That afternoon, Mercy stared at the red spray paint that now coated the edge of the concrete culvert. The vandal had also sprayed the wet dirt, but the paint hadn’t stuck very well. Broken beer bottles covered the area, the crime scene tape had been ripped down, and the wood stakes marking the search area had been ripped out and tossed aside.
Mercy was at the crime scene to meet Dr. Peres because a second group of bones had been found farther down the hill. She sighed at the disrespectful damage.
Dr. Peres was grim. “Pissed me off when I found it.”
“I can’t say it pleases me,” said Mercy, wiping from her nose the rain that had sneaked past her hood. “But no one had the manpower to keep a watch here twenty-four seven. At least all the initial evidence had been removed.”
“I usually want to examine the scene again,” Dr. Peres stated. “I’m thorough, but I always double-check to see if I missed anything.” The anthropologist put her hands on her hips. “I’d like to know who made this mess.”
“That makes two of us. Drunk teenagers? Drunk adults?” Mercy asked. “Who knows?”
“Or someone who isn’t happy we found his burial site,” Dr. Peres asserted, a knowing look in her dark eyes.
It’d crossed Mercy’s mind too.
“What’s done is done,” said Dr. Peres. “And I’m pleased the searchers found another cache of bones. There’s no evidence that our vandals knew about it.”
Mercy stared down the steep hill. Her thigh throbbed at the sight, and she hadn’t even started the descent. She rubbed the complaining muscles, feeling the lumpiness of the scar where the bullet had entered her leg. I have to do this.
She carefully followed the tall woman down the slope. Someone had tied ropes between the trees, creating a much-needed safety line. The two women wore vests with straps and carabiners that they hooked to the ropes as they slowly stepped downhill. The ground was damp under the trees, mostly protected from the heavy rain, but Mercy could see where the water from around the culvert had created a wide, washed-out channel that wound between the trees. The dirt around some tree roots had washed away, and the trees had fallen, leaving huge spidery roots exposed to the air. It was against the trunk of one of these fallen trees far down the hill that the cache of bones had been found.
The dirt under Mercy’s left foot gave way, and she grabbed for the rope. Her hands flailed in the empty air, and she landed on her back, then began sliding down the slope. Her breath was knocked out of her lungs as the strap of the carabiner jerked her to a halt, stopping her from a dangerous journey down the hill. She lay in the dirt, panting, digging her hands into the bank, petrified the carabiner would give way. Her right thigh screamed in pain, and she fought to catch her breath.
“You okay?” Dr. Peres asked from above, gripping the safety rope, concern on her face.
“Yep.” The word was casual, not revealing that her heart was trying to beat its way out of her chest.
“Need a hand?”
“I’ve got it. Give me a moment.” Her right leg felt as if it’d run a marathon, the muscles useless. She took a deep breath and hauled herself to her feet with pure arm strength and willpower. She crept back up to the safety rope, forcing her right leg to move. She kept a tight grip on the line as she followed Dr. Peres, paying better attention to the placement of her steps. Her leg shook from the strain. No wonder the search for more bones had taken so long. Dr. Peres looked over her shoulder and took in Mercy’s dirty pants and coat.
“That was why we put in the safety line. Sorry about your clothes.”
“I’ve got another outfit in my vehicle.” As always. She never went anywhere without a duffel or backpack stuffed with clothes, food, medical supplies, water purification tablets, and ammunition.
Preparation.
The women worked their way down the hill with no more accidents. At one of the fallen trees, Mercy exhaled as the ground flattened out near the trunk and gingerly placed all her weight on both feet at the same time.
“I’ll get my team out here tomorrow to officially excavate the area,” said Dr. Peres. “I thought you’d like a first look.”
Mercy nodded and crouched beside the downed tree. The pine was easily four feet in diameter and had landed perpendicular to the downhill slope, held in place by the thick trunks of still-standing pines. Beneath one section of the fallen tree, water had washed away the dirt and still trickled downhill unimpeded.
Are there more bones farther down the hill?
She knew a lot of the slope had been explored, but the searchers weren’t done yet.
To the right of the wash under the tree, branches had trapped mud and debris when the flow of the water was heavier. It took Mercy a moment to spot the bones that had caught the eyes of the searchers. Several small white nubs stuck out of the mud. Around one, a searcher had dug a little deeper to reveal that the nub was a bone.
