Page 121 of Concealed in Death

Eve let it hang between them until they’d gotten into the car, into the warm. “It felt okay with her. Okay on my side of it, the right thing on hers. It is personal, but sometimes you use the personal to lever off the lid of something.”

“Do you still have nightmares?”

“Not like I did.” And it wasn’t as hard to think about, Eve realized as she merged into traffic. “Hardly ever. I have weird dreams, talking to the dead.”

“That’s creepy.”

“Not really, not always. And it’s useful. Just another lever. See about Nash Jones. I want him in the box, and I’ve got just the lever to pry him open.”

While Peabody tried to hook Nash Jones, Eve used the in-dash to contact Mira’s office.

Mira’s dragon peered coolly from the screen. “Lieutenant.”

“I need a few minutes with Dr. Mira.”

“The doctor is in session. She has a meeting directly after, followed by a consult. Her day is booked, Lieutenant.”

“Five minutes. Twelve dead girls and I need five minutes.”

“I’ll get back to you when I find five minutes.”

Eve bared her teeth at the screen as it went blank. “Who doesn’t have five fucking minutes? You’d think I was asking for an audience with God.”

“Mira is her god,” Peabody pointed out. “And Nash Jones is also in session. Shivitz passed me to his assistant who said she’ll have him contact me as soon as he’s free. But also said his day was crowded.”

“He’ll just have to make room.”

Since without Nash Jones or Mira she had five minutes, Eve detoured to DeWinter’s lab.

•••

She heard someone shouting as she walked in. Her hand went to the butt of her weapon, then released it again when she recognized elation rather than fear or violence.

From the other direction she heard what sounded like a muffled explosion, followed by hysterical laughter.

“What kind of madhouse is this?”

“I think it’s kind of icy.” Peabody peered through glass walls, craned her neck to see over equipment. “But maybe you have to lean toward nerd to think it.”

“You have to be neck-deep in nerd to think it. Like nerd quicksand. And why is it called quick anyway? In the vids people and unfortunate animals just sink slowly.”

“Actually, you wouldn’t sink but float, unless you struggle.”

Eve glanced to the left where some nerd—sex not quite apparent in the baggy lab coat and behind the fly-eye microgoggles—looked up from examining a jawbone.

“What?”

“Quicksand’s just ordinary sand that’s saturated with water to the point it can’t support weight, and it’s usually only a few feet deep. The grains lose their friction, being saturated. But if you can, just float on it because your body’s less dense than the quicksand.”

“Okay, good to know. Next time I fall into some, I’ll remember that.”

“But if the mixture contains clay, that’s a problem. The clay acts as a gel, so if you fell into it, the force would cause the gel to liquefy and bond the clay particles together.”

The lab rat slapped one palm on the other. A good look at the hands determined male lab rat for Eve.

“You could sink pretty deep. Then the force needed to pull you out would be about the same as to lift a car or small truck. The trick is to wiggle out, as the motion lets water seep in, so you’re back to floating.”

“Okay then. I’m going to have to write all that down. Just in case.”

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