Combustible (A Boone Childress Novel)

by CC Abbott

  “Oh baby,” she said and put it in drive, “you ain’t seen nothing yet.”

  He watched as she pulled out of the lot, remembering what Bennie has said about Julia marking her territory.

  “Watch what you’re doing with this one,” he told himself as he walked across the lot. Boone wasn’t interested in being anybody’s territory, even a woman as hot as Julia’s. “You’re going to get burned.”

  He was in his truck when his cell rang. Cedar’s name popped up on the ID. “Hey, Cedar. What’s up?”

  “Good news,” she said. “I’ve got the notes from the rest of the lab. And I talked Dr. K into letting you make up the time.”

  “Really? That’s awesome.” He felt a pang of guilt talking to Cedar so soon after making out with Julia, though there was no reason that he should. “I really owe you now.”

  “So you can make up for it by buying me lunch,” she said, “and I’ll tell you about the details. This is going to be fun. Food court in an hour?”

  “Got it. Catch you in an hour.” He ended the call and was about to put the phone away when she had a second thought and scrolled through his contacts. The phone rang five times before going to message. “Hey, Abner, it’s me, Boone. Call me back. I’ve got a couple of questions for you.”

  It took Boone longer than an hour to drop by the fire station to help put up the gear, to hose down and change into a clean pair of jeans and a T-shirt, then drive to campus, find a parking place, and dash to the cafeteria. It took fifteen minutes longer, to be exact, which is how many minutes Cedar had been sitting alone at a table next to the windows, pushing around her salad.

  A quick scan around the room, and Boone found her. That sundress was pretty easy to pick out of the crowd of shorts and jeans. He gave her a quick wave, which she returned. When she stood, the sunlight poured around her, giving her an aura and also allowing Boone to see her legs right through the fabric.

  “Don't be such a perv,” he told himself and looked away.

  When he got there, Cedar gave him a friendly hug. “You smell like smoke and beer.”

  “The smoke’s an occupational hazard, and the beer’s a vollie tradition,” he said. “They have a cold one to celebrate the newest rookie busting his cherry. I had to buy, of course.”

  “Wish I could buy beer,” she said. “My twenty-first birthday isn’t until next month.”

  “Having a party?”

  “Want to come?” She blushed reflexively, her whole face turning red. “I mean, to my party.”

  “Sure.” He kept his face neutral, even though he was dying to smile. He didn't like to embarrass people, especially Cedar. “Sounds like fun. Is this a graduation party, too?”

  Both Boone and Cedar were finishing their associate’s degrees at the end of the semester, which was only a couple of weeks away. Cedar had spent two years at Coastal and was dying to leave town for State, where she had been accepted into the biotechnology program. Boone had accumulated college credits while in the Navy, allowing him to finish in one semester. Now, he was choosing between three schools with forensic programs.

  “Not so much for graduation,” Cedar says. “Not to be dismissive, but I came to Coastal to save money. It’s not such a big deal to graduate. You know?” She covered her mouth, then licked her lips, which had to be the sexiest thing ever. “That made me sound like a real bitch, didn’t it? I’m sorry, I didn't mean it that.”

  “Not at all,” Boone said. He didn’t have a problem with the truth, and he wasn’t the type to judge. So Cedar was going to State. It never bothered him before. For some reason, it did now.

  He phone rang. Without looking, he rejected the call and set the ringer to buzz.

  “Thanks. Most guys would’ve taken the call.” She slid a folder full of photocopied papers to him. “Here are the notes from class. I finished up the dissection, and Dr. K gave us both an A since you had started the process.”

  “Thanks.” He felt a little embarrassed that she had to cover for him. “So what’s this thing I need to do to make up for the missed lab hours?”

  “It’s complicated,” she said and cleared her throat. She flashed a little smile that made her face light up. She leaned forward so that the strap of her dress slipped over her shoulder. How could he be more distracted by a little slip of cloth than a horny woman pressing her body against his? It made no sense.

