AllFreeNovel
Share Us
"Chief Annie? What's up?" I asked.
"I'm sorry to disturb you so late, but I was still at the station and thought you would want to know this."
I sat up straight on my couch. "Know what?"
"The lab results came in tonight, and I'm just now seeing them. This is not good for our case against John Baker."
"What’s going on? What do they show?"
She cleared her throat. "The blood in his house, on the wall… it wasn't Rachel's."
"Could it be her sister's? Elyse Winter’s? The one we found in the backyard?" I asked.
"Not hers either. Get this… it was John's own blood. This backs up his testimony before he was shot that he had an accident and a nosebleed."
"Dang it,” I said. "I was so sure it would be Rachel’s."
"There's more."
"Now what?"
"The clothes, the ones that were found in a plastic bag in the attic of his house… the blood on them was, in fact, a match with Rachel's, but…."
"But what?"
"There's no DNA from John on them. If he had put them in the bag and hid them, there would most likely be his DNA as well if he had touched them or from sweat and oils. They were Rachel’s clothes she was wearing when she was killed, but her body was naked when found. The only DNA trail of John's found inside the garbage bag with the clothes was from a pizza crust that was somehow in there too—in the pants pocket."
"A pizza crust?" I asked. "That's an odd thing to find among hidden bloody clothes from a murder?"
"It sure is. But it had John Baker's DNA all over it."
I hung up and looked at Matt, who had been listening in on our conversation.
"This just got more complicated," I said, setting down my wine glass. "John's alibi might be stronger than we thought."
Matt nodded. "But there's still something fishy going on. Why would there be a pizza crust with his DNA in the same bag as Rachel's bloody clothes?"
"I don't know," I said, rubbing my temples. "But we need to find out. And we need to talk to John again."
Matt stood up, grabbing his coat. "Let's go. We can't waste any time."
I gripped the steering wheel tightly as I raced down A1A, accelerating through the yellow lights. Inside the car, a thousand questions whirled through my mind, and I had trouble focusing on where I was going. John was in there recovering from a gunshot wound that I had inflicted upon him, and I felt my stomach twist in knots at the thought that if he didn’t regain his memory, that was what would keep us from getting to the truth.
Chapter54
Matt and I rushed into the hospital, our hearts pounding as we made our way to the front desk. The lady behind the counter looked up at us and raised her eyebrows, but we wasted no time in showing her our badges.
"We're here to see John Baker," Matt said, his voice urgent.
The woman nodded and handed us visitor badges before pointing us toward the elevators. We stepped inside and hit the button for the third floor, our minds racing with thoughts of what we might find when we reached John's room.
As the elevator doors slid open, we could see an officer slumped against the wall, his head hanging low. Panic coursed through my veins as I realized that something was wrong.
"Hey, wake up!" I shouted, shaking the officer's shoulder.
He groaned and lifted his head, his eyes bleary and unfocused.
"What on earth is going on here?" I demanded, my voice rising. "You were supposed to be protecting the door."
