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“We do, but I need to go. I’ll call you later. Can we meet at the coffee shop?” She nodded while I gathered my backpack and headed out.
Driving to the lab, I considered what we had learned. Why would Johnny lie? The article didn’t mention a gun or shooting at all, except for neighbors hearing a shot. I wondered which neighbor heard it and called the police. Was it Glenda? Eddie? Was that the shot that caught Johnny in the arm?
The article stated my father was stabbed to death. Wouldn’t Eli have remembered that? If he was so “wasted,” as Johnny had said, how could he have stabbed my father repeatedly when he couldn’t even stand up? Was it possible to stab someone that many times while intoxicated?
And why didn’t Leticia wake up? Johnny told me his girlfriend, Kara, was with her at the time. What were they doing? Was Leticia involved in some way?
I wondered if anyone else had been in the house that night.
When I arrived at the lab, I checked in with the receptionist, who viewed my student badge the company had provided me. For the last few weeks, I had toured several sections, but today I would be with a new technician in the DNA processing laboratory.
A pretty middle-aged lady with a dark brown bob and olive skin met me in the lobby. She was dressed in a long lab coat with big goggles that wrapped around her eyes. Her pockets were spilling over with latex gloves.
“Hi! I’m Lucy. I’ll be showing you around this week. Welcome!”
“Hello, I’m excited to learn whatever you have to teach me.”
We buzzed through the first set of security doors and Lucy took me down a white-tiled hall to a lab and badged us inside. Showing me around, she introduced me to other technologists and scientists working there.
Some of the equipment the team used took up a lot of space in the room. Lucy showed me the polymerase chain reaction tests she performed under a hood and the large machine that ran several tests at a time quicker than one person could. One of the other technologists checked the machines regularly; if there was a flag on an order, the scientists would run the test manually.
“Yeah, we get all kinds of samples. A lot of paternity tests. We also do work for the FBI or police.”
“Like crime scene evidence?”
“Yeah. Crime scene blood, semen, urine, whatever bodily fluid they come up with.”
“What about old samples? Like how long will blood last, and how much do you need to tell whose blood it is?”
“It depends on how well the sample is preserved. How much there is, what kind of surface it’s on… lots of things. Sometimes we can only get a partial match from a degraded sample. Of course, a lot of times we don’t know the donor match.”
I spent the rest of the three hours shadowing her, watching how she performed her tests and checks. Fascinated, I realized this was something I could see myself doing after college. I spent the rest of my time asking questions about Lucy’s career, and how she chose to work at that particular lab.
The three hours passed in what felt like a blink, and I made my way home. There were so many things I needed to do that evening, like study for the classes I had missed and take a nap. My exhaustion was overwhelming. I considered going straight to bed, waking up early, and then taking care of my classwork.
When I approached the driveway, however, the trash cans had been turned over. Paper and debris blew in gusts with the wind. I jumped out of the car and noticed the window next to the kitchen side door had been shattered. A scream threatened to erupt from its cage, but I took a deep breath and sprinted toward the side of the house, my heart thudding inside my chest.
The side kitchen door was unlocked and partially open. Shards of glass were covering the floor. The kitchen had been ransacked. Cabinets were left open and drawers were pulled out, upturned, and their contents dumped on the floor. Scanning the area, tears filled my eyes at the destruction as well as the panic lighting up in my veins like fire.
I pulled out my phone, ready to dial for help while creeping through the rest of the house, terrified someone would jump out at me at any moment. The living room had also been completely ransacked. The cushions lay on the floor and all the tables had been flipped. The same in the downstairs bedroom, office, bathroom, and den. Something must have scared off the intruder because the rooms upstairs were left unscathed.
Once I called them, the police sent some officers to take my statement and dusted the areas for fingerprints in obvious places. Their presence didn’t take away any of my anxieties. I somehow had to still sleep in my own bed tonight, and that thought made me want to vomit. The perpetrator must have worn gloves because the team did not find any prints. Sweeping the grounds, they did not find footprints useful for the investigation either.
Instead of napping, I spent the rest of the evening cleaning up the kitchen, sweeping up glass, and covering the window with thick plastic I found in the garage. It had been quite a while since I had a break-in. The person had never gotten so close before. Cleaning up helped allay my fears for a while, but once I climbed the stairs slowly toward my bed, it all came rushing back.
As I lay, unmoving, my laptop playing old Hercule Poirot mysteries, the lamp lighting up the room, and a chair in front of my door, all I could think was,I wish Eli was here.
ChapterNineteen
ELI
“She’s coming down! She’s coming your way! Johnny!” I heard Kara screaming from somewhere I wasn’t. Davis was falling back to the couch, clutching his arm and chest as if he’d been shot. I knew I had to run, but how? My legs weren’t moving. I was stuck on the floor. My body felt as heavy as lead.
My self-loathing had only escalated, knowing how far I pushed myself with Essa. I missed a week of work, staying in bed and drinking bottles of whiskey. I wasn’t even careful to hide them. Rhodes came down to my room a few times. He tried to get me up, but I grunted until he went away.
When I was with Essa, I didn’t have any fear that I would collapse. I knew what I wanted. I wantedher. She made me want to be a better man. Without her, I was decimated. I’d destroyed what we had. She would never take me back now; I knew it. So, what was the point of going on?
In my haze, I saw Dix come into my room. His blond hair was tied back in a knot. It must have been warmer outside because he wore aThe Armstead BreweryT-shirt with chino shorts.
