The Curse of Tenth Grave

by Darynda Jones

  After I could fill my lungs with air again, I scowled at him. “You’re an ass.”

  “Exactly. How do you think I got this far? So, don’t even try to fuck with me.”

  I was beginning to seriously wonder about ADA Nick Parker. “Did you even try to intervene on Lyle’s behalf?”

  “Of course I did. But according to campus bylaws, the president takes the fall for whatever happens in his house. I’m paraphrasing. And—”

  When he dropped his gaze again, I prodded him with a “Yes?”

  “I think my dad intervened.”

  “Ah. The state’s attorney.”

  “At the time, yes. Anyway—” He stood and went back to the window. “How is the case coming?”

  “Well, I’m actually a little surprised you guys moved forward with an arrest. Everything, just about all the damning evidence, can be explained and backed up.”

  “That’s not good enough,” he said to the window. “I need you to find who killed Emery Adams to be sure El is cleared of all charges.”

  “I’m working on it.”

  “Work harder,” he barked.

  I lifted an unconcerned shoulder. “I need access to the ME’s records.” I needed access to investigate the deaths from the children’s home, but he didn’t need to know that.

  “For what? There’s no body.”

  “He still examined the scene. Tested the blood.”

  “I can get you an updated repor—”

  “I’ll get it myself, thank you.”

  “Fine. I’ll have Penny set it up.”

  “For this afternoon.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Yes. What about the other thing?”

  He turned back around. “The other thing?”

  “I’ve taken the case. Hand over whatever you have.”

  That time he shook his head. “When you clear El, you’ll get the file.”

  “You have a file?” I asked, getting up. “How odd. So do I.”

  He sat down again, leaned back, and clasped his hands behind his head. “And just what’s in your little file, Mrs. Davidson?”

  I let a slow, satisfied smile—it was more of a smirk, really—widen across my face as I pulled out my phone from my jacket pocket. “This conversation, for one thing.”

  That time the blood drained from his face, his gaze superglued to my phone.

  “It’s in the cloud, so don’t even think about it. Do you think I’m an idiot, Parker? I don’t appreciate being blackmailed. Or extorted, for that matter.”

  He started to get up, but I motioned him to sit back down. “Go ahead and keep whatever you have on me. But just remember, games are much more fun with two players.”

  I turned and walked out the door, feeling slightly vindicated from the stunned look on Parker’s face. He shouldn’t have punked me like that. A woman’s wrath and all. I hadn’t thought far enough ahead to actually record the conversation, but he didn’t know that.

  He could keep whatever he had on me. I wouldn’t be the one losing sleep tonight.

  Or so I thought.

  16

  Right? And I’m not even on drugs.

  —T-SHIRT

  I went straight to the Office of the Medical Examiner from Parker’s office. Wade was a friend of mine, but without clearance, he would never have let me look through his files willy-nilly.

  “Hey, Charlotte,” he said.

  “Hey back.” One of his assistants walked in. I had no choice but to take advantage. “How’s the chlamydia?”

  The assistant chuckled.

  “Oh, don’t worry. You won’t shock her. The moment Parker called, I told everyone all about you and your … creative sense of humor.”

  “Man. I was so looking forward to humiliating you.”

  “I know. I was looking forward to being humiliated. So, anything, huh? How’d you rate that?”

  “Haven’t you heard? Parker and I are now besties.”

  “I didn’t think Parker had any friends.”

  “Well, he does now, thank goodness. That stick up his ass was getting longer and straighter.”

  He laughed and led me to a computer. “Okay, so you look up the files here, and then, depending on how old the case is, you may have to take the call number to the dungeon.”

  “Wade,” I said, surprised. “Last time you had me in the dungeon, we got the cops called on us.”

  Wade looked over his shoulder at a lab tech who’d walked in to grab a file. “Nope. Told him, too.”

  “Dang it. You’re no fun since you got married.”

  “Hon, I’ve been married longer than you’ve been alive.”

  “That’s a long time.”

