Cut to the Bone (4 page)

CHAPTER 5

Brockton

TYLER SHOOK SWEAT FROM
his face, like a wet dog, spattering the ashen ankles of the corpse he and I were carrying toward the pig barn. “Hang on a second,” he said.

I stopped. “You need to set him down, Mr. Yoga Super-Athlete?”

“Naw. I just need to get the sweat and sunscreen out of my eyes.” He shrugged his shoulders and craned his head from side to side, rubbing his face on the sleeves of his T-shirt—like a dog pawing at itchy eyes. The movement made the sagging body sway from side to side, like a guy sleeping in a hammock, except there was no hammock. And the sleeping guy wasn't ever going to wake up. “Okay, that's better.”

As we resumed walking, I heard a familiar buzzing. A small squadron of blowflies materialized and began circling the corpse.

“Amazing,” said Tyler. “Those guys can smell death a mile away. Hell, you don't even have to kick the bucket—just swing your toe
toward
the bucket—and
bzzt,
they're all over you.” He grimaced and sputtered, spitting out a fly that had strayed into his mouth. “
Hey,
you little bugger, get out of there. I'm not
quite
dead yet.”

“Maybe your personal hygiene isn't what it ought to be,” I said. I mostly meant it as a joke, but at the moment, Tyler was trailing a fairly pungent cloud of aroma. For that matter, I probably was, too. “Speaking of flies, though, we need to talk about your thesis project.” I'd been poring through the Chinese forensic handbook the night before—it had been my bedtime reading, much to the dismay of Kathleen, to whom I'd read several graphic passages aloud—and during my sleep, something in the thirteenth-century book had clicked, connecting somehow with the wasp nest and tree seedling we'd found in the skull from the strip mine.

“What do flies have to do with my thesis? I'm making good progress, by the way. Honest. That's why I was in the bone lab on Labor Day—looking at a bunch more pubic bones.”

“I know,” I said. “I saw the tray of bones. But I've been thinking.”

“Crap,” he muttered. “I hate it when you think.”

“What? Why?”

“Because whenever you start thinking, I end up with more work,” he said, glancing over his shoulder as he backpedaled toward the barn. Wafting toward us through the open door came the unmistakable smell of death, mingled with another powerful stench. Tyler disappeared as he backed into the darkness. “
Christ,
this place stinks,” came his voice from within, floating on the fumes.

I suspected Tyler was stalling, trying to distract me from the thesis discussion. But he was right about the stench; in fact, if anything, he was understating things. Over the course of several decades, countless litters of pigs had been farrowed and nursed in this barn, and every pig—sows and piglets alike—had left a legacy of stink. As the state's only land-grant university, UT still had a strong agricultural college, but in recent decades the school's working farms had been scaled back in favor of a more academic orientation for Ag majors. By 1992, the university was largely out of the farming business, with the exception of a few cornfields along the river and a small dairy farm adjoining the hospital.

We laid the body down in one of the empty stalls, the ground soft and slippery underfoot from decades of pig droppings and a half-dozen decomposing corpses donated to me by medical examiners so that I could begin building a teaching collection of modern, known skeletons.

The barn was windowless, but shafts of sunlight angled through gaps in the plank siding. Dust motes drifted and danced in the shafts of light. The blowflies—a dozen or more by now—appeared and disappeared in strobing succession as they traversed the slivers of light.

“Funny thing,” Tyler mused. “I don't mind the smell of the decomp so much; it's the pig shit I can't stand.”

“Anyhow,” I resumed, “I've been thinking about your thesis, and I think you need a different research project.”

“What?
I've spent weeks—months—looking at pubic bones. I've looked at hundreds of pubic bones. Maybe a
thousand
pubic bones.”

“But wouldn't you rather do something important?”

“You said the pubic-bone study was important, Dr. B.”

“It is. But not as important as this.”

“As what? Never mind—I don't want to know.”

“Everybody
studies pubic bones,” I said. “I'm talking about seminal research, Tyler.”

