CHAPTER THIRTEEN

"I can't tell whether we're on to something," Sheila said as she drove, "or if we're going deeper down the rabbit hole."

Sheila and Finn were on their way to speak with Jason Reeves, Rachel Kim's twenty-eight-year-old dog walker. He'd been working as a professional dog walker for the past five years with several clients in Rachel's upscale neighborhood. He had no criminal record and no religious affiliations that might make him a more likely suspect.

"I know. But we have to follow every lead, no matter how small," Finn said, studying his phone. "This guy had access to Rachel's house—we can't just ignore that."

Sheila said nothing. She sensed they were missing little details—details that might be the difference between life and death for the killer's next target.

Jason's modest apartment building was older, clad in a faded brick exterior crawling with rusted fire escapes. A few kids were playing in the small courtyard, their laughter echoing off the walls.

Sheila parked the car, and the two of them got out. They entered the building and climbed the creaking stairs to the third floor, the smell of various lunches cooking wafting through the hallways. Finn knocked on the door of apartment 3B, the sound echoing in the narrow corridor. There was no response.

"Lights are on," Finn murmured. "So why isn't he answering?"

Sheila was about to knock when she heard it: a muffled coughing sound coming from within the apartment. Her pulse quickened. Was Jason trying to hide from them? Or was something else going on?

"Jason Reeves?" Sheila called. "This is the police. We'd like to speak with you about Rachel Kim."

"Come in!" came a choked voice, followed by more coughing.

Finn tried the door handle, finding it unlocked. They entered cautiously, sweeping the small living room with their eyes. The apartment was cluttered but not dirty, with dog-themed decor scattered about. A half-eaten bowl of soup sat on the coffee table, still steaming.

And there, sprawled on a worn couch, was Jason Reeves. He looked pale and sickly, his face shiny with sweat. The apartment smelled of illness and disinfectant, making Sheila wrinkle her nose.

"Mr. Reeves?" Finn asked. "We'd like to ask you some questions about Rachel Kim."

Jason groaned, sitting up slowly. His movements were weak and uncoordinated. "Rachel?" he croaked, his voice hoarse. "Is she okay? I had to cancel on her this morning. Food poisoning hit me hard last night."

Sheila and Finn looked at one another. If Jason had been here, sick, all day, he couldn't have been involved in Rachel's murder. Assuming he wasn't faking his condition, of course. They still needed to establish an alibi, though—they couldn't just take his word for it.

"How long have you been ill, exactly?" Sheila asked.

Jason reached for a glass of water on the coffee table, his hand shaking slightly. "Since about ten last night," he replied after taking a sip. "Bad takeout, I think. From that new place on fifth. I've been stuck here ever since. Called all my clients first thing this morning to cancel."

"Can you prove that?" Finn asked.

Jason nodded weakly, reaching for his phone. "Yeah, check my call logs. And I've got the takeout receipt somewhere...probably in the kitchen."

"Can anyone verify that you've been here?" Sheila asked as Finn left to find the receipt.

Jason frowned, thinking. "My neighbor, Mrs. Goldstein in 3A, she brought me some ginger tea this morning. And the delivery guy who brought my meds saw me, too. You can check with them."

Sheila nodded, making a mental note. "We'll do that. Mind telling me when the last time you saw Rachel Kim was?"

"Would've been...two days ago? Yeah, Tuesday afternoon. I walked Mochi—that's her dog—while she was at work. I saw her right before she left."

"Did you notice anything unusual? Anyone hanging around her house, maybe?"

Jason shook his head, then winced at the movement. "No, nothing out of the ordinary. Rachel's neighborhood is pretty quiet. Lots of security systems, you know?"

Finn returned with the takeout receipt, confirming Jason's story.

As Sheila's eyes scanned the room, they landed on the half-eaten bowl of soup on the coffee table. Something about it caught her attention. She leaned in closer, careful not to touch anything.

"Mr. Reeves," she asked, "is this the takeout that made you sick?"

Jason nodded weakly. "That's right. Why?"

Sheila peered into the bowl, her brow furrowing. Nothing about the soup looked strange…still, Sheila had a nagging suspicion that something was wrong here.

"Mind if we take this?" she asked.

Jason's eyes narrowed, and he blinked at her, puzzled. "Uh…yeah, sure, I guess."

"Thank you." Sheila snapped the lid back over the styrofoam soup bowl, then picked it up. "We appreciate your time, Mr. Reeves, and we hope you feel better soon. Let us know if you think of anything else."

As they left Jason's apartment, Finn turned to Sheila. "What's with the soup? You think there's something off about it?"

