Page 102 of Solid as Steele
Nearing eight o’clock, Owen pulled onto Tovar’s property with a stack of pizzas on the passenger seat of his truck, a late dinner for the Veritas team. He wished he could say it had been a satisfying day with copious evidence to point to Tovar’s part in killing Cassie. Not so. Some evidence had been recovered, but would need processing to determine the evidentiary value, leaving Owen feeling helpless much of the time. There wasn’t a lot for him or Mackenzie to do on-site other than answer questions and bring food for the workers.
He’d been working hard to keep Wheeler on the right track as regards to the three victims Kelsey had found. She hadn’t located any additional graves and had unearthed enough of the remains to determine the recovery did not fall within her domain and asked the sheriff to call in the medical examiner. She’d confirmed the victims were women who she believed to have been in the ground for less than a year. That was all she would speculate on. She protected the graves with tarps, and thankfully, Wheeler called OSP, who would send someone out first thing in the morning.
Owen parked near the house and jogged around his truck to retrieve the pizzas and drinks. He crossed the lot to a large canopy where he’d earlier helped Blake erect a table and filled coolers with refreshments. The Veritas team and Mackenzie were taking a break in lawn chairs that Blake had added to the area.
Mackenzie hurried up to him to remove the pizza boxes from on top the drinks and place them on the table. “Thank you for picking these up.”
“I’m glad to do something to help.” He set the boxes on the table next to snacks that he and Mackenzie had purchased earlier in the day and turned to the team. “Get the pizza while it’s at least a little bit hot.”
He flipped open the top three boxes revealing a pepperoni, a sausage, and a cheese only pizza. The pizza place was miles away, likely leaving the pizzas lukewarm. Not Owen’s appetite. He’d endured the smell for the drive but wouldn’t take a slice before the real workers had gotten their food.
The men hung back and let the women go first.
“Go ahead, Mackenzie,” Blake said.
She shook her head. “I appreciate your manners, but I’ll wait until everyone on the team has theirs.”
Owen looked around for the rest of the team but didn’t see everyone. “Should I go get Riley and Kelsey?”
“He took off with evidence while you were gone, and Kelsey went back with him,” Blake said as he plopped three large slices of pepperoni pizza on his plate.
“He took Tovar’s glass, then?” Owen asked.
Blake chomped a bite of pizza and nodded. “Along with copious hairs and prints located in Tovar’s truck.”
“Anything more you can share on that?” Owen asked, eager for that lead he so desperately wanted.
“Nothing much, really.” Blake grabbed a bottle of water. “We found untold red and black hairs, but we also found a few strands of long brown hair.”
Owen’s interest piqued. “Can you tell if it was dyed?”
Carrying her plate and water, Sierra dropped into a chair. “Yes, but not in the field. I need to use Surface-Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy to look at the hair in the lab. I’ll be able to not only tell you if it was dyed, but can likely identify the brand of dye used.”
“Can one of your techs perform this test?” Owen asked.
“Probably, but with something this important, I’d like to handle it myself.” Sierra picked up her water bottle.
“But most importantly.” Emory approached, her plate holding sausage pizza. “The hairs we recovered contained follicles and will give us nucleic acid DNA which is the best DNA for comparison to the sample your parents provided for Cassie.”
Owen’s hopes of proving Tovar had kidnapped Cassie skyrocketed, but he tamped them down as it was way too early to think these hairs came from Cassie. “How long will it be before we have DNA?”
Emory looked at him. “The glass should be pretty straightforward and processing time will be less than the hairs. The flight back to Portland is about an hour and a half. Then it’ll take a few hours for my team to get the samples, and if all goes well, you can figure about twenty-four hours from then.”
Owen did the math. Tomorrow night at around midnight. “That’ll be late. Will someone still call then with the results if he matches any of the other samples?”
“We will,” Emory said.
Sierra set her slice of cheese pizza on the plate she balanced on her knees and dabbed her mouth with a napkin. “We’ll also be lifting his fingerprints and comparing them, and that’ll go faster.”
“And you’ll update me right away?” Owen asked.
“You can count on it.” Sierra smiled.
The men finished loading plates with thick slices, and Owen waited for Mackenzie to approach the table. She chose the last sausage pieces and opened the new box below before sitting. Sausage was his favorite, so he took three large pieces and a seat next to her.
Owen looked at Grady and chewed the tangy pizza. “Any luck in locating a rifle that could’ve been used to kill Cassie?”
He nodded and set down his slice. “Found a Sig Sauer Cross. It’s chambered for a .308 Winchester.”
