Carbon Dating

by Jerusha Jones

  I waved back, a big swinging arm motion.

  Then my phone rang.

  “Eva,” Denby said. “Thanks for coming.” She sounded tense, on edge. Which was understandable, given the circumstances, but still her voice made my throat constrict a little. The poor thing.

  “I brought breakfast,” I murmured consolingly.

  “Okay,” she whispered. “We’ll come to you. But be prepared…” I could just see the tip of her red bandanna under a wide-brimmed rain hat. She had separated from the group under the makeshift awning of blue tarps and was slogging toward me already, but she kept her voice low as though she didn’t want to be overheard. “Dr. Zales is, um, is—well, a damper on an already sucky day. Fair warning,” she huffed, and hung up.

  As the group straggled toward me, I realized I hadn’t missed out on much by not being adequately attired in rubber boots. Even hip waders might not have been sufficient to deal with the muck they were wading through. Consequently, everyone looked as though they’d just completed one of those Tough Mudder adventure races.

  Including the portly gentleman with spectacles slipping down his long, sweaty nose. He was wearing one of those fishing vests with the myriad pockets, a tapered waterproof hat, and balloonish khaki canvas pants that were duct-taped around the tops of his knee-high boots.

  “Eva, this is Dr. Lincoln Zales,” Vaughn said. He stood close but didn’t accompany his words with his usual touch on my arm or the small of my back, which—for once—I appreciated, because mud transfer was sure to happen. “And his assistants, Chloe Gillespie and Heath Rooney.”

  “Good morning.” I offered my hand to each archaeologist in turn, and they all kindly snapped off their blue latex gloves before returning the greeting by shaking my hand. I was really glad I’d had the foresight to pack a supply of warm, damp dishtowels in an insulated case so everyone could clean up before eating.

  It didn’t seem appropriate to use the word tailgating, even though that was effectively what we were doing, because the atmosphere was most definitely not party-like. Vaughn dropped the tailgate on his pickup, and I spread out the buffet of baked goods of both the sweet and savory persuasions, supplemented by thermoses full of hot drinks.

  Just in time to welcome a rapid increase in the drizzle. The rain was now falling at a rate that could be called soaking. I should’ve thought to bring an awning of my own, except it was one of those items I had yet to add to my arsenal of Pacific Northwest-specific equipment.

  They were a dull, taciturn bunch, and it wasn’t just because their mouths were full. It could’ve been because of the chilly downpour, but I thought it was more than that. Their body language was revealing—excessive slouching and wide gaps between one other when it would’ve been more appropriate to huddle together for warmth. There wasn’t even a flicker of amicable eye contact among them to punctuate the tight-lipped chewing.

  “So?” I ventured into the bristling reticence. “How’s it going?”

  Nash was looking absolutely morose, and he just wagged his head at me. Dr. Zales was busy selecting his third pastry from under the plastic lid of a large Tupperware container. Heath Rooney flashed a sharp glance at the rotund doctor’s back, locked hard gazes with me, then returned his attention to his steaming cup. He’d barely sampled the food.

  Only Chloe Gillespie, the little wisp of a woman swaddled in rain gear, was brave enough to answer. “It’s going to take a while,” she said softly. “Outside guess is we have ten to fifteen separate skeletons. It’s hard to say exactly. We’ve already mapped the gravesite with ground-penetrating radar, and we’ll grid the plot today and do the initial photography.”

  My mouth hung open. My mind had gotten stuck way back on the ten to fifteen skeletons statement. So Hollis, the Navy team leader, hadn’t been joking about the mass grave similarities. Not that mass graves are a subject to joke about, but still—I’d been hoping for some level of exaggeration on his part.

  So had Denby, apparently. She turned and buried her face in Nash’s chest with a whimper, unmindful of the mud smeared on his coat. Obviously, this horrible aberration was not part of the family lore passed down from generation to generation which she seemed to treasure so highly.

  “So this is taking priority?” I asked of no one in particular. From a public relations perspective, the sooner a ghastly mess like this one can be gotten through, the better.

