“Absolutely. Are you free tomorrow night? I can finagle the schedule to make that work.” If he put in a double shift himself and made do with a quick nap before their date. But it would be worth a bout of exhaustion to have two or three uninterrupted off-duty hours with Cara.
“I wish I could, but I’m going back to Cape tomorrow afternoon. One of my doctoral students hit a glitch on his dissertation, and I offered to take a brief hiatus from my sabbatical and meet with him early Friday morning.”
That figured.
But how could he complain, when his own job had messed with their plans twice?
“I get it. Duty calls.”
“Can we pick a day next week?”
“Why don’t I call you Sunday after I see how the department flu epidemic shakes out? I don’t want to have to cancel a third time, or you might write me off.”
“Not happening.”
“Good to know.” He leaned back in his chair. “Any more moving lights in the woods?”
“No. I check periodically at night now that I’m alerted to it, but everything’s been quiet. Natalie told me you tried again to convince her to install cameras.”
“I did. She wasn’t ready to commit.”
“That’s what I heard. She seems convinced the only alerts you’d get would be from wandering deer.”
“She could be right. All the same, I think it’s worth a try. If Micah hadn’t turned up dead, I wouldn’t be as concerned, but I sense there’s a connection between the two.”
“She said if I saw any more lights, she’d rethink her decision.”
“That’s something, I guess.” Rod appeared in his doorway, and he tipped his chair upright. “I have a visitor. Expect a call Sunday.”
“I’ll look forward to it.”
As he ended the call, Brad motioned Rod in. “What’s up?”
“I got the tox screen back on Micah Reeves.”
“That was much quicker than usual.”
“Must have been a slow week at the lab. Either that, or they got tired of me bugging them. This case has been on my mind.”
“That makes two of us. What did you get?”
“Nothing. Screen was clean as a whistle.”
Not unexpected, but it would have helped if the findings had offered even a tiny clue.
“I can’t say I’m surprised in light of what I’ve learned about him.”
Rod stuck his hands in his pockets. “I’m not coming up with grounds to rule this as anything but accidental, Brad—other than the unidentified vomit. Without a suspect to test for a match, though, that doesn’t help us.”
“I hear you. But there are a few other loose ends I’m trying to tie up that came to light during the investigation. Can you hold off on the final report for another couple of weeks?”
“Sure. You have any real leads, or are you going on instinct?”
May as well be honest.
“No leads in the sense you mean, but there are pieces of the puzzle that don’t fit. My gut tells me that all it will take to connect the dots is one solid clue. However, if that doesn’t surface soon, I’ll have to let this go.”
“No rush on my end to issue the final report. It’s not like we have family clamoring for it.”
