by Ellen Crosby
I shuddered.
“I know,” she said with a kind smile. “I spent some time working for the International Commission on Missing Persons in Sarajevo after I got my doctoral degree. Their mandate is to search for individuals who have been the victims of armed conflict, human rights violations, or natural disasters. The things I saw in Bosnia were just … brutal. Horrific. The commission’s headquarters is in The Hague, but the best forensic lab in the world is in Sarajevo.”
I thought of Win Turnbull and his work in Iraq. Both he and Yasmin had witnessed unspeakable horrors in war zones. Yet they seemed so centered and confident. I wondered how they coped, how they managed to remain so normal.
“I didn’t know that about the lab in Sarajevo.”
She nodded. “Someone has to do this work, as distressing and difficult as it is. I’m good at it. I’m not going to be able to wave a magic wand and bring that person back to life. But at least I can help find closure for the family. That’s important. It’s worth doing.”
“So what will you do now? Start digging?”
She set her camera on top of the backpack. “Not right away, but yes, eventually. First I need to take measurements, photographs, make sketches and notes so everything is documented before I do any digging. Then I’ll probably do what’s called shovel skimming with that flat shovel you see over there.”
“You take off the top layer of dirt?”
“That’s right. I’ll be looking for what’s called the grave cut. No matter how old a grave is, the soil is always different there from what surrounds it.” She ticked items off on her fingers. “It’s less compacted, it’s a different color since topsoil was mixed in with deeper soil as the grave was filled in, and either it’s still mounded from adding all that earth back on top of a body or, if there has been significant decomposition, there will be an indentation where the remains are.”
“You can really find the actual grave, even without a coffin?”
She nodded. “The odds are good that it won’t be that deep, either, because there isn’t a coffin. People always dig graves that are way too shallow—usually no farther down than two meters, or about six feet—and they make them too short. So you often find the pointed bones sticking up out of the earth. Specifically the knees and the feet.”
In spite of the subject matter, I found what she was saying mesmerizing. “I didn’t know any of that.”
Yasmin pulled out her phone. “I probably ought to get started. Let’s swap contact information, so I can let you know if I find anything,” she said. “Then I’d better get to work.”
“Of course,” I said, and reached for my own phone.
After we exchanged cell phone numbers and email addresses, I said, one more time, “I really want to know who she is.”
“The lab will be able to tell a lot from the DNA in her teeth,” she said. “I ought to swab you, too, and get a sample of your DNA to send along to the lab. If there’s enough of a match, you’re related.”
“Win said something about a database that you can check.”
She smiled. “At that point I suspect Win thought this might possibly be a criminal investigation. If that were true, then yes, I’d have access to the law enforcement database. But since it’s not, I can’t use any of the DFS labs in Virginia. I’ve got to send your samples to a private lab. The one I like to use specializes in working with bones and teeth, and they’re the best.”
“What’s DFS?”
“Sorry. Department of Forensic Science. And, just so you know, it’s going to take the lab some time to process everything. It will be weeks, more likely a couple of months.”
I should have expected that, but I was still disappointed. “So definitely not like on television.”
She grinned. “’Fraid not.”
“I’m already in the DNA database,” I said. “I did one of those ancestry tests.”
She gave me a tolerant smile. “Actually this lab works with its own database,” she said. “There’s more than one, unfortunately. As for those discover-your-ancestry tests, they’re all well and good for what they tell you—which is mostly anthropological information—but in the profession we call that ‘recreational genomics.’ At the other end of the spectrum is CODIS, the law enforcement database.”
“What does CODIS stand for?”
“It’s short for Combined DNA Index System. It’s a software program run by the FBI,” she said. “It uses a combination of forensic science and computer technology to link violent crimes to each other and connect to known offenders. When I help out with criminal cases, those DNA samples go through CODIS to assist the National Missing Persons DNA Database in identifying missing and unidentified individuals.”
“Does that mean that what I found out through the tests the Genome Project ran on my vial of spit could be wrong?” I asked. That David Phelps might not really be my half brother?
Yasmin laughed. “Not at all,” she said. “But it’s a completely different system, for a completely different purpose. The companies that sell those test kits use an algorithm to determine someone’s ancestry composition by comparing their DNA to public and private reference data. People ‘find’ relatives by connecting with someone who is also in that specific database and who has shared DNA segments. The more segments you share with someone else, the closer the familial relationship.”
“I see.”
She gave me a curious look. “You seem to have a lot of fairly specific questions about this. I don’t want to pry but sometimes these companies, as well-intentioned as they are, don’t do enough to prepare people for the reality that they might discover information that could be life changing. It happens often enough in cases of adoption. An adult child wants to find their birth parents and then they’re devastated once they discover that a birth mother or father doesn’t want to have anything to do with them. Especially if it’s someone who had every expectation that their identity would always and forever be protected by privacy laws and a contract they signed with the adoption agency. They’ve moved on, they have a new life and a family that knows nothing about this child. It can leave some terrible emotional scars. On everyone involved.”
