Chapter Twenty-One

“Okay, here's something that's really putting a cramp in my brain,” I say.

“You say that like it's not a perpetual condition,” Winter laughs.

I pull out of The Marquis' parking lot and turn out onto the street, bound for the Black Salmon Falls police department. Traffic is sparse, as it usually is, but all over town, along with all of the holiday cheer, I'm seeing more and more pro-Green signs. And it turns my stomach.

“Emily is dreaming of the deaths of the victims. Like she's there,” I say. “And yet, we know she's not the one doing it. How can that be?”

Winter shrugs. “I honestly do not know,” she says. “But, I can hazard a guess.”

“By all means.”

“It's entirely possible that she was there for the Wendigo's first kill,” she says. “Saw it all happen on one of her late night runs in her new form. Now, I don't know what she is exactly, but her body shape kind of resembles a Wendigo.”

“You're saying she's a Wendigo?”

Winter shakes her head. “Not what I'm saying,” she replies. “I'm hazarding a guess. But, her body type closely resembles a Wendigo in some ways. What if, when she was in that lab, they gave her some sort of a genetic cocktail. Something that infused her with the DNA of different supernaturals? Wolf. Bear. Wendigo, perhaps?”

“Okay, I'm listening,” I say. “Without knowing what they did, it's possible.”

“Okay, so what if by doing that, they opened her up to the Wendigo's magic? Maybe she has some sort of connection to it. By witnessing it kill, maybe she sort of absorbed its energy,” she says. “It's possible that she's seeing through its eyes, I suppose.”

I shrug and let out a frustrated sigh. “Yeah, I suppose,” I say. “Makes as much sense as anything.”

“If we can destroy the Wendigo,” she says. “We may very well sever the connection between them.”

“Yeah, but that's not going to change what she's become,” I say. “If they changed her DNA in that lab –”

“One thing at a time, Jasper,” Winter says. “First, let's confirm that we're dealing with a Wendigo. After that, we'll move on to the next step.”

I nod as we pull into the rear lot that will lead us to the ME's office. A sense of dread and foreboding has settled over me and I don't like it. I don't like it at all. But, I also recognize that at the moment, there's nothing I can do about it. Like Winter said, one step at a time.

~ooo000ooo~

“You okay, Dr. Floyd?” I ask as we step into the autopsy suite.

He's hunched over his desk, looking for all the world like somebody just shot his dog. He looks up at us, an expression of pure dejection on his face.

“Yeah,” he says. “I'm fine.”

He looks like he's anything but fine though. We don't really have time to delve into the personal life of Dr. Connor Floyd, but he is distracted, and I need him to be sharp.

“What's going on, Dr. Floyd?” I ask. “Why so glum?”

He looks up at me, an expression of gratitude crossing his features. I imagine being locked down here with the corpses all day, he doesn't get a lot of human interaction. He's probably grateful that somebody is willing to listen. And after all that he's done for us, the least I can do is carve out a few minutes for him.

“Ariel betrayed me, Jasper,” he says.

That was surprising. From everything he'd told me, they were a perfect match and were completely in love.

“Wow, I'm so sorry, Dr. Floyd,” I say. “I never would have thought Ariel would have cheated on you. That's shocking.”

He nods eagerly. “I know, right?” he asks. “I mean, I never, in a million years, would have thought she would have picked a partner for a Scrabble tournament that wasn't me.”

Winter and I share a look and have to stifle our laughter. I put my hand over my mouth to hide the grin that I can't push back.

“I'm sure she has a good reason for it,” I say.

“I can't think of a single one,” he says, sounding entirely miserable.

“I can,” Winter says. “It's foreplay.”

“Foreplay?” Floyd asks, perking up a little bit.

Winter nods. “Yes,” she says. “She's daring you to compete with her. Daring you to beat her. She wants you to be jealous and hunt her. There is nothing better, nothing that spices things up in the bedroom, like a little heated competition. Believe me, I know. There was this one time I took on two men in a martial arts tournament. It was a very heated competition. But afterward, we used that energy to –”

“Okay,” I say, cutting her off. “I don't think we need to hear all the gory details.”

“Actually, I wouldn't mind hearing them,” Floyd says.

“What I'm saying is that this Ariel wants you to fight her. She wants you to build up that energy you can only build up in a competition,” she says. “And after that – well – I'm sure you can imagine how she wants you to expend that energy, Dr. Floyd.”

“Oh, I'm sure I can find some creative ways to burn that off,” he says.

The light in his eyes and the smile on his face is kind of creeping me out. The last thing I need bouncing around in my head are images of Floyd getting down with his fiancée.

“Wonderful,” I say. “Do you have any brain bleach I can use, Dr. Floyd?”

He gives me a grin and waves me off. “Do you really think so, Winter?”

“I know so.”

He jumps out of his seat and throws his arms around her, thanking her profusely. Winter pats him on the back, looking entirely uncomfortable by the outpouring of emotion. She looks at me to rescue her, but I just shrug and give her a grin. She created the monster.