  “Dr. K agreed to let you help me with research,” she said. “I'm doing it on scent receptors, and it’s really cool. Well, I think it’s cool. It’s an artificial nose. I’m hoping to win the Olympiad with it.”

  “Sounds like fun. My project is on decomp—“

  The alarm on Cedar’s phone went off. “Damn. I have to run in a minute. I’ll tell you more about the research later?”

  “Works for me,” he said, even though he was disappointed that she had to go so quickly. He put a ten on the table for her.

  “What’s this for?” she asked.

  “Your lunch. I’m buying, remember?”

  She handed the money back to him. “I’m having second thoughts.”

  Had he offended her? Stared at her sun-lit legs too long? “Second thoughts about helping me?”

  “No, about the repayment meal.” She laughed nervously then said, “I’m thinking that dinner would be more in line with the level of favor.”

  “Sure.” He grinned. “Are you free tonight?”

  “Sorry,” she said and seemed to mean it. “Luigi needs a ride to meet his benefactor later.”

  “His what?”

  “The people who helped fund his student exchange. He has to attend this social thing they do.” She curled a lock of hair around her finger. “How about tomorrow?”

  “Deal. I’ll pick you up at eight. Any dietary restrictions I should know about?”

  “You mean you’re not letting me pick the restaurant?”

  “I could,” he said and leaned toward conspiratorially, “but why spoil the surprise? You like surprises, right?”

  “Only the good kind,” she said and winked.

  Boone’s gut twisted. “I’ll see what I can do.”

  They both rose, and she gave him the same kind of quick hug as before, except this time, he put a hand on her hip, and her hand lingered on his arm, fingers lightly tracing the curve of his hard bicep.

  As he watched her wind through the crowded tables, Boone shook his head and wondered, “What the hell is going on here?”

  For months, there were no women in his life, now there were two in the matter of hours. He barely had time to think about it when his voicemail buzzed. The missed call was from Abner, and Boone hit the redial button to call him back.

  Abner Zickafoose was a legend among North Carolina law enforcement. A short man with a big personality, he started his career as an anthropologist studying pre-Columbian Native American civilizations. His specialty was the excavation of burial mounds, mass graves that reached thirty or forty feet and included hundreds of bodies. Men, women, and children were all piled together in ceremonial burials. Excavating a single mound could take years and a small army of anthropologists and graduate students.

  It was a satisfying career, and Abner Zickafoose probably would have been happy to continue it, until one late July day, thirty-one years ago, when he and a graduate student dusted off a skull that was decidedly not Native American. It had protruding dentition called prognathism and no nasal sill, characteristics of an African-American individual. Based on the lack of weathering, it was also not thousands of years old, and two of the molars had gold fillings. What Abner had in his hands was a modern skull, a black female who he estimated to be eighteen to twenty years of age at the time of death. What the police had on their hands was a murder.

  After that, Abner became the go-to guy for most of the rural police departments in the Carolinas and southern Virginia. He traveled to beaches, forests, mountains, ponds, lakes, creeks, and swamps. His ability to identify the sex, race, and age of corpses earned him a solid r
eputation with law enforcement, and his research quickly turned from pre-Columbian mounds to modern burials.

  He lived in an antique quaint house on Spinnaker Island, on the other side of the county, and it was there that Boone reached him.

  "Zickafoose speaking," Abner answered.

  "Hey, Doc." Abner insisted on being called either Abner or Zickafoose, and if you had to, Dr. Zickafoose. Never grandpa, granddad, granddaddy, and certainly, never, ever paw-paw. "It's Boone, your grandson."

  "Of course, it's Boone, my grandson. I only have one, and his name is Boone. "

  "I need your help with a case, Doc. I think we have a serial arsonist torching farmhouses. One place burned down today, and there was another last week over in Duck."

  There was a pause. "A case of what?"

  "A forensics case."

  "Too bad. I don’t consult anymore,” Abner said, a hint of weariness in his voice. "I’m retired."

  Boone expected this. Abner was still moping about his forced retirement the university. "It's a fire, Doc. A human finger was found on the scene."