“You want me to research
semen
? I'm supposed to write a thesis about spunk?”

“Don't be so literal. Or so argumentative. This research will be unique. Original. A pioneering contribution.”

“Dammit!”
He swatted the back of his neck.

“You need to quit killing the flies, Tyler,” I said.

“Why?”

“Because they're your new best friends. The stars of your new thesis project.”

“What new thesis project? You keep dropping these veiled hints,” he grumbled. “Veiled threats. Just spit it out, Dr. B.”

“The first detailed study of insect activity in human corpses,” I said. “Our first step toward basing time-since-death estimates on scientific data. One blowfly at a time.”

“Let me get this straight. You're saying you want me to spend even more quality time out here, crawling around in pig shit?”

“Gathering data,” I said. “Advancing the cause of science.”

“And in your new vision, how much more time do I spend out here advancing the cause of science? How many data trips a day? This is a long damn way from the bone lab.” He had a point there, I had to admit. “Any chance you could get me a transporter beam, so I don't spend four hours a day shuttling back and forth from campus?”

“I'll figure something out,” I said, hoping it would prove true. My flash of nocturnal inspiration hadn't extended to anything so mundane as transportation logistics.

In the darkness a few feet away, I heard the sound of one hand clapping—Tyler's hand clapping against a fly on the back of his neck. Perhaps he had not yet fully grasped the brilliance of my new research plan. But he would. What choice, after all, did an indentured academic servant have?

CHAPTER 6

Crystal

CRYSTAL HEARD THE GROAN
of the semi's brakes close behind her, then the popping and skittering of gravel pinched by the edges of the tires, as a massive cab—no trailer—drew alongside her and stopped, the big pistons of the diesel knocking in its iron heart. The brakes hissed, causing her to jump. The truck was a long-hooded Peterbilt, which loomed over her like a locomotive; its small, divided windshield was shaded by a metal visor, jutting and ominous; the sleeper compartment, grafted behind the cab, looked half the size of Crystal's house trailer.

Crystal took two more steps forward, into a band of shadow, to avoid being blinded by the sun as she looked up at the driver. The shadow, she realized, was cast by the Baptist Church's giant cross, and for the first time in hundreds of comings and goings past it, Crystal was glad the cross was there, dispensing a bit of shade along with its monumental dose of disapproval.

The cross, the shade, and Crystal were thirty miles northwest of Knoxville, atop Jellico Mountain. Just beyond the point where I-75 finished its long, slanting climb up the mountain's flank and leveled out, a handful of buildings clustered at Exit 141: a blue-roofed Comfort Inn; a Pilot truck stop; Redeemer Primitive Baptist Church; and—last but not least—Crystal's place of employment, XXX Adult World. Adult World was the seamiest and the flashiest of the exit's buildings: a neon-emblazoned establishment surmounted by a pair of billboards and ringed by a gravel lot capable of accommodating half a hundred tractor-trailer rigs at a time. For efficiency's sake, Adult World ought to have shared a parking lot with the Pilot truck stop, since truckers constituted most of Adult World's clientele—and since women like Crystal spent a lot of time shuttling back and forth between the two businesses. But irony had trumped efficiency in this case: The truck stop lay on the opposite side of the interstate, and Adult World instead sat cheek by jowl—or haunch to haunch—with Redeemer Primitive Baptist, a corrugated metal building whose five-story cross did double duty, inspiring multitudes of passing motorists while simultaneously rebuking Adult World's lusty customers and fallen women.

“DIDN'T MEAN TO SCARE
you.” The voice floated down from the cab toward Crystal. “You want a ride?”

She looked up, over her right shoulder, shading her eyes against the glare of the slanting morning sun. All she saw were wraparound shades, the brim of a cap, chiseled cheeks, and a stubbly jaw leaning out the driver's window. “I don't care to walk,” she said. “I'm just going over yonder to the truck stop. Thanks anyhow.”

