Page 38 of Colton in the Wild
“I’m already tired of that phrase, whether it’s about the plane, the shooter or when I’m getting out of here.”
“You’ve always been a yes-or-no kind of person,” Spence said dryly.
“If that means I don’t take well to stalling, then yes.”
“In this case, it’s simple truth. They’re looking at everything, and that takes time. And that,” he added with that upward quirk of his mouth that used to irritate her but now seemed…charming, “applies to all three of your questions.”
She made a face at him, one that had always made him laugh back in school, because she didn’t want him to think she was upset with him rather than just the circumstances. All of them. She thought she saw him smother a laugh.
“I did talk to Eli, though,” he said.
That caught her attention. “You did?”
He nodded. “He stopped by to see how you were. Your brothers were still here, so he said to just tell you hello and to get out of here soon.”
“Well, I’m with him on that,” she said the words heartfelt. “But does that mean he did get assigned to investigate…the body?”
Spence nodded. “They haven’t identified her, or the manner of death yet. They moved the body to their lab and will have one of their best people working on it.”
“But she was murdered, right? The way she was…arranged…” She suppressed a shudder.
“He thinks so.”
She had the feeling there was something more, something he wasn’t saying, but if it was something Eli had told him to keep in confidence, that was what he would do. Spence Colton was a man of his word. He would never break a promise. Or a vow—
Her thought was abruptly cut off when two people came through the door. Not hospital staff, as she would have expected, but two people she didn’t recognize, at least until Spence greeted the first one in, a man in a pair of khaki pants and a casual jacket over a dress shirt. When she heard his voice, she realized he was the detective who had questioned her right after she’d awakened, the one who was working the case of their shooter. She’d still been a bit foggy then, so it took her a moment to place him.
A rather shy-looking woman in a pair of baggy jeans and a loose, flowing blouse in an almost Hawaiian print followed him in. She carried a small case of some kind, but the sketchpad in her other hand told Hetty why she was there. Spence had mentioned they wanted to try to do a sketch of the man she’d glimpsed, and had promised they understood it had only been a glimpse and at some distance.
“We usually do this at the station,” Detective Barton said. “We’ve got a computer that does it, but frankly, I think Amy here is better.”
The woman smiled. “Sometimes humans are better at humans.” Then, to Hetty, she said, “I’m glad you’re feeling well enough to do this now.”
“So am I,” she said fervently.
Hetty found herself oddly distracted after Spence had bowed out and left the room, and had to make herself focus on the task. She had been sure this would be pointless, but the artist asked some either/or questions that had her realizing she might have noticed more than she’d thought.
After the artist had finalized the sketch, and Hetty had said that was the best she could do—it didn’t look like anybody she’d recognize if she saw him again, but the hair was right—Detective Barton asked her some other questions, mostly about the weapon the man had used.
“We know the caliber fit a 6.5mm Creedmoor from the rounds we recovered at the site…” he began.
That surprised her. She hadn’t realized they’d gone back there already. But then, she’d barely realized how much time had passed, she’d been so completely out of it. He went on.
“That’s a common sniper round. Causes less recoil, and the trajectory—” He cut himself off. “Sorry, that’s not what you need to think about. Think about the weapon itself.”
She closed her eyes for a moment, trying to replay that moment in her mind. “All I know is it looked all black. Not a wood stock. And it had some kind of optical sight. But that’s all I could see.”
Barton nodded. “All right.”
“You’re sure he’s gone?”
The man nodded. “We did a full sweep of the area before we went in to gather evidence.”
“One round hit the plane,” she said. “He almost hit Spence.” Just saying it gave her a little chill. And not just because if he’d also been hurt, they both could well have died out there.
The man nodded. “Your partner told us about that one, so we got that.”Your partner…She wasn’t sure how she felt about that term. “Guy did a number on the electronics there, didn’t he.”
It wasn’t really a question, so she only nodded. She wondered how they were going to get the plane back from the lake. Wondered why there had been a problem in the first place.
