Kathy Reichs - Flash and Bones

The clock said 10:08.

Out of excuses for further delay, I phoned Summer.

“Hello. I’m Summer’s answering machine. Please tell me your name. I’m sure Summer would love to call you back.”

Eyeballs rolling, I disconnected and dialed the number Larabee had provided.

Wayne Gamble picked up on the first ring.

“This is Dr. Brenn—”

“Any news?” In the background I could hear the roar of engines and the tinny sound of electronically enhanced announcements.

“Dr. Larabee will perform an autopsy this morning. But I can tell you that the victim from the landfill is male.”

“I’m being followed.” Gamble spoke in a hushed, clipped way.

“Sorry?” Surely I’d heard incorrectly.

“Hang on.”

I waited. When Gamble spoke again, the background noise was muted.

“I’m being followed. And I’m pretty sure my back door was jimmied last night.”

“Mr. Gamble, I realize you’re anxious—”

“It happened then, too. To my parents, I mean. I used to see guys hanging around outside our house. Odd cars parked on our street or following us when we drove.”

“This occurred when your sister disappeared?”

“Yes.”

“Did your parents tell the police?’

“My parents contacted the Kannapolis PD and the Cabarrus County Sheriff. And the FBI. Maybe the Charlotte PD. The local cops had asked Charlotte for help. No one took them seriously. Everyone wrote it off as paranoia.”

“Why the FBI?”

“The feds took part in the investigation.”

“Because?”

“It was the nineties. Lovette was hanging with right-wing wackos.”

It took me a moment to grasp Gamble’s meaning.

In 1995 Timothy McVeigh blew up the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. In 1996, during the summer Olympics, a bomb exploded in Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta. In 1997 the target was an abortion clinic in Sandy Springs, Georgia. That same year bombs were planted at the Otherside Lounge, a lesbian bar in Atlanta. A year later it was an abortion clinic in Birmingham, Alabama.

In 1998, when Gamble and Lovette disappeared, the FBI was focused full-bore on domestic terrorism. If Lovette was known to associate with anti-government extremists, I wasn’t surprised the bureau was keeping an eye out.

“Regretfully, I see no link between your sister and the victim found in the landfill. As I stated, my preliminary findings suggest that the individual is male and that he was older than twenty-four.”

“Then why is some jackass tailing me?” Very angry.

“Calm down, Mr. Gamble.”

“I’m sorry. I feel like crap, probably some kind of flu. Really bad timing.”

“If you’d like to reopen the investigation into your sister’s disappearance, you could try contacting the Charlotte-Mecklenburg PD Cold Case Unit.”

“Will they admit to the cover-up back in ’ninety-eight?”

“What do you mean?”

“The cops formed a task force, made a public show of looking, then shoved the whole thing under the rug.”

“Mr. Gamble, I’m a forensic anthropologist. I’m not sure how I can help you.”

“Yeah. That’s what I expected.” Coating his anger with disdain. “Cindi wasn’t a congressional intern or some bigwig’s kid. No one gave a rat’s ass then, no one cares now.”

My first reaction was resentment. I started to respond.

Then I thought of Katy, just a few years older than Cindi. I knew the agony I’d feel if my daughter went missing.

How much time could a little poking around take?

“I can’t promise anything, Mr. Gamble. But I’ll ask a few questions.” I reached for pen and paper. “Who was lead on the investigation into your sister’s disappearance?”

The name shocked me.

COTTON GALIMORE. THE MAN WHO’D VISITED LARABEE. THE head of security for Charlotte Motor Speedway.

“Anyone else?”

“A detective named Rinaldo, or something like that.”

“Rinaldi?”

“That’s it. You know him?”

“I do.” After so much time, cold fingers still grabbed and twisted my gut.

Eddie Rinaldi spent most of his career with the Charlotte-Mecklenburg PD Felony Investigative Bureau/Homicide Unit. The murder table. We’d worked many cases together. Two years back, I’d watched Rinaldi gunned down by a manic-depressive who’d skipped his meds.

Gamble’s words brought me back. “Rinaldi seemed like a stand-up guy. You’ll talk to him?”

“I’ll see what I can find out,” I promised.

Gamble thanked me, and we disconnected.

I sat staring at the page on which I’d written nothing.

For decades Rinaldi had partnered with a detective named Erskine Slidell. Skinny. I wondered why he was working with Galimore in the fall of ’ninety-eight.

Call Slidell? Galimore?

Though a good cop, Skinny Slidell tends to grate on my nerves. But something in my brain was cautioning against Galimore.

I checked my address book, then dialed.

“Slidell.”

“It’s Temperance Brennan.”

“How’s it hangin’, Doc?” Slidell views himself as Charlotte’s answer to Dirty Harry. Hollywood cop lingo is part of the shtick. “Found us a rotter?”

“Not this time. I wonder if I could pick your brain for a minute.” Generous. A second was plenty to search Skinny’s entire neocortex.

“Your dime, your time.” Spitty. Slidell was chewing on something.

“I’m interested in a couple of MPs dating back to ’ninety-eight. Eddie worked the case.”

There was a long moment with neither reply nor sounds of mastication. I knew Slidell’s insides were clenching, as mine had.

“You there?” I asked.

“Fall of ’ninety-eight I was TDY on a training course up in Quantico.”

“Did Eddie partner with someone while you were away?”

“A horse’s ass name of Cotton Galimore. What the hell kinda name is Cotton?”

Typical Skinny. He thinks it, he says it.

“Galimore is now in charge of security for Charlotte Motor Speedway,” I said.

Slidell made a noise I couldn’t interpret.

“Why did he leave the force?” I asked.

“Got too close to a buddy name of Jimmy Beam.”

“Galimore drinks?”

“Booze is what finally got him booted.”

“I gather you don’t like him.”

“Ask me? You can cut off his head and shit in his—”

“Did Eddie ever mention Cindi Gamble or Cale Lovette?”

“Give me a hint, Doc.”

“Gamble was a high school kid, Lovette was her boyfriend. Both went missing in October of ’ninety-eight. Eddie worked the case. The FBI was also involved.”

“Why the feds?”

“Lovette had ties to right-wingers. Possible domestic terrorism issues.”

I waited out another pause. This one with a lot of slurping and popping.

“Kinda rings a bell. If you want, I can pull the file. Or check Eddie’s notes.”

Cops hang nicknames on each other, most based on physical or personality traits. Skinny, for example, hadn’t seen a forty-inch waistline in at least twenty years. Other than excessive height, a taste for classical music, and a penchant for pricey clothes, Rinaldi had exhibited no quirks at which to poke fun. Eddie had remained Eddie throughout his career.

Rinaldi’s one singular peculiarity was his habit of recording the minutiae of every investigation in which he took part. His notebooks were legendary.

“That would be great,” I said.

Slidell disconnected without a good-bye or any query concerning the nature of my interest in a case now over a dozen years cold. I appreciated the latter.