“You fixing to get some breakfast? Come on, I'll buy.” He took off the sunglasses so she could see his eyes. He was looking at her face, not her tits. She appreciated that, though she knew he'd already had plenty of time to check her out as he pulled up behind her and then drew even. Hell, he'd probably seen her naked not more than twenty minutes before, dancing on the peep-show stage.

She noticed a chrome silhouette of a nude woman on the truck's mud flaps, as well as a bumper sticker on the sleeper cab, just below the door handle:
I ♥ LOT LIZARDS
.
She had mixed feelings about the sticker. On the one hand, it meant he was willing to pay for sex. On the other hand, it showed that he considered the truck-stop prostitutes he bought it from—“lot lizards,” in trucker slang—to be less than human.

Crystal's head was pounding and she was seriously pissed off; she'd worked all night for seventeen dollars in tips, and that bastard Bobby T had given her an “attitude adjustment”—a one-week suspension—for sassing a customer who'd looked and groped but never did tip. She'd wanted to sass Bobby T, too—to say, “Hey, man,
you
try dancing bare-assed all night for a bunch of fat guys with BO and grabby hands, see how chirpy
you
feel.” But she'd bitten it back, because this was her second attitude adjustment, and she knew Bobby T had a strict three-strikes-and-you're-out policy. “They's plenty other crack-whores to take your place in here, princess,” he'd told the last girl he sent packing. Sad truth was, he was right. Seventeen bucks wouldn't go far, but zero bucks went nowhere. And the night before last had been all right, thirty-something in tips, plus two quick twenty-dollar blow jobs in the parking lot out back. “Sorry; what?” she said, realizing that the trucker had said something to her and was waiting for an answer.

“I said business looked kinda slow in there.” She shrugged by way of a noncommittal acknowledgment. “Wondering if you might like to make a little extra on the side.”

On the side, hell,
she thought.
On my ass, you mean
. But what she said was, “Might. Depends on what you're lookin' for. And what you're offering.” Careful not to say what she'd do, and careful not to ask outright about the money. She'd never heard of an undercover cop driving a semi, but you couldn't be too careful.

“The no-frills, good old-fashioned way, forty bucks,” he said. “Take me around the world, I could go sixty. Show me something I've never seen before, might be worth a hundred.”

She didn't much like feeling pressured, but she definitely liked the prospect of making a hundred first thing in the morning. Maybe he'd even spring for a room in the Comfort Inn, which would give her a chance to shower and nap before traipsing home to the trailer. “Well then,” she said. “All aboard, I reckon.”

He grinned down at her. “That's the ticket. Come on around. You need help getting up?”

“Nah, I can manage. I've done it once or twice before.”

“Ha. I bet you have, babycakes. I bet you have.”

She walked around the long, looming prow of the truck, the top of the hood a foot higher than her head, the windshield blocked from view by the mammoth engine. When she got to the side, the passenger door swung open for her. Planting her left foot on the thigh-high step, she grabbed the chrome bar running up the side of the cab and swung her right leg up to the floorboard, almost as if she were climbing onto a horse.

“Oh yeah, I'd say you've done this once or twice,” he said, grinning.

He was younger than most truck drivers. Better looking, too—good muscles, no gut. Well, that would change soon enough, if he ate and drank and sat on his ass all the time, like every other truck driver she'd ever known. Once she was in, he eased out the clutch and the truck rumbled forward. “Name's Jake. As in ‘jake brakes.' What's yours?”

“Crystal,” she said. It wasn't her real name—or at least, it didn't use to be—but maybe by now she'd turned into Crystal. Didn't matter anyhow. Plus she was pretty sure his name wasn't really Jake.

“Crystal. Pretty. So how's about we work up a little more appetite before breakfast, Crystal?”

She was already starving, but she figured she'd best reel him in while she had him on the hook. “Whatever you want. You're in the driver's seat.”