“Oh, no, it’s nothing like that.” I waved my hand like I was banishing a pesky fly. “I just thought everyone used the same database so you could already access my DNA.”
“’Fraid not,” she said again, and I wondered if she believed me or was just pretending she did. “Don’t worry, Lucie. Like I said, once I get a little further along in this excavation, I’ll do a buccal swab on you … swab your cheek, that is. I won’t be telling you the likelihood of whether you and your DNA relatives are more or less likely to have sweaty feet or drink green tea compared to the rest of the population like those ancestry tests do.” She flashed that smile again. “But I will let you know if you and this woman share DNA.”
“Thank you,” I said. “Now I’d better get back to work and leave you to get started. Call me or text me if you need anything.”
“I will. With that hurricane coming, I’d like to be finished as quickly as possible now that the structure that protected the skull all these years is gone.” She smiled again and turned back toward the grave site.
I walked down the hill to my car and wondered if the skull in the old storage shed would reveal yet another secret that would catch me as off-guard as the one I learned last night.
I really hoped not. But the way things were going, I wouldn’t bet my life on it.
Ten
I climbed into the Jeep after I left Yasmin Imrie and phoned Quinn. “I’m finished at the grave site,” I said. “I’ll see you in a few minutes.”
“I’m checking Brix in the Cab Franc block again. The grapes won’t be ready by Saturday, but we don’t have a choice about when to pick,” he said. “The latest weather report I heard says Lolita will be here Sunday morning. We’ve got to get everything done Saturday.” He paused. “Or else.”
He didn’t have to say or else what.
Hurricane Lolita. My thoughts shifted from the unknown past outside my family’s cemetery to the nerve-wracking present and the looming, ominous threat of things we couldn’t control. The wind. The rain. The damage Lolita could inflict.
No power. No water. No lights. No phones. Goose Creek overflowing and flooding Sycamore Lane. We couldn’t afford the expense of a generator big enough to keep the equipment running in the winery. We could survive a couple of days, but after that things would start going downhill.
A knot formed in my stomach. “We’ll just get it done then.”
“Yup. Hey, did Miguel ever tell you that he would work for us on Saturday?”
Miguel. My mind went blank for a moment. “Damn. No, he didn’t. I texted Antonio yesterday and asked him to speak to Miguel, but neither of them got back to me. After what happened last night, Miguel might have forgotten all about it.”
“We’d better get an extra person to help in the field. You were right about that.” I didn’t like the sense of urgency in his voice.
“Why don’t I just drive over to La Vigne and talk to Miguel myself?” I said. “If he can’t do it because he’s tied up sorting out his legal problems, I’ll ask someone else.”
“Let me know how it goes.”
I disconnected, opened my text messages, and groaned. The text I thought I’d sent to Antonio was still on my display from yesterday. I’d never sent it. No wonder neither of them had replied.
I backed the Jeep onto Sycamore Lane and drove to La Vigne Cellars. It seemed impossible to imagine that by the end of the week, the sky would be black and menacing and it would be raining as if it were time to build an ark. Today was gorgeous; a perfect mid-September morning of sparkling sunshine, clouds as white and fluffy as sheep, and a cerulean sky. It wouldn’t be long before the first hard overnight freeze when the trees would turn the vivid colors of autumn, the summer sound of the cicadas would go silent, and the sunlight would slant cooler and lower, lengthening the shadows. Our work, after the frenzy of harvest, would slow down as the vineyard went dormant for winter.
After everything that had happened in the last few days, this year I would be glad when those quieter months finally arrived. Right now it felt as if my life was moving so fast I had to run just to keep up.
I put on my signal and turned left onto the private road that led to Wicklow. At the top of the hill I took the fork leading away from the house, and drove toward the stables and the vineyard. Showing up unannounced like this meant there was a good chance I’d bump into Jean-Claude. But it was better to get that meeting over with sooner rather than later and let him know he hadn’t intimidated me. That I didn’t give a damn about his threats. Especially now, after the story in today’s Trib with him trashing the Goose Creek Inn and our wine. Gloves off. I didn’t plan to pick a fight with him, but I did mean to let him know I was angry.
I stopped in front of the entrance to the tasting room. Unlike us, La Vigne Cellars didn’t open their winery every day. There was a CLOSED sign on the front door so I drove around to the back of the building where the winery was located.
The place was Sunday quiet—almost eerily so—as if no one was around. I parked next to Miguel’s Honda Civic, reached for my cane, and climbed out of the Jeep. The crush pad door leading to the barrel room was open, which was odd. At this time of year, you only raised that roll-up hangar door when you needed to move grapes into the cellar. Jean-Claude still had some reds on the skins in fermenting bins in the barrel room. The sweetness of the juice-changing-into-wine would attract bugs like a magnet. One of our dirty little secrets was that no winemaker could avoid having dead bugs floating in those thousand-gallon bins however hard we tried, but the last thing anyone wanted to do was put up a neon sign with an arrow that said, THIS WAY TO FOOD: DIVE RIGHT IN. So much of our job revolved around cleanliness and sterilization, eliminating anything that could contaminate the wine. That included bugs. Especially bugs.