  “Yeah,” Vaughn rumbled. “For now.”

  He didn’t have to continue the explanation. I knew the reason was the possible criminal nature of the grave. Most people, no matter the epoch, don’t tumble the bodies of their friends and relatives together unless there was a plague and deaths were occurring so rapidly that the corpses were creating an additional health hazard for the living.

  So I blurted the word that seemed to offer a perfect explanation. “Epidemic?”

  Once again, it was Chloe who answered by shaking her head. “The remains are all of adults, and they all—so far—appear to be male. An epidemic would most likely result in casualties across the age spectrum, with most victims coming from the youngest and oldest populations, also those who were already frail. Strong, healthy males in the prime of life would normally be the last to succumb.”

  “What are the odds, though,” I whispered. “Whoever did this is probably dead now too.”

  “Confirmation,” Vaughn murmured. “I have to have confirmation. It’s standard procedure to keep evidence on unsolved crimes for ninety-nine years, just in case.”

  The stringencies of the job. I nodded.

  “You can tell they’re male from the skeletons—without, you know…?” I asked, stupidly, waving my hand to indicate, well, fleshy appendages. Water droplets flung off my fingers as I did so.

  I felt as though I was forcing the conversation, but I needed fodder—anything, something—to work with for a press release. Snippets, even, would’ve been fine. I’m not so good with fabricating out of whole cloth.

  “Of course we can,” Dr. Zales snapped, spraying crumbs from the goat cheese and thyme filled croissant that he’d stuffed in his mouth. “We’re not charlatans.” He sniffed. “At least I’m not. If you’d been paying attention in school, you would know that there are distinct differences between the male and the female in the os coxae. This applies across mammalian species.”

  When people are scarfing down my food, I generally expect them to be nice to me, regardless of the weather. So Dr. Zales’ venom came as a bit of a shock in spite of Denby’s warning. Heath, also, snorted at my ignorance while my ears burned. But Chloe made a parallel motion with her hands in front of her hips while she mouthed the word “babies” with an apologetic expression on her face.

  Ahhh. I nodded to her gratefully. Since I owned a pair myself, I knew all about wide hips, and what they were supposedly designed for, besides making jeans shopping an absolute nightmare. They’re why I wear stretchy leggings under skirts so often.

  I also felt sorry for her. She seemed like a reasonable, considerate woman, and here she was stuck on an investigation team in this miserable pseudo-monsoon with two surly, narrow-hipped males. Huh.

  I offered Chloe a refill from the hot cocoa thermos, and she accepted with a slight smile. Here was a brain I could pick—later. My questions clearly weren’t opening up lines of broader communication at the moment, so I settled into speculative silence.

  Dr. Zales had progressed to the container of sweets. In fact, he’d curled his arm protectively around it and tipped the brim of his hat over it while he methodically grazed across the smorgasbord, thus shielding the desserts from a deluge of dampness and effectively warding off any other potential partakers. I consoled myself with hoping that his belligerently excessive consumption of sugar would result in a case of the trots while he was on the far side of the field, knee-deep in sucking mud.

  Because I can be petty that way. Poetic justice executed by distressed gut microbes. It’s been known to happen.

  CHAPTER 7

  C
hloe was the first to break camp. She quietly thanked me for the food, then began her solo trudge back to the gravesite. Heath drained his cup, tossed it into Vaughn’s pickup bed, and followed her without a word. Learning from his distasteful mentor, that one.

  Dr. Zales, on the other hand, wrapped handfuls of the less-sticky leftover desserts in napkins and stuffed them into several of the pockets of his vest. Then he unlatched the rear passenger door of a maroon Chevy Suburban and bent to rummage in a cooler on the floorboard.

  My blood pressure jumped another notch. Had the man brought his own snacks, and he was hoarding mine? I like leftovers as well as the next person, and had just been thinking that I might not have to spend time preparing lunch or supper given what remained in the containers. Which would have been a benefit considering the scant resources I had to work with for a press release. I was anticipating a lot of mental exertion in the next few hours.

