Devil Bones

by Kathy Reichs

  A bullet list offered the following choices: How to Build the Ultimate Gaming PC. Components of a Good Game. Advice in Game Design Careers. Game Design Courses. Free Downloadable Games.

  I went straight to door five.

  And discovered a chilling new world.

  28

  OF THE SIX GAMES LISTED, I SAMPLED ONLY THREE.

  In Killer Dozen the player controlled twelve combatants who pursued and destroyed their enemies in countless gruesome ways. Bodies were torn in half, throats were slit, heads were impaled on falchions and pitchforks.

  In Reality Crime the player was a cop looking for information on the death of his brother. Suspects were beaten and shot with a variety of weapons.

  In Gods of Combat the player was a rebel warrior seeking revenge on the gods. Details of the injuries inflicted were appallingly realistic.

  Other choices included Island of Death, Blood Frenzy, and Mansion of Mayhem. I didn’t even look.

  Grabbing the phone, I dialed Slidell. He answered, sounding edgy.

  I told him about the link from Finney’s Web page to Cuervo’s shop, and about the pop-up to the gaming site. He said he’d have someone research ownership of the Dr. Games domain, and look into the existence of a second, online La Botánica Buena Salud unrelated to Cuervo’s operation.

  I also told him I’d received the entomology reports.

  “Summarize.”

  “Cuervo killed the chicken sometime in mid to late August.”

  “I’m guessing that was before his boo-boo with the train.”

  I ignored that. “Klapec was never in the lake, and probably died two days before we recovered his body.”

  Slidell was silent a moment, thinking about that.

  “Dame by the name of April Pinder sprang Vince Gunther. Wonder if she knows what line of work her boyfriend is in. Anyway, April and me are gonna become real good friends.”

  “I want to be there.”

  Slidell made a noncommittal noise and disconnected.

  The clock said 9:50.

  I had to hurry.

  St. Ann’s calls itself the little parish with the big heart. What was needed that morning was a big parish with colossal seating and parking capacities.

  Driving from the Annex, I saw hundreds lining up to march. City cops and state troopers. Firemen. Military personnel. EMT’s. It seemed everyone in uniform was represented.

  As predicted, there was also an enormous civilian turnout. People stood three and four deep at certain stretches. Some wept. Some embraced or held hands. Many gripped or waved small American flags.

  Leaving my car at the YWCA as Slidell had instructed, I worked my way to the church. From the front doors hundreds of cops in dress blues had organized into a formation that wound out the parking lot and far up Park Road.

  The media were present in extraordinarily large numbers, mostly local, with CNN and FOX clocking in for the nationals. Helicopters circled overhead.

  The weather was cooperating. The sun was shining and the sky was a deep autumn blue, a picture-perfect day for broadcasting from a graveyard.

  After showing ID to a uniformed officer, I was checked off a list and allowed inside the church.

  Slidell was seated in the last pew of a side row, hands clasped between his knees, face looking like sculpted marble. On seeing me, he shifted right, but didn’t speak.

  I slipped into the pew beside him.

  And immediately felt the usual rush of emotions.

  The somber drone of the organ. The scent of incense mingling with the sweet smell of flowers. The sunlight filtering through stained glass.

  My mind flashed back to memories of funerals past.

  My brother’s tiny white casket. My father’s gleaming bronze one. Balloons over the coffin of a little girl gunned down by bikers in Montreal. Baby’s breath atop the gravestone of a friend dead of lymphoma at forty-three.

  I inhaled deeply, exhaled. Focused on the music. Handel’s “Dead March”? Chopin’s “Funeral March”? I wasn’t sure. Wasn’t uplifted.

  An ancient priest said Mass. Slidell’s boss, Harper Dunning, offered a reading. Tony Rinaldi spoke of his father. Others talked of their colleague, their friend, their fellow parishioner. We all stood, sat, knelt. Sang “Abide with Me” and “Lead, Kindly Light.”

