Laura and Norris met with Diaz on the fifth floor. She stood from her small desk at the bullpen, buttoned her suit jacket, and extended a hand. "Rosalie Diaz, you can call me Rose."

Norris smiled. "Not Rosie?"

She tilted her head and fixed him in a cold glare with luminous amber eyes. "I think it's best if we start from a place of mutual respect, agent Norris."

Norris looked at his feet. "Noted."

"Good." She nodded, dark chestnut hair in a severe cut bobbing. "Now, do we have a van?"

Norris nodded, and pulled the keys from his pocket.

"Outstanding." She looked around the bullpen. "Team, let's get going."

Three junior technicians stood and followed Rose, stopping to collect a stack of evidence boxes. As they walked together to the elevator, Rose looked at Laura. "What's your early read on the scene?"

"Hard to say, but I want to find out what's in the journals, and what was in the frying pan."

"Why they died, and how?"

"Exactly."

Rose slowed her pace, letting the rest of the team walk ahead. She put a hand on Laura's shoulder. "I think you and I will get along just fine. But can I ask you something?"

Laura nodded.

Rose lowered her voice to a whisper. "Keep Norris in check, please. He seems like kind of a dipshit."

Laura nodded again. "He's better when you get to know him. He's saved my ass before. But I'll try." She smiled. "You run a tight ship."

Rose furrowed her brow. "What other kind is there? The alternative is sinking."

They reached the elevator, and Laura swiped her badge on the elevator panel and pressed the button for the basement garage. The doors opened and three agents and two technicians walked past a gated row of seized vehicles, and then a row of privately owned cars. The garage smelled like old exhaust and tire rubber. Laura patted the roof of her old, dirty Corolla as they passed her parking space. Their footfalls on the hard concrete echoed.

Norris fished the keys from his pocket. A small laminated tag with the van's inventory and details dangled from his hand. He started clicking the key fob, and heard nothing in return. He raised the key fob to his head, pressed it against his temple, and the van beeped in return, far away down the row.

Norris turned and walked in the direction of the chime, chuckling to himself. "If you hold it up to your head, you can use your skull as an antenna."

Rose looked at Laura, shaking her head.

They reached the van, and Norris climbed in the Driver's seat. The opening doors echoed in the large, dimly lit garage. Laura climbed in the passenger seat. Rose climbed in the second row, the technicians unloaded their evidence boxes in the back and climbed in behind her. The van's interior smelled like new carpet and all purpose cleaner. A space where there would be a radio sat empty, and a dummy knob covered the space for an air conditioning knob. Norris tapped the empty radio slot's hard plastic cover. "Sorry, guys. No tunes today. Otherwise, I would love to give Laura the aux."

No one replied. Norris turned the key and the van's big engine fired to life. He reached for the shifter, and Laura held her hand up. She opened the hard plastic glove box, and pulled out a binder with a pen clipped to it. A fleet gas card sat in a small plastic pocket.

She flipped to the first page of the vehicle logs and clicked her pen. "Norris, what's the current mileage?"

He sighed, then craned his head forward and poked the trip meter. "24,136."

Rose made eye contact with Laura through the rear view mirror and mouthed, thank you.

They made their way out of the garage. Norris badged at a small kiosk and a metal mesh garage door lumbered open. A robotic voice outside called out, 'vehicle approaching! Caution! Vehicle approaching!' Pedestrians stopped on the sidewalk. Norris eased the throttle and climbed out of the garage, joining the hiss of traffic on third avenue behind a yellow cab.

They slowly snaked their way to Interstate 5, through stop and go mid-day traffic. Rain drummed on the long metal roof of the white van, and the windshield wipers worked methodically at their sisyphean task, the glass turning into a kaleidoscope between swipes. Laura twisted the fan knob and slid the temperature knob all the way to 'hot' with her thumb. The vents started to blow warm, dry air. Laura felt herself relax as the chill left the air and the fogged corners of windows started to slowly clear.

Rose learned forward in the back seat and checked her watch. "I'd guess it's about two hours up there. It's after noon now. We won't have a ton of time at the scene. Sun sets before six-o-clock this time of year."

Laura looked out the windshield. To her left, the road gave way to the hulking Alaskan Way Viaduct. The waterfront peeked through in patches, the ferris wheel looming large above the Puget Sound. "Copy that, Rose. We'll have to be quick."

They reached the I-5 onramp, and Norris pressed the gas. The van's big engine roared as they shot forward to merge with freeway traffic. The wind and tire noise rose to a steady blur, making conversation hard. Downtown buildings sped by, then South Lake Union, and the University of Washington. Neighborhoods passed by in a blur, then gave way to suburban sprawl. Traffic slowed again as they reached Everett, and picked back up again. They cruised in the carpool lane and Laura leaned her hand on her palm and rested her elbow on the window ledge, lost in thought. Sprawl fell away, and farm fields came into view. Soon, the huge brick smokestack of Mount Vernon towered to their left, painted cheerfully with brightly colored tulips.

Norris pointed through the windshield and nearly shouted above the noise of the van. "I love this smokestack. It was part of the Carnation dairy factory. They used it for their milk condenser."

The rest said nothing.

They made their way to highway 20, and started to climb East into the foothills of the North Cascades. The highway narrowed to a twisty two-lane, bordered by trees and scattered houses with livestock fences. The rain let up, and the van fell into silence. At a bend in the two-lane, the Skagit River joined them, the water high and rushing. Soon, they came to the large abandoned silo at Concrete.