  But Vaughn stepped in front of me, blocking my disturbing view of the good doctor’s ample derrière. “Heading back?”

  I nodded. “Just to the farmhouse. Denby said I could work there. That way I’ll be on hand for when you’re ready to make the announcement.” I blinked drops off my eyelashes and tipped my head in the direction of the county road. “But the press isn’t here, so I could just email it to the television stations, save us some hassle.”

  “They’ll show up. You can count on it. I’ve already received several texts from KPTV’s investigative reporter.”

  “You didn’t answer them?” I sputtered quickly.

  “Nope. Waiting for you, babe.” Vaughn’s lips turned up at the corners in that lilting smile that makes my stomach do flippy somersaults. “But I think he got a few details from a JPAC crew member that I would’ve preferred to have been kept under wraps.”

  I frowned. “Speaking of JPAC, where are they?” It’s hard to control what comes out of people’s mouths when you can’t even see them.

  “Over there.” Vaughn placed warm hands on my shoulders and turned me toward the hillside rising beyond the Frasers’ field of horrors. “They found a closer access road from the other side and got permission from the landowner up there to set up a base camp. They’re much more interested in the plane wreck than in the bomb now that it’s been rendered harmless.”

  With his forefinger pointing them out, I finally spotted half a dozen navy-jacketed people among the tree trunks on the hillside.

  The Suburban’s door slammed, and Zales slogged off into the field, stuffing even more things into his pockets as he went.

  “They have their work cut out for them,” Vaughn added. “From what I’ve heard, the debris field is a couple hundred yards in radius, and so much vegetation has grown up in the meantime that they’ll be doing most of their searching with handheld metal detectors.”

  Not to mention the blackberry brambles and poison oak. I was suddenly highly sympathetic to their plight. “Do cadaver dogs work after seventy years? How will they find the pilot and gunner?”

  Vaughn shook his head and leaned in close to murmur, “That’s more Zales’ territory than mine, but let’s leave the boor alone. I don’t think you’re going to find it necessary to quote him in the press release.” His voice was a sexy rumble, but I could hear the barely contained chuckle in it.

  “He is awful, isn’t he?” I asked, relieved that I hadn’t been terribly overreacting to the archaeologist’s display of offensive manners.

  “Too bad he’s the best.” Vaughn nuzzled even closer to my neck and gently slid an arm around my waist.

  I grinned. I could become accustomed to this, and had lost all concern for mud. Vaughn wears an aftershave that is deliciously spicy. Or maybe it was his native scent. I hadn’t dared asked him for the particulars.

  “But he’s a pain in the ass to work with,” Vaughn continued, his breath tickling my cheek, “which is why I authorized using a supplemental team of trained volunteers as diggers for this project. We’re beyond worrying about DNA contamination given the age of the site and the lack of remaining soft tissue, and they’ll expedite the grunt work portion of the investigation.”

  A huge rivulet of water ran off the side of my scalp and into my ear, ruining whatever kind of bonding moment we were having slanted together in the downpour talking about dead bodies.

  Vaughn laughed and dabbed at the trail with his fingertips. “Let’s get you to shelter. The volunteers are due to arrive in about twenty minutes anyway. I’ll ride up to the house with you and give them their operating guidelines before I turn them loose. Zales already pitched a fit, but I expect there’ll be an encore when I escort them out to the site.” His expression turned grim.

  oOo

  Vaughn had been right. I definitely did not want to endure the humiliation of traipsing around behind Dr. Zales collecting whatever tidbits of helpful information that might fall from his lips. But my press release would have a lot more meat in it if I could invoke his professional reputation. Because if Zales declared the site free of criminal intent—as I was hoping he would—then his findings wouldn’t be contested. He was that good.

