Lisa Gardner - The killing hour

“The mountains,” Kimberly filled in.

He nodded. “Yeah. Now the question is, which range? Are we talking the Blue Ridge Mountains, the Shenandoah Mountains, the Appalachians? Hang on, I have an idea.” His chair shot across the room again. He found a directory on top of his bookcase, flipped through several pages, grabbed a phone and made a call. “Kathy Levine, please. She’s out? When do you expect her back? I’ll leave a message.” And in another moment, “Kath, hey, it’s Ray Lee Chee from USGS. Got a question about gray birch. Where is it in the state? It’s actually important, very Sherlock Holmes. When you get in, give me a buzz. We’ll be waiting. Bye.”

He hung up the phone, then met their expectant gazes. “Kathy’s the botanist with Shenandoah National Park. She’s more familiar with the trees in that area and if anyone knows about the gray birch, it’s her. Unfortunately, she’s out in the field right now.”

“For how long?” Mac demanded to know.

“Four days.”

“We don’t have four days!”

Ray held up a hand. “Yeah, yeah, yeah. Kind of got that. Give her until around noon. Come lunch, she’ll check messages, give me a call, and then I can give you a call. Noon’s only four hours away.”

“Four hours can be a long time,” Mac said grimly.

“What can I say? It’s not easy when you only have a picture of a leaf.”

“I have a question,” Kimberly spoke up. “From all of your various studies… Is there any connection between Virginia and Hawaii?”

“Virginia and Hawaii?”

“Yes.”

“Huh. Hell if I know. From a plant perspective, I can’t think of a thing. Hawaii’s kind of tropical, you know. And Virginia isn’t. Well, except for this week, of course. We’re always prepared to make an exception.”

“No other way they might be related?” Kimberly prodded.

Ray did the nose wiggle again. “You might ask a geologist. We have mountains, they have mountains. We have Chesapeake Bay with its multitude of barrier islands, which might be similar to their barrier islands. But from a flora and fauna perspective, I don’t see a relationship.”

“And where in this building might we find a geologist?”

“We don’t have geologists, you’d have to go to Reston. Wait!” He read her expression and immediately held up a hand. “I know, I know, you don’t have time for Reston. Okay… Jennifer York. She’s one of our core samplers, and I believe she has a background in geology.”

“Where’s her office?”

“Other side of the building, third office on the left.”

“Okay.” She turned toward Mac, who was looking at her with a puzzled expression. “You heard the man,” she said crisply, “let’s go find a geologist.”

Richmond, Virginia

8:31 A . M .

Temperature: 87 degrees

“WHY ARE WE ASKING ABOUT HAWAII?” Mac asked thirty seconds later when they were back in the halls of the USGS building.

“Because the ME’s assistant said the victim had a travel brochure for Hawaii in her purse.”

He grabbed her arm and they both came to a sudden halt. Mac looked cool. She was already breathing hard and gazing with lethal intent at his fingers on her wrist.

“I don’t recall you mentionin’ that yesterday,” he said ominously.

“I didn’t think of it. The brochure was something the ME’s assistant brought up in passing and I took it in kind. But then last night, I remembered what you said. That for some of the victims, the man put things in their purses-a business card, a cocktail napkin with a name. And that got me wondering.”

Mac slowly released her. “Anything else you remembered last night?”

“Yes. I remembered to strap on my knife.”

He grinned. “Where is it this time? Ankle? Inside of a thigh? I swear it’s the first thing I thought when I saw you this morning. So few clothes and yet somewhere on that lean little body, I know there rests a three-inch blade. I swear, honey, I never met a woman who could make a man think of knives quite the way you do.”

Mac leaned a little closer. He smelled of soap again. Clean, strong. Kimberly instantly took a small step back. Funny how it felt as if all the air had just been sucked from her lungs.

“If I’m a good boy,” Mac murmured softly, “do I get to search you later? Or would you prefer it if I were bad?”

“Hey. Hey, hey, hey.” Kimberly finally found her bearings, getting her hands up and placing them firmly between them. “I am not flirting with you!”

“Of course not.”

“Now, what is that supposed to mean?”

“You’re not the type for a casual social gesture, Kimberly. I know that. Nah, with you, I imagine it would be very serious.” He nodded at her, his blue eyes suddenly somber and affecting her far more strongly than any of his teasing ever had. Then he was straightening up and turning back toward the hall. “So where’s that geologist?”

He strode forward, and Kimberly had to scramble to follow suit.

Five minutes later Mac rapped on a closed door bearing the nameplate Jennifer York. The door almost immediately opened up.

“Yes?” a young woman asked. Like Ray Lee Chee, she was dressed casually-khaki shorts, white scooped-collar shirt, and heavy-duty hiking boots.

Mac flashed a smile, and went to work. “Jennifer York, I presume? Special Agent Mac McCormack, ma’am. And this here is… Special Investigator Quincy. We were just asking your associate Ray Lee Chee some questions relevant to a case, and he highly recommended you as an expert in the field of geology.”

The woman blinked her eyes a few times. Her gaze had started on Mac’s face, but now had drifted to the broad expanse of his chest. “Special Agent? As in police?”

“Yes, ma’am. We’re working on a special situation, a kidnapping, if you will. We have a few items from the scene-tree leaves, rocks, etc.-that we need to identify to help find the victim. Could we take a moment of your time? It sure would be a big help.”

Mac gave the woman one last charming smile, and she practically tripped over herself getting the door all the way open and inviting Mac inside. Briefly, she seemed to notice Kimberly was in tow, but then her gaze was all Mac all the time. Not that the man didn’t have a way with women.

Inside the office, Jennifer York’s workspace appeared very similar to Ray Lee Chee’s-a modest arrangement of overstuffed bookshelves, crammed filing cabinets, and a utilitarian desk. Now she stood with one hand lightly touching her desk and the other supporting her lower back, which she had arched in a not-so-subtle attempt to emphasize her breasts.

“So,” Kimberly spoke up curtly, finally earning York’s attention. “We were wondering if there is any connection between Hawaii and Virginia.”

“You mean the two states?”

“I believe they are states, yes. So are they related or what?”

The brunette stared at Kimberly a moment longer, then abruptly abandoned her feline pose, and took a seat in her desk chair. Now that they were on the subject of work, her expression had grown serious.

“Actually, from a geologist’s perspective there is quite a connection. We often compare the Blue Ridge Mountains in Shenandoah National Park with the Hawaiian Islands-both were partially formed by flows of basaltic lava. Essentially, one billion years ago, what we now call the Blue Ridge Mountains were actually the Grenville Mountains, which we believe may have stretched from Newfoundland to Texas and may have reached as high as the present-day Himalayas. This mountain range eroded over time, however, until by six hundred million years ago it was little more than a series of rolling hills. Then, however, we had the Catoctin volcanics.”