  While the line crackled with static, Boone pulled into Scoonz’s Burger House, and he realized how hungry he was, and his stomach was complaining like a tractor with bad pistons. He should have eaten with Cedar at the cafeteria.

  The static's a good thing, he thought, as he pulled up to the drive-thru to order. It meant that Abner was actually thinking about it.

  "I'll take a Big ol' Burger," Boone said to the speaker. "No onions. Absolutely no onions, unless you like me to die of anaphylactic shock in your parking lot. And an extra large coffee. Black."

  "Onions?" Abner said into the phone. "What's onions got to do with this?"

  "No, no," Boone said.

  "No, no what?" the worker said through the speaker.

  "No onions." Boone pressed the phone against his chest, trying to block the sound. "And a large Coke, too. No ice. Yes, I want both coffee and Coke." The worker repeated the order, and Boone pulled around to pick it up.

  "No ice what?" Abner said. "Thought you said this was a fire case."

  "It is!" Boone yelled, exasperated. "Look, Doc, I'm ordering food. Hang on the line for a minute, before the cashier decides I want my Big ol' Burger with a side of spit.”

  "Why didn't you just say so?"

  Boone paid for his lunch and circled the parking lot until he found a shady place to park and eat. He unwrapped the Big ol' Burger and set the coffee on the dashboard. Steam from the cup left ghostly condensation on the windshield, which he wiped away with back of his hand. He wolfed down a monster bite of the burger. Crumbs bounced down the front of his shirt as he licked mustard off his fingers and wiped both hands on his jeans.

  After another bite went down, Boone said, "Sorry about that, I was starving."

  "You in school?"

  "I’m between classes. I have to drive back in a minute.”

  "Driving? You're thirteen years old, for Christ's sake. Who let you loose on the road?"

  “The US Navy, Doc. I’m twenty-two years old.”

  “Since when?”

  "Time flies."

  "And flies tell time. How's the research project? Got many maggots yet?"

  "Doc, I need to know what kind of evidence to look for, so I'll call you back tonight about the arsons."

  But as soon as Boone pulled out of the parking lot, he knew that he could not wait until tonight to test his theory. The first farmhouse that burned was only a few miles from Frisco, and it was located near the highway. If he hurried, there was time for a quick visit.

  It took Boone longer than he calculated to find the house. It was set off from the highway, hidden behind a pine forest owned by Carolina Pacific. He passed it three times before finally stopping at roadside vegetable stand to ask directions. When he finally reached the end of the long dirt drive that led to the site, Boone had lost hope of finding anything useful.

  The house looked like ground zero. There was nothing left except a brick foundation and a toppled chimney. This fire had burned fast, and it had burned hot.

  Probably a waste of time, Boone thought as he stepped over the crushed foundation to look around. A blast had blown a crater at least six feet deep into the center of what was once a crawlspace. A smaller hole, not as deep, overlapped it. Rubble and sand filled the holes. Mixed with the aroma of burnt plastic and wood, Boone noticed the slight odor of rotten eggs.

  "This wasn't kids playing with matches," Boone said and took a long, searching look at the scene before widening the radius of his search and grabbing his backpack from the truck.

  His path took him to a small creek nearby. The ground looked scorched in a few places near the edge of the water. It was no more than one foot deep in the middle. During spring rains, it probably would look like a little river, though now it wasn't very impressive.

  What's that? Boone thought after scanning the area.

  He saw something resting in the wash and jumped down to retrieve it. It was a piece of metal, uniformly curved but jagged, and it was stuck in the mud. The area around it looked as if the metal had landed while still hot.

  Boone carefully pried it free. The piece was about the size of his palm and was covered in black residue. Boone scratched it with the knife blade on his multitool, removing some powder and carbon. It looked like a cast iron pipe, the kind once use for the toilet stack in old houses. Could this be the house's waste pipe?

  Boone took a gallon-sized freezer bag out of one of the pockets in his backpack and put the metal piece inside. He used a laundry marker to note the location where he had found it so that investigators could take a second look at the fire.

