She nodded and produced a tiny object.
He realized it was a bone. “It’s amazing we found this! Oh, we have a femur, too, and a few more ribs, and Katie and Jorge over there have just discovered a partial on the pelvis. But this! This is amazing. Maria from the forensics lab discovered it.”
Raina had dismounted, as well. They both looked at the tiny object in Dr. Carlysle’s hand.
“A hyoid!” Dr. Carlysle said.
The bone at the back of the throat.
“And can you tell anything...?” Axel began.
“Oh, yes! Definitely and unbelievably with the size of the bone and the amount of time it’s been in the elements. But see this, right here? Thank goodness the sun is bright and your eyes are good, right? You can see this tiny scratch here, but it’s deep, really, not just from a brush with a rock or something like that. No, sir, I believe this proves these bones belong to someone who was murdered. Murdered by having her throat slit. Most likely, from ear to ear.” She wasn’t being dramatic. The look in her eyes was one of horror. “Didn’t that happen recently?” she asked. “Just days ago. That poor girl they found...”
“Thank you,” Axel told her. “Did you share your findings with Detective Ferrer yet?” he asked.
“I called him just moments ago,” she said.
“Good,” Axel said. He looked over to Raina, his eyes signaling to mount up. She wasn’t surprised and neither was he. It was as he had expected.
“Thank you. This is important to know,” he said, as he looked down at Dr. Carlysle from the saddle. He glanced at Raina. She was stoic, looking back at him.
He lifted a hand to Dr. Carlysle and they started off again.
“You already knew,” she reminded him.
“I did. And if you don’t mind, it’s given me an idea.” He hesitated. “To use you.”
She arched a brow his way. She didn’t appear to be upset or afraid.
“How?”
“I need to call a friend. A coworker. And his girlfriend.”
“And?”
“She has some unusual talents, too.”
“She tried on a dress and saw a body?”
“No. I’ve mentioned them to you before. Past life regression—that brought her to the moment of what was happening.”
“We need to see Jordan.”
“I know. And to the best of my knowledge, my friends are in Virginia. Even if the jet is available, it will take them time to get here.”
She looked at him steadily. “I’m willing to try anything you think might help.”
“Thank you.”
He looked back. Beneath the flickering afternoon sunlight, he saw someone else among the workers. Peg-legged Pete, and there, behind one of the big old cypress trees, another of his ragtag crew. Pete was trying to point something out to one of the workers. She didn’t see him, but she must have sensed him.
She was looking where Pete was directing her attention.
Pete looked up and saw Axel. Grimly, he lifted a hand in acknowledgment.
Axel lowered his head, indicating his thanks.
Thirteen
Titan was apparently happy enough chewing on his bone at Andrew’s house. He was equally happy they returned, greeting Raina with an affection that almost knocked her over.
She was glad to see Titan appeared almost as happy to see Axel, especially since Titan was a good judge of people.
“So now what?” she asked Axel.
“We’ll get back to your place and get ahold of Jordan.”
“What he wants to say—it may not have anything to do with any of this.”
“But it does.”
Raina was thoughtful. “It wasn’t Jordan. You saw him. He was bereft. I don’t remember his exact words, but he insisted Jennifer Lowry hadn’t deserved it. He cared for her, and he was stunned and angry. Besides, Titan wouldn’t like him if he was a murderer.”
“I have a lot of faith in the dog, Raina, but even you said there was something off with Jordan. You knew it from when he was at your house, and you knew it after we saw him.”
“I can’t believe he’d be a party to this.”
“Maybe he’s not. Maybe he’s seen or heard something that can help.”
“That has to be it,” Raina said. “I’ll call him while we’re on the way back to my place.”
As they tended to the horses, Andrew returned. He found them in the stables.
“Well, this could be a total waste of time,” Andrew said, “but I suggest we hang out at that camping trip coming up. Your couple-not-official-couple, Loretta Oster and Frank Peters, will definitely be there. They bring the kids in Wednesday night and the bus picks them all back up on Sunday around noon. Campfire tales Wednesday night—you do the pirate ship story best, Axel, as I recall—and then on Thursday they’re doing Shark Valley and the Miccosukee restaurant. On Friday it’s airboat tours, and Saturday the village and their final campfire. Now, here’s the thing. The groups are a bit larger these days, so there are two additional chaperones. But all four of them are supposed to be with the kids from start to finish. I’m not sure what we can get.” He hesitated. “If those two have somehow figured out how to murder people, I don’t know how they can get away with it with sixty pre–high school kids in their care.”
“And,” Axel said, “if this is something organized or for some bizarre special purpose, there’s no reason they’d be at it again so quickly. Still, I do think we should be there. I’ll talk to Nigel and make sure he’s in accord with us. And find out if he has gotten anything else.”
