“You coming?” Nell asked.

Sara pushed open the door. The air felt chilly compared to the stuffy cab of the truck. The police officers at the end of the street stared with open curiosity. Sara waved. She got two nods in return.

Nell told Sara, “I’m’ll call Possum and see if he checked in with the nurse yet.” She flipped open her phone and dialed the number. Her hand went to her hip. She looked up at the house as she waited for Possum to answer.

Sara hoped Nell was reconsidering her plans. The first thirty minutes of their drive had been spent discussing the realities of what cleaning the crime scene would entail. Sara hadn’t held back toward the end. She’d been fairly brutal, which only seemed to galvanize Nell’s resolve.

Nell spoke into the phone, “How is he?”

Sara walked away from the truck to give her privacy. A breeze stirred the air as she headed toward the crime scene van. Sara rubbed her arms, wishing she’d thought to bring a jacket.

“Dr. Linton.” Charlie Reed smiled at Sara. He was a nice-looking man except for a well-groomed handlebar mustache, which gave him the appearance of a lounge singer. “Please tell me Amanda finally managed to snag us your services?”

“Lord no.” The last thing on earth Sara would ever want to do is work for Amanda Wagner. “I’m here with a friend.” She indicated Nell. “Her son’s Jared Long.”

“Oh.” Charlie’s smiled dropped. “Surely, she doesn’t want to see …?”

“Worse than that. She wants to clean it up.”

Charlie indicated for Sara to follow him to the front of the van. He glanced at Nell, probably to make sure she couldn’t hear them. “It’s pretty bad in there. I mean, not as bad as most, but they used a shotgun and there was quite a struggle. The volume of blood—”

Sara held up her hands. “I would gladly leave right now if I thought I could get her to go with me.”

Charlie looked at Nell again. Her determination must’ve been apparent. “Well, it’s good that she has you here to walk her through it.”

“I’m still trying to change her mind.”

“She doesn’t look like the type who does that,” he noted. “I can give you a quick rundown if you like?”

Sara nodded, ashamed that she was so eager to hear the details.

Charlie’s voice took on a practiced tone. “The man we’re calling Assailant Two entered through the front window.” He indicated the window in question. Black fingerprint powder smeared the white trim. “He more than likely used a pocketknife. Slid it between the frames, pushed open the thumb latch.”

Sara nodded. The entry method was typical for burglaries.

He continued, “We can assume from fingerprints that Assailant Two then opened the front door, letting the man we’re calling Assailant One enter the house. From the gunpowder residue on the floor and walls, we can conclude the first assailant was standing in the front room at the mouth of the hall when he initially fired the shotgun. Sawn-off Remington 870, twenty-eight gauge.”

Sara knew from past cases that a shotgun blast from that distance could rip apart a half-inch piece of plywood. The sawed-off barrel had spread the pellets, which was probably the only reason Jared hadn’t dropped dead on the spot.

Charlie said, “I’ve read the hospital admitting report. My preliminary field investigation supports the shotgun pellets mostly clustered in a twenty-centimeter circle in the victim’s thoracic region, roughly T-2 through T-7, with some penetrating the skull. At the scene, a few pellets were found lodged into the wood around the doorframe. We can assume that the majority of the pellets went into the victim.”

Sara had gotten out of the practice of listening to people talk as if they were giving testimony. “Jared was standing in the doorway?”

“Yes. The victim’s body was almost exactly centered in the doorway. He likely had his arms crossed or in front of him. According to the hospital report, he had no wounds on the back of his arms or hands. He was wearing a toolbelt, which we can surmise is where Detective Adams got the hammer.”

Sara had been wondering about that detail. She didn’t imagine Lena kept a hammer in the bedroom, though who knew what the hell she got up to.

Charlie continued, “Adams used the hammer to take out the first assailant, the shooter, at the doorway to the bedroom.” He pointed just below his eye socket. “Claw went in here. Got lodged in the orbita, went straight through the vitreous. The shotgun went off a second time, blasting a hole approximately thirty-two centimeters into the far wall. At some point, the assailant fell to the floor, whereupon the hammer was yanked out of his face. We found splatter and bone on the walls approximately ten to sixteen inches from the floor, so he was likely supine when it was removed. Some spatter arced onto the ceiling as it was wrenched away.” Charlie shuddered. “Sorry, hammers freak me out.”

“You’re not alone.”

“Nonetheless.” He shuddered again. “At some point, Assailant Number Two tried to come to the rescue. Residue puts him at approximately six feet outside the bedroom when he fired three shots from a Smith and Wesson five-shot revolver. He ended up shooting his buddy instead. I’m not certain how that happened, but Assailant One was standing with his back to the door when he was shot. Obviously, he fell to the floor shortly after. Then somehow the second assailant fell, and Adams went at him.”

“The second assailant fell before she hit him?”

“Fell to his knees,” Charlie clarified. “Sorry. We found knee and hand prints in the blood where he fell to the floor. This was when Detective Adams likely hit him in the head with the butt of the shotgun. We’ve got blood and hair on the gun, and the spatter on the wall and bed, which is approximately thirty-two inches from the floor, backs up a baseball swing. We took the dislodged teeth for evidence, so at least the mother won’t have to see them.” He glanced at Nell again. She was off the phone now, digging around in the back of the truck for her bags of cleaning supplies.

Sara asked, “What happened after the second shooter was taken out?”

“The neighbors arrived.” Charlie nodded up the road. “There are two officers on the block as well as a paramedic and a fireman. Sorry, firewoman. They got Jared’s heart pumping again. Fortunately for me, the on-duty officers who responded to the 911 call stayed out of the bedroom. The scene was fairly pristine when I arrived.”

Sara asked, “You said Jared’s heart stopped?” That would explain why they’d taken him to the closest hospital instead of the trauma center.

“Correct,” Charlie answered. “As I understand it, the neighbors worked on the victim for quite a while before the ambulance arrived. I’m surprised he made it, if you want to know the truth. He lost a significant amount of blood. My estimate—and don’t quote me on this until I do the math—is maybe two liters.”

Sara let the information settle. If Charlie was right, Jared had suffered a Class III hemorrhage, losing thirty to forty percent of his blood volume. The cascade of respiratory distress and organ failure were second and third only to severe tachycardia. If not for his neighbors physically pumping Jared’s heart, Sara would’ve met Nell at the funeral home this morning instead of the hospital.