Particles of Murder (A Shadow of Death Romantic Suspense Series Book 1) by Charlotte Raine

friend for a second.”
    He sets down the papers and walks out to the hallway. He stands in front of me.
    “What’s going on?” he whispers. “Did you find something in the evidence you had missed before?”
    “Um, no, sorry,” I say. “I just heard about what happened to your office, and I was concerned that if something had happened to Victoria, that the person who hurt her could have gone after you.”
    “Oh,” he says, a hint of disappointment in his voice. “Well, thank you, but I’m okay. It was probably just a student angry about some criticism or a bad grade.”
    “You don’t think it could have been someone who could have hurt Victoria?” I ask.
    He shakes his head. “Why would they go from killing someone to wrecking my office? That makes no sense. Maybe it was one of her friends who suspected me, like you had suspected me. Maybe it was the killer, but he was just making sure he didn’t leave anything behind. I don’t know, but they did it before I got here this morning, so I don’t think they wanted to hurt me.”
    “The fact that you only think this person didn’t want to hurt you isn’t very reassuring.”
    “It’s nice that you’re concerned, but I’m fine,” he says. “But since you came rushing over here, that makes me think you do think Victoria was murdered and you still want to investigate.”
    I grimace. “Of course I want to figure out what really happened, but I also don’t want to lose my job. I worked really hard to get it. Chemistry is not the easiest field of study.”
    “You can tell yourself what you want, but you would have heard on the news if I had been hurt, or you could have just called to check on me,” he says. “I think you wanted to come back here to start up our investigations again. I’m not trying to—”
    There’s a loud clanging sound in the classroom, followed by several gasps.
    John turns back toward his classroom and rushes inside. I peek past him. A young man—bald, wearing a plaid shirt and carpenter pants—is lying on his side, his chair knocked over beside him. He must have fallen back from his desk. His eyes stare blankly up at the ceiling.
    John kneels down next to him. He presses two fingers against the man’s neck. After a few seconds, he grabs the man’s wrist and checks his pulse there. He looks up at me.
    “He’s dead.”

    * * *
    “ H is name is Everett Pine . He is…he was in his senior year. This is the third class I’ve had with him. Everyone called him Plaid because he has at least a dozen plaid shirts,” John tells Detective Stolz.
    Detective Macmillan and I watch as Tim takes the body out of the room.
    “And where did all your other students go?” Stolz asks.
    John turns to me. “Mira had me tell her all of their names and we dismissed them all,” he says. “I didn’t think it was a good idea to keep them around a…a deceased person. I’m sure the fact that they were all in here was traumatizing enough.”
    Stolz scowls. “Good. So you may have set loose our killer, who could disappear forever now.”
    “I’m sorry. Are you proposing that I should have kept all these kids here?” I ask.
    “Young adults, Solano,” Stolz corrects. “And they were all suspects.”
    “We have their names.”
    “The killer could still run.”
    “Okay, ladies,” Macmillan interrupts. “Let’s focus on what we have right now. Did Mr. Pine have any connection to Ms. Glassman?”
    I look to my right, where Ed Bunt, another forensic scientist, is packing up everything he found around Everett’s desk. Ed leaves the room, silent as always. I wonder if it’s just a job to him or if he cares whether or not a killer is found.
    “They’re both in the English department. They’re both good writers…I don’t know. They likely share a few classes and have overlapping friends. It’s a tight knit group.”
    “You know what else they have in common?” Macmillan asks. “You.”
    He shakes his head. “I had an appointment when