Page 69 of See How They Hide

“The coroner is going to clear the den,” Jim said, “then you two can go in to search. I’m joining him at the morgue—nice guy, a lot of experience, but he’s never handled something like this. Michael, I’m going to take the car if you can take Sloane to the hotel with you?”

Michael nodded, then asked, “Can you tell us anything after inspecting the body?”

“Not much. Wish I had my mobile lab. Maybe we should have retrofitted an airplane instead.” He didn’t sound like he was joking. “Anyway, he’s been dead at least two weeks, up to a month. We’ll be able to narrow it down. I don’t know if they opened the windows to slow decomposition, or if he had them open when he was killed. No sign that the dog was killed in the house, so I’m hoping his killers have a tiny amount of compassion and took the animal to a shelter. The sheriff’s department is checking all shelters in the county and adjoining counties.”

“One of our witnesses said that Morrison was very attached to the dog, a Saint Bernard. He’s likely chipped,” Michael said.

“Dog like that?” Jim nodded. “Yep.” He looked over his shoulder as the coroner and an assistant brought the body bag out on a stretcher and rolled it over the rocky ground to the wagon. “We’re not going to do the autopsy tonight, but we’ll prep him and if we find anything important on his person, I’ll tag you.”

He left, and Michael and Sloane went into the house.

“Where do you want to start?” Sloane asked.

“You take his bedroom, I’ll take the den.”

“You don’t need to spare me from the gore.”

“I’m not. I’m the senior agent and I want to go through his papers. You figure out if he kept anything important upstairs. In my experience, people who want to hide something and don’t have a safe, pick personal spaces, like an underwear drawer.”

“You’re the boss.”

Michael grinned. “Don’t tell Matt.”

Sloane went upstairs to where Jesse Morrison once slept in a large, open loft. There was a small bathroom, but nothing important there. No prescription medications. No sign that a woman stayed over regularly. She did, however, find mini shampoo and conditioner bottles of the same brand that Chris Crossman had at his house. Could that mean someone who stayed with Chris also came here?

His bed was made. There was dog hair on the comforter. She smiled, though it was bittersweet. When she grew up in Montana, her golden retriever slept on her bed every night. She would love to have a dog again, but with all the traveling in this position, it wouldn’t be fair to the animal.

She looked through Morrison’s drawers, which had mostly male clothes, though she found two pairs of women’s underwear, a pair of women’s jeans, and a couple T-shirts that seemed too small for Jesse. All the items were in the bottom drawer of his dresser. Old girlfriend? Maybe.

She looked under clothes, in the nightstand, under the bed. There was no closet, only an armoire. He didn’t have any formal clothes—aside from one skinny tie shoved in the back of the top drawer. Jesse Morrison lived in jeans and flannels. He had several pairs of hiking boots—all good quality shoes—and extensive outdoor gear, which would be necessary living in this climate. There were a couple books on the nightstand, nothing she’d read. A lone photo was stuck in the middle of a book shoved in the back of the nightstand drawer.

She pulled it out. It was of a dog—she presumed the missing Saint Bernard—sitting between Jesse and a woman.

Jesse appeared to be a few years younger than his current thirty-five. The woman was younger, closer to twenty-five. The photo was faded, but she had long dark red-brown hair in a thick braid that fell over her shoulder and dark eyes. She wasn’t smiling, but her arm was around the dog’s neck.

Sloane looked at the back of the photo. Nothing was written on it. She sealed it in an evidence bag, marked where she’d found it on the label, and went downstairs.

Michael was still in the den, frustrated. “Either he had no papers of value, or they cleaned him out. We’ll grab the computer. I doubt Quantico can salvage anything, but maybe there’s a chip or two that they can pull data from.”

“I didn’t find much, but this photo was hidden in the middle of a book.”

Michael stepped out of the den and looked at the picture. “We’ll ask Riley if she knows who this woman is.” He looked around. “I’ll take the bedroom down here and the bathroom. You want to tackle the kitchen and living room?”

“Got it.”

They didn’t find much else of interest, though Sloane figured out how the killers got in—someone shot out the kitchen window and then unlocked the heavy side door. She took pictures, and then asked one of the deputies to print the entire area. They might not find anything, but there was a chance the killers had left something of themselves behind.

There was a mat with the nameBanjo, but no dog bowls. She opened cabinets and found one that had dog biscuits and a place where there must have been a large bag of food—a few loose kernels were scattered around.

Carefully, she examined the cabinet door and saw a small amount of blood.

“Deputy?” she called to the man who was taking prints.

“Yes, ma’am?”

“Print this door, too. Where the dog food was. There’s blood here—we’ll need samples of that.” Most likely the victim’s, but after working with Jim for a short time, she knew he would want a sample of every drop of blood found where it wasn’t expected.

“On it,” the deputy said.

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