A moment later, he steps back and smooths out his lab coat. His cheeks are flushed, and he looks a little bit embarrassed.

“Sorry,” he says. “That was just the best news I had all day.”

“I'm glad I could help,” Winter says.

“So,” he says, clapping his hands together, his face bright and cheery again. “I guess congratulations are in order, are they not?”

I cock my head and look at him. “Congratulations for what?”

“For Emi –” he cuts himself off and suddenly looks like the kid who got caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

“What about Em?” I ask.

“Oh, well, you should probably ask her,” he says. “I assumed she told you already.”

“Told me what?”

“It's really not my place –”

“I'm making it your place, Doctor,” I say. “Is something wrong with her?”

“No, well, I mean – I really think you should talk to her.”

I step forward, standing close to him. It's a cheap intimidation ploy and I'm ashamed of myself for using it against Floyd, but he's holding something about Emily back and I need to know what it is. If she's sick or hurt, I need to know.

“Dr. Floyd, what's wrong with Emily?”

He sighs and runs a hand over his face. “She's going to kill me for telling you anything.”

“She won't,” I say. “But, I might if you don't tell me.”

He looks at me with wide eyes – as if I'd really lay a hand on the man. But, it seems to loosen him up a little bit.

“She's having me run some tests on her,” he says. “She suspects that whatever they did to her in that lab where she was being held – well – that they changed her somehow. Made her into some sort of a monster.”

I let out a long breath and run a hand through my hair. “I know,” I say. “Winter and I saw her last night. But, we know that she's not the one doing the killings.”

“I know,” he says. “She gave me a bloody shirt and had me run it, fearing that it was human blood. It wasn't. It was animal blood.”

Although we'd already seen the Wendigo with our own eyes, the scientific confirmation that Emily had nothing to do with the killings still lifts a huge weight off my shoulders.

“There's something else,” he says.

And just like that, the weight is back. “What is it?”

“She's pregnant.”

I suddenly feel like I got kicked in the nuts with a steel-toed boot. “Come again?”

“Pregnant,” he says. “You're going to be a father, Jasper. Congratulations?”

My head is spinning, and I lean over, putting my hands on my knees, trying to avoid hyperventilating. I can't believe it. I'm going to be a father. I don't even know how I feel about that right now. But, the one thought that keeps rattling through my head is that Emily knew she was pregnant and kept it from me. Is still keeping it from me.

As stunning and life-altering as that news is, I can't deal with that at the moment. I look over at Winter who's staring back at me with wide eyes, in stunned silence. I stand up, try to gather myself, and clear my throat.

“Thank you for telling me, Dr. Floyd,” I say. “I'm sorry to come down on you like that, I just...”

“It's okay, I know you worry about her,” he says. “But, what can I do for you?”

“We wanted to take a look at the bodies,” I say.

“Specifically, we need to see the hearts,” Winter says. “Did you examine them?”

“Honestly, no,” he says. “There really wasn't much left of them, so I didn't see the need to examine the internal organs that closely. What is it you're looking for?”

“I'll let you know if we find it,” I say. “Can we start with the most recent victim?”

“Sure,” he says. “I just pulled him out of the fridge to do some work on him.”

Floyd walks over and pulls the sheet off the corpse on the autopsy table. Even now, ever since the bodies started dropping, it's still a little shocking to see a body so badly shredded. Floyd straps on a pair of gloves and starts digging through the cavity.

“Can you shine that light over here?” he asks.

Winter steps over and adjusts the overhead light so the cavity is illuminated. Crowding around the corpse, we all look down at the heart.

“Holy crow,” Floyd says. “Would you look at that?”

Winter turns to me. “Sucked out just like a juice box.”

Never before had a description been so apt. The heart in Floyd's hand was dried up and shriveled. Just like somebody had used a straw to suck out all of the juice inside. Floyd moves over to the drawers and pulls one of them out, taking the sheet off the body inside. He opens up the cavity and peers inside, his face blanching. The body in the next drawer reveals the same thing.

“What in the world did this?” Floyd asks, his eyes wide behind his glasses.

“Wendigo,” Winter says flatly.

“A Wen – what?”

“A Wendigo,” I say and give him a smile. “And now you have something else to study up on, Dr. Floyd.”

“Well, I do enjoy learning,” he says. “Always have.”

I turn to Winter. “I guess we have our answer.”

“I'd say so.”

“Thank you, Dr. Floyd.”

“Yeah, uhhh... glad I could help.”

As we turn to go, Winter turns back to him and gives him a smile.

“Remember, Doctor,” she says. “Hunt your woman. Show her you're the boss. She wants that.”

Floyd gives us a toothy grin. “I will,” he says. “I'll show her a thing or two.”

“Good for you, Doctor,” Winter says. “You will have a ton of great sex after that.”

He opens his mouth to reply, but then closes it again just as quickly. Floyd's cheeks flush and looks away quickly and I have to stop myself from laughing out loud.

“Happy hunting, Doctor,” I call over my shoulder as we leave the autopsy suite.