Not One of Us(42)

“I’ll be damned,” he muttered. “Makes me wonder about the rumors you told me about, that Louis Cormier trafficked in drugs, same as Strickland.”

“Could be he wanted Cormier to represent him in a new trial. There’s no telling. But I thought it interesting that the two had a scheduled meeting.”

Oliver scratched his head. “Definitely. It was such a long time ago, but I’ll call George Blankenship. He was the warden at Fountain for decades and a friend of my father’s. I’ll ask if he remembers Strickland and any of his known associates in prison. If we’re lucky—extremely lucky—someone will remember why Strickland contacted Cormier.”

Thank goodness for the good ole boys’ network. “Perfect. I’ll get back to work on my reports.”

He waved me off, already punching out numbers on his cell phone. When I returned to the office, Sinclair grinned when I walked by.

“Looking kinda puny today, Blackwell. Case getting to you?”

“Shut up, jerk wad,” I replied good-naturedly, walking to my desk.

Haywood felt the need to chime in. “Need any help yet, rookie?”

I ignored him and raised a brow at Mullins. “You ready to pile on, too, big guy?”

“Nah.” He laughed. “When you’re ready for my superior expertise, which should be soon, I’ll be right here. Waiting.”

I snorted, pulling up a screen on my computer. “The day I—”

Oliver rushed into the office, as fast as I’d ever seen him move. His features were lit with excitement.

“Just got a call from Dempsey. A fisherman called the station, reporting a human skull found in Black Bottom Creek. Let’s go.”

I grabbed my sunglasses and raced to the door.

“Some people get all the luck,” Mullins complained under his breath as I went by, clearly disappointed not to be part of the breaking action. I rolled my eyes at him.

Oliver was already starting down the stairs at the end of the hall, and I hurried to catch up. “Is the skull a child or adult?” I asked, flying down the stairs.

“Don’t know yet. Forensics has been called. They might be there already.”

By the time we got to the cruiser, Oliver was sweating and huffing. “Getting old and out of shape,” he complained as he backed out of the parking lot.

As we motored through town and then headed south on a county road, I wondered if the skull belonged to one of the Cormiers.

“By the way, I spoke to the former warden at Fountain before I got the news,” Oliver said. “No dice on finding any records that old. He told me that visitor logs weren’t kept over a year.”

“Bummer.” I’d been expecting that news but was still disappointed.

“Still an interesting find,” Oliver noted as we rounded a bend.

“You’ll have to tell me exactly where this place is,” he warned. “Been a long time since I’ve been fishing this way.”

“Another mile and a half, you’ll turn right on Turnipseed Road.”

We soon came up on it, and Oliver turned onto the dirt road, stirring up dry red dirt that swirled around us.

“Another fifty yards and—”

“I see the cop cars up ahead. County coroner and forensics people already here too.”

We pulled up next to a car and scrambled out of our vehicle. I had to fight my way through a ring of several people before I saw it.

A human skull with empty eye socket cavities and a mouthful of teeth.

A stark, ominous artifact dredged from the stygian waters. An older man dressed in camo and khaki stood off to the side with his fishing pole still in hand, looking unsettled. I could imagine his horror as he thought he had a bite, only to pull up his line and discover grisly human remains. Dempsey and another cop were still questioning him, writing notes in their cell phones.

Cameras flashed as everyone stared at the ground. One of the forensics team members knelt on one knee and closely examined the skull. I recognized many of the same faces I’d seen last week at the Strickland home.

The sight of the skull disconcerted me more than the fresh corpse of Raymond Strickland. It was so . . . final. A total absence of tissue and flesh. The home of our brain, the part of us we used to think and feel and act. That defined our very being. The bony cavity was empty now, with hollow eye sockets, no nose, and protruding teeth from a squared jawbone. A flash of something glimmered on the ground.

“Gold cap on the left molar tooth,” one of the techs murmured. “Pronounced jawbone,” another said. “Most likely male.”

More cars arrived at the scene. Four men emerged from a van and began donning black wet suits. Where there was one bone, more might follow.

How many bones? How many people? Had they finally found the remains of the Cormier family?

I glanced at Oliver. “The Cormiers?” I whispered.

“Maybe. If not, we might have a whole new mystery to solve on top of everything else.”

“Who has the quickest access to the dental records?”

“Checking it out now,” he assured me. “Already sent a text.”

The divers entered the shallow water, a small creek banked by reeds on either side. If one had to dive in the swamp, spring would be your best choice. The mosquitoes and other insects were horrid in the summer, and in the winter, though not frozen, the water would be chilly.