Page 29 of Lost Hours
Mina slowed on her approach to the front door. The solid wood that looked original to the older home stood open, and she stepped over the threshold, then paused.
Looking over her shoulder and around her, Nolan caught sight of the viscous pool of blood she’d mentioned. Memories flooded his brain. His gut cramped. He’d only seen this quantity of blood once. His buddy. Lying on the ground. His lifeblood oozing around him until he lost his life in protection of their governor.
No, stop. Don’t let your mind go there.He was charged with having Mina’s back, and she needed him clearheaded.
They approached the bloody pool. No one could survive this level of loss. At least, not likely. He wasn’t an expert, but he suspected he was right. “We’ll have to get Veritas to run a sample. See whose blood this is.”
Please don’t let another person have died.
“Stick right on my tail,” Mina said, keeping her focus pinned ahead. “I’m counting on you to have my back.”
She shouldn’t have had to say that to him. Was it because she thought he’d deserted her once, and she feared he would do it again? No way he would abandon her here unless he was dead. No law enforcement officer worth their grain of salt would leave another officer vulnerable.
Nolan followed her under a wide arch into a formal living room. The nearest window was marred with telltale bullet holes and fissions in the glass extending outward. She stopped to take a look, and he moved closer to her.
“Looks like a bullet bullseye,” he said. “Since the mayor was shot this could mean the entryway blood is his.”
“Could be,” she said, getting closer and eyeing the glass. “The bullet had to come from the outside.”
He moved into place beside her for a better look. “The holes confirm that. A double pane window. Outside hole is smaller than the inside, so it would be the point of entry for the bullet.” He looked around for blood, but found none. He turned and put himself in the line of sight that a bullet could have traveled.Could have, as the glass would alter a shot somewhat. But the pool of blood in the hallway was in direct range.
“We move on,” Mina said and advanced further into the space.
He followed, his mind swirling with questions. The biggest still was, had the mayor or Becca been shot from this window? Seemed highly likely to him that one of them had been, but they would need a professional to trace the trajectory of the bullet. He would have to call Sierra back and ask her to process this scene too and have their weapons expert join them on scene.
He trailed Mina through the open doorway into a large dining room with a table and chairs for twelve people. The dark walnut gleamed as if it had recently been polished. He passed through the next doorway and reached the kitchen where Mina stood.
She turned to look at him. “Notice anything else?”
He shook his head. “I’ll ask for the Veritas team to come here too. Now that we have a likely murder scene, we should request they also perform a bullet trajectory. That will confirm that a bullet fired from this window could’ve struck the mayor or Becca.”
“We finish clearing the place before making that call.” She turned toward the opening in the wall. “Back to the entry for the main stairwell.”
He didn’t question but trailed her down the hallway, skirting the sticky pool of blood, to the front stairs. A slight trail of blood about a foot long appeared where a body could’ve been picked up out of the blood pool and then removed via the front door. Or they’d cleaned up other residual trails.
Made no sense, though. Why bother to clean up any of the blood, then leave a massive pool in the entry? He took a closer look. A footprint in the blood. If the killer cleaned up, they surely wouldn’t leave the footprint for forensics to evaluate.
“Coming?” Mina asked from the stairs.
He hurried ahead to a striped carpet runner covering original treads. He searched it for any bloody footprints but found none. They climbed the stairs and silently checked out two massive bedrooms with ensuite bathrooms.
“All clear,” he said, though she’d been with him on the search.
“No sign of a disturbance or struggle at all,” she said, already turning toward the stairway again. “Time for a perimeter search, and then we can really look at this place without fear of a shooter remaining on the property.”
They jogged down the stairs and out the front door.
“All clear out here,” Abe said.
She nodded. “We’ll head to the right. I’d like to get a look at that window from the outside. See if any tracks or other evidence were left behind.”
She started down a concrete walkway highlighted by ground floodlights and leading to the side of the house. She moved slowly, her gaze roving over the area like a searchlight.
Nolan eased behind her, looking into the lushly landscaped beds surrounding the home. Some of the rhododendrons and azaleas that grew so well in Oregon reached halfway up the wall, and they had to step out further to get around their girth.
She stopped near the broken window. “Looks like we have some fresh prints in the sand here.”
Nolan took as close of a look at the window as he could from his distance. “The glass is still fairly intact. Had to be a small caliber.”
