real, not flesh and blood and bones. Except as he got closer, he could see the dark stain emanating from the chest area of the outline, spreading out under the desk, lapping at the leather of the overturned chair. Jeremy’s blood. Jeremy’s life.
That outline was Jeremy, his last, brutal moment, as he collapsed onto the floor, some sort of ivory spear jutting from his chest. Jack could see from the drawing that he’d landed forward, angled slightly to the side, one arm outstretched, the other clutching at the thing between his ribs.
Jack dropped to one knee, just inches from the chalk. His face was cold, and he fought to stay in control. He only had a few minutes, and he needed all of his senses. The crime scene specialists had already gone through this lab a dozen times. He could see, glancing around the room, pieces of colored tape attached to various objects, some already tagged and wrapped in plastic evidence bags, logged and ready for transport to the CSI labs. Otherpieces of tape near spots on the floor and the nearby wall marked areas of blood splatter. Jack couldn’t be sure, but he guessed from the placement of the tags that the crime scene specialists had been working in a spiral pattern, starting at the door, ending at the chalk outline in front of him.
If the specialists had missed anything, it wasn’t going to be something simple or obvious. Jack looked up toward the glass desk, just a few feet away. The desk was empty; the oversize computer flat-screen and the shattered remains of his brother’s laptop had already been bagged, cataloged, and brought to the CSI labs. The detectives who’d questioned Jack had told him that both computers had been professionally erased before they’d gotten to them. A thorough job; both hard drives had been magnetically wiped, and then a virus had been implanted to make any sort of data recovery impossible.
Which begged the question: Was it possible that Jeremy had been working on something using the computers that had gotten him killed? Or did the computers somehow contain evidence that would lead to the killer—something as simple as an appointment calendar or a contacts list? The police had already gone through Jeremy’s cell phone, and the only number that had come up over the past six months was Jack’s. Four calls in total, all of them incoming.
The detectives had been shocked at the idea that Jeremy hadn’t made a single outgoing call; Jack only felt embarrassment. Four calls in six months, and none of them lasting over ten minutes. Mostly just logistics surrounding his most recent visit to Boston.
Jack turned back to the chalk outline. He tried not to picture his brother lying there, gasping for air as the blood ran from his body. Reaching out for help, clawing at the floor, maybe trying to find some way to fight back, or to drag himself away from whoever had come to kill him.
And then Jack saw something glinting in the fluorescent light, about a foot beyond the chalk that designated his brother’s extended right hand. Asmall item in a tagged plastic evidence bag, jammed right up against one of the brassy metal legs of the glass desk.
The item in the bag was almost the same color as the desk leg; even from a few feet away, one might easily have missed it, especially in the glare from the fluorescent lights. But the CSI specialists had dutifully marked, and probably fingerprinted and photographed, the object. Eventually, they’d bring it to an evidence locker, when they’d finished reconstructing the last minutes of Jeremy’s life.
Jack crawled closer, then gingerly reached for the plastic evidence bag. Holding it in his hands, he was surprised to feel a brief smile moving across his lips. He hadn’t known that his brother had kept the
Jack’s mouth went dry as he crossed toward the outline. He tried to control the thoughts jamming through his head. It was just chalk, a picture, nothing real, not flesh and blood and bones. Except as he got closer, he could see the dark stain emanating from the chest area of the outline, spreading out under the desk, lapping at the leather of the overturned chair. Jeremy’s blood. Jeremy’s life.
That outline was Jeremy, his last, brutal moment, as he collapsed onto the floor, some sort of ivory spear jutting from his chest. Jack could see from the drawing that he’d landed forward, angled slightly to the side, one arm outstretched, the other clutching at the thing between his ribs.
Jack dropped to one knee, just inches from the chalk. His face was cold, and he fought to stay in control. He only had a few minutes, and he needed all of his senses. The crime scene specialists had already gone through this lab a dozen times. He could see, glancing around the room, pieces of colored tape attached to various objects, some already tagged and wrapped in plastic evidence bags, logged and ready for transport to the CSI labs. Otherpieces of tape near spots on the floor and the nearby wall marked areas of blood splatter. Jack couldn’t be sure, but he guessed from the placement of the tags that the crime scene specialists had been working in a spiral pattern, starting at the door, ending at the chalk outline in front of him.
If the specialists had missed anything, it wasn’t going to be something simple or obvious. Jack looked up toward the glass desk, just a few feet away. The desk was empty; the oversize computer flat-screen and the shattered remains of his brother’s laptop had already been bagged, cataloged, and brought to the CSI labs. The detectives who’d questioned Jack had told him that both computers had been professionally erased before they’d gotten to them. A thorough job; both hard drives had been magnetically wiped, and then a virus had been implanted to make any sort of data recovery impossible.
Which begged the question: Was it possible that Jeremy had been working on something using the computers that had gotten him killed? Or did the computers somehow contain evidence that would lead to the killer—something as simple as an appointment calendar or a contacts list? The police had already gone through Jeremy’s cell phone, and the only number that had come up over the past six months was Jack’s. Four calls in total, all of them incoming.
The detectives had been shocked at the idea that Jeremy hadn’t made a single outgoing call; Jack only felt embarrassment. Four calls in six months, and none of them lasting over ten minutes. Mostly just logistics surrounding his most recent visit to Boston.
Jack turned back to the chalk outline. He tried not to picture his brother lying there, gasping for air as the blood ran from his body. Reaching out for help, clawing at the floor, maybe trying to find some way to fight back, or to drag himself away from whoever had come to kill him.
And then Jack saw something glinting in the fluorescent light, about a foot beyond the chalk that designated his brother’s extended right hand. Asmall item in a tagged plastic evidence bag, jammed right up against one of the brassy metal legs of the glass desk.
The item in the bag was almost the same color as the desk leg; even from a few feet away, one might easily have missed it, especially in the glare from the fluorescent lights. But the CSI specialists had dutifully marked, and probably fingerprinted and photographed, the object. Eventually, they’d bring it to an evidence locker, when they’d finished reconstructing the last minutes of Jeremy’s life.
Jack crawled closer, then gingerly reached for the plastic evidence bag. Holding it in his hands, he was surprised to feel a brief smile moving across his lips. He hadn’t known that his brother had kept the
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