  “Call out if you need any help.”

  “Are you off to perform an autopsy?”

  “That’s the plan. Want to come in?”

  The smile I offered was part in-your-dreams and part surely-you-jest. “No thank you.”

  One would think that, with all the corpses at a morgue, the place would be filled with the walking dead, wandering about, trying to find their bodies. It didn’t work like that, thankfully. I didn’t need a sudden influx of life stories to hit me all at once. That had happened to me in my late teens. I’ve never been the same.

  I sat at the computer, which was perched on a lab table, and started looking at the names Cookie had texted me along with the dates of birth. The OME may not have gotten all the kids here, but surely they’d had to autopsy a couple. A child dying was not an everyday occurrence.

  The first one popped up on the screen immediately, and unfortunately her files were in the dungeon. I wrote down the number and went on to the next name. By the time I got to the bottom of the list, only two names were not in Wade’s system. Seven were, with all those residing in the basement/dungeon. I always got the feeling Wade was a big D&D fan.

  I told a tech I was headed into the pits of despair. He smiled and nodded. I could have walked out with a corpse at this point and no one would care. But why would I? Probably why security wasn’t terribly tight. Like, they didn’t have an armed guard or anything like Parker did.

  I made my way down to the basement, which was actually a rather well-lit room on the lower level. I’d forgotten it had vending machines. I totally would’ve dug through my furniture for change.

  By the time I’d finished grabbing all the files and going through them, I came to one insurmountable conclusion. Someone was killing kids at Harbor House.

  “How’s it going?” Wade asked.

  “Pretty good. Can I ask you about a few cases?”

  “Absolutely.” He’d hit up the vending machine for coffee and powdered sugar doughnuts. I loved vending machine coffee, so I looked at it longingly.

  Wade grinned. “Would you like some coffee?”

  “Sure!” I grabbed his and took a sip. “Mmmmm.”

  “I was going to get you your own.”

  “That’s okay. Yours is fine. So, do you remember any of these cases?”

  He wiped his hands together and then took the files from me. “Oh, sure do. I autopsied this one. And this one.”

  “They all died of different causes.” And they did. A couple had been in and out of the infirmary for months. Taken to the hospital multiple times. But their illnesses were all over the place. The doctors couldn’t find an underlying cause for either of the cases. This was all in the notes Wade had made. Then a couple died violently. One hit by a car that was never found. One was struck by a blunt instrument.

  If there was a single person killing those kids, he was doing a damned good job of covering his tracks.

  “Well, yeah,” Wade said. “Blunt-force trauma to the head and suicide by rat poison are considered to be vastly different causes of death.”

  “But look where they all lived.”

  “Oh, that’s right.” He nodded as he looked through all the files. “I remember your dad looking into these cases.”

  “My dad?” I asked, taken by surprise.
r />   “Yes, yes. He suspected a connection, but since nothing ever came of it, I guess he couldn’t prove it. Have you been hired to look into Harbor House?”

  “In a way, but I don’t have a lot to go on. There’s no pattern. No common ground. Did Dad tell you anything about the case other than he was looking into it?”

  “No. Sorry, hon. But since you’re on official business, I can have my assistant make you copies if you’d like.”

  “I would most definitely like. I need more time to study them. To find a common thread.”

  “Well, I sure hope you see something your dad didn’t. This case really bothered him.”

  “I can see why. I hope so, too.”

  As I sat waiting for the files to be copied, I wondered who’d set Dad on this case in the first place. Surely someone had assigned him the case, but who’d noticed the pattern, or lack thereof?

  Wade’s assistant didn’t really want to copy all those files right then and there, but I wasn’t taking no for an answer. Heather Huckabee was sick, and I had a feeling it was related to all the cases.

  I walked out of the OME with an armload of case files and another cup of joe. Wade had turned his back on me. Great guy but far too trusting.

  When I walked out the front door, I ran smack-dab into the middle of a building. I didn’t remember them putting a building there, but there it was nonetheless.