  Technically good, anyway, according to Google. Search engines are the publicist’s best friend—or worst nightmare, depending on the situation. But I found plenty of background information about Dr. Lincoln Zales’ academic and professional pursuits in the public domain. He was a legend—already, while he was still very much alive—for excavating, examining, and sleuthing out the truth regarding sites that had stumped others, even other experts with as many or more university degrees and letters after their names.

  The problem was, he apparently also enjoyed the limelight, frequently presenting his findings in lecture format at conferences around the world. And had difficulty attracting the audiences he seemed to expect he deserved. Not because the subject matter and his conclusions weren’t fascinating, but because the man had the personality of a rotten egg. Which meant I found plenty of transcripts of his work online, but only a few video or audio snippets of the learned doctor expounding in his characteristically snide style. The cameras—and the people behind the cameras—didn’t seem to want to be in the same room with him.

  So Vaughn had been right on yet another front. It would be more pleasant for all parties—the Fidelity Police Department; the Frasers, as the owners of Heritage Farms; and the Portland-metro area at large; anyone within reach of the local television broadcasts, really—if I was the one managing the information flow. Not because I’m prettier or smarter—far from it—but because Dr. Zales was so putridly acerbic as to be poisonous to viewership ratings, even in small doses.

  While everyone wanted Dr. Zales’ brain on the job, nobody wanted him to get within shouting distance of a bank of microphones while the investigation was underway. He was the type of man who was offended that the television talk show recruiters hadn’t come calling, and blithely ignorant as to the rationale that had successfully kept him off the broadcast airwaves so far.

  I was finally grateful for the weather. Perhaps the mucky distance between the gravesite and the county road would serve as an effective barrier to Dr. Zales’ punditry ambitions. Far better to keep him occupied under the close confines of his blue-tarp awning, cataloging bones and haranguing his staff. But as his surrogate, I had my work cut out for me.

  I started drafts for three different press releases, which is my standard procedure in cases like these: one for if the news is good, one for if the news is bad, and one for if I’m required to give the media something to tide them over before we know the results—a sort of interim press release. Depending on how long the investigation took, I might have to develop several iterations of the interim release, so it’s always prudent to have a template ready to go.

  I glanced at the clock over the kitchen sink and rose from the chair to stretch out the kinks in my back. I’d availed myself of the Frasers’ hospitality to brew a mug of strong black tea a couple hours ago, and I’d snacked on the crumbled remains from breakfast. But the time ha
d dragged slowly with no report from the back forty. I supposed it was too much to hope that the case would be solved within twenty-four hours.

  Cricket, Denby’s sweet and fluffy seal-point Himalayan cat, descended from her perch in the living room’s picture window and delicately inspected my morning’s handiwork on the kitchen table by walking all over the spread-out papers with her tail curled in the shape of an airborne question mark. She performed this remarkable feat without shuffling anything out of place.

  Then she hopped down to drape herself around my ankles. “Mmmroww?”

  I dabbed up the bits of smoked salmon pâté that dotted the bottom of the savory pastry container and let her lick them off my fingertip. “I’m not much company, huh, sweetie?” I crooned. She rolled over onto her back and presented her belly as an effective suggestion for what else I could do with my fingertips.

  Well, maybe I was making at least one creature happy. But there was still a dull ineffectualness weighing my limbs, and my spirit.

  I picked up my notes for interim release 2f (I label all releases in the order in which I expect to issue them, with letters indicating variations on a theme). Perhaps I’d gotten a little carried away, but I’d planned for several contingencies in the archaeological results. Unexpected historical phenomena, such as unusual burial practices, a particularly tragic farming accident, a mass cult suicide, or—and this was the one I was still holding out for—a sudden attack of acute dysentery in a lumber camp comprised of only men, would all be welcome explanations compared to murder. I’d elaborated rather pitifully in my hopeful anticipation. It was about as close to writing fiction as I ever got.

  But the longer I waited for a phone call, the more I worried. So I decided to nip that useless waste of brainpower in the bud and dialed Vaughn’s number.

  He answered on the fourth ring. I pictured him having to strip off mud-caked gloves in order to dig into his pocket for the phone. “How’s it going?”