Sheila nodded, her expression grim. "I have a hunch it might be poisoned. Think about it—if Jason was too sick to walk Rachel's dog, she'd have to come home early to take care of Mochi herself."

"Assuming she didn't have anyone else she could call," Finn said. "And that's a big assumption."

He had a point. Still, Sheila was undeterred.

"Maybe the killer knew her well enough to know she wouldn't let just anyone walk her dog," she said. "Either way, it seems like just the sort of devious thing our killer would do. He poses as a priest, he kills one woman in a confessional and lures another into an alley…"

"He's clever, that's for sure."

Sheila nodded. "And that's why I want to take this to the lab. Because if we just focus on the big break, the obvious explanation…we might never catch this guy."

***

This place is a jungle, Sheila thought, gazing around in surprise.

The forensics lab was located in the basement of the Coldwater County Sheriff's Department. Ordinarily the lab, all gleaming stainless steel and state-of-the-art equipment, was fairly quiet, humming with efficiency. Today, however, the lab seemed particularly chaotic.

On the drive here from Jason Reeves' apartment, Dawson had called for an update and explained that the Coldwater Confessor case had exploded in the media, because of which the mayor had ordered a review of all unsolved homicides from the past five years, looking for any possible links to the current case. This meant that boxes of old evidence had been dragged out of storage, filling every available surface in the lab.

Adding to the mayhem, a local reporter had leaked information about DNA evidence found at one of the crime scenes. This had led to a flood of calls from concerned citizens, each claiming to have information about suspicious individuals who might match the DNA profile. The lab was now processing hundreds of voluntary DNA samples, trying to rule out potential suspects.

Amidst all this, the regular caseload of the department hadn't decreased. If anything, the general sense of unease in Coldwater had led to an uptick in reported crimes, each requiring its own set of forensic analyses.

Sheila and Finn had to weave their way through a maze of busy technicians and towering stacks of evidence boxes to reach Dr. Patel, the head forensic analyst. Despite the chaos around him, Dr. Patel stood out like a calm eye in the storm. He was a tall, lean man in his fifties, with skin the color of polished mahogany and a shock of prematurely white hair that seemed to defy gravity. His most striking feature, however, was his eyes: heterochromatic, one a deep brown and the other a startling blue. These mismatched eyes peered out from behind thick-rimmed glasses, giving him an air of both eccentricity and intense focus.

Dr. Patel was hunched over a microscope, his lab coat rumpled and his tie askew. A half-empty cup of cold coffee sat precariously close to the edge of his workstation. He barely looked up as they approached, his mismatched eyes fixed intently on whatever sample he was examining.

"Dr. Patel," Sheila began, "we need your help with—"

"Let me guess," he said, finally turning to face them. "Another rush job?"

Finn nodded. "We have a soup sample we need tested for poison. It could be crucial to—"

Dr. Patel held up a hand, stopping Finn mid-sentence. "I'm sorry, deputies, but we're swamped here. The mayor's pushing for results on three different high-profile cases, not to mention the backlog from last month's evidence room flood. I simply don't have the manpower or the time to add another test to our workload right now."

Sheila felt her frustration rising. "This isn't some decades-old unsolved homicide. This is the Coldwater Confessor case, an active serial killer investigation."

Dr. Patel blinked at her as if a light had just gone on in his head. "Of course," he murmured. "I'll run a test right away. But I have to warn you: This test will only detect a limited number of common toxins—it won't give us a comprehensive analysis. So don't get your hopes up."

"Thank you, Dr. Patel," Sheila said, relieved.

"Alright then," Dr. Patel said. "Let's see what your mysterious soup has to tell us."

He gestured for them to follow him to a less crowded corner of the lab, where he donned a fresh pair of gloves and carefully opened the soup container.

He dipped the paper strip into the soup, then placed it on a small device that looked like a cross between a scanner and a spectrometer. The machine hummed to life, and a series of numbers and graphs appeared on its attached screen.

As they waited for the results, Sheila couldn't help but ask, "Dr. Patel, how did you end up in forensics? It seems like a...unique career choice."

The scientist's lips quirked in a small smile. "I was pre-med in college, but I found I preferred working with the dead more than the living. Less complaining."

Before Sheila could respond to this rather morbid joke, the machine beeped. Dr. Patel leaned in, scanning the results rapidly.

"Well, I'll be damned," he muttered.

"What is it?" Sheila asked, leaning forward.

Dr. Patel turned to face her, his expression grave. "Your hunch was right, deputy. This soup contains significant traces of ipecac syrup—an emetic agent used to induce vomiting."