  I looked up at Ubie, who was busy staring down at me. “Hey, Uncle Bob.”

  “Hey, pumpkin. What are you doing here?”

  “Oh, you know. Little of this. Little of that. You?”

  He flashed me a saucy grin. “’Bout the same. While I have you, I need to know who hired you for the Adams case.”

  “Really? You need to know?”

  “Yeah. You know, for our records.”

  “Ah yes, those pesky records. Did you ask Cookie?”

  “I did.” His jaw jumped. “She wouldn’t tell me.”

  “That’s weird.”

  “Very,” he agreed. “So?”

  “Oh yeah, sorry. I can’t tell you.”

  “Bullshit. You always tell me who hired you.”

  “Wait. Are you catching heat for this?”

  “Nothing I can’t handle.”

  “From Joplin?”

  “He is the lead detective on the case.”

  “Really? I had no idea.”

  “We were just talking about that fact yesterday.”

  “Were we? What does he know?”

  “You’re really not going to tell me.”

  “I’m really not. But it was great to see you,” I said, bouncing off to be pelted by icy wet sleet.

  “That you’ve been hired,” he called out to me. “But he doesn’t know by whom. Kind of like me. Your favorite uncle.”

  “My only uncle,” I called over my shivering shoulder.

  “The one who saved your life and gave up everything for you.”

  Okay, the saving-my-life thing, I could see, but … “Everything?”

  “Well, a lot.”

  He had me there. “And I’m totally grateful.” I stopped and turned back to him. “More than you will ever know or understand, Uncle Bob. You’re the only family I have left.”

  “What about Gemma?”

  “You and Gemma are the only family I have left. You have done so much for me.”

  “I have. I really have,” he said above the sound of the sleet firing little cannons of razor-sharp glass. “You could repay me by telling me—”

  Before he could finish that thought, I ran back to him and threw my arms around him. Or, well, one arm. The other was holding a plastic bag with all the copied files and my nigh-frozen coffee. Wade’s assistant had put the files in the bag, not wanting all her hard work to go to waste.

  He wrapped large arms around me and hugged back.

  “I love you so much.” After I said it, I couldn’t remember another time when I told him that. Surely I had, because it was true. I loved him.

  “Hey, what’s this? You okay, pumpkin?”

  “Yes.” I stepped back. “It’s just, you’ve done so much for me, and all I seem to be capable of doing in return is almost getting you killed and/or fired.”

  “Well, then. It’s a good thing I love you, too.”

  I gave him another hug, refused to tell him who hired me when he asked for the third time, then hurried to Misery before I became a coffee-flavored Popsicle. The weather wasn’t totally unusual for Albuquerque, but I was suddenly glad it never lasted long.

  After I’d climbed inside, I took another look at something I thought I’d seen through the sleet. Garrett’s truck was parked down the street, and I almost came unglued until I realized I hadn’t seen him all day until now. Maybe he wasn’t tailing me, but then who?

  I turned back and watched Uncle Bob through the glass door. He was talking to Wade, laughing about who knew what. Was he following Ubie? Why on earth would he follow Ubie? Weren’t they on the same side?

  * * *

  Having yet to check on Heather and Pari other than the occasional text in which Pari would ask things like, Is eating only beef jerky for 24 hours straight harmful? and Quick! What continent has the fewest flowering plants? Don’t blow my lead!

  Was she kidding?

  I snuck in through the back door of Pari’s place and called out.

  “We’re in here!”

  “Where?” I walked through the maze that was her shop until I was standing in the tattoo room where she did tats, and almost passed out when I saw Heather in Pari’s chair, her arm covered from shoulder to wrist in a full sleeve.

  “What do you think?” Pari asked.

  She slipped on her shades while Heather held up her arm for my inspection. “It didn’t even hurt that bad.”

  I covered my mouth with both hands. This was it. I was going to prison.

  Heather cracked first. Laughter bubbled out of her a half second before it bubbled out of Pari as well.