  Through it all, I kept seeing Rinaldi, all bony limbs and angles. In my office, carefully taking notes with his Mont Blanc pen. In my lab, staring at Susan Redmon’s skull. On Thirty-fifth, bleeding through his perfect Armani jacket.

  At the end, an honor guard of officers marched the coffin out. We exited to Mendelssohn’s “On Wings of Song.”

  Slidell got us to the cemetery, where the scene was repeated al fresco. Cops. Mourners. Reporters. Dignitaries.

  Larabee was there dressed in black. I was about to approach him when a hand touched my shoulder. I turned.

  Two green eyes were gazing down into mine.

  Without a word, Charlie drew me to him and hugged tightly.

  Placing two palms on his chest, I pushed free and stepped back. Why? Embarrassment over his public display of affection? Over my bender? Over our roll in the hay? Rolls.

  “How have you been?” Charlie asked gently.

  “Good,” I said, aware of Slidell ten feet away, aviator-shaded face turned to his boss, listening to us while pretending not to.

  “I called,” Charlie said.

  “It’s been crazy busy.”

  “I’ve been worried.”

  “I’m fine. Thanks for the food.”

  “I’d rather have cooked you a meal myself.”

  “Listen. I—”

  “Don’t explain. Not to me, Tempe. You did what you had to do.”

  “That wasn’t me, Charlie.” I wasn’t quite sure of my meaning.

  “On Thursday? Or on Sunday?”

  He cut in before I could respond.

  “Shall we try again? Maybe on a Friday?”

  “There’s been someone else, Charlie. A detective in Montreal. I’m not sure it’s over.”

  My own words surprised me. Of course it was over. And I was over Ryan.

  “He’s very far away,” Charlie said.

  In so many ways, I thought.

  “Stand by your man,” Charlie sang softly.

  I had to smile. The song had played incessantly on an interminable bus trip to a state tennis tournament. It became one of the team’s standing jokes.

  “Who owned that tape?” I asked.

  “Drek Zogbauer.”

  “We went to school with someone named Drek Zogbauer?”

  Charlie shrugged.

  “I remember everyone applauded when the driver finally confiscated the boom box.”

  “I led the ovation. It was not the music of my people.”

  I cocked a brow. “Your people?”

  “Yankees fans.”

  Again, I had to smile.

  “I do understand, Tempe. Healing takes time.”

  You would know, I thought, recalling the photos of his murdered wife.

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  “I can wait.” Charlie grinned. Sad, but a grin. “I’m a very patient man.”

  And then I hugged him.

  He started to walk away.

  “Charlie.”

  He turned back.

  “Asa Finney was released this morning.”

  One hand went to his chest. “Really. No need for accolades.”

  I rolled my eyes.

  “Just an acknowledgment that I’m the greatest lawyer on the planet.”

  “Between you and me, do you read Finney as capable of violence?”

  Charlie stepped back to me and lowered his voice. “Honestly, Tempe. I don’t know. Slidell’s right about one thing. The guy’s one weird duck.”

  “Thanks.”

  Charlie had gone barely ten paces when Slidell left Dunning and ambled back to me.

  “That was touching.”

  “We went to high school tog
ether.”

  “I’m happy for you.”

  I said nothing.

  “Dunning’s pissed.”

  “Why?”

  “Switchboard’s lighting up with calls from outraged citizens wanting to know why the cops ain’t rounding up witches and warlocks.”

  “Jesus.”

  “Yeah. They think He’d be all for it.”

  I just shook my head.

  “She puts it partly on you.”

  “Wait. What?”

  “Says you goaded Lingo.”

  “I goaded him?”

  “Most callers think you’re the spawn of the devil.”

  Thirty minutes later, the cavalcade arrived and a brief graveside service took place. Guns were fired, then the coffin was lowered into the ground. The crowd began to disperse.

  The backhoe was shoving dirt onto Rinaldi when I spotted Larabee staring toward the gate opening onto Sharon Amity Road. Curious, I followed his sight line.

  Like ants drawn to a gumdrop, reporters were circling a pair of men. All I could see were the tops of two heads, one silver-haired, the other buzz cut.

