Chapter 30
THIRTY
Josie set a paper bag in front of Hummel.
Grease stains bled through the side of it.
The smell was enough to make her stomach growl despite having just eaten two leftover T-Rex pancakes.
She and Noah had had breakfast with Wren, Misty, and Harris before Noah left for his shift and Josie had a shower and several hours of sleep.
When she woke up, she’d found a stack of pancakes in the fridge.
She’d enjoyed them at the time but now she wondered if she should have gotten a giant cheeseburger when she and Gretchen stopped to get Hummel food.
Gretchen was out in the car finishing hers.
Hummel sat at the stainless-steel table in the middle of what Josie thought of as his processing room.
His laptop was open in front of him. The rest of the surface was clean, so she didn’t have to worry about the grease soaking through the bag disturbing any evidence or equipment.
Hummel didn’t have ready access to takeout all the way out here.
Even food delivery apps wouldn’t always make the trek.
His domain was inside the fences of the department’s impound lot, which was guarded by an officer at all times.
He worked out of a drab cinderblock building with an unmarked door and two garage bays.
The only windows were at the top of the bay doors, and those had been covered with white laminate to ensure no one could see inside.
He looked up from his computer, eyes narrowed. “What’s that?”
“Your favorite,” Josie said. “A double-bacon cheeseburger with everything except onions, from Lannan’s Grill.”
“Fries?”
“Do you really think that little of me?”
“With a side of ranch dressing instead of ketchup?”
“Now I’m just insulted.”
Josie counted two beats until his face transformed from a scowl to a giant smile.
Slapping his laptop shut, he took the bait, tearing the paper bag in half and using it as a makeshift placemat.
He took a big bite of the cheeseburger first. When Gretchen walked in, he grunted at her and kept eating.
They watched him demolish his dinner in silence. Finally, he acknowledged them again.
“What do you want?”
Gretchen laughed. “You’re welcome.”
“Thanks for the meal. If you couldn’t figure it out, I was starving. It hit the spot. Now, what do you want?”
“Something we can use to find whoever took Turner’s family,” Josie said.
While she slept, Noah, Gretchen, and a half dozen of their colleagues had continued to work, running down leads, interviewing people who had known all four women, and following up on whatever came in through the tip line.
Nothing had panned out so far. The tips were useless.
Noah had tracked down Cassidy’s friend, Toni, from art class, and she had confirmed the conversation that Wren had overheard between her and Cassidy.
The only new information that came from the interview was that Cassidy had seen the guy outside Turner’s building and Dani’s house and that she’d seen him there for about a week before he disappeared.
She hadn’t been able to sneak a photo of him.
Without a better description than man in ballcap, it didn’t help at all.
All it told them was that Cassidy or Dani—or both—may have had a stalker in Denton.
Hummel sighed as he gathered up the remains of his lunch and threw them into a trash bin in the corner of the room. “I’ve got nothing, unfortunately. Well, almost nothing.”
That explained why he was so irritable. Hummel was very good at his job, and he took pride in it. Often, he refused to delegate important tasks because he was too worried someone else might get it wrong. Like Josie, he was a bit of a control freak when it came to work.
“Touch DNA?” asked Gretchen.
“Couldn’t get anything from the flower stems at either scene.”
“What about Maxine and Haven Barnes?” said Josie. “DNA on their bodies? Under their nails?”
“There were no skin cells under Maxine Barnes’s fingernails.”
Maxine had had bruising on her arm but given the condition of her body, she hadn’t had time to fight back against the killer. Her hands had likely been trapped at her sides the entire time.
“But Haven would have had something under her nails,” Josie said. “Given how hard she fought.”
Hummel shook his head. “No skin cells. I did find fibers, though.”
Josie frowned. “Just fibers?”
The killer had to have had some exposed skin. Haven had clearly awakened before the killer could get into the burking position, straddling her chest with her arms trapped between his legs and a pillow over her face. Given her injuries, he had struggled to subdue her.
“Maybe he had long sleeves and pants on like he did when he arrived at the Schwarber scene,” Hummel suggested.
“I’m just telling you what I found. I examined the fibers under the microscope.
There were a few different kinds. One was a type of cotton.
Dyed indigo. It may be consistent with fibers found in denim. ”
“May be?” Gretchen echoed.
“I’m only looking at these fibers using a microscope.
There’s a lot I can tell you just from that.
Whether they’re natural or synthetic; the general category of the synthetic fibers, like if they’re acrylic, nylon, polyester, that sort of thing; dye properties.
What I can’t tell you is the chemical makeup of these fibers, what kind of fabric or item of clothing they came from, the brand, anything like that.
I can guess, hence the ‘may be consistent with,’ but even my guesses are very limited without more information.
That’s why I sent them off to the state police lab.
They can do things like scanning electron microscopy, microspectrophotometry, infrared microspectrometry, micro-X-ray fluorescence spectrometry. ”
Gretchen held up a palm. “I’m going to stop you right there because you lost me at electron something, but tell me if I have this right. You’re saying that those other tests that the state lab can do will tell you a lot more information about the fibers you found?”
