CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

 

THE following day Trevor asked Randi and Brina to meet him at the firehouse to discuss final touches.  “You know, we’re coming down the home stretch with the project.”

They were seated on inverted five-gallon buckets around a big box that contained Brina’s new desk which everyone planned to put together later that evening.

Trevor leaned back against the concrete wall, crossed an ankle at his knee.  “Have you two given any thoughts to doing anything across the back of the building? Right now, it’s an eyesore with a parking lot and not so pretty view of Stanley’s garage. 

Plus, Randi’s office looks out on a trash pile.  I have the boys clearing it now, but what do you think about putting in a patio?  We could put down pavers and enclose it with lattice fencing to block the view of the parking lot. Add a couple tables and chairs, hanging plants. Give you another place to meet with clients or just enjoy lunch outside on a clear day.”

“I hadn’t really thought about that,” Brina said.  “We’ve been so focused on just getting the building done.”  She looked at Randi.  “What do you think?”

“I like it.” Randi smiled, then frowned at Trevor.  “How much will it cost?”

“Haven’t figured it yet, but we can make it worth your while.”

Brina snickered.  “A man after my heart.  Although I don’t think it’s my heart he’s thinking about.”

Randi punched her friend, turned back to Trevor.  “How long will it take?  How complicated will it be?  Will it be finished in time for the Grand Opening?”

Trevor shook his head at the barrage of questions.  “Well, for starters, we’ll need to clear it.”  He grabbed his clipboard and pencil.  Drew a long line with an opening for the back door.  “The back walls’ long enough that you could have a mural painted on the cement blocks.  Maybe a horse race since this is Lariat’s town.  You could put the patio on one end and balance it with a deck off the loft at the other end.” He stopped when Josh stumbled into the room.

“You haven’t finished the clearing already, have you?”  He saw that Josh was white as a sheet and jumped up.  “What’s happened?  Did somebody get hurt?”

“No,” Josh croaked, “but you’ve gotta’ come see it.”

“See what?”  Trevor tossed the clipboard onto the big box, followed the boy outside.  He found Clay vomiting off to one side and Norman on his knees by the mound, staring straight ahead as if in a daze.  “What happened?”   Trevor ran to Norman’s side.

Norman pointed to a big pile of dirt that had grown up over the years. The boys had already tossed the scrap lumber from the job into the back of the truck and had started on the matted weeds that had been flattened by the scrap wood.  

“We started pulling the brush away and there were lots of weeds.  Clay grabbed a bunch and,” he paused, “and then we saw that.”  Norman pointed to a bare spot in the dirt.

Trevor knelt, examined it and saw what looked like a worn burlap bag.  There was a hole in the bag where Clay had pulled away the tough grass.  He gently brushed away a little more dirt and saw what looked like a small hand.  A human hand.

He motioned to Randi and Brina to stay where they were.  Saw that the foreman had followed them outside.  “Aaron, see if you can find Officer Peterson.  Don’t say anything.  Just ask him to come to the site.”

Aaron saw the bones, nodded and raced away.

“Randi.  Brina.  I think you two need to stay over there.  Don’t come any closer.”

“But what is it?”  Randi took a step forward.  Trevor motioned her to stop.

“I’m not sure.  But I don’t want to do anything else until Duane gets here.”  He looked at the boys who were still in shock.  “You three, go inside.  Chill up in the loft for a while.  I won’t be long but I don’t want you calling or texting anyone about this.  Okay?”

The boys nodded then stumbled inside.

Trevor stood and walked to the two women.  “Don’t get upset but I think we have a body buried there.  I’m going to get a tarp to put over the site.  Why don’t you wait inside till Duane Peterson gets here?  There’s nothing else we can do till he gets here.”

Within ten minutes, Aaron returned with Duane Peterson.  Trevor took the deputy to the spot, lifted the edge of the tarp, gave him a chance to observe and react.

“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” Trevor asked.  “Do we have us a body?  Could this be why someone doesn’t want us to finish the job?”

Duane nodded.  “Looks like it.  We don’t have a medical examiner, though.  Sheriff’s going to have to bring someone in.”  He looked at his watch. “It’s getting late in the day.  We can make a few calls but it’ll probably be morning before anyone can get here.”  He looked at Trevor.  “Who found it?  You?”

