Robin Jenkins and Christina Clark find the dead body of Violet Hayes in their apartment. They strike an investigation of their own and enlist the help of their neighbor, Finn Dallas.
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ROBIN THOUGHT SHE HAD TO DEAL with the autopsy report fiasco in the foreseeable future.
She did not expect for the foreseeable future to be an hour later when she ran into Andrew Hayes at the nurses' station.
She had been in the middle of stretching her neck from side to side, the stethoscope around her becoming a slight weight against her exhausted shoulders, when she caught sight of him. She slowed down, eyes scanning her surroundings for a swift escape.
"How was your surgery, Doctor Jenkins?"
Her full attention zoomed back on him, realizing he had looked up from the document in his hand to address her. She tucked her hands in her uniform's pockets, nodding her head once.
"Not bad."
He offered a smile, putting his pen down and angling his body to fully face her. Now, that got her uneasy. She narrowed her eyes, refusing to move a muscle, not until she was released from his scrutinizing gaze.
"You didn't answer my earlier question, Doctor."
Her fingers curled into tight fists underneath the material of her trousers to stop herself from fidgeting.
"Oh." If it were anyone else, she wouldn't have answered. She would have let it go there and maybe turned to leave without much else to spare. But his presence was oddly intimidating, and it made her stand straighter before him. That unconscious reaction her body did irritated her - because it was the same reaction it would succumb to whenever she used to be around someone else, someone she desperately wanted to be wiped out of her memory. "I might've tuned out."
His chin tipped up, and he offered a brief nod. He took a step forward, and Robin was quick to look down to assess the distance between them. Two feet away.
"Was it Violet's autopsy file you were requesting?"
His question rang through her ears and wrapped around her gut, squeezing. She met his gaze, unable to hide the intense feeling gripping her throat, and he stared back, unrelenting.
"Yes," she forced out, body rigid.
"I thought so." He exhaled a steady breath. "I have a form in my office, you can fill it out and I'll approve it directly. You can pick it up from the office right away."
Shock prickled her senses, and her jaw hung at his words. She blinked, sensing that the first words she was about to utter would be a sputtering mess, and instead, she chose silence for a few seconds to gather her composure.
She felt the tautness of her nerves when she rasped a simple, "Okay." She felt it in her bones, the hesitation that paralyzed her legs for a moment, watching Andrew Hayes's tilt in his head, ushering her to follow him, and his disappearing body.
She couldn't tell what awaited her, but slowly, she followed.
His office wasn't one out of the ordinary; a small, enclosed space with a desk in the middle and a computer on top, a window behind it with the blinds shut, a scale, an examination table in the corner, and filing cabinets. The examination table didn't surprise her; it was further proof that he did specialize in emergency medicine and forensic pathology as she had heard, dedicating his entire life to his work.
