Into the resulting dead silence that followed, during which Liam felt rather than saw Jo Dunaway go on red alert, the second kid, slightly less skinny but considerably wider of eye and with hair in infinitely better shape said, “I told you I had a bad feeling about this.”

“And you are?” Liam said.

“Logan,” McGuire said. “That’s Logan. And that’s Logan’s mom, Cynthia Reese, and that’s Kyle’s dad, Greg Kinnison.”

Liam nodded at both of them. “Nice to meet you. Liam Campbell, Alaska State Troopers.” He looked back at Kyle. “What do you mean, you found a body?”

The stern note in his voice caused Kyle’s grin to fade a little. “I mean we found a body.”

“You mean you found a body,” Logan said, although it was more of a mutter.

Kyle gave him an impatient shove. “Shut up. And I can prove it.”

“Dude, you’re just going to freak them the hell out.”

“Logan!” his mother said. “Language.”

Kyle ignored them both and reached down to unbutton the pocket on the calf of his cargo pants, which also looked much the worse for wear. He produced a package wrapped clumsily in what looked like paper towels. He slid to his knees on the floor and with a due sense of ceremony folded back the towels to reveal what was within. Cynthia looked ill and averted her eyes. Greg folded his arms and tried to out-manly the trooper and the movie star.

Liam heard Wy draw in a quick breath and he said to Jo in a low voice, “Not a word. Not yet.”

Kyle, a little apologetically, said, “It kind of fell apart when I grabbed it.”

It was a collection of small bones. Finger bones, if Liam was not mistaken, and he had the sinking feeling that he wasn’t. “You said a body, Kyle.”

“The rest of it is still back there, sir. This was all I could reach before they pulled me out.”

“Pulled you out of where?”

“Out of the cave.”

Liam looked at Gabe.

“Erik’s dig.”

Liam sat down. “Maybe you should start at the beginning.”

“Yes, please,” Jo said, and ignored the look of death Liam sent her.

“You sure I can’t get you something to drink?” Gabe said.

It transpired that the boys had taken advantage of Erik’s absence to explore Erik’s dig and the cave behind it. During said exploration, they had discovered a crack at the back of said cave. Kyle found that his arm fit in the crack, which inspired him to see if his head could fit in it, too. At which point he became stuck. After futile efforts to extract him that resulted in the marks of mauling on display on Kyle’s face, Logan went for help.

“Why you?” Liam said.

“Mine’s the closest house.”

McGuire had sent Logan to alert the parents—the Kinnisons and the Reeses lived off the same driveway nearer to East Bay Road—and had gone down to the cave to see what he could do. “I’ll give you this, dude, when you get stuck into something you really commit.”