  “Told you,” Pari said. “So gullible.”

  I rushed forward to inspect her arm. The artwork was gorgeous. But underneath there was no swelling, no bleeding, no signs of trauma at all. Temporary.

  I almost passed out again, this time in relief. After giving Heather a quick hug—and hoping we were at the hugging stage or that was just really awkward for her—I offered Pari the same treatment.

  “I can’t thank you enough,” I said.

  “Oh, please. This kid is an angel. And, dude, she seriously likes beef jerky.”

  Heather pointed to a series of shelves. “We organized all her paints, and Pari is teaching me to draw.” She reached over to grab a sketchbook and opened it to the first page.

  “Wow,” I said, completely impressed. It was the beginnings of a dragon, and though the scale was a little off, for the most part it was fantastic. “You, Heather Huckabee, are going to be a star,” I said to her. “I’ve done some drawing. I drew a duck once. It was a great duck except that it was supposed to be an eagle.”

  Heather laughed, and I was floored by her transformation. She turned to watch one of Pari’s artists tattoo a young man’s calf. He was getting a steampunk clock that was melting down his leg.

  “So, what did the doc say?”

  Pari motioned for me to join her in the front parlor. Two young girls were perusing the photo albums.

  “He didn’t find anything, but he said her pallor is too yellow and her white blood cell count is high. She told him she gets stomach cramps sometimes and feels nauseated and has to swallow a lot.” She leaned in closer. “Chuck, he thinks she’s the victim of chronic, low-dose poisoning.”

  I closed my eyes. “Son of a bitch. Why hasn’t another doctor picked up on this?”

  “I don’t know. He said he only suggested that because I told him she could be the victim of a crime, and all the signs are there. Unfortunately, without a thousand tests, there’s no way to know what she’s been poisoned with. If at all.”

  “But we have her now
, and the dosing has stopped. Will she get better, or do we need to get her to a hospital?”

  She shrugged. “He’s coming back in the morning. Said he knows a guy who knows a guy who can run some very basic tests on the side, if you want to go that route. It’ll cost around five hundred.”

  “That’s fine. Anything.”

  “And I wish I had better news, but you were right about Nick Parker. He has a file on you on his home computer. It seems like more of a personal project than an official one.”

  “You’re kidding me. Did you get a look?”

  “I did.” She handed me a manila envelope. “This is a copy of everything he has on you. Charley, he knows you had a baby and that the baby is gone. He suspects foul play.”

  I’d started to open the envelope but stopped and stared at her a solid minute. “This is about Beep?” I asked, the edges of my vision darkening.

  “He’s been going around to hospitals, showing your face, asking if anyone in the maternity ward had seen you. And I think he found the doctor Reyes hired. Somehow figured out he knew something. Threatened him.”

  I closed my eyes. “This is not happening. Not with everything else.”

  “I’m afraid it is. And this is serious stuff. He could bring you up on all kinds of nasty charges. Bizarrely enough, from what I could tell from his notes, he stumbled upon the pregnancy while investigating Reyes.”

  I had to sit down. Pari grabbed a visitor’s chair and pushed it under my shaking knees. “Reyes?”

  “I guess he can’t just let it alone. Some people feel like there was something fishy about his release from prison and exoneration of all charges. He’s looking into both of your financials, too. And he’s been e-mailing the authorities in Sleepy Hollow, New York, asking about your stay there.”

  “How the fuck does he know about Sleepy Hollow?”

  “He’s following the money. Chuck,” she said, cupping my face and turning me toward her, “you have to get in front of this.”

  “I know. You’re right. I have no choice. He is going to push too far.”

  “No,” she said, hardening her gaze. “Don’t let it come to that. Tell Reyes. He’ll know what needs to be done. More importantly, he’ll be willing to do what needs to be done.”

  “Pari, we can’t kill him.”

  “I know,” she said, but I wasn’t sure she did. “I don’t mean kill him. Just, you know, put him in the hospital for a few days. Or years. Whichever.”