“No.  I had the boys clearing back here and they found it.  Understandably, all three are upset.  I had them go up to the loft till you or I could talk to them.  Aaron,” he turned to his foreman, “would you go check on them?”

Duane looked at Randi and Brina who had huddled near the back door of the firehouse.  “You two okay?  This project just gets more and more bizarre by the day.”  He stepped towards them.  “Let’s go inside.”

Everyone returned to Brina’s make-shift office, stood in silence.  Realizing the time, Randi grabbed her cell phone and called Ginny.

“Hey, we’ve had a problem come up at the firehouse and I was wondering if you could take the boys home with you.”

“Sure.  Is everything okay?”

“I’m not sure.”

“Tell her we all need to meet at her house later.”  Trevor commented.

“I heard that,” Ginny said.  “Did something happen?”

“Yes. No.” She sighed.  “Trevor’s right.  There’re a few things around here we need to take care of, but if you could get in touch with Marcie, Rafe and Cliff, we need to meet this evening.”

Randi pocketed her phone, leaned against the wall next to Brina.

“Sheriff’s on his way,” Brina said.

“Don’t know how long the body’s been there but have you had any missing persons lately?” Trevor asked.

“Not really.  None while I’ve been here and that’s going on eight years.  Of course, it could be from outside the area, but being as it’s in town, I’d say it’s local.”

“Based on what little I could see, I’d say it’s female, a child or small man.”

“Yeah,” Duane said.  “You sent your crew home, right?  Why don’t we go talk to the boys till the Sheriff gets here?  Probably should arrange for some counseling.  More importantly, we don’t want anybody saying too much about this yet.”

Trevor and Duane spent twenty minutes with the boys.

“Do you know what it is?” Josh asked.

“We’re not sure, yet.” Duane said.  “It could be an animal for all we know.”

“But it looked like a hand,” Norman said.

“Yeah, but we need to let the medical examiner verify a few things.”

“Boys,” Duane sat in the floor with them.  “I need you to help me here.  Until we know more about things, we need to keep this quiet.  People might get upset, some might snoop around the site.  If the media finds out, it could be a real circus.  That’s why I’m asking you not to talk to anyone about this.  I know it’ll be hard not telling your parents but we can’t go public with this.  Not yet.”  He handed each of the boys a piece of paper.  “If you need to talk to anyone, don’t hesitate to call me.”

 

Sheriff Matthews determined that there was nothing they could do until he found a medical examiner.

“I’ll be staying here tonight,” Trevor said.  “I need to meet with Randi, Brina and her friends this evening but will come back to safeguard the scene.”

“I appreciate it,” the Sheriff said.  “I don’t have the manpower to watch it overnight.  I’m sure if we put some of the scrap wood on top of it, it will be okay but I appreciate your staying too.  I just don’t want word to leak out before we’ve had time to determine whether these are human bones and if so, who it could possibly be.”  He looked at Duane.  “We’ll make some calls and be here as soon as we locate someone to study the area.”

Trevor followed Randi and Brina to Spicer Meadows after he and Duane covered the tarp with some of the brush so no one would notice the disturbance in the earth.

“Do you really think it’s a body?” Randi asked.

Trevor nodded.  “We didn’t want to upset the kids but we’re pretty sure it’s a body.”

“I can’t believe that someone would just bury a body behind the firehouse,” Ginny exclaimed.

“And who could it possibly be?” Marcie asked.

 

The following morning, Randi fixed an egg sandwich and coffee for Trevor.  As soon as she dropped the boys off to school, she headed for the firehouse.  He’s tired, she thought when she saw his blood-shot eyes.

He took a bite of the sandwich.  “I talked to Aaron last night and suggested that he and the guys work on one of the other projects until we get this handled.  Then Sheriff Matthews called to say the state medical examiner’s office is sending someone first thing this morning.  I was on my way to clear the brush before he gets here.”

“You’re tired.”  Randi said.  “Finish your sandwich and I can help you,” Randi said.  “Did anyone come around last night?”

“Nope.  Hal is still holed up in the garage so he was my backup.   He came by when he saw my flashlight so I had to tell him I was staying on the job.  Didn’t tell him why though.”  He leaned his head against the wall behind him.  “Came back this morning, said he didn’t see any activity outside all night.”

Randi shivered.  “Let’s just hope we can take care of this quickly.”

Duane arrived mid-morning with a stocky man carrying a small bag that reminded Randi of a doctor’s medical bag.  His name was Gil Fitzgerald and he walked around the site then knelt to examine the bare spot.

