Field of Graves(75)

The body was housed in the small refrigerator unit in the room. They brought her out and set her on the aluminum table. Sam turned on the large overhead spotlight, and Peterson settled in to work, pausing briefly to pull a clipboard with the National Crime Information Center dental form from his briefcase.

Sam sat back and let him work, helping as needed.

The female they were trying to identify was most likely on a missing persons list. She’d had at least ten thousand dollars of cosmetic work done on her teeth. Veneers, bonding, a well-done root canal, wisdom teeth extractions. Taylor had set Lincoln to work looking for a young female who would have gone missing within the past two months, just to cover all the bases. If there was any chance of finding the identity of this girl, it would be through her dental records.

Dr. Peterson was humming, marking his coded chart, and clucking to himself occasionally. He finally looked up.

“Someone is missing this girl. She’s had a lot of work done, and someone had to pay for it. As young as she is, I’d bet anything on parents.”

“Care to hazard a guess at her age?”

“You really should talk to your anthropologist to be completely accurate, but the lack of wear, the condition of her bone, I’d give it a guess at twenty to twenty-five years old.”

“Yeah, she put it there, too.”

He handed her the dental chart he had completed. “I know it’s a long shot, but eventually that damn NCIC database is gonna make a match. Give this to Taylor, and let’s see how lucky we are.”

“I’ll fax it up there right now. Are you going to be available if I need to get in touch?”

“Of course. I’m always available for your calls.” He gave her a winsome smile, nose twitching, and they walked back to the lobby together.

“Thanks so much for your help, Gerald. I really hope we can find out who this girl is.”

Sam walked him out, then swiped her card and went back inside, stopping in the reception area.

“Kris, could you fax this over to Lincoln Ross in Homicide? Tell him it needs to go in the dental database right away. If by the grace of God something matches, tell him to call me on my cell.”

“Certainly, Dr. Owens. I’ll do it right now.” As she spoke, she was already out of her chair.

“Thank you,” Sam said then headed to her office, saying a prayer as she went.





62



“Forensic Medical, can I help you?”

“Can I speak to Dr. Owens, please? This is Lincoln Ross with Homicide.”

“I’m not sure exactly where she is, but if you would hold on, I’ll forward you to her cell.” There was a brief moment of silence, then a click as the phone was transferred.

“Yes?”

“Sam? It’s Lincoln. I just finished talking to Taylor. She asked me to give you a call. You are never in a million years going to guess what happened when I ran the dental records.”

“Yeah, sure, Lincoln. You got a match. Now tell me what’s really going on.”

“No, Sam, seriously, we got a match.”

“You’re full of crap.” Sam spun in her chair, watching her office walls fly by.

“I swear by all that’s holy that I have your girl. Her name is Mary Margaret de Rossi.”

“Are you sure it’s her? I mean really, that frickin’ database hasn’t ever made a match. How can we be sure it’s correct?”

“I’m sure. Can you come on over here? Taylor wants to call her parents, but she needs you to make a positive on the records.”

“Hell yeah, I’m on my way.”





63



An hour later, Sam was staring at Mary Margaret de Rossi’s antemortem radiographs on the computer screen. Her mind was crowded with a future image of the poor girl’s parents, bravely sitting in the family waiting room at her office, waiting to fill out the paperwork. There was no reason to show them the body; it was burned beyond recognition, and Sam didn’t want them to have that image of their daughter.

Mary Margaret’s parents had told Taylor the sad story of their runaway daughter. They had only recently found out that she was alive and living in Nashville. They were so proud she’d gotten her life together, kicked her demons, was in college, and had found her own way back to the real world. They’d forgiven her, and she’d forgiven them.

When she first went missing, several years earlier, they didn’t know she had simply run away from home. They had filed a missing person report with the Atlanta police. The police investigation turned up nothing. Because of her age and background, they chalked it up to a runaway situation and dropped the case. But a year or so ago, a young detective had contacted them. He was looking at all the missing person cases for the past ten years, and asked if they were still looking for their daughter. When they admitted they still didn’t know where she was or if she were alive or dead, the young cop suggested they provide her dental records for him to put in his new database. He had warned them that finding a match was unlikely, but wanted to give it a shot.

He was excited to learn about all the work that had been done on her teeth. Braces in her youth hadn’t fully corrected a large frontal gap, so her parents had spent even more money, ten thousand dollars, to have veneers put on, which even they agreed took their daughter from ugly duckling status to elegant swan. The detective was certain the work done on her teeth would differentiate her radiographs, and give them a better shot at finding a match should her body ever be found.