Gene Search: A Collin Carter Mystery

by Kathleen Steed

Lily was very challenged by Collin’s request that they spend their vacation in the Cook Islands. Air New Zealand flew there directly from Los Angeles. But only on Sundays and it was expensive. But Collin had told her it would be a challenge. So she was continuing her search to find a way to get there before July. Several of the other nurses she worked with had already scheduled vacations in the middle and end of July so she needed to get her plans in place. Lucky for her the airline only required a two day notice.

  She was encouraged when she found a blog on the Internet written by people living on Rarotonga, the main island in the Cook Islands. Along with their comments there were pictures. Such pictures - the place was gorgeous. A few buildings nestled into a jungle of palm trees surrounded by white sand beaches, the deep blue sea and a brilliant sky of blue as well. Every time she got frustrated about the trip she went back to the blog and gazed at the perfection displayed in the photos.

  It was the Saturday after she had told Collin about the baby born without eyes that she found it - an offer on e-bay from a couple in Rarotonga who needed to come to Washington D.C. They had been looking for two months but had not had any offers. They needed to be near Washington D.C. for the last two weeks of June and the first week of July. Their family was from Washington D.C. and there was going to be a family reunion they desperately wanted to attend.

  Lily could think of all kinds of reasons that a house swap with strangers would lead to disaster. But it also sounded exciting and fun. It would decrease the cost of the trip to just the airfare and incidentals. Certainly Collin would not mind if they extended their stay for three weeks instead of two. The Hospital would give Lily the time she wanted. Lily entered the townhome as a possible swap and waited a couple of minutes for a response. One didn’t come right away so she logged off. She could hardly wait to tell Collin. He wasn’t home. He was off snooping again. He didn’t have a new case but he was continuing to look into the place where the young ladies Lily had seen at the mall had been staying. Lily wasn’t sure why he was working on that case with no pay but it was keeping him busy.

  Collin went to the cathedral near the Gene Search compound early Saturday morning. He was hoping the compound would be deserted and he could spend the day looking for any information about the Cook Island location. When he and Lily got to Rarotonga he could use his GPS software to find the girls but any information he could find ahead of time would help.

  He was tired and scratched up by the time he got through the woods to the compound. He looked around. No cars were parked near the lab building or the security building he had been to before. Near the security building, on the opposite side from the lab building, was a building that might be a dormitory. He could see two other buildings beyond that. He crept over to the furthest building and peaked in a window. He saw a garage with lots of tools. Most likely this was a vehicle maintenance building. He tried the keys he had made from the impressions of Doreen’s keys. The fourth key turned the deadbolt and he got inside. Collin walked through the deserted garage to the office behind it. Nothing here looked of interest to him. Past the office was a short hall with a bathroom and a set of stairs. He quietly made his way up the stairs. At the top were a sloppy storage room and a messy room with a bed and dresser. Why would the Gene Search people had a live-in mechanic? He reminded himself that they were security conscious. Would the Gene Search people would have flown the mechanic with them? Did that make sense?

  Collin looked out the window of the bedroom and saw a man approaching from behind the garage. Collin quickly departed the premises. He was curious as to why the mechanic had been behind the garage so he slipped around the building to the tree line and walked back away from the compound. He soon discovered that there was a back entrance. There was a parking lot and a road. The area was fenced and the entrance was gated. There was a pick up truck in the parking lot. Collin figured it must belong to the mechanic. At the far side of the parking lot was a dumpster. Collin walked over to see if anything of interest might be inside. It was empty.

  Collin walked back along the tree line past the garage and while keeping an eye out for the mechanic he approached the last building other than the dormitory. One of his self-made keys let him in. What he found inside gave him shivers. It was an operating room. The center of the ceiling had large movable lights and there was an operating table below them. To the side were movable stainless steel tables. He found supplies in the rooms around the operating room and a set of sinks where a surgeon would scrub. In the back was a set of three hospital rooms and a room with bassinets in it. There was an area with a desk and phone that looked like a nurses’ station. There was also a small room with a microscope, a refrigerator and an incubator on the counter. Collin opened the incubator. He was relieved to find it empty.

  Collin left the medical building and entered the dorm. There was an office on the first floor just off a reception area. The rest of the first floor contained a room with comfortable chairs and a TV. There were rolled up exercise mats against one wall. Beside the TV room was a kitchen and dining room. He found the elevator and took it to the second floor. Here were the dorm rooms where the girls must have been living. He carefully searched looking for any clue about the girls’ trip to the Cook Islands.

  All the closets and dressers were empty and the beds had no sheets or blankets on them. He ran his hand between the mattresses to see if anything was hidden there. He failed to find anything under the mattresses but to his delight as he was reaching under one of the mattresses he spotted a corner of an envelope poking out from the back of the night stand near that bed. He pulled the night stand out and picked up the envelope. It was sealed and addressed to a person he did not know. He opened the letter. It was two pages long and signed: Love, Ellen. Collin remembered that Ellen was the name of the girl that Shelby told him had been sent to the tropical island early. Collin stuffed the letter back into the envelope and into his shirt. Then he pushed the night stand back against the wall.

  Collin left the Gene Search compound and made his way back to the cathedral. It was time to go home and see how Lily was doing with the vacation plans. It was more important than ever that he get to Rarotonga. He hoped time wasn’t running out for the girls. Ellen had written in her letter that she would be home soon. That she was not going to be included in the rest of the Gene Search project and would not be receiving the money she had been hoping for. She was discovered to be pregnant when the girls were given a final screening before moving on to the next step in the project and disqualified. This information contradicted what Shelby Radcliff had said. Plus the letter had never been delivered. Collin wondered what had really happened to Ellen.

  Chapter Eighteen