“We are,” Laura confirmed. “You can call Rondelle on the way. We need a full forensic team down here to do this properly. I’m not letting them blame it all on a washout. No more incompetence—we’re nailing him on this one.”
“Yes, boss,” Nate said, seemingly stunned at her fierceness all of a sudden. Laura grabbed the driver’s side door and ignored him, wanting to get to the hospital as quickly as possible now that a life could still be on the line.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
“For Christ’s sake,” Laura muttered, almost hitting the steering wheel in frustration and only managing to hold herself back because she didn’t want to activate the horn by accident. The slow-moving truck in front of her put on its hazard lights and slowed down, letting them pass, perhaps sensing her frustration although the driver couldn’t have known that they were law enforcement.
“Just calm down,” Nate said, which made Laura want to snap his head off even more than the driver’s.
“I want to get there in case she wakes up,” Laura said. “If she saw him, we’re done. We can wrap this whole thing up. But if no one’s there to ask, and she slips away…”
“I know the frustration,” Nate said, shifting in his seat and holding onto the overheard handle. “I would just like to get there in one piece. Not collected into the back of a truck which, by the way, would definitely win in a fight with this car.”
“I keep seeing the same damn thing,” Laura said, which wasn’t really a reply but was related all the same. “The same table, the book, the carving. I think I’m looking at figureheads. But how does that even help? It’s not like we can check every single residence or building for a room with a book in it that has an illustration on one page of a figurehead.”
“You must be seeing things from his perspective, though,” Nate argued. “That’s good. That gets us closer.”
“Does it?” Laura scoffed in frustration. “All it gets me is a headache.” The pain throbbed behind her eyes even more as she said it. She felt like she’d hardly slept at all now. The pain of the vision as well as the headache from the tiredness combined into one supercharged attack on her skull. She just wanted to go back to bed, except she didn’t. She wanted to catch a murderer and see a girl who had been expected to die wake up. She wanted a happy ending, or as happy as you could get when two people were already dead anyway.
“We’ll get there,” Nate reassured her. “We always do.”
“Yes, but we don’t always manage to do it before another person dies,” Laura snapped. She took a breath, having to brake as she nearly went out into the path of an oncoming vehicle when she tried to overtake. She flexed her hands on the steering wheel in an attempt to make herself slow down. “Sorry. I’m stressed.”
“I can see that,” Nate said wryly. “It’s not just the case, is it?”
“No,” Laura admitted. The GPS said they were almost at the hospital. She slumped back slightly in her seat, knowing they were nearly there. “It’s Chris too.”
“Did you talk to him last night?”
“Tried to,” Laura said. She shrugged. “He didn’t answer.”
“Just let him go, Laura. You’ll be better off. If he’s too much stress, then look after yourself, and let him go.” Nate’s tone was kind, even if his words stung. Laura knew he was trying to look out for her, trying to be her friend, but the advice didn’t feel like something she could take.
“It’s not just our relationship though, is it?” Laura asked. “There’s Amy. And she’s become such good friends with Lacey. And anyway, that’s not all. I had a dream about him.”
“A vision dream?” Nate asked.
“No, just your regular run of the mill nightmare,” Laura said, taking the turning for the hospital. A sign beckoned, telling them which way to go for guest parking. “I think it was because of what you said before. I dreamed he had me sectioned when I told him I was psychic.”
Nate sucked in a breath. Laura spared a glance toward him as she drove up toward the parking spaces. He was shaking his head slightly, almost to himself.
“And you’re sure it was just a dream?”
“Unless he’s going to have a team of white-coated psych ward goons waiting outside his house at all hours to take me away, on the recommendation of you and the Chief, I think it was a dream,” Laura said drily.
“I would never—not even when I thought—” Nate started, but Laura cut him off with a wave of her hand as she parked.
“I know,” she said. “I know. That’s why I said I was sure it was a dream. We need to go find out what ward she’s on.”
“Right,” Nate said, opening the door before she’d even finished parking. “But, Laura, I really do want you to consider just letting Chris go. It’s not worth this level of stress.”
“Love isn’t?” Laura asked, before she could stop herself.
Nate gave her one more glance through the open door, then slammed it shut as he walked away toward the hospital entrance.
Laura swore under her breath. What was Nate’s problem? Just because he was unlucky in love, she had to be alone too?
She hadn’t meant to say love. Not really. She wasn’t sure if she was there with Chris yet. Sometimes she thought she was, but other times…