Page 27 of Race to Save Her

Katie knew she was stalling. She had to be professional and just tell him. “Cisco and I did a search to try to find where the perpetrator might have entered and exited the scene.”

“Okay,” he said. “What did you find?”

It was as if he was trying to help her get to the point.

“Cisco found a napkin with blood on it, so we took it to the lab and they found a match.”

He watched her closely. It was unclear if he was curious or already knew what she had discovered.

“The blood type and DNA matches yours,” she said.

“What? The blood was mine?”

She nodded.

Ames leaned back, thinking. Katie thought he was going to get mad.

But instead, he laughed. “You do realize I run in that area almost every day.”

Katie nodded and sipped her beer.

“Detective, it was probably in my pocket and somehow fell out and got taken by the wind to land near the crime scene.”

Katie chose her words carefully. “It is slightly plausible that a napkin with your blood on it would end up at a crime scene that you called in.” She hesitated. “Did you have the napkin in your pocket when you found the dismembered arm? Where does the blood come from?”

Ames laughed. It seemed honest and lighthearted. Katie was surprised, but very curious about his reaction.

“Am I on your list of suspects?” he said, diverting the question.

“No. But we have to look at everything.”

“And did you report this to my supervisor?” His face was serious and it was as if he stared through her.

“No. Three of us know—my partner and our head of forensics… and now you.”

“I see.”

“I will need to put my findings in a report for the sheriff at some point.”

“But you haven’t yet?” he said, moving a little closer.

“No. I wanted to talk to you first.”

There were loud voices as two people entered the bar.

“Do you think I’m dangerous?” he said with little expression, testing her boundaries.

“At this point—no.”

He laughed again, but there was something different in his tone this time. The way he looked at her made her feel uncomfortable.

“Look, Detective, I grab things to eat all the time. That napkin probably ended up in my pocket when I was running.”

Katie remained quiet.

“I have a usual running area and that day I changed it up a bit.”

“That doesn’t help. It shows that the day you changed your route was the day you found the arm.”