  He checked his watch. Where did all the time go? The case would have to wait, at least until he’d learned all about North Carolina’s farm bill during the Great Depression. All things being equal, Boone preferred being in a burning building to sitting through that lecture.

  He was only a half-mile down the road, when Cedar called his cell. “What’s up?” he said, trying to sound casual, not wanting to let on that when her name popped on ID, his stomach did a flip-flop.

  “Change of plans so I called to ask a little favor,” she said. “For Luigi.”

  “Well, if it’s for Luigi, I think so. Because if it were you, then we’d be equal, and I’d be off the hook for dinner.”

  “Do you want to be off the hook?”

  Oh no, she wasn’t going to catch him in that little trap. “I say what I mean, and mean what I say.”

  “I’ll take that as a no, then.” She sounded relieved. “Could you take Luigi to meet his benefactor tonight? My coach called an emergency practice at the same time as his thing.”

  “Be glad to,” he said and got the details. “If you can do something for me, since this sounds like I'm doing you a favor, not Luigi.”

  “What does this favor entail?”

  “Not much, just a little trip to Stumpy Meeks’ house. I’ve got to get to NC History, but there’s an item I need from him. I’ll give you the address.”

  “Like what?”

  “A finger.”

  “Any of his fingers in particular?”

  “Not his. The one he keeps in his fridge.”

  “Boone Childress,” she said with a tone mixed with disgust and fascination, “you’ve got some explaining to do.”

  The new jewel in Bragg County Medical Center's crown was the Ethel Landis Children's Hospital, a state-of-the-art facility for the care of children from birth through young adulthood. It boasted wings dedicated to birth and delivery, neonatal care, pediatrics, and teen health. And it was paid for by a capital campaign led by the Lethe Foundation, a philanthropic group created by the late Ethel Bayer Landis, wife of G.D. Landis and mother of Trey Landis.

  As part of the benefactor thing, Boone and Luigi passed the new wing on the way to the offices of that very foundation, which was located in a renovated building across the street from the hospital. One of the many ways that the Lethe Foundation su
pported area schools was to fund student exchanges with foreign countries. Ethel Landis was a world traveler, and she believed that the school children of Bragg County deserved to study other cultures. Since she couldn't fly the children to the countries, her foundation brought foreign students to Bragg County. Luigi was one of several recipients of an exchange grant, and protocol dictated that he visit his sponsor to formally give thanks.

  "It would suck to be you right now," Boone said as they crossed from the street to the Lethe Foundation offices.

  Luigi, who was dressed in a gray herringbone suit, shrugged. A gentle wind blew through his black hair, which he had tamed with a fine-toothed comb and a tube of hair gel. "It is expected," he said. "Thank you for accompanying me."

  "It's no problem."

  Boone pulled the door open. The wind swept in, lifting a few sheets of paper off the receptionist's desk. She snatched the papers, then slapped them on the desk and set a paperweight atop the pile.

  "Sorry," Boone said.

  "It's fine," she said through her teeth, which were perfectly straight and free of stains. Her brown hair was pinned up, and she peered at them over thick-framed reading glasses. "Do you have an appointment?"

  Luigi stepped forward. He pulled a business card from a pocket and offered it with two hands while bowing. "My name is Ryuu Hasegawa. I have an appointment with Mr. George Deems Landis, III."

  "That's Landis."

  "Yes."

  "You said Randis."

  "Ah," Luigi said. "Forgive my pronunciation. My English is not so good."

  What a witch, Boone thought. Her English wasn't so good, either.

  She flipped the card over. The same information was written in Japanese on the back, and she spent a few seconds puzzling at the kanji before she replied. "I'll tell Mr. Trey you're here."

  When she was out of earshot, Luigi whispered to Boone, "Who is this Trey?"

  "The man you're supposed to meet. George Deems the Third. His nickname is Trey. It's sort of an idiom."

  "Very confusing. It sounds like an object for serving tea."