Дана Стейбнау - Spoils of the Dead

Liam nodded back. “Liam Campbell.”

“Archeologist.” Berglund volunteered the information like he expected a fanfare of trumpets in response.

Liam was interested, though. “Oh yeah? Here on the Bay? What have you found?”

“Save yourself, don’t get him started,” Jeff said, reappearing with a brown ceramic jug that would have been more at home at an Appalachian hootenanny.

Erik grinned, unabashed, and handed over his card. “Harpoon heads, arrowheads, axe heads, fish hooks, a bone drill, frames for dip nets, stone oil lamps, and what I think are the pieces of a snare.”

“A snare for what?”

“Fur-bearing animals, I think.” Erik shrugged. “I’ll know more once I manage to figure out how it goes together.”

“How far back do they date?”

Jeff groaned, handing Erik his card and receipt. “I’ll pay you a hundred bucks to take back that question.”

“I will make you eat those words, Ninkasi.”

“Will you make Domenica Garland eat them, too? Because you’ll have to.”

Erik winked at Jeff. “She’s already given it her best shot. She didn’t leave happy.”

“Oh, man, you turned that down? Hell, I’d tap that!” Jeff cast a nervous look at the ceiling. “I mean, I would if I wasn’t married.”

“Uh-huh.” Erik tucked the jug under one arm. “Also, not what I said.” He grinned when Jeff’s eyebrows flew up. “Come see my dig… Liam, right? I’m up the Bay twenty miles, on the Bay side of the road. It’s a steep climb down but I promise it will be worth your time. Thanks, Jeff. Later.” He was out the door with a backwards wave.

“Oh, shit,” Jeff said.

“What?” Liam turned to see Erik pause briefly before another figure, also a man. “What’s wrong?”

Jeff came out from behind the bar fast and hit the door before it had closed fully behind Berglund, Liam right behind him. By the time he caught up with Jeff, a third person had pulled up in what looked like Lincoln’s ne plus ultra version of a Navigator, black in color. The woman that slid down from the driver’s seat was a looker, medium/medium, but with her weight distributed in a manner that would have made Rubens weep. Her waist-length hair was nearly the same color as her vehicle and she wore jeans and T-shirt to match her vehicle and so tight that you could eyeball her pulse through the cloth. As much-married as Liam was he was also a man and it was difficult to drag his eyes up to her face. When he did manage it his gaze was caught and held by a pair of large, dark, widely spaced eyes whose initial Disney-princess look was belied by an intelligence so sharp it might draw blood. How much was up to her, and if you got in her way.

“Dom,” Jeff said in a resigned voice. “To what do I owe the honor?”

“Just starting the day off right, Jeff.” She made even that innocuous statement sound seductive. She strolled over to stand next to the man confronting Berglund. A more unlikely couple would have been impossible to find. She was perhaps in her early forties and he looked at least twice her age and a quarter her weight. She stood erect, shoulders back, those amazing breasts thrust out in front of her like bazookas taking aim, skin glowing with health and vigor. He was thin to the point of emaciation, stooped over a chest caved in by age, all exposed skin freckled with liver spots, only wisps of colorless hair remaining in the barest fringe above his ears. His eyes were red and watery with swollen lids and his right hand was curled arthritically over the head of a massive diamond willow cane with a braced handle that looked as if it weighed as much as he did. His remaining energy was directed in what could only be described as a homicidal glare at Erik Berglund. His voice was high and raspy and vicious. “You ignorant lout, you puppy, you—you—” Spittle flew as the old man spluttered to a halt.

“Hey, old man,” Berglund said, impervious. He gave the woman a long look, head to foot, and his mouth curled up on one side. “Domenica. Looking good, as always.”

She gave as good as she got, a sultry once-over that made Liam glad it had passed him by because he was afraid of what would have happened if it hadn’t. “Erik.” She turned to the older man. “Leave it, Hilary. Erik’s, quote, findings, end quote, will never hold up. No point wasting your energy in a quarrel that will never go anywhere. RPetCo needs you in fighting form for when we get to court.”

Liam was standing a little behind and to the right of the group and he could see everyone’s expression but Jeff’s pretty well. He saw Erik’s lethal grin flash out at both opponents impartially, and there was a broad chuckle in his voice when he replied. “Whatever makes you sleep better at night, Dom.” He winked. “I’m always, ah, up, for that.”

Dom, or Domenica, was not one to be outfaced or even the least little bit embarrassed. She smiled back at Berglund. Jesus. Liam hadn’t seen such a blatant come-on since watching J.Lo strip on screen. “I seldom repeat myself, Erik.”

Erik’s beam edged into a knowing smirk. “More than three or four times, anyway.”

Dom slid her arm through Hilary’s and urged him past Erik and Jeff. “About opening time, isn’t it, Jeff?” She caught sight of Liam and paused, infinitesimally, but it was long enough for Liam to feel an interest that was as searing as it was brief. He found himself blowing out a breath after she had passed by and looked up to find Berglund’s knowing gaze on him. “Careful there, dude. She will eat you alive.”

“I’m a married man,” Liam said.

“Keep telling yourself that.”

It took a moment for his vision to clear completely and when it did he saw the old fart with the walker was a step behind the old fart with the cane. He glanced at Liam in passing and slammed to a halt. “Trooper.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Recognized you from your photo. Blue Jay Jefferson. I’m kind of a fixture in these parts.”

“Sergeant Liam Campbell. Nice to meet you, sir.”

“You were the cop who figured out the prop murder,” Jefferson said. “Tricky.” He held up his left hand. The middle finger had been broken between the first and second joints and healed crookedly. “Made that mistake once myself. Easy enough to do when you’re not paying attention.”

Liam wondered what Wy would say when he told her that.

“You’re out of uniform,” Jefferson said.

“It’s at the cleaners in Anchorage,” Liam said.

“Hey, Blue Jay.” Erik saluted Jefferson with the growler, hopped into a dusty Ford F-150 old enough to be carrying its own cane, and chugged out of the lot.

Blue Jay Jefferson stomped past with his walker to Backdraft, where the woman was holding the door open for him.

“Who the hell is that?” Liam said.

“I’m guessing you mean her,” Jeff said, heavy on the irony. “That’s Domenica Garland. President and CEO of RPetCo Alaska.”

“Oh.” It was a weak response and Liam knew it. Trying to recover some portion of the genitalia that had followed Domenica Garland into the brewpub, he said, “Who are the old farts?”

Jeff sighed. “The one who was foaming at the mouth is Hilary Houten. Also an archeologist. He and Erik have, ah, professional differences. Blue Jay Jefferson is so far as I know the oldest living inhabitant of the Bay who was born here, white or Native. He knows where all the bodies are buried, including the ones he buried himself.” He changed the subject, by chance or design Liam couldn’t tell. “What does your wife think of the house?”

Liam thought of the three-bedroom, four-bathroom house on the edge of a 600-foot bluff that overlooked even more of the Bay than the brewpub did. “She’ll see it today.”

“My wife would have killed me dead if I’d bought a house before she’d had a chance to look at it.”