"No. It's true."

He put Diane's key on her desk. "The orange carpet fiber was on your couch, and on the b.l.o.o.d.y towel."

Jin frowned suddenly and pulled up a chair and sat down, switching gears from his usual hyperactive mode.

"I've been looking at the evidence from Kacie Beck's scene. The rape kit was negative. He used a condom. I didn't find anything on the body that be longed to the perp. Her house was clean too. No prints, no fibers that we can identify-we got the same cotton fibers, but that's all. The guy skinned her fin gers pretty bad getting the ring off. I'm betting he got some blood on him-clothes, gloves, something. Doesn't help us now, but it might later. You know, Boss?"

"What?"

"I've been thinking about a DNA lab."

"You have. Been thinking about the money to put one in?"

"No. Haven't been thinking about that. The Girl Scouts raise a lot of money selling those cookies. Maybe we could get some crime cookies-some shaped like a gun, a knife, a bone, maybe. The sand wich cookies could have red filling. What do you think about that?"

"I'm starting to think you don't have enough to do."

"How about tee-shirts? We could sell tee-shirts- People are just dying to see us People are just dying to see us."

"Good-bye, Jin."

Diane watched him go out the door. She looked at her blank wall and decided she needed to do some thing to decorate this office-it seemed like she was spending a lot more time in it.

The reports her team generated were stacked up on her desk. She'd been through them several times hop ing for a revelation. There was none, but it was the slowly trickling evidence that was taking the day. They were getting close-more than close. They could put whoever it was in the hospital with the hanging victims on two separate bits of evidence-the orange fibers and the DNA. That was a home run.

Her thoughts went to Raymond Waller. He seemed such an unlikely person to be involved in crime. But who knows? She'd really only met him a couple of times. Lynn Webber knew him, though. Worked with him every day. She'd trusted him. Diane shoved it out of her mind and stood up. All this was really in Garnett and Braden's purview.

She started back to her other office but made a detour to the rock lab and looked at Raymond's dia monds in the safe. Even uncut they shone against the black velvet.

The diamonds kept intruding into her thoughts. That must have been what Steven Mayberry meant when he said his ship had come in-and what Chris Edwards was so happy about. They must have gotten their hands on several valuable diamonds-not only the one in Kacie's ring. Bet they had more. Raymond had to be a part of it somehow. However unlikely a criminal ring the three of them seemed to be, they must have stumbled into something.

But how in the world did a serial killer fit into all of this? Unless he wasn't a serial killer. The other thing Chris, Steven and Raymond had in common was the hanging victims. Chris Edwards and Steven Mayberry found them. Raymond Waller helped with their autopsies. That connection was accidental. It came after the Cobber's Wood victims were dead-or did it, really? Maybe Edwards and Mayberry simply led the sheriff to the people they had killed-but then, how did the man in the hospital play into it? He was there too.

It hit Diane suddenly. Maybe he was supposed to be in the fourth noose, the forgotten victim-but what were the E-mail, phone calls, flowers and the attack in her apartment about? If he was a victim, why didn't he just walk into a police station instead of calling her?

No matter what scenario she came up with, there was always some part of it that didn't make sense. She gave up and went back to her museum office.

She'd been going over budget figures for an hour when Garnett called and asked her to meet him and Braden at the hospital.

"He might tell you something he hasn't told us," he said. "He was anxious to talk to you before."

"You're not talking to my client."

John Doe's court-appointed attorney stood in front of the door leading to critical care, barring Diane, Sheriff Braden and Chief Garnett from entering.

"Your client," said Sheriff Braden, "killed three young people barely out of their teens in my county. One of us is going to talk to him."

The attorney, Tim Preston, looking hardly out of his teens himself, stood with his arms folded, not moving.

"You don't know my client did any such thing."

"We have your client," said Garnett. "We've matched his DNA with DNA left with the Cobber's Wood hanging victims."

"Did you have a court order to take his DNA?"

"Didn't need one. He left his blood all over Dr. Fallon's apartment," said Sheriff Braden.

"What's his name?" asked Diane.

"I don't know."

"What do you mean, you don't know?" asked Braden.

Preston dropped his arms to his side. "I mean he's not talking to me either. My client is still in critical condition. If your policemen hadn't been so quick to shoot a man for holding a cell phone..."

"He broke into Dr. Fallon's apartment and attacked her. She barely escaped with her life. My men went in to get him and he drew something from a holster on his side that looked like a gun-after he was or dered to freeze. We aren't going to have any of this he-was-just-a-poor-innocent-victim business around here," said Garnett. "Now, we want to know who he is."

"He's not talking-not to you and not to me. That's the way it is. The doctors are giving his chances of recovery about fifty-fifty right now. If you want him to live to stand trial, leave him alone."

"We would like to know who the victims are so we can notify their families," said Diane.

"No. He's not talking. What part of that aren't you people getting?"

"Well, this is a h.e.l.l of a note," said Sheriff Braden, as he, Diane and Garnett walked back to their cars. "We have him dead to rights, and can't even get the son of a b.i.t.c.h's name."

"We'll get it sooner or later," said Diane. She got in her car and drove back to the museum. As she was parking, her cell phone rang. It was Neva. "I got a hit on the plastic surgeons' list."

Chapter 40.

Neva was sitting at the conference table in the crime lab when Diane arrived. She had several photographs in front of her, along with her drawings of the victims. David and Jin joined Diane at the table.

"What have you got?" said Diane.

"First, let me tell you, I bombed out on the tattoo lists. I didn't really handle it the right way. I cleaned up the photos of the tattoos so they didn't look like they were on a dead body, and I phrased my questions as if they were missing persons. Not a good idea with this group. They took the att.i.tude that they had a right to be missing. I sort of got a lot of flames on that list.

