“In simple terms, yes.”
“How long does something like this take?”
“At high concentrations, Victim Thirteen would have lost consciousness in seconds. Death occurs in less than a minute. Also, the conditions inside the barn were ideal for specimen preservation. I’ve officially listed the time of death at 1:30 in the morning. Plus or minus half an hour.”
Vaughn nodded again, glanced at the table beside the gurney. Neatly folded atop the man’s clothes—jeans, a generic t-shirt—was the piece of paper with the number thirteen on it.
“Aaron Treadman,” Delaney said out of the blue.
Vaughn had forgotten that the officer was in the cold room with them. Delaney had a way of doing that, just popping up without warning.
Like herpes or gonorrhea.
“Excuse?”
Delaney smiled, showing off a mouth just a little too full of teeth.
“Ran his prints, got a hit. Victim with the number thirteen on his chest is Aaron Treadman. He was picked up about six months ago for petty theft.”
“Really?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Where?”
“Princeton.”
Vaughn raised an eyebrow.
“The university?”
“Yep. Worked as a campus security guard. Some faculty member’s laptop went missing from their office or something when he was the only one around. Cops were called and he was pulled in and printed. Never officially charged, but the uni let him go anyway.”
“Address?”
“Not yet. Working on it.”
Vaughn took a photo of Aaron’s face with his phone. His skin looked even more blue now, but at least Dr.Button had cleaned the white foam from his nose and mouth.
“Delaney,” Darnell said. “Keep printing the other victims, see if we can get names for them, too. Names and addresses.”
Delaney stopped smiling.
“Do you have the 3D photos that Landon took at the scene?” Vaughn asked.
“Yeah, he sent them to me. Also let me hold onto the gas detector. Cool little thing.”
Vaughn ignored this last part.
“Forward the photos to me.”
“Sure thing.”
Vaughn turned to Dr.Button and held out his hand, only to pull it back. The ME was wearing thick black gloves that glistened with an unknown substance.
“Thanks, Dr.Button. If you find anything else, let Delaney here know. He’ll pass the message along.”
“Should be another six or eight hours before I process all the bodies, but if they’re anything like Victim Thirteen, I don’t expect to find anything new.”
