My name was mentioned, and the fact that remains had been transported from the Morehead Road landfill to the ME office. I figured Byrne had seen Hawkins and Molene load the drum into the van. Combining that with the radio transmission from the Concord cops, he’d decided the story was solid.

Fair enough. Maybe exposure would help with an ID.

I pulled a pair of forms from plastic mini-shelving on a filing cabinet at my back, filled in the case numbers, and wrote brief descriptions of each set of remains and the circumstances surrounding their discoveries. Then I went to the locker room, changed to surgical scrubs, and crossed to the stinky room.

The sandpit bones were on the counter, in the brown evidence bag in which I’d placed them.

The landfill drum sat atop its mud-caked sheeting on a morgue gurney.

Since the missing housewife was higher up the queue, I decided to start there.

After assembling camera, calipers, clipboard, and a magnifying lens, I accessorized with a paper apron and mask and snapped on latex gloves. No match for the hard hat and vest, but the look was elegant in its own way.

By ten-fifteen I was done. x-rays, measurement, and gross and microscopic observation revealed that the bones and teeth were compatible with the rest of the sandpit skeleton. Dental analysis would confirm the finding, but I was confident the parts I’d recovered belonged to the missing housewife.

And that she had indeed been murdered.

The hyoid, a delicate U-shaped bone from her throat, showed fractures on each of its wings. Such trauma almost always results from manual strangulation.

I was finalizing my notes when the phone rang in a cadence that indicated the call was internal.

“I have a gentleman here who wishes to see you.” Mrs. Flowers sounded flustered.

“Can’t Joe deal with him?”

“He’s still out.”

“I’m trying to focus on these cases,” I said.

“The gentleman says he has information that is extremely important.”

“Information about what?”

“The body from the landfill.”

“I can’t discuss that yet.”

“He thinks he knows who it is.” Hushed but excited.

“D. B. Cooper has finally turned up?” Snarky, but I’d heard this line many times before.

There was a moment of prim silence.

“Dr. Brennan. This man is not a crackpot.”

“What makes you so sure?”

“I’ve seen his picture in People magazine.”

Chapter 3

GENERATION? UPBRINGING? HORMONES? I’VE NO CLUE THE reason, but in the presence of attractive Y-chromosomers, Mrs. Flowers blushes and her voice goes breathy.

“Dr. Brennan, I’d like to present Wayne Gamble.”

I looked up.

Standing in my doorway was a compact man with intense brown eyes and dark blond hair cut short and combed straight back. He wore jeans and a black knit polo with a Hilderman Motorsports logo stitched in red.

I laid down my pen.