Hummel nodded.
Josie rubbed her temples, feeling just as overwhelmed by the barrage of enormously long words and the frustration that there hadn’t been any actual DNA under Haven Barnes’s fingernails.
“Were there other fibers besides the denim—I’m sorry, possible denim?”
“A couple,” Hummel answered. “They were synthetic, looked like polyester to me. Continuous filaments with a round cross-section and medium diameter. Uniform gray color, meaning the fibers were the same color their entire lengths. No variations. That’s without fluorescence, meaning they didn’t glow when I applied UV light. ”
Wishing she had another coffee, Josie said, “Is that important?”
“In this case, it could be. When a fiber doesn’t fluoresce, it can indicate that there were no optical brighteners added to the fabric it came from.
Those are chemicals that companies put into stuff like curtains, clothes, bedding to make them look brighter.
The other possibility is that the fabric it came from was dyed with a non-fluorescent dye.
Those are often used in workwear. The fibers also have some characteristics that are consistent with machine-knit fabrics. ”
Instead of asking what those characteristics were, Gretchen said, “What are machine-knit fabrics?”
“My money is on work gloves.”
“Like the kind you wear while doing construction?” asked Josie.
“Could be. Depends on what kind of glove. Some of the ones used on construction sites may be higher-quality and sturdier than something you’d use for a home renovation.
These fibers could also be from a multipurpose type of glove which could be used for anything, really.
Like I said, home renos, assembly-line work, landscaping, gardening.
I can’t tell which just from microscopy. ”
“What makes you think the fibers are from work gloves?” Josie said.
“One of the fibers had residue on it. Looked like some kind of polymer fragment. A lot of work gloves have a nitrile coating. Usually on the palm or the fingertips. Makes it easier to grip stuff. Nitrile is a synthetic polymer.”
“Gardening fits,” Josie said. “With the flowers.”
“Maybe, but there’s something else you should see.”
Hummel flipped his laptop open again and took a few moments to search.
When he found what he was looking for, he motioned them over.
Josie and Gretchen crowded behind him, studying a photo of a portion of the floor of the Barneses’ glamping tent.
Beside a photomicrographic scale was a tiny dark splotch measuring roughly two millimeters.
“This had to be sent out to the lab, too,” Hummel said. “But I took a look at it under the microscope and I’m pretty sure it’s wood putty.”
“Wood putty,” Gretchen said slowly.
Josie had watched Noah and her former fiancé Luke do enough work around the house to have some knowledge of wood putty. “You know when you put up trim or baseboard and after you hammer in the nails, there’s a gap between the head of the nail and the surface of the wood? A hole?”
“No,” Gretchen said. “I draw the line at home repairs.”
Hummel laughed.
“And wood putty is used for what, exactly?” Gretchen asked.
“You use it to fill in or blend imperfections,” said Josie.
“In wood?” Gretchen said.
Hummel rolled his eyes. “Yes, that’s why it’s called wood putty. Come over here.”
He wheeled his chair around the table to one of the counters along the wall.
Josie hadn’t even noticed the small canisters and tubes of various wood putties arrayed across the surface.
Hummel plucked one from the collection and popped the lid open before handing it to Gretchen.
“Stick your finger in there and dig some out.”
Gretchen looked skeptical.
Josie laughed and pinched a small bit of putty from the container. She rolled it between her thumb and forefinger. It was dark brown, almost black.
“That’s red mahogany,” Hummel said. “There are all different kinds and colors. I took stains of a bunch of these so I could compare it to the one from the scene. To match it up to a brand or even a particular color, it would have to undergo much more extensive testing which I can’t do here, but it’s consistent with wood putty. ”
Josie handed the soft ball of putty to Gretchen who squished it between her thumb and forefinger, her brow shooting up in surprise. “It’s so soft. Kind of sticky.”
“Which is very likely how it got tracked into the crime scene. That would easily get stuck in the treads of a shoe,” said Hummel.
“This is great,” Josie said. “But it doesn’t help us find this guy. All we can do is try to match up the fibers to gloves and the putty sample to wood putty found in his possession once we’ve located him.”
Hummel took the can of putty from Gretchen and snapped its lid back on. “Like I said, it’s almost nothing. Given the flowers, it’s not really a surprise that he could be a gardener or landscaper—based on my guess that some of the fibers came from work gloves.”
“The wood putty is curious, though,” Gretchen said. “That doesn’t exactly fit with either of those things.”
“Of course it doesn’t,” said Josie. “Did you find anything like this at Dani’s house?”
Hummel shook his head. “Nope. We took some prints and DNA samples from places we think he might have touched—doorknobs, the kitchen table, their phones—but they could be from anyone—the residents, landlord, neighbor, Turner—and unless this guy is already in the CODIS database, it’s not going to matter. ”