Norris slowed as they passed a small 1950's themed drive-in with a large sign for 'Skagit Burgers. 1/3lb patties! Home of the famous Baker Monster 1lb burger!' He craned his neck to face Laura and Rose. "Anyone want a burger? I didn't get any lunch."

Rose bored into him with a fierce glare. "We're driving to a crime scene, show some punctuality and decency."

He sped up again. "Fine. Look, we don't have sirens and lights. We're 'last responders.'"

Soon, Laura checked her phone and pointed Norris to the gravel mouth of Road 1060. The turn signal click-click-clicked then canceled, and the van's tires crunched into the soft gravel. They hit a pothole, and all of the heads in the van swayed in unison. Laura looked at Norris. "Swerve around them if you can, but remember it's a one lane. And take it easy. I don't want to do any paperwork."

Norris nodded. He swerved around the rain soaked potholes. A large washout approached, filled with muddy water. He crept the van around the edge of the road to avoid it, crashing over tree roots. A root snapped with a loud crack, and then the branches of a vine maple scraped against the side of the van with a long screech. Rose visibly winced.

Miles down the road, they spotted the back of a State Patrol cruiser down a small side road, with a civilian car parked behind it, nosed into the bushes. Norris eased the bulky van down the rutted track, shuddering and creaking over bumps. Small saplings between the tire tracks brushed against the bottom of the van. They eased to a stop and he threw the big column shifter into park, the van swaying for a second before settling.

A state trooper rounded the side of his cruiser in a long rubber raincoat, and waited for them to get out. Laura shrugged on a navy blue FBI windbreaker, looped her camera lanyard around her neck, and walked forward, pulling her ID badge from her pocket. "Laura Constantine, special agent, FBI."

The trooper nodded. "Took you long enough." He jerked his head behind him, the motion made larger by his wide brimmed hat. "They're this way. A whole mess."

The agents turned sideways to walk between the cruiser and the imposing vegetation at the edges of the road, their feet crunching on the gravel. The camp site slowly came into view, the smell following not far behind. Laura wrinkled her nose, then tucked her chin and covered it with the collar of her windbreaker.

Norris stood beside her, scanning the scene. He lowered his voice. "Glad I didn't get a one pound burger."

Laura said nothing, trying to take it all in. She started walking a slow circle around the camp site, a primitive clearing in the woods. The CSI techs did the same. Two snapped on rubber gloves and carried evidence boxes, and the third shrugged on a large camera. He started snapping photos of everything, moving slowly and meticulously. Rose watched from the sidelines as they started work.

Laura dropped to a crouch next to one body. The smell of vomit and decomposition hit her like a physical force, and made her eyes water. She nodded to one of the technicians and pointed. "Can you get a swab of the vomit?"

She kept circling, taking photos through the open tent doors and peering inside. She looked at the camp table, snapping a picture of the position of the journals and camp stove. To her dismay, the journal pages were streaked with smeared ink and the pages were wavy and swollen with rain. She shook her head, wondering if they would even be readable.

A short, middle aged man in wire rimmed glasses and a crinkly rain jacket approached her. "I'm Frank, the Deputy Coroner."

"Laura, FBI."

"Pleased to meet you, Laura. Quite the scene here."

"I'll say."

He put his hands in his pockets and looked at the nearest corpse. "Based on the bodily fluids and the state of the bodies, my hunch is a poisoning."

"State Patrol said the same."

"Makes sense. Still doesn't tell us if it's accidental or not, or really much else." He tilted his head and whistled. "Toxicology ought to be interesting."

Laura pointed at the tied corpse. "I can't believe this would be accidental. We have someone tied up."

He shrugged. "Sure. But it's hard to know for sure. Maybe their kidnapping was interrupted by a bad dinner. Sometimes you get foragers out here eating the wrong things."

They turned at the sound of tires on gravel. A big, white truck bounced down the road toward them, with a yellow light bar and a large radio antenna on the roof. The door opened, and a young, tall ranger stepped out in a brown uniform. He nodded at the State Patrol and walked to Laura, his heavy boots crashing through the brush.

"Laura? I'm Billy, the District Ranger."

Laura shook his hand. "Good to meet you, Billy. Glad you could make it."

He grunted. "Sure. Beats looking for lost hikers, or keeping bears out of garbage cans." The cool wind changed direction, and a wall of smell washed over them. Billy doubled over, with his hands on his knees, and retched. He dry heaved, shoulders thrown forward, then slowly stood back up and wiped his forehead with the back of his hand. "Damn, d'you ever get used to that smell?"

The coroner shrugged. "A long time ago."

Laura turned to Billy. "Look, Billy, I don't know the first thing about this forest. I just know it's huge. We want to get an idea of what brought these people here, and whether there are any more surprises around."

He nodded, pinching his nose. He walked to the center of the site, craned his neck over the frying pan, and then waved Laura over. "I can give you a first guess." He pointed at a small fragment of food in the pan, and leaned down for a closer look. "Mushrooms. Looks like a slice of something white and gilled here. My hunch is an Amanita species. We get Death Caps and Destroying Angels here. They could've mixed up Amanita Smithiana for a Matsutake. Easy mistake to make."

Laura nodded, trying to commit the names to memory. She looked into the entrance of a tent across, and had a sudden thought. "Hang on." She circled the tents again. "There are seven bodies, and eight bags. Did someone get out?"