  Boyce Lingo and his aide. Exploiting Rinaldi’s funeral to spread a message of hatred and intolerance.

  White-hot anger seared through me.

  Elbow-jabbing Slidell, I took off in Lingo’s direction, intending not to speak, but to stand front and center, a living reminder to the commissioner that he’d be held accountable for every word he uttered.

  Behind me I could hear Slidell struggling to keep up. Behind him, more movement, which I assumed was Larabee.

  Reaching the scrum, I pushed to the front and positioned myself opposite Lingo.

  “—Finney was set free this morning. Free to live amongst us paying tribute to Satan, worshipping Lucifer and bringing evil into this world.”

  Silence, Brennan.

  “Now, the law is the law and the man has his rights. That’s as it should be. That’s our system. But what happens when that system begins to crumble? When the rights of criminals outweigh those of law-abiding citizens like you and me?”

  Easy.

  “I’ll tell you what happens. O. J. Simpson plays golf in Florida. Robert Blake and Phil Spector party in their Hollywood mansions.”

  “Are you saying those juries were wrong?” a reporter called out. “That these guys are guilty?”

  “I’m saying our government is losing its ability to protect us against criminals and terrorists.”

  “Why?” another voice asked.

  “I’ll tell you why. Restrictive laws that tie the hands of police and prosecutors. If elected to the state senate I’ll work hard for repeal of those laws.”

  I forgot the chief’s warning. Forgot my plan of silent intimidation.

  “This is hardly the place for campaigning, Commissioner.”

  As at our previous encounter, all eyes swung to me. Lenses and booms followed.

  Lingo smiled benevolently. “We meet again, Dr. Brennan. But, yes, what you say is true.”

  “Asa Finney has a right to his day in court.”

  “Of course he does.”

  I couldn’t let it go at that. “And to worship as he chooses.”

  Lingo’s face went somber. “In venerating Satan, Asa Finney and his kind ignore the goodness of Jesus and show contempt for all our Savior has done for us.”

  Lingo raised humble hands.

  “But enough. She is right. Today is for mourning a fine officer who sacrificed his life in the line of duty.”

  With that, Lingo turned and began walking away.

  Pumped on adrenaline, I started to follow. Buzz-cut blocked my path.

  “I have questions I’d like to pose to the commissioner off air,” I said.

  Buzz-cut spread his feet and shook his head.

  “Out of my way, please,” I said, voice all steely control.

  Buzz-cut’s face remained impassive. “Best to call for an appointment.”

  I started to move past him. Extending an arm, he blocked me. I stepped left. He mirrored my move.

  I started to say something I would later have regretted.

  “Hold on right there.” Slidell was seething. “Did you just strong-arm this little lady?”

  Little lady?

  Folding his arms, Buzz-cut canted his head, gangsta-tough.

  “What’s your name?” Slidell demanded.

  “Who’s asking?”

  Slidell flashed his shield. “I am, asshole.”

  “Glenn Evans.”

  “You his flunky?” Slidell chin-cocked Lingo’s retreating figure.

  “I serve as Commissioner Lingo’s personal assistant.” The voice was more shrill than I’d expected for a man of his size.

  “Perfect. Then you can explain why my partner would be phoning your boss.”

  “Are you serious?”

  “Deadly.”

  “This is harassment.”

  “Sue me.”

  “I fail to even understand your question. Nevertheless, I’ll answer it. All communication goes through me, personally, and no such call ever came into Commissioner Lingo’s office.”

  “You’re pretty sure about that. Don’t need to check a calendar or nothing?” Evans’s belligerence was not improving Slidell’s disposition. “This be easier for you down at the station?”

  “You don’t scare me, Detective.”

  Slidell glared in silence.

  Evans pulled on his nose with thumb and forefinger. Cocked his hands on his hips. Drummed his fingers on his belt. “When did this alleged conversation take place?”

  “Shortly before Detective Rinaldi was shot. You want, I can subpoena your phone records. Your preference.”

  “This is bullshit.”

  “Jimmy Klapec. That name mean anything to you?”