“A femur,” stated Dr. Peres as she pointed to the exposed bone. She pulled out her camera and took several photos of the area before she gently brushed away loose debris. Two more nubs were exposed further. “Bingo,” the anthropologist said under her breath.
Mercy fought back the urge to start randomly digging. It was best left to the experts and their careful processes. She stood back and watched over Dr. Peres’s shoulder as she carefully moved small tree branches and rocks, photographing every step.
“Aha!”
Mercy’s heart sped up. She’d spotted the smooth section of bone at the same time as Dr. Peres. The anthropologist gently removed the packed soil around the bone. A minute later she had a skull in her hand. No mandible. Its front teeth had been shattered, and Dr. Peres clucked her tongue in sympathy as she brushed mud from the bone.
“Male. Adult,” Dr. Peres stated. “Caucasian.”
“Possibly the Hartlage father or brother-in-law,” said Mercy. “Whichever we don’t already have.”
“Possibly,” the doctor repeated.
“We still need the dental records for the adults.” Frustration filled Mercy. I have to assume one or more of the Hartlage adults could be alive. “DNA testing will take a long time.”
Dr. Peres did some more superficial digging, unwilling to disturb most of the site. No more skulls.
In her gut Mercy believed this was the Hartlage family, but she didn’t have proof outside of the children’s dental records.
How does the Asian skull fit in the picture?
Possibly this was a dumping site for multiple murders. The Hartlage family might be only a few of many deaths.
Mercy had run a search for a missing adult Asian male within the state of Oregon. From the last thirty years, two relevant cases were still unsolved. The men had been in their sixties and seventies when they vanished. Dr. Harper had examined the dental records in the missing men’s files; they didn’t match the Asian skull’s dentition.
“I’ll take this skull with me and clean it up tonight,” said Dr. Peres. She surveyed the ground near the fallen tree. “I wonder if they’ll find more skulls tomorrow?”
That was Mercy’s question too.
Mercy limped up the stairs to her apartment.
Driving home had almost been too much for her leg. Continuously pressing the gas pedal had taken an amazing amount of concentration. Now she just wanted Advil, a hot shower, and her bed.
Thank goodness there is a bench in the shower.
She pushed open the apartment door and was greeted by a screech from Kaylie. “Don’t let her out!”
A low white flash shot from the kitchen and Mercy slammed the door behind her. The cat slid to a halt, meowed, and wound herself between Mercy’s legs, her tail wrapping around Mercy’s calf. The cat didn’t appear to resent that her escape route had been cut off. Mercy bent over to pet her and was rewarded with a throaty purr.
“I swear she’s smiling,” said Kaylie, who had appeared from the kitchen. “I think she likes you more than me.”
“I was the first person she’d seen in a long time.”
“She needs a name.”
“We don’t know that we can keep her.” To Mercy, giving the cat a name would mean her stay was permanent.
“I took her to the vet today,” said Kaylie, scooping up the cat and pressing her cheek against the cat’s fur. “She’s not chipped, but she has been spayed. Her blood work looked good, but she’s underweight.”
“An easy fix.”
“Especially with the way she’s been eating,” agreed Kaylie. “She’s a pig.”
“I can’t blame her.”
“We could call her Piggy.” Her niece blinked innocently.
“Hell no. That’s a horrible name.”
“I was thinking about names that tied to your job. Glock, Beretta, Ruger.”
Mercy patted the cat. Her fur was as soft as a bunny’s. “She’s a girl. Those names aren’t girly at all. Not to mention they sound violent. And more accurate names about my work would be Paperwork, Phone Calls, or Headaches.” She stroked one of the tan patches on the cat’s side. “How about bakery- or coffee-related names? Cupcake, Latte, Mocha, Cookie.”
“Biscotti,” murmured Kaylie. “Or Snickerdoodle, Streusel, Dulce de Leche, Café au Lait.”
“I like Dulce de Leche. It fits with her tan patches, and we could call her Dulce for short, which means ‘sweet.’”
“Perfect.” Kaylie planted a kiss on the cat’s forehead and set her down. “She’s definitely sweet.”
