The Botanist by L. K. Hill Read Free Book Online Page B

for more than an hour. According to the news, tips were rolling in by the thousands. Everyone who ever had a loved one go missing, and thought they might have passed through that part of the desert, was tying up the line, trying to speak with the detectives. The detectives weren’t speaking to anyone calling in. They were following leads recorded from the tip line and assuring people that as soon as autopsies had been completed and DNA profiled, the families of the victims would be notified.
    Then she saw him.
    She let the phone drop from her ear and leaned forward so that she was inches from her parents’ LCD flat screen.
    That was him; she was sure of it. The same cop she’d talked to that night kept walking across the screen. She couldn’t remember his name, and he looked different than she remembered. His hair was longer in back, his face more weathered, and a jagged scar reached across his right eyebrow and over the upper part of his right cheek. She was certain he hadn’t had that the last time she’d seen him, brief though their meeting had been.
    The reporters tried to get his attention, tried to get a quote from him. A spokesperson for the department finally stepped forward, assuring the reporters that a press conference would be held as soon as possible, but that the detectives were making no statements at this time.
    So, he was a detective now. With a sigh, Alex looked down at her phone and made a decision.
    “Your call is very important to us. Please stay on the—”
    Sure it is, she thought. Which is why I’ve been on hold for an hour. Alex clicked the PWR/END button on her phone and got up from the couch. Her mother watched with anxious eyes from the loveseat four feet away.
    “Alex,” Deirdra Thompson’s voice was wary. “Where are you going?”
She knew her mother would object, but she just couldn’t sit around anymore. “I’ve been waiting almost ninety minutes, Mom.”
    “They’ll get to you eventually,” her mother muttered, but Alex ignored her.
    Alex pointed to the man on the TV screen. “See him?”
    Her mother glanced at the screen, but Alex doubted she really saw the detective.
    “He’s the cop I filed the report with.”
    Her mother’s eyes widened and darted to the television screen. “Really? But I thought you said he was just some amateur uniform.”
    “He was, but that was four years ago. Things change. If I can talk to him, I think he’ll remember me.” She started for the stairs.
    “How are you going to talk to him if you don’t stay on the tip line?”
    “That’s just it, Mom. The detectives aren’t talking to anyone on the tip line. Volunteers write down what you say and pass it on to the cops.”
    “Then what are you going to do?”
    By now, Alex was calling over her shoulder on her way up the stairs. “I’m going to drive down there and find him.”
    She heard her mother’s gasp from behind her and, as she entered her own room, the unmistakable stomp of her mother coming up the stairs.
    Alex grabbed her duffel bag from its usual place hanging behind the door. She yanked out stale gym shorts and dumbbells, replacing them with clean clothes, toiletries, and her MP3 player. She also tucked in a couple of books and her wallet. She’d moved back in with her parents a few months ago when her mother’s health had taken a turn for the worse. With her father traveling as much as he did for work, it was just better for someone to be around to help. Yet, Alex worked so much that a dozen unpacked boxes still leaned against the far wall, waiting to be dealt with.
    She was almost done packing when her mother finally huffed into view.
    “You aren’t supposed to be going up and down the stairs, Mom. Your hip will act up.”
    “Don’t really,” Dierdra panted, “give me much . . . choice, Alex. You just . . . walked away.”
    Alex glanced patiently at her mother while putting her travel bag together. Her mom leaned over, bracing herself on her knees and catching her