Bones Never Lie (Temperance Brennan, #17)(18)

“Right,” Barrow affirmed. “The media’s starting to turn ugly. Mainly, I wanted to get us all face-to-face—”

“Without that f*ckwad Tinker.”

Barrow slid a look to Slidell before continuing. “I wanted Detective Ryan to meet Detective Rodas.”

The men nodded at each other, acknowledging earlier introductions.

“Dr. Brennan has briefed Detective Ryan on details of the Vermont and Charlotte cases.” Question, not statement.

“Yes.” I’d done it with zero feedback on the drive from the airport to Ryan’s hotel.

“I’m only here as an observer.” Ryan favored me with a sideways glance. “And to appease Dr. Stalker.”

Hurt and anger reared up in equal proportions. I fought both down.

“Two murders,” Barrow said. “And Shelly Leal is missing one week today.”

“Still, the link is weak.” Ryan often played devil’s advocate.

“DNA connects Gower to Nance and both to Pomerleau. The MO for Leal is identical.”

Ryan rubbed a thumbnail along the edge of the table. Thinking about long-ago girls in a cellar? His dead daughter? A bottle of Scotch he’d left in his room?

“Ryan—” I started.

“I’ll be no good to you.”

“You know Pomerleau,” I said.

“I’m a mess.”

Slidell snorted. “Should take the heat off my ass.”

“I’m sorry.” Ryan wagged his head. “I’m done with cracked skulls and slit throats and cigarette burns. No more dead kids.”

“What about live ones?”

Ryan’s thumb continued its slow back-and-forth. I wanted to slap him, to shake him to his senses. Instead I kept my voice even and neutral. “Pomerleau’s thrill didn’t come from killing. You know that. She fed her victims just enough to keep them alive so she could torture and rape them. She and her twisted sidekick.”

“Neal Wesley Catts,” Rodas tossed in. “Aka Stephen Menard.”

“Leal could be alive,” I continued. “But if Nance and Gower are indicative, it’s not like the old days. Pomerleau’s pattern has changed. Leal won’t last long.”

Still Ryan said nothing.

Rodas placed a palm on the cardboard box holding his case notes. “I have to head north in the morning. Would you at least skim the file?”

Ryan closed his eyes.

I looked at Slidell. He shrugged.

A very long moment passed.

Ryan ran a hand over his jaw. Sighed. Then his eyes rose to mine. “One day.”

He looked at his wrist. Which bore no watch.

“Twenty-four hours.”





CHAPTER 8


RYAN AND I got coffee before plunging into the Nance file. We wouldn’t drink it. The stuff tasted like liquefied dung. It was a ritual, like sharpening a pencil or straightening a blotter. Meaningless action as prelude to the real show.

We started with a section titled Summary of the Crime.

On April 17, 2009, at 1620 hours, Elizabeth Ellen “Lizzie” Nance, eleven, left the Isabelle Dumas School of Dance, located in the Park Road Shopping Center, heading for the Charlotte Woods apartment complex on East Woodlawn. A motorist reported seeing a child matching Lizzie’s description at the intersection of Park and Woodlawn roads at approximately 1630 hours.

Lizzie lived with her mother, Cynthia Pridmore, thirty-three, and sister, Rebecca Pridmore, nine. Cynthia Pridmore reported her daughter missing, by phone, at 1930 hours. She reported having contacted the school, several of Lizzie’s classmates, and her former husband, Lionel Nance, thirty-nine. Pridmore said she and Nance repeatedly drove the route between the school and the home. Said her daughter could not be a runaway. An MP file was opened, with Detective Marjorie Washington as lead investigator.

On April 30, 2009, a groundskeeper, Cody Steuben, twenty-four, found a child’s decomposed body at the Latta Plantation nature preserve, northwest of Charlotte. Medical examiner Timothy Larabee identified the remains as those of Lizzie Nance. The case was transferred to the homicide unit, with Detective Erskine Slidell as lead investigator.

Lizzie Nance was a sixth-grade student with no history of drug, alcohol, or mental issues. A low-risk victim. Cynthia Pridmore was a legal secretary, twice divorced. The second former husband, John Pridmore, thirty-nine, sold real estate. Lionel Nance was an electrician, unemployed at the time of his daughter’s disappearance.

Neither of the Pridmores had an arrest record. Lionel Nance had a 2001 arrest for public drunkenness.

Witnesses who knew the victim all stated that the person responsible had to be someone she knew or someone she trusted. Witnesses all doubted Nance or either of the Pridmores was involved.

We skimmed a few newspaper articles. It was the usual bloodlust frenzy. The disappearance. The search. The angelic little face with the long brown hair. The headline screaming that the child was dead.

I was still reading when Ryan leaned back in his chair. I laid down the page. “You okay?”

“Rosy.”

“Move on to crime scene?”

“Sure.”

I exchanged the folder we had for the crime scene search report.

CSS arrived at 0931 hours, 4/30/09. The site was an open field surrounded by woods, an unsecured area, but one not normally visited by the public. The body had been left fifteen feet north of a small access road.