Read Online Bones of the Lost by Kathy Reichs - Free Book Online Page A

cooler.
    The hit-and-run victim had a mother somewhere, wondering where she was. Why she wasn’t calling. Was someone assuring her that her little girl was well?
    I gulped the last of my Perrier, now mostly melted ice.
    “My car—”
    “Off we go!”
    Pete pantomimed writing. April and her teeth reappeared with the check.
    We did our usual lunge. Pete got there first, paid cash, including a tip that could have financed a presidential campaign.
    Five minutes of Rihanna, and we were at the courthouse parking deck. I got out and circled to Pete’s side of the car. He lowered his window.
    “So. Tomorrow we’re officially free.” Christ. Did I really say that?
    “Yeppers.” Equally lame.
    We shared a clumsy through-the-opening hug. Lasting a moment too long?
    “All the best to you and Summer.”
    “Thanks. Keep in touch?”
    “Of course.”
    “Do you want me to wait until you’re wheels-up?”
    “I’m a big girl.”
    “But lousy with keys.”
    I dug out and dangled the spares from my desk. Returned his loaner.
    Then Pete was gone.
    My purse was still in the Mazda. The hated shoes.
    Below, passing vehicles made soft whooshing sounds on Fourth Street. In the distance a drunk warbled “Lucy in the Sky.”
    I dropped one set of keys into my purse and pulled out my phone.
    Slidell answered after two rings.
    “Yo, doc.” In the background I could hear the play-by-play of a baseball game.
    “How’re you coming on the hit-and-run vic?”
    “Tomorrow—”
    “Have you canvased the neighborhood? There are a few shops along Old Pineville Road.”
    “Like I said—”
    “What about body shops?”
    “I’m on it.”
    “Clothing and boot shops?”
    “On it.”
    “Clinics?”
    No response.
    “Did you drop by St. Vincent de Paul?”
    “On it.”
    “On it when?” Slidell’s cavalier attitude was pissing me off.
    “Look, we got nada. We’re going to get nada. If she’s illegal, no one’s gonna come forward. If she’s on the stroll, no one’s gonna come forward.”
    Deep down I suspected Slidell was right. Still.
    “How about running her picture in the paper?”
    “Did you hear what I just said?”
    “Can’t hurt, right?”
    “Neither can tossing goat turds into the sea.” Deep sigh. “Look, I ain’t blowing you off. A few hours ago I caught an MP with ties to the mayor. Single mother, two kids, steady job at the Rite Aid. Gone. Chief says I got no life till the lady is found.”
    The line went silent.
    I sat, irritated but not totally discouraged. Though sometimes slow out of the gate, Slidell usually came through in the stretch. Unless preoccupied. Enter high-pressure missing-person case.
    I pictured the girl with the pink barrette.
    I pictured Katy the last time I’d seen her, at Fort Hood the day she graduated from basic combat training. Instead of barrettes she wore camouflage fatigues, boots, and a black beret. Her body was rock hard, her long blond hair tightly knotted at the nape of her neck.
    Throughout that day, I’d fought back tears of pride. Tears of dread.
    The same dread I felt sitting alone in that parking deck.
    What if Katy disappeared and no one bothered to find her? To determine if she was dead or alive?
    The human brain is a switching station that operates on two levels.
    As my hand turned the key, my higher centers sent up images of a lonely stretch of two-lane.
    Instead of going home toward Myers Park, I wound through uptown toward I-77.
    Took the southbound ramp.
    Headed toward Woodlawn.

THE STRETCH OF old pineville road I was driving had once been the main route from Charlotte to Pineville. But the town and the road had both seen better days. And busier. South Boulevard, to the east, now had all the action, and few motorists made this strip their final destination.
    I flicked on my turn signal and tapped the brakes. Double beams bore down on my trunk. A horn blared and a large mass swerved around me, tail lights like glowing red eyes in the darkness.
    After reversing