“Looks human alright. Will know better when we clear the rest of the mound.”

Trevor knelt beside him and they meticulously removed weeds and clumps of dirt.  The more they removed, the more burlap they uncovered.  Two hours later, they had uncovered the bag, peeled it back and had an entire skeleton laying before them.”

“I’ll take over here.” Gil said.

When Trevor couldn’t do much more, he headed inside to catch a couple hours sleep on the cot Hal had brought over from the garage.

Randi and Brina unlocked the front door and found him sound asleep.  “He looks exhausted,” she whispered to Brina.  They tiptoed through the building and found Duane talking with Gil in the back.

“How’s it going?” Brina asked, cringing when she saw the skeleton.

“We’ve cleared the bulk of the pile and Gil’s almost finished clearing the dirt from around the bones.”

Randi blew out a breath.  “Do you have any idea about who it might be?”

“Not yet,” Duane said.  “Won’t be able to do that until we have a name and some DNA to compare it to.  That’s why we need to review the missing persons cases.”

“I just feel so bad for whoever it is.” Randi said.  “Somewhere, some parent is missing a child.”

Brina stared down at the bones.  So small, she thought as her eyes travelled up the body from the feet to the skull.  She saw something shining near the skull.  “What’s that?”

“I was just getting to that,” Gil said.  He brushed more dirt aside, reached for the loose object.  He heard Brina’s gasp and looked up to see the color drained from her face, her hand over her mouth.

“Brina?” Duane touched her arm.  “Are you okay?”

“Brad,” she turned, raced through the firehouse.  “I need to find Brad.”

 

Stacie was just sitting at her desk when Brina and Randi entered Brad’s office.  She smiled.  “Hey girls, how are you,”

“Is Brad in?”  Randi interrupted her.  “Brina needs to talk to him.”

“Sure,” Stacie jumped up.  “I think he’s working on an email.  Let me check.”  Stacie returned moments later.  “He says to come on back.”  She touched Randi’s arm when they stepped forward.  “Is Brina okay?  Can I get you anything?”

Randi nodded. “No, but thanks.”

Brad stood as soon as he saw how upset both women were.  “What’s happened?”  He looked at Randi.  “Has Tim done anything?”

“No.  No, it’s not me.  Brina needs to talk to you though.”  She looked at her friend.  “Do you need me to leave?”

“No.”  Brina reached for Randi’s hand.  She turned to look at Brad.  “Brad, we need to talk.”

When he saw her eyes fill with tears, Brad guided her toward the sofa.  “Brina, you’re scaring me.  What’s wrong?”

A tear streaked down Brina’s cheek.  “Didn’t you give Deborah a locket?”

Brad’s head jerked in confusion. “Yes. I gave her one after we’d been dating several months.”  He smiled.  “My Mom had shown me the one my father gave her before leaving for World War II.  She used to talk about how it comforted her while he was away.  I decided to give Deborah one till I could afford a ring.”

Randi’s heart swelled, felt tears in her own eyes when she realized why Brina was upset.

“What did it look like?”  Brina asked.

“It was heart-shaped and had a rose engraved on the front of it.  I remember talking about how important my mother’s locket was to her.  We laughed when we put small strands of our hair together inside.  She said we would put our pictures in it the day we got married.  Brina, why are you asking about this now?”

“Brad,” Brina whispered.  “There has been a development at the firehouse.  You need to come with me.”

“Brina,” Brad stood when Brina jumped up.  “You’re scaring me.  What has happened?”

“Please,” she pleaded, “just come with me.”  She pulled him behind her.

“Stacie, I need to go with Brina and Randi.  I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

Brad followed Brina around to the back of the firehouse.  Gil had brushed the last of the dirt away from the body.

“Mr. Fitzgerald,” Brina asked.  “Have you been able to uncover all of the locket.”  When he nodded, she continued, “Could you show it to Brad?”

He stood and handed the necklace to Brad. 

Brina sobbed when he stared down at it, then held it to his heart. Stared down at the small skeleton.

Trevor immediately put two and two together and put his arms around Brina and Randi.  Hugged them to his side.  He watched the man who had become a friend grieve for someone he had lost.

Brad fell to his knees, lightly touched the bones that used to be a hand.  “Deborah,” he whispered.  “My Deborah.”