Kathy Reichs: Break No Bones

"Hot and sticky. You should have let me know you were coming. I could have rescheduled."

"If you actually took time off, I'm sure you needed the break."

Emma didn't reply to that. "Dan Jaffer still out of the loop?"

"He's been deployed to Iraq until sometime next month."

"You met Miss Honey?"

"Oh, yeah."

"Love that old lady. Brimming with piss and vinegar."

"She is that. Listen, Emma. I may have a problem."

"Shoot."

"Jaffer put me on to the site, thought it might be a Sewee burial ground. He was right. We've been getting bone since day one, but it's typical pre-Columbian stuff. Dry, bleached, lots of postmortem deterioration."

Emma didn't interrupt with questions or comments.

"This morning my students spotted a fresh burial about eighteen inches down. The bone looks solid, and the vertebrae are connected by soft tissue. I cleared what I felt was safe without contaminating the scene, then figured I'd better give someone a heads-up. Not sure who handles Dewees."

"Sheriff's got jurisdiction for criminal matters. For suspicious death evaluation, the winner would be me. Got any hypotheses?"

"None involving the ancient Sewee."

"You think the burial is recent?"

"Flies were opening a soup kitchen as I was scraping dirt."

There was a pause. I could picture Emma checking her watch.

"I'll be there in about an hour and a half. Need anything?"

"Body bag."

I was waiting on the pier when Emma arrived in a twin-engine Sea Ray. Her hair was tucked under a baseball cap, and her face seemed thinner than I remembered. She wore Dolce amp; Gabbana shades, jeans, and a yellow T with Charleston County Coroner lettered in black.

I watched Emma drop fenders, maneuver to the dock, and tie up. When I reached the boat, she handed out a body bag, grabbed camera equipment, and stepped over the side.

In the cart I explained that, following our phone conversation, I'd returned to the site, staked out a simple ten-by-ten square, and shot a series of photographs. I described in more detail what I'd seen in the ground. And gave warning that my students were totally jazzed.

Emma spoke little as I drove. She seemed moody, distracted. Or maybe she trusted that I'd told her all she needed to know. All I knew.

Now and then I stole a sideways glance. Emma's sunglasses made it impossible to know her expression. As we moved in and out of sunlight, shadows threw patterns across her features.

I didn't share that I was feeling uneasy, anxious that I might be wrong and wasting Emma's time.

More accurately, anxious that I might be right.

A shallow grave off a lonely beach. A decomposing corpse. I could think of few explanations. All of them involved suspicious death and body disposal.

Emma looked outwardly calm. Like me, she'd worked dozens, perhaps hundreds of scenes. Incinerated bodies, severed heads, mummified infants, plastic-wrapped body parts. For me, it was never easy. I wondered if Emma's adrenaline was pumping like mine.

"That guy an undergrad?" Emma's question broke into my thoughts.

I followed her line of vision.

Homer Winborne. Each time Topher turned his back, the creep was snapping photos with a pocket-size digital.

"Sonovabitch."

"I take that as a negative."

"He's a reporter."

"Shouldn't be shooting."

"Shouldn't be here at all."

Flying from the cart, I confronted Winborne. "What the hell are you doing?"

My students turned into a frozen tableau.

"Missed the ferry." Winborne's right shoulder hunched as his arm slid behind his back.

"Fork over the Nikon." Razor tone.

"You've got no right to take my property."

"Your ass is out of here. Now. Or I'm calling the sheriff to haul it to the bag."

"Dr. Brennan."

Emma had come up behind me. Winborne's eyes narrowed as they read her T.

"Perhaps the gentleman could observe from a distance." Emma, the voice of reason.

I turned my glare from Winborne to Emma. I was so peeved I couldn't think of a suitable reply. "No way" lacked style, and "in a pig's eye" seemed low in originality.

Emma nodded almost imperceptibly, indicating I should go along. Winborne was right, of course. I had no authority to confiscate his property or to give him orders. Emma was right, too. Better to control the press than to turn it away angry.

Or was the coroner thinking ahead to her next election?

"Whatever." My reply was no better than the ones I'd rejected.

"Providing we hold the camera for safekeeping." Emma held out a hand.

With a self-satisfied smile in my direction, Winborne placed the Nikon in it.

"This is puppy shit," I muttered.

"How far back would you like Mr. Winborne to stand?"

"How about the mainland?"

As things turned out, Winborne's presence made little difference.

Within hours we'd crossed an event horizon that changed my dig, my summer, and my views on human nature.

TOPHER AND A KID NAMED JOE HORNE STARTED IN WITH LONG-handled spades, gently slicing topsoil inside my ten-foot square. Six inches down we spotted discoloration.

Send in the A team.

Emma shot videos and stills, then she and I troweled, teasing away earth from around the stain. Topher worked the screen. The kid might be goofy, but he was a world-class sifter. Throughout the afternoon, students dropped by for progress checks, their CSI zeal wilting in inverse relation to the blossoming fly population.

By four, we'd uncovered a barely articulated torso, limb bones, a skull, and a jaw. The remains were encased in rotted fabric and topped by wisps of pale, blond hair.

Emma repeatedly radioed Junius Gullet, sheriff of Charleston County. Each time she was told that Gullett was unavailable, handling a domestic disturbance.

Winborne stayed on us like a hound on a cottontail. With the ratcheting heat and odor, his face morphed into something resembling splatter on a sidewalk.

At five, my students piled into carts and split for the ferry. Topher alone seemed open to working for as long as it took. He, Emma, and I kept moving dirt, sweating, and shooing Calliphoridae.

Winborne disappeared as we were transferring the last bones into a body bag. I didn't see his departure. One time I glanced over, and he was gone.

I assumed Winborne was scurrying to his editor and then his keyboard. Emma wasn't concerned. A body wasn't big news in Charleston County, which chalked up twenty-six homicides a year with a mere three hundred thousand citizens working at it.

We'd kept our voices low, our actions discreet, Emma argued. Win-borne had gotten nothing that could compromise an investigation. Coverage might be a plus, draw reports of missing persons, ultimately help with an ID. I remained skeptical, but said nothing. It was her patch.

Emma and I had our first real exchange on the way to the dock. The sun was low, slashing crimson through the trees and across the road. Even though we were moving, the salty pine smell of woods and marsh was tainted by the bouquet drifting from our backseat passenger.

Or maybe it was us. I couldn't wait to shower, shampoo, and burn my clothes.

"First impressions?" Emma asked.

"Bone's well preserved, but there's less soft tissue than I'd anticipated based on eyeballing those first vertebrae. Ligament, some muscle fiber deep in the joints, that's about it. Most of the smell is coming from the clothes."

"Body was wrapped in them, not wearing them, right?"

"Right."

"PMI?" Emma was asking how much time had elapsed since the victim's death.

"For postmortem interval you'll need to study the insect inclusions."

"I'll get an entomologist. Rough estimate?"

I shrugged. "In this climate, shallow burial, I'd say minimum of two years, maximum of five."