He smiled, putting the shades back on. The truck rumbled up to the stop sign where Old Kentucky Road intersected I-75. He turned left, toward the underpass and the Pilot, but then he cut the wheel to the right, turning onto the interstate's northbound on-ramp instead of heading for the truck stop.

“Hey,” she said, turning in her seat. “What the hell you doing?”

“Just finding us a little privacy,” he said. “You know Exit 144? Three miles up the road? There's a nice little pull-off there where nobody'll bother us.”

She thought about opening the door and jumping out onto the ramp, but the truck had already picked up a fair amount of speed, and she didn't think she could do it without hurting herself pretty bad. She sat back in the seat, her nerves jangling, magnifying every jolt as the truck shuddered over seams and patches in the pavement. Her anxiety lessened a bit when he put on his turn signal and downshifted to take the exit.

“Stinking Creek Road,” he said. “Reckon how come they give it such an ugly name?”

“I reckon it don't smell too good,” she said. He probably wanted her to say something more clever or funny, but she was feeling hungry and nervous, not entertaining.

“Down near Chattanooga, there's a stream called Suck Creek. Suck Creek Mountain, too. I'd hate to have to tell people I lived on Suck Creek Mountain.” She didn't say anything. After a moment he added, “Up in Virginia, I-66 crosses Dismal Hollow Road. That'd be a bad address, too.”

Halfway down the ramp, on the left, they passed a long shed with a Quonset-hut roof. He braked and turned onto the gravel, crossing the far end of the structure. The shed was completely open on the end, and inside she saw an immense mound of salt—the highway department's stockpile for the coming winter, she supposed. The four-mile grade on Jellico Mountain was a nightmare when it snowed; the lanes were in the shadow of the mountain for most of the day, so stuff was slow to melt.
Take a hell of a lot more'n you to thaw that damn mountain,
she thought, as if the salt could hear what she was thinking.

Just past the end of the shed, he spun the wheel again, tucking in behind the building so the truck was screened from view. “See?” he said. “Close, but quiet. If it don't come a blizzard in the next hour, won't nobody bother us here.” He smiled at his joke. “Aw, relax, darlin'. You changing your mind? Hell, I'll take you back to the Pilot right now and still buy you breakfast, if you want to call off the deal. I'd be disappointed—who wouldn't be, a good-looking woman like you?—but I'm a big boy. I reckon I'd get over it. In a year or two.” He grinned and winked.

She shook her head. “Not changing my mind. I just need to . . . switch gears, I guess,” she said. “My boss was giving me a hard time back there.”

“You want something to take the edge off? Sip of Jack Daniel's? A little reefer?”

She felt a glimmer of what passed for hope these days. “You gonna smoke?” By way of answering, he took a fat joint and a lighter from the pocket of his denim shirt. He lit it and then handed it over so she could take a hit. She took a long drag and held it; when she exhaled, she seemed to be letting go of not just the smoke but also the stress of the night, the meanness of Bobby T, and the flash of panic she'd felt when the truck had taken the on-ramp instead of ducking under the freeway to the Pilot.

“That looks like just what the doctor ordered,” he said, and she was thinking he was right. Long as she didn't forget to collect the money, being stoned would make it easier to zone out while he did his business. A good buzz might even help her think of something kinky enough to score the extra forty.

She was feeling pretty good by the time he helped her down from the cab and up into the sleeper. He gave her a hand as she stepped onto the bottom rung of the ladder, then boosted her up the rest of the way by cupping her ass in both palms and pushing, with a little squeeze for good measure.

The inside of the sleeper was like a cave; the compartment had two windows, but both were covered with blackout shades. “Here, let me turn on a light so you can see,” he said, switching on a dim dome light.

The sleeper contained a double-sized mattress along one wall, a galley kitchen in one corner, and a shower in the other corner. “Hell's bells,” she said, toppling backward onto the mattress, “this is nicer'n where I
live
.” She spread her arms wide and swung them up and down, like wings. “I ain't never been in a sleeper this big.”

He smiled. “I don't expect you ever will be again, angel,” he said.