  “Who is he?”

  “I’m asking the questions.” Slidell’s forehead vein was doing a rumba.

  “The commissioner often reaches out into the community, visits homeless shelters, soup kitchens, battered women’s homes, food banks, that kind of thing. He meets a lot of people.”

  Slidell said nothing, hoping Evans would feel compelled to continue talking. The ploy worked.

  “The commissioner could have met this Klapec at any one of a dozen places.”

  “The kid was a runaway living on the streets. Seventeen years old. Detective Rinaldi was investigating his murder. That’s why I gotta be curious Rinaldi’s calling your boss.”

  “Wait. Are you talking about the boy found at Lake Wylie? I thought that was some kind of satanic-ritual thing.”

  “Why’d you think that?”

  “It was all over the news.”

  Again, Slidell offered silence. I doubted he really viewed Lingo as a suspect, figured he was hassling Evans simply for showing attitude.

  “Look, Mr. Lingo is a politician. He comes in contact with a lot of people from a lot of places. So he met some half-moon hick living on the streets, which I’m not saying he did, doesn’t mean he had anything to do with the kid’s murder.”

  As Evans talked, I studied his face. Up close I could see that his skin was pitted and scarred like Asa Finney’s. But all resemblance ended there. Evans’s hair was fair and shaved close to his scalp. He had close-set eyes, high, fat-padded cheekbones, and a tapering jaw ending in a prominent chin.

  “Just for fun, Mr. Evans, where was your boss on October ninth?”

  “The commissioner was speaking at an event in Greensboro. I was with him. If you like, I can provide a copy of the program and credit card receipts showing hotel and restaurants. Oh, and perhaps four hundred eyewitness accounts.”

  Again, Evans answered quickly, without giving thought to the question. I stored that observation.

  Through the crowd, I could see Larabee talking on his mobile. I guessed he was putting the best spin possible on my recent outburst. Knowing Larke Tyrell, I feared the effort would fall short.

  Returning my attention to Evans, I sensed i
nterest from my lower centers.

  What?

  The voice? The acne? Finney? Mention of Satanism?

  It was no good. Whatever cell had cocked a brow had again lost interest.

  Unfortunate. A synapse at that moment might have helped save a life.

  29

  I LEFT MY CAR AND RODE WITH SLIDELL. SEEMED I WAS DOING A lot of that lately.

  April Pinder lived at Dillehay Courts, a public housing project off North Tryon, not far from a small city park.

  Pulling to the curb on Twenty-eighth Street, Slidell checked the address provided by the bondsman.

  “Gotta be over there.”

  He pointed to one of several oblong boxes divided into two-story townhouses faced with cheap vinyl siding above, brick below.

  We got out and walked in silence, each pointed at the same thought. As the crow flies, Rinaldi was gunned down just across the rail bed running to our right.

  In this part of town, it was hard telling which side of the tracks was the wrong one.

  Like its neighbors, Pinder’s unit appeared to have enjoyed little attention since construction in the midseventies. The paint was flaking and the window AC units were rusting. Plastic lawn chairs didn’t improve the ambience.

  Double-checking numbers, Slidell pressed his thumb to the bell.

  Dogs started barking, voices up at the glass-shattering end of the spectrum.

  Slidell puffed his cheeks and shook his head. Holding comment, he rang again.

  The dogs grew even more frenzied.

  “I hate yappy little mutts.”

  How did I know that?

  Slidell was about to try pounding when a voice called out, “Who’s there?”

  “Police.”

  A key turned and the door swung in. A woman peered up at us through the gap allowed by the security chain. She was squatting, holding a wriggling Pomeranian under one arm while restraining another at her feet by its collar. Both dogs were shaking and barking hysterically.

  “April Pinder?”

  The woman nodded.

  “I called this morning.” Slidell held his badge low so Pinder could see it.

  The floor Pomeranian peed on the tile.

  “Hold on.”

  Pinder rose and started to close the door.

  “How about you lock up the pooches?” Slidell made no attempt to mask his disgust.