Andrew nodded gravely, looking at Raina. “Wild Thing really likes you. That horse has never been so well behaved. Well, I like to think he likes me, too, but...”
Raina smiled. “I like Wild Thing. Great horse. I hope you’ll... I hope you’ll keep letting me come see him.”
“Of course!”
They headed out a few minutes later. Raina tried to reach Jordan. His phone went straight to voice mail.
Axel had greater success in calling his headquarters. Raina wasn’t sure what was said exactly, but another Krewe agent was coming down with his “unusually gifted” girlfriend.
“Jordan isn’t answering,” she said.
“We’ll just keep trying every fifteen minutes or so until we get him,” Axel said.
When they reached the house, Titan went bounding out the car door. Raina thought he was racing for the house, but he wasn’t.
He was making a beeline for the bushes by the house.
“Titan!” she called, rushing after him. “What is it, boy?”
Axel followed her as she hurried toward the dog. Titan wasn’t upset or growling at anything; he had something between his teeth and he was wagging his tail wildly.
“What the heck?” Raina said.
“Get it from him!” Axel said.
“What?”
“Get it from him—quickly.”
“He doesn’t kill squirrels or lizards or iguanas or birds—he knows better. He’s just found—”
“Whatever he’s found, get it from him.”
He stepped by her. Titan might like Axel, but not well enough to allow him to take some treasure out of his mouth.
She hurried forward herself.
“Titan, drop it!”
For a moment, the dog stared at her.
“Titan, you heard me. Drop it!”
The dog did so, staring at her belligerently.
“What is it?” Axel asked, moving forward to take the mass the animal had dropped.
Titan let out a growl. Raina chastised him.
“I’ve got it!” she said.
She picked up the mystery pile the dog had dropped. It looked like a piece of charred meat.
“It’s someone’s leftovers, I guess,” Raina said.
“
On the side of your yard, in the bushes, next to your window?” Axel asked, his voice hard.
He dug in his pocket, producing a plastic baggie with a sealed closure.
“That’s an evidence bag.”
“Yes.”
“You just walk around with evidence bags?”
“Always. Think we should give Titan some kind of reward for spitting out his find?”
“Right, yes, of course.”
Raina unlocked her door. No one had tried to jimmy it. She wondered if Axel’s work hadn’t made him eternally suspicious.
“You know, a bird might have dropped that piece of meat,” she said.
“What bird do you know that’s big enough to carry that? No hawk out there is going to drop a morsel like that and leave it. No vulture or anything else I can think of. Anyway, better safe than sorry,” Axel said.
“Yes, of course, better safe than sorry, always,” she admitted.
“I need to get this to the local lab. Let’s give Titan a treat and head that way. You can keep trying Jordan while we go. We can swing by his place and see if he’s there, if you think it will help.”
She was quiet a minute. “He might talk to me, but not you. I don’t know.”
“He knows you’re with me.”
“I guess. Anyway, we’ll keep trying him.”
She checked Titan’s water bowl and gave him several of his favorite treats, then told him to stand guard.
Then they left again.
It was growing late. The Miami sun was going down.
But Axel apparently knew he would find someone at work at his local offices and he did. He left Raina in the reception area while he spoke with the local field director.
While he was gone, she tried Jordan again.
He still wasn’t answering his phone.
In the middle of her dialing, a phone call came through and she answered it quickly, thinking Jordan was calling her back.
It wasn’t Jordan. It was Lucia.
“Hey, I know this is late and you might be busy, but Mya and I were having pedicures this afternoon, and talked about doing something this evening. We called Elly and she was free, and Elly called Tate Fielding and he’s free, and, oh, Mya’s husband is free, and we thought, hey, Tall, Dark and Good-looking is still here, maybe we should have an impromptu dinner. All we need to get the gang back together is you and Jordan.”
“Have you reached Jordan?”
“No, but Elly talked to him earlier. He won something or another at the fundraiser and she needed to see about getting it to him. Something big. A piece of exercise equipment, I think. Anyway, he said to let him know if anything was going on and he’d show up. Text him a time and a place, you know? So, how about it? You in?”
“Um, I’m not sure yet. Do the same with me, okay? Just text me the details, and if we can, we’ll be there.”
“Cool. We, huh? So, you are together, then?”
Raina hesitated. “Well, for now. We went riding today. Out to the village.”
“You always did love all that nature and culture. But remember—your dude is an FBI agent. He’ll go back to big-time civilization when this is over.”
“Lucia, we live in big-time civilization. We don’t spend our days in the Everglades.”
Lucia laughed. “True. But it’s there, you know. Reachable, easily. But you went riding? In the muck and the swamp and the snakes and the gators?”