I walked inside the barrel room and yelled, “Hello?” No one answered above the whirring noise of the fans that were running full blast to disperse the potentially fatal buildup of carbon dioxide released by the fermenting grapes. Why would Jean-Claude—or anyone else—leave the crush pad door open and walk away? You were just asking for trouble.
It was a good thing La Vigne Cellars was closed to the public today. Otherwise there was always a chance some visitor might wander in and decide to explore the place, like a kid let loose in a candy store. Every vineyard owner had stories of the curious guest who removed the bung—the stopper—from a wine barrel when no one was looking, “just to see” what was inside and then didn’t replace it. By the time someone discovered the open barrel, the entire contents—say, anywhere from six to ten thousand dollars’ worth of wine—had been ruined. And occasionally there was the bright light that thought it would be fun to drink directly from the spigot of a stainless steel tank like it was a public water fountain.
La Vigne’s barrel room was L-shaped, with a closed-off room at the long end of the L: a narrow dark cave extending underneath the tasting room where most of their red wine fermented in cool darkness in row upon row of barrels stacked on racks from floor to ceiling. I turned the corner. In the dim light of a single exposed lightbulb at the far end of the room, there was a sliver of darkness as if the door to the wine cellar was ajar.
I continued calling “Is anybody here?” and “Hello?” and hearing my voice echo in the silent, deserted room. Even before I got to the cellar I knew for sure the door was open. There would be hell to pay when Jean-Claude found out.
I reached for the handle, unsure whether to close it or pull it open and see if anyone was inside. Except no one had answered my calls. So who did I think would be there, someone who would jump out from behind a wine barrel, scare the hell out of me, and yell “Boo”?
I opened the door and gripped my cane tighter, raising it in the air like a club. I’d only taken a couple of steps into the room when the odor hit me. Mingled with the overpowering tangy scent of fermenting wine was an unpleasant metallic smell that made me think of iron or copper.
Or blood.
I pulled my phone out of my pocket, turned on the flashlight, and bit back a scream. Lying on his back, arms outstretched, a dark red-black pool of blood seeping from underneath him, was Jean-Claude de Merignac.
The day before yesterday Antonio and Jesús warned me that unearthing that skull by the cemetery meant someone would die soon. I’d dismissed their fears as an old wives’ tale, a baseless superstition. Then yesterday Jean-Claude swore he was sure someone was trying to kill him here at La Vigne and make it look like an accident.
The three of them had been right—almost. Jean-Claude’s eyes were partially open as if he were staring at something. But he was most definitely dead. The only premonition that hadn’t come to pass was that no one would ever consider his death to be an accident.
He’d been murdered.
I backed out of the room, hoping I wouldn’t be sick. My phone showed no bars so I had to get out of here before I could call 911. Something felt sticky under my work boots, which made a squishing sound on the concrete floor as I walked. I stopped and turned around. A trail of bloody footprints led from the wine cellar.
Mine. I must have stepped in Jean-Claude’s blood before I turned on the flashlight. Now I really wanted to throw up.
I tried to run, but ever since my accident the best I can manage is to walk faster. At times—like right now—it terrifies me because I am vulnerable and powerless. If I am being pursued, I’m at someone’s mercy. What if Jean-Claude’s killer was still here, watching me from some hidden place? No one knew where I was except Quinn. How long would it take him to realize something must have happened to me if I didn’t show up for a while?
Probably a long damn time.
Wait. Just calm down.
With the hangar door wide open the temperature in the barrel room had warmed up to the ambient temperature outside. But in the cave where
I’d discovered Jean-Claude it had been sharply cooler, probably between forty-five and fifty degrees Fahrenheit. Chilly enough to slow the decomposition of a body. Maybe Jean-Claude had been dead longer than I thought. And if I were the killer, I wouldn’t hang around after I finished what I came to do. I’d take off. My heart, which had been rabbiting against my rib cage, slowed to a more normal rate.
As soon as enough bars showed up on my phone I called 911. For the second time in three days I told the dispatcher what she needed to know and said I’d stick around until someone got here. Then I called Toby’s mobile and got his voice mail. I left a message and tried Robyn. Same thing.
It was just going on ten-thirty. Last night Robyn said she planned to talk to Jean-Claude first thing this morning about Miguel’s papers being stolen. If she had been here, she might have been the last person to see Jean-Claude before the killer showed up.
Maybe if I called Wicklow, Colette Barnes or the maid would know how to reach Toby or Robyn. The maid answered on the fifth ring and I told her Jean-Claude was badly injured. Did she know where anyone was? In heavily accented Spanish she asked me to hold while she found Colette.
I heard Colette’s voice before she came on the line. “No, Marta, I’ll handle this. I’ll tell Secretary Levine and Ms. Callahan myself.”
Marta murmured something that sounded like disagreement and Colette snapped back at her. “I said, I’ll take care of it.”
A moment later, she was on the phone with me. Her voice was still sharp. “Lucie? What’s wrong? Marta said something about an emergency, that Jean-Claude was injured. Are you sure?”