“So how was it?”

“Excuse me?”

She’d thrown Racine completely off and tried not to smile at the expression on her face. That’ll teach her, if she thought she was going to get absolution for her confession.

“The kiss. How was it?”

Racine smiled, definitely relieved, then said, “It actually was very nice.”

“You know the most difficult affairs to get over are the ones that never happened.” Gwen let it sink in before adding, “They remain forever perfect in our minds. No bad memories to get in the way.”

“So what are you saying?”

“Enjoy it for what it was. Don’t invest in what might have been,” Gwen said.

“Is that the kind of crap you tell your clients?”

“Yes, and you’re lucky I’m not charging you, because you’re a pain in the ass and you can’t afford me.” Then Gwen pointed to the onion, indicating that Racine should get back to work.

Amazingly she did, but of course, she couldn’t do it silently.

“So have you heard from Maggie or Tully?” Racine asked.

“Both of them have been checking in with me almost every night.”

“Alonzo’s been filling me in on the details. Pretty crazy stuff. There doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to the victims he chooses. Male, female, different ages, occupations, and backgrounds. I’ve been beating my brain trying to find some common denominator. There doesn’t appear to be any connection in where they’re taken or their destinations. I even had Alonzo do a vehicle comparison. You know, thinking maybe all of them drove Fords or SUVs.”

“And?”

“Nothing. Alonzo can’t come up with anything and that guy is like the king of data. Best guess is that he’s a long-haul trucker who enjoys killing a smorgasbord of travelers.”

“Can we please keep food references out?”

Gwen glanced up to see Racine had been chopping like a pro. She seemed to have no problem with kitchen prep as long as she kept her mind on work.

Gwen’s cell phone started ringing and she did a quick hand wash before answering.

“This is Gwen Patterson.”

“Gwen, it’s Dr. Halston. I apologize for calling you at home.”

“Oh, that’s no problem,” she said, but immediately realized that she’d never had a personal phone call from her doctor, after hours or otherwise. Someone from Dr. Halston’s staff usually called to set up appointments or answer questions and her nurse always called to go over test results. Results. Something was wrong. She knew it before Dr. Halston continued.

“I got the results for your mammogram and there’s … well, a questionable area on your left breast. I’d like to set up an appointment for a core biopsy.”

“Biopsy? That sounds serious. Are you saying it could be cancer?”

“It might be nothing. But I’d rather we err on the side of caution.”

“I guess I could make time late next week.”

“Gwen, I think we should do it before next week. I’ll have my nurse call you tomorrow and set something up.”

Gwen wasn’t quite sure what else Dr. Halston had said after that. When she ended the call she turned around and saw Racine staring at her. Then she did the strangest thing, something that Gwen would never have expected of the tough and often crass detective. Without a word, Julia Racine walked over to Gwen and hugged her.

CHAPTER 44

KANSAS STATE UNIVERSITY

VETERINARY SMALL ANIMAL HOSPITAL

MANHATTAN, KANSAS

Maggie handed Creed a bottle of Mountain Dew and took her place beside him in the reception area. The waiting was excruciating. It was going on three hours since they had talked to the young surgeon, Dr. Towle. Her team of students and professors were still in surgery working on Grace.

Earlier the internal medicine chief resident, Dr. Smee, had examined Grace then ordered an assortment of tests, scans, and X-rays while the surgical staff prepped. Though they wouldn’t know the full extent of Grace’s injuries until she was under anesthesia, they were able to tell Creed that Grace’s left hind leg had sustained the worst of the impact. It was broken in at least two places.

“I’ve heard good things about this place,” Creed said, breaking the silence.

Maggie didn’t tell him that he had already said that twice before.

“You sure I can’t get you something to eat?”

He shook his head. Then he added, “You don’t have to stay. I’m okay.”

“I’m not here for you. I’m here for Grace.”

She saw the corner of his mouth hitch up. It was the closest to a smile she’d seen since morning.

“She likes you,” he said.

“I like her. She’s not stubborn like her master.”

That garnered a full smile. “Don’t count on it. Hannah says all our dogs have a streak of my stubbornness.”

“Is Hannah your wife?” Maggie asked without thinking. Thankfully Creed didn’t seem to care.

“She’s my business partner.”

Maggie knew there was more to the relationship. She could tell by the way he had said Hannah’s name. She waited. But Creed didn’t offer anything else.

When she went in search of a vending machine she had checked in with Tully. He was still back at the ravine. Detective Lopez had called in a CSU team and the county medical examiner. According to Tully, they hadn’t finished removing Ethan’s body. Tully said that the teenager had not been decapitated. His body had, however, been partially dismembered. And there was more, he had told her. Chunks of flesh had been cut out.

For a killer who had directed them to one of his dumping grounds and left so much for them to find, Maggie couldn’t figure out why he would leave Ethan’s body down a ravine. He certainly wanted them to know about this murder or he wouldn’t have left her cell phone number with the severed finger. But perhaps he didn’t want them to actually find Ethan’s body. She didn’t want to think about it. Not until Grace was out of surgery.

Dr. Towle had warned them that the surgery might take three to four hours. The wait was bad enough, but Creed’s silence was unbearable. They had watched two cats and more than a dozen dogs of various breeds come and go with their owners. Several were hard to watch. Maggie knew she wouldn’t shake the image of the elderly couple with an old and worn-out border collie, so weak a student had to carry the dog to an examination room.

It was at the end of the day and the reception area, which had been bustling with activity, was quiet. They were the only two left.

“Tell me about Grace,” she said, hoping to keep him talking.

“What about her?”

“She doesn’t seem like the typical cadaver dog. I know you said it’s not about the breed as much as the individual dog, but she just seems—”

“She’s small but she’s strong,” he interrupted. “And she’s a workaholic.”

He sounded defensive. The last thing Maggie wanted.

“Almost all our dogs are rescue dogs, so none of them are typical.” He opened the bottle of soda and took a sip. “By rescue, I mean we’ve found them literally on our doorstep or I’ve gotten them from the pound. Some of them have a lot of issues and it takes longer to work with them. And to be honest, we’ve had some we just couldn’t train.”

“What happens to them?” From his expression, she wasn’t sure she wanted to know.

“Hannah finds them a good home. She gets dragged into doing a whole lot of things she never bargained for.”

The mention of Hannah’s name made him pull out his cell phone and check it. She had seen him send several text messages when they arrived and after Grace went in to surgery. Now she realized it must have been Hannah he was keeping posted. As usual, the gesture made her recognize that she didn’t have anyone she felt such urgency to talk to that she needed to text and communicate in real time. Anything she had to say could wait.

It was always that way even when she was married. There was a time she believed Benjamin Platt would change that. She had even hoped he would. Ironic. Since her divorce, Maggie had felt it would be too encumbering to be held down in a relationship. She didn’t want to be obligated to tell someone where she was, what she was doing, or when she would be home. She refused to live up to someone else’s expectations in exchange for being loved. She had done that for too many years in a marriage that was more exhausting than rewarding.