"Thank goodness, the doctors were more forth coming." Neva turned the photographs around. "I said from the start that I was trying to identify two sets of bones. I got a bite last night. A plastic sur geon in Buffalo, New York, E-mailed me to give him a call."

"He recognized the drawings?" asked Diane.

Neva nodded. "He said they looked like patients of his. I also included photographs of the nasal bone and spine of Blue Doe. I hope that was all right. I thought he might recognize his work, even . . . even though the nose wasn't there."

"Too bad he wasn't one of those surgeons who ini tials the bones of his patients," said Jin.

"Did he? Recognize his work?" asked Diane.

"He said he did a lot of rhinoplasty like the ones that showed up in the bones, and he said the drawings did resemble a particular patient of his. When he found out I was trying to identify bodies, he sent these photographs to my E-mail."

The four photographs were before and after shots of a young woman in side and front views. The photos looked startlingly like Neva's drawings.

"The interesting thing is," said Neva, "that he was scheduled to do her cousin. Here's his before shots."

Neva pushed two more photos across the table. Again, they looked to Diane like a match to Neva's drawings.

"You say he was scheduled for surgery?"

Neva nodded. "He didn't show up for pre-op. The doctor's office called his home and didn't get an an swer. They called the cousin's home and the house keeper said the family was gone on a trip. Isn't that interesting?"

"Yes, it is. Frankly, I'm amazed this worked. Good job, Neva. What are their names?"

"Ashlyn and Justin Hooten. Both live in Buffalo, New York. I have their addresses and phone numbers."

"Well done," Diane said again. "I'm going to call the sheriff."

Diane couldn't reach the sheriff or Garnett immedi ately. She left voice mail on their phones. She won dered if they went back to the hospital after she left them.

It was past lunchtime and she was hungry. She left the crime lab and went down to the restaurant, or dered herself a club sandwich and took it to her mu seum office.

Andie was eating at her desk with one of the do cents, a young woman about Andie's age.

"Everything going well here?" Diane asked.

"All quiet. No strange E-mail, wandering snakes or anything else out of the ordinary."

"Good. I'm going to be eating in my office. I'd like some quiet time, so unless the museum catches fire . . ."

"Gotcha."

Diane went into the meeting room adjoining her office. She got a bottle of cold water from a small refrigerator she had there and sat down at her small conference table with her sandwich.

She felt like the note containing the information about the Hooten cousins was burning a hole in her pocket. She tried to ignore it. She was about half finished with the sandwich when she decided to make the call herself, without waiting to talk with Braden or Garnett. The ident.i.ty of the victims was the key to everything. She walked into her office and picked up the phone.

She called Justin Hooten's number first and let it ring twenty-five rings. No answer. She dialed Ashlyn Hooten's number. Someone picked up on the third ring and announced that she had reached the Hooten residence.

"I'm Diane Fallon from the Rosewood Police De partment in Georgia."

She decided that saying she was head of the crime lab might be too frightening. As much as the photo graphs and the drawings seemed to match, they may not be the right people.

"I'm looking for a possible witness. Is Ashlyn Hooten in?"

"No. She on vacation with her cousin family."

"Are her parents there?"

Diane heard another voice in the background. "Who is it, Nancy?"

"She say she the police. From Georgia."

"I'll take it. h.e.l.lo. I'm Ashlyn's father, an attorney here in Buffalo. What is it you want?"

"When was the last time you saw Ashlyn?"

"What's this about? Look, I want you to stop ha ra.s.sing my daughter. You are not to call here again." He hung up.

"Well," Diane said aloud. "That went nowhere."

She tried both the sheriff and Garnett again. They still weren't answering their cells. She started back to the conference room to finish her sandwich when the door flew open and Lynn Webber stormed in. Andie flew in behind her.

"Dr. Fallon . . ." Andie was obviously helpless to slow down Lynn.

"It's all right, Andie." Andie backed out and closed the door.

"Just what are you and Garnett trying to do to Raymond?"

Diane sat down and motioned to the chair. "I don't know. What are we trying to do?"

"Don't act smart. I thought we were friends. I thought you liked Raymond."

"I thought so too, and I do like Raymond. If you tell me what you are talking about, maybe I can re spond more coherently."

Lynn Webber dropped herself into the chair in front of Diane's desk.

"Garnett came to see me, insinuating that Ray mond was a thief, asking me all kinds of questions about him knowing Chris Edwards and some other people I never heard of. He suggested that I might have had something to do with stolen diamonds. I don't even like diamonds. He said you and he cooked this up."

Diane was having a hard time making sense of Lynn's diatribe in terms of what Garnett might have actually said.

"Did he really use the work cook cook?"

"What? Are you taking this seriously?"

"I am. But since we 'cooked' nothing up, I'm having a hard time following. What exactly did he say that brought you here?"

"I can't remember his exact words. He said some diamonds were found among Raymond's possessions and he wanted to know where he got them and did I have any ideas. It was the way he asked if I I had any ideas. I mean, would Garnett know a real diamond if he stepped on one?" had any ideas. I mean, would Garnett know a real diamond if he stepped on one?"

Diane was trying to measure what exactly to tell her in terms of what Garnett might have revealed to her. She didn't want to give anything away, but if he had mentioned the diamonds to Lynn, then he didn't mind her knowing about them.

"Diamonds were found among Raymond's things, and they are real. One of the geologists here at the museum verified that."

"Oh. Garnett said they're valuable."

"Yes, they are. Would you like to see them?"

"Well, yes, that would be interesting. If I'm sus pected of stealing them, I'd like to see what it is I was supposed to have stolen."