4
Sydney examined the sketch pad, the nearly finished drawing. She’d been sitting in this damned room for the last couple of hours, and the autopsy photo had yet to materialize. Still, Sydney doubted she’d need it. The original crime scene photo contained the necessary elements such as the hair, and she made a rough sketch on a separate sheet of paper. She’d complete it from that-wanted to complete it from that, as anything was better than looking at the crime scene photo, the memory of which was bound to stay with her far too long.
Her cell phone vibrated. Thinking it was probably Tasha returning her call, she pulled it from her belt, saw her ex, Scotty Ryan’s number showing on the screen, then looked over at Griffin to see if he would object.
“Who is it?” he asked.
“My boyfriend. He’s an agent out of HQ,” she said, figuring Griffin was in the business, and undoubtedly knew she meant the Washington, D.C., office.
“I was under the impression the two of you had broken up.”
“Delving a bit on the personal side, aren’t you?”
“This is a sensitive case.”
“So what
“You’re thirty-three, five-nine, brown hair, blue eyes-”
“Besides the obvious?”
“You were a cop in Sacramento for eight years before joining the Bureau four years ago. According to SAC Harcourt, you’re one of the best forensic artists the Bureau has. You transferred from Washington, D.C., to San Francisco when you and your boyfriend broke up, and you were recently looking into your father’s murder, which took place twenty years ago. His murder case is why you took the transfer back to D.C.”
“Maybe I should have asked if there was anything about me you
“Red wine or white.”
His answer surprised her, and she was tempted to quip that apparently he hadn’t seen her and Tasha drinking the other night, or he’d know it was red. Instead, she merely stared at him, noted there was actually a spark of amusement in his previously unreadable gaze, and it wasn’t until her phone vibrated again that she was able to look away. “I need to take this call. Scotty’s a little on the possessive side. But then you probably already know that if you’ve done a complete background.”
As quick as that spark appeared, it was gone. “
Sydney ignored him, flipped open the phone. “Hey, Scotty.”
“I called your mom’s house, and she said you were already back at Quantico. Are you okay?”
“Just a crime sketch. I’m flying back to my mom’s this afternoon.”
“I mean about Tasha.”
“What are you talking about?”
“The hit-and-run.”
Sydney stilled, felt her heart beat several times as she absorbed what she was hearing.
“I figured you knew, why you flew back to D.C. It was in the papers. She was crossing the street and-”
“Oh my God,” she said, since that was all she could think to say.
“I’m sorry, Sydney. I know you were good friends.”
“I can’t believe it…”
He was quiet for a moment, then, “Call me when you’re done. I’ll pick you up, and you can decide what you want to do.”
“Thank you…”
He disconnected, and she closed her phone, staring at it, unable to believe any of this was real. They’d just gone out drinking…
And then it hit her. That’s why Griffin had handed over a set of notes that weren’t included in a finished report. Tasha had been killed before she’d been able to complete it. It was also why Tasha wasn’t present, because she would’ve insisted on being here.
What was it Griffin had said to Sydney, why they’d refused to tell her what was going on? Because someone would kill her if she knew…
She spun around in her chair, looked right at him, very much aware that he’d heard the entire conversation, knew that she knew. “How dare you keep me in the dark about my friend’s death.”
“This case takes priority.”
“Was Tasha killed because of it?”
“At this time, we have no proof that there is any connection.”
“And being that it’s a hit-and-run, how would you know?”
He didn’t answer.
She turned away in anger and disgust, closing her eyes against the pain and confusion. Was it her fault her friend was dead? Sydney had recommended Tasha. She was-had been-one of the best forensic anthropologists on the East Coast. But if she was killed because of the case, then it stood to reason that anyone Sydney might have recommended would have come to the same fate…“Were you aware of the danger in this?”
“Not all of it.”
It was said with such quiet conviction, that she believed him. “Then why keep it from me?”
“Because we had to reevaluate. If Dr. Gilbert was killed because of this case, then we had to protect anyone else we had working on the identification. You think you were followed on your run this morning? If you were, it was by someone who can gain access to these grounds. Someone who knew we were bringing the skull to Quantico. You can understand why I didn’t want to involve yet another artist. And why we let you go home to San Francisco to preserve the illusion that you were not connected to the case at all.”
“Hence the private jet to bring me back?”
“Exactly.”
And that she could appreciate. Because if someone came after her, they could certainly do it while she was visiting her family. “I need a few minutes, if you don’t mind.”
Griffin hesitated. “I’m sorry about your friend.”
She nodded, waited until she heard the door close behind him, then stared at the skull through a blur of tears, wishing that Tasha had left for her dig in Italy a week earlier.
By the time Griffin returned about fifteen minutes later, she had composed herself enough to attempt finishing the Jane Doe sketch. Pencil poised over paper, she suddenly doubted herself and her hurried sketch of the victim’s hair. “I need to see the crime scene photo one more time before I finish.”
He picked up the briefcase, unlocked it, removed the folder, set it on the table in front of her. She opened the folder, tried to force her gaze past the woman’s visage to the surroundings, everything she needed to remember. It was not an easy task. Look at any photo of a person, and one’s gaze is drawn to the face. Look at a photo where the face has been savagely removed, and it’s just as hard not to stare at where the face is supposed to be.
But do it she must. An ID of Jane Doe was imperative, assuming that Jane Doe’s killer had also killed Tasha. Eyeing the photo, and making a few tentative strokes on the paper, Sydney tried to mentally take in everything from the obvious to the not so obvious. She noted what the victim wore, blue jeans and a zippered sweatshirt. She noted the ground, the neatly manicured lawn, and more importantly the absence of snow, which, if the murder had occurred in this area, meant it was at least a week or more ago. To the right of the victim was what looked like the base of an old-fashioned streetlamp, black iron, and beyond that the corner of a building made of massive blocks of hewn stone that, other than the reddish color, reminded her of the historic brownstones seen in the New York area.
“How much longer?” he asked.
“Almost done.”
She finished up the hair, another ten minutes to get the basics, try to emulate the style she presumed the woman would’ve worn, judging from what she could tell in the photo, what wasn’t matted in congealed blood. Brunette. She’d been a brunette. After that it was simply shading to give the sketch depth and realism. An hour later she was done.
