Bloodlines (30 page)

"No, but back before all these environmental laws started being passed, people buried their trash all the time."

"Have you found a lot of other buried trash out here today?"

He frowned, then called the backhoe man over. Before long, an old, smashed-up blue Buick was uncovered. "From the fifties at least," one of the men said.

"We've delayed enough," Brian O'Malley said. "Let's get the damned thing out of here."

One of the men had moved to the trunk and had been working at opening it. When he heard Brian's order, he said, "Wait, maybe there's a briefcase full of money in here." He managed to free the latch, but as he opened the trunk, his face went white. "Holy shit, Brian..."

We moved to take a look.

"People," I said, staring in disbelief at the pile of bones and dried sinew before me. Two loose hollow-eyed skulls stared back from within.

"Fuck me, there goes the schedule," Brian said in disgust. Then remembering my presence, said, "Don't you dare tell your father I said that in front of you."

**CHAPTER 26

THE BODIES WERE SORT OF MUMMIFIED--DRIED OUT, YELLOWISH-BROWN sinew clinging to bone. Both skulls damaged. A man and a woman, judging from the long, stained dress and the man's suit and knot of what looked like it had been a tie near one skull. Piled on top of each other, woman below. And small shiny objects glistened here and there. I took a deep breath and forced myself to take a few more photos before Brian slammed the lid of the trunk closed. "That's it for now, my girl...."

I know that a true newshound should have been begging him to open it again, but I was really kind of relieved to have the bodies out of sight. I felt a little shaky.

"Doug!" he called to one of the burliest men. "You make sure no one else touches this thing, all right?"

"Sure, boss."

Brian walked back toward his trailer, and I followed him, struggling to keep up with his long-legged stride.

"Did you see what was in there?" I asked.

"You're kidding, right?"

"I mean, besides the remains."

He stopped walking.

"Diamonds scattered over the floor of the trunk," I said.

"Or cut glass," he said, but he didn't believe that any more than I did.

I was ready to fight H.G. for the right to keep covering the story, had my arguments all lined up, and figured I'd have to take them to John Walters-- the news editor--and Wrigley as well. But H.G. surprised me. He heard me out as I told him the basics of the situation, then, after a moment's silence, he said, "I'm going to let you stay on this on your own for now. But you are going to have to make some promises to me right here and now--you're not going to hold information back from me, and you're going to call for help if you need it."

I readily promised. "Actually, if I'm staying here to watch what goes on-- do you think I could ask for help from someone who might be able to learn more about the property's past? Someone who won't try to take the story from me?"

He laughed. "Sure. Have anyone in mind?"

"Lydia Ames."

"She's in features."

"Trust me. We did a story in our college paper about the university annexing some property--Lydia did all the county record work." I gave him the details I had on Griffin Baer, which weren't many. "The car looks as if it's from the 1950s, but maybe it wasn't new when it was buried. Lydia can find out how long Baer owned the property, and talk to the heirs to learn who lived out here if he didn't."

"If features can spare her from her work there, okay. If not, I'll find someone else and make him keep his mitts off your story."

I reassured him that I had a roll of dimes and that I'd call back if I needed any other help, then hurried back out to the pit that held the car.

Most of the outside of the car was so dirty, you couldn't see much inside. I doubted that absolutely clean car windows would have helped much, because the front windshield had collapsed, and most of the passenger area of the car was filled with dirt, too. The grill was smashed in, making it look as if the car had been in an accident, but maybe that happened during the burial process. There were no license plates on the car.

The police arrived, ending my snooping. Uniformed officers, and not much later, two guys in suits. One of the suits was a broad-shouldered, gray-haired man I guessed to be in his fifties, with a pleasant, easygoing manner. He introduced himself as Detective Matt Arden. He ignored my presence almost immediately and focused his attention on Brian and the workmen.

His partner was tall and slender and far more reserved. He was younger than Arden, probably about forty. No one would have called him handsome. His features were harsh, but he had big, beautiful, intense brown eyes. He looked over the group of us who stood near the car, taking note of everything and everyone. Eventually he was looking at me. I could almost hear him singing to himself, "One of these things is not like the others..."

"Irene Kelly," I said, holding out a hand. "Las Piernas News Express."

His face kept its oh-so-serious expression, but he shook my hand--nice, firm handshake. "Philip Lefebvre, Las Piernas Police Department."

I heard the mimicry of the form of my introduction and smiled. Taking care with the pronunciation of his last name, I said, "Detective Lefebvre, you can't do much for the folks in the trunk of the car, but you can save a life today."

"Yours?" he said, and smiled. He had a chipped front tooth. For some reason, I found it endearing.

"Oh yes. I was sent out here to cover the groundbreaking of a shopping center. I don't suppose I need to tell you how much this changes things."

"These victims are giving you a career opportunity, then?"

I don't think I flinched--outwardly, anyway. "Don't pretend they might not do the same for you."

He gave a Gallic shrug. "We don't even know if this is a homicide yet."

"I suppose they could have crawled into the trunk of a car, closed it, and even completed their murder-suicide pact inside the trunk, but I don't know how they got the gun out of the car, or buried the car while they were in it, for that matter. Especially not in their evening clothes. Hell, I don't even know how they got their arms back down at their sides after they shot themselves."

"How could you know they were shot?" he asked, then noticed the camera in my hand. "Have you been taking photographs of the car and its contents?"

"Yes. And I don't know for certain about the shooting, or even if that was the cause of death, but they do have wounds on their heads that look like bullet entry and exit wounds."