We weren’t supposed to name her yet.
Mercy acknowledged that she’d failed on that objective.
Dulce hopped onto a dining table chair and settled down as if she’d always lived there, her blue gaze locked on Mercy. Dulce had lived through a tough winter on her own, and Mercy suspected she would have gone on to survive another just fine without people. The cat was very self-reliant. Just as Mercy strove to be.
You’re a survivor too, aren’t you?
Will a relative take you home?
They were still trying to contact the Hartlages’ closest relatives. So far Darby had located the father’s uncle in Arizona. He didn’t care about the deaths and only wanted to know if he’d get some money. Darby continued to search.
The suspicion that Dulce had a permanent home with her and Kaylie grew stronger.
“Have you read or heard the news today?” Kaylie asked as she started to wipe down the kitchen counter, not looking at Mercy.
Kaylie’s tone was too casual, and Mercy’s radar went off. “I haven’t. What did you hear?”
Her niece focused on scrubbing at an invisible spot. “You haven’t read anything new about your find up on March Mountain?”
Crap. “What did he write now?”
Kaylie indicated her laptop on the table. The article was still open. Mercy spotted Chuck Winslow’s name and quickly scanned the article, her fury growing as she scrolled.
He didn’t.
He did.
Chuck Winslow had written a recap of the murders two decades earlier and then stated that Britta Verbeek had recently moved back to the area and was currently using the name Britta Vale. He’d listed her work website.
Every nut and reporter in the country is going to hound her.
He went on to quote Grady Baldwin’s declaration that he hadn’t committed the murders and, without stating it outright, implied Baldwin’s belief that Britta was holding back something that would exonerate him.
Baldwin told me he didn’t talk to Winslow.
Rereading the article, she realized that wasn’t true.
“Dammit.” She fumed, wondering if her conversation with Baldwin had encouraged him to reach out to Winslow, seeing a way to get his side of the story out in public again.
The only positive she saw was that Winslow hadn’t mentioned Mercy’s name or the missing Hartlage family. He stated that the bones found on March Mountain had a few similarities to those in the old cases. Shit. The sentence read almost exactly how she’d stated her reason to Grady Baldwin for the interview.
Baldwin must have contacted Winslow after I left.
Winslow didn’t mention the murders that had supposedly followed Britta from city to city. No doubt Baldwin had shared that theory, but Mercy hadn’t found the claim credible after more research, and Winslow must have come to the same conclusion. One family had been killed by a relative, another family had all died in a car wreck, and another had died in a house fire. All of the deaths had been explained. Baldwin was grasping at straws by pushing the theory that mysterious deaths had followed Britta.
Poor Britta. Sympathy for the woman filled her. Britta needed her privacy, and Mercy wondered what this exposure would do to her psyche.
Asshole. Chuck Winslow had no idea of the emotional trauma his article could cause the woman.
Or did he?
“What is it?” Kaylie asked. “You look like you want to strangle someone.”
“I do. Chuck Winslow would do just fine.”
“He doesn’t mention you,” Kaylie said helpfully.
“No, but he’s mentioned a woman who’s been through enough.”
“Britta Vale? It sounds like the police need to investigate her.”
“That’s my point. There’s nothing concrete to back up what he’s implying about Britta. It’s all speculation from a man who desperately wants out of prison. I’ve talked to her twice.”
“Well, that’s horrible. What’s she like?”
Mercy turned to her niece, wondering how to best describe the unusual woman. “She’s different. The trauma from her past has stripped away all the bullshit that people hide behind . . . the fake layers . . . the socially correct facades. Her essence is what’s left, and it’s very strong. She’s scared at times but determined. Blunt. Self-sufficient. I like her,” Mercy admitted with some surprise.
“What are you going to do about her now?” asked Kaylie.
“I’ll check in with her. Wait . . . I don’t even have a cell phone number for her. Both times I’ve talked to her in person. I’ll have to drive out there.” She grimaced, not knowing when she’d find the time.
Kaylie frowned. “Don’t put it off. It sounds like she’s alone and needs people like you who understand her.”
Admiration for her sensitive niece touched Mercy, and she hugged the girl, kissing her on the forehead.
“Damn, you’re a good kid.”
“I know.”