He sighed. "Are we bargaining here, Ms. Kelly?"

"Irene. And let's not make it any more sordid than it already is--Phil."

That won a laugh from him. I saw Matt Arden look over at us in surprise.

"Look," I said. "I'll make double prints and give you a copy if you promise not to pass them around to other members of the media. But please don't make me stand a thousand miles away from whatever is said and done here."

"All right," he said, "but you won't be in the middle of things, either. You don't try to eavesdrop when I talk to my partner, and you don't touch anything--have you been touching the car?"

"No. The only ones who have touched it are a few of the guys on the crew, and most of them were wearing work gloves. I can point out the ones who did make contact with the car, if you'd like."

"Thanks."

He spent time talking to the people I indicated, leaving me to watch-- with a uniformed officer at my side--from nearby, but not close enough to overhear his questions or the crew's answers.

A crime lab technician arrived, and a few minutes later, the coroner's wagon pulled up. The police had some photos of their own taken. I began to wonder if mine would be of any value to Lefebvre after all.

After the technician was finished with his initial work on the trunk, there was the tricky job of removing the bodies. I heard Lefebvre speak sharply to one of the coroner's assistants. I caught one word of what he said: "Three."

Three bodies? I was fairly sure I had only seen two, but I hadn't really been able to study the contents of the trunk in the way the police investigators did.

The assistant brought out a small body bag. A child's bones?

Other media started arriving just as the car itself was placed on a flatbed tow truck. Eventually, a lieutenant from the Las Piernas Police Department arrived, and after conferring with Arden and Lefebvre, made a brief statement to the press--remains thought to be human had been found, an investigation into the matter was now under way, but no further comments would be made until the coroner's office had been given a chance to study the remains. Lots of questions were shouted at him, but he didn't answer any of them.

I glanced at my watch. I had a deadline to make and lots of questions to ask, too, but now that the lieutenant was on the scene, Lefebvre might not be able to answer any of them. I wondered if any ID had been found on the bodies. If not, I wanted to get back to the morgue at the newspaper--where articles and photographs and past issues of the paper were kept on file--to see if I could find out who disappeared during the years when that Buick was new.

I found myself thinking about O'Connor. Every year, he wrote about missing persons. He had been writing these stories since 1956. A Jane Doe had been found beneath the Las Piernas fishing pier the year before--and never identified. Someone had nicknamed that woman "Hannah." O'Connor covered the story of the discovery of her body in 1955, then on the anniversary of the day they found her, wrote the first of his "Who is Hannah?" articles. They were some of the most powerful stories I had ever read.

They weren't just about her, but about all the John and Jane Does--and about the other side of the equation, missing persons cases. Now, more than twenty years later, Hannah's case was still unsolved, but O'Connor had helped police to close a number of other cases through that column. If anyone in Las Piernas knew who was still missing, it was O'Connor.

Wrigley would probably give this story to him.

I told myself it could go to worse hands than O'Connor's. If he got it instead of Wildman or Pierce, at least it would be given the care it deserved.

I still didn't like the idea of losing it to anyone, though.

Maybe if I showed O'Connor a little respect, we could start over. I had nothing to gain from being at odds with him, and a lot to lose. For one thing, the paper wouldn't keep me on if I continued to make life miserable for one of its stars.

I looked at my watch again and sighed. A badly thrown bowl of strawberries had probably screwed up my chances of seeing this story through.

**CHAPTER 27

O'CONNOR GLANCED AT HIS WATCH. SHE HAD ALREADY BEEN AT THE scene on her own for several hours now. Would he be able to convince Wrigley before deadline brought her back here?

Wrigley tapped a pencil against his desk as he looked at the cardboard box O'Connor had set on it. Written in felt pen, in a hand few others could decipher, was a single word, a name: Jack.

Wrigley had thought it said "jerk."

O'Connor was watching the pencil, not the box. He had learned, over the years, that he could anticipate the outcome of any meeting with the publisher of the Express by gauging the speed of this tapping. Slow tapping, he was inclined to favor your proposal. Rapid tapping, you were doomed.

This was somewhere in between. Outcome uncertain.

"Tell me, Conn--do you happen to remember shouting--shouting, mind you--at me a few weeks ago?"

"Well--"

"Loud enough for the entire newsroom to hear you?"

"Yes, sir."

"Sir, is it? I believe I was Win not five minutes ago."

O'Connor said nothing.

"What were you shouting at me about?"

"You wanted to give Ms. Kelly a skirt on that school chemicals story."

"A generous mention, noting her contribution, at the end of a story you had reworked and greatly expanded. That seemed wrong to you."

"She deserved a byline. Her enterprise brought the paper's attention to the matter. That's all I was saying."

"Oh no, that wasn't all. I remember it almost word for word, Conn, because I may catch an earful from Wildman once in a while, but you don't tend to be a shouter. That impressed me. Made me see the error of my ways. You told me it was clear that H.G. and John and I were 'wasting her talents'-- wasn't that it?"

With a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach, O'Connor nodded.

"Yes. And you said she could handle tougher assignments than the ones we were giving her, and let me see, now... what was it?" He faked concentration, then opened his eyes wide. "Oh yes! How could I have forgotten?"

"How indeed," O'Connor murmured.

"Yes, this was one of my favorites--you said that 'the next time Kelly stumbles onto something big'--that was a little insulting to her, wasn't it, Conn? Stumbled? But you said that if she stumbled onto something big, we ought to let her run with it. Well, Conn, she has stumbled onto something huge."

O'Connor leaned over and picked up the box.