“There’s, like, a trail back there. I’m not into slushing through sawgrass, snakes and swamp.”
“I guess no one is these days. Except maybe the python hunters. Hey, they’re going to make a show about it, you know.”
“So I’ve heard,” Raina said.
She looked up. Axel was returning. “I have to go, Lucia. Just text me where you all are going and when.”
“Well, it will be soon. And nowhere fancy. Maybe Sergio’s—we all love that, right on Coral Way. Somewhere casual!”
“Text!”
“I will.”
She hung up, standing.
“Did you get Jordan?”
She shook her head. “But I was just talking to Lucia. She wants to get together for dinner, and Elly told her she’d talked to Jordan earlier, and he’d said if they texted a time and a place, he’d try to be there.”
He shrugged. “Sure, we’ll go. Where does Jordan live? We can drive by and just see if he’s home.”
“He lives in Coconut Grove. At this time, it might be easiest to shoot straight down US 1.”
“That’s fine. Keep calling.”
She did. She tried his number as they got to the car. Once again, it went straight to his voice mail.
“That’s his cell. Does he have a house line?”
She looked at him, arching a brow.
“Hey. There are people who still have house lines. And is it a house? Or is he in a condo or apartment?”
“No, a house. He inherited it from an aunt he’d been good to all his life. His grandparents on his dad’s side came over from Cuba and the family was close and very tight.” She hesitated. “Jordan is a good guy, Axel. He really is.”
“You never dated him?”
She shook her head. “We were always just good friends.”
“But you did date Tate Fielding.”
“He’s not a bad person, either. Just a little full of himself.”
“You said you stayed friends when you split up.”
“It was never much of a romance. We were just together. I don’t think he was ever particularly into just one person. Tate likes being adored. It’s just the way he is. And he was cool in middle school and high school and college, and he stepped right into his father’s firm. That might make him an ass. It doesn’t mean he’s evil.”
“I’m just asking.”
“And now you’re going to want to know about Lucia, Elly and Mya?”
He looked at her. “You think women can’t be evil?” he queried, a slight curl to his lips.
“No. Of course not. Anyone can be evil,” she said. “But again, when Fran Castle disappeared, we were kids. Thirteen and fourteen years old.”
He nodded. “Yes.”
“What does that mean? Hey, I was on the bus with those guys. And through every lecture. Plus, we were at school all day before we got on the bus. In the same class. I saw all of them.”
“Right.”
“What does that mean?”
“Sorry—nothing. It doesn’t mean anything.”
“Yes, it does!”
“I need the address.”
“What?”
“Jordan’s address.”
“Oh!” She gave him the address, watching him suspiciously.
“What are you getting at?” she demanded.
“I think I’ve told you. Angela is checking, a zillion techs are checking, looking for something that might in any way connect our victims. We’re not finding anything that matches up, anything all of them might have been doing, or that they might have been associated with. All we have is they were killed in the exact same way.”
“And?”
“That suggests they were murdered by a hired killer.”
She was quiet a minute. “And you think one of my friends might have been a hired killer—thirteen years ago?”
“Not then. No.”
“Okay, so one of them might be a hired killer now? But somehow, they’re killing in the same way someone did years ago?”
“It’s a quick and easy method,” Axel said.
They turned off US 1 on Twenty-seventh Avenue and headed down to Tigertail. Raina told Axel where to turn.
Jordan’s house was a pretty Mediterranean, built in the late 1930s. It was two stories, and maybe about twenty-five hundred square feet. Not massive, but nice for a single man.
>
“His car is here,” Raina said, surprised.
“Maybe he fell asleep and just hasn’t been answering his phone,” Axel suggested.
“Let me try him again.”
Raina did and, yet again, her call went straight to his voice mail.
“So, we try the door,” Axel said.
They did. They rang the bell, then pounded on the door, and there was no answer.
“You don’t know of any secret way in there, do you?” Axel asked.
“Uh, maybe.”
“Don’t tell me there’s a key under the mat.”
She shook her head. “Nothing so obvious. But his aunt always left a key in the flowerpot by the porch that opened the back door. But...is it legal?”
“No. But do you want to check on your friend? Would Jordan have you arrested?”
“I sincerely doubt it. I don’t know if he still keeps a key there.”
“We won’t know unless we try.”
They walked around the house. A flowerpot was next to a little cement porch at the back. Raina felt around in the dirt.
And found the key to the back door.
They went in.
“Jordan!” she called as they entered.
Axel quickly went through the downstairs rooms—kitchen, dining, living room and office. He headed for the stairs.
“Stay down here!” he warned Raina.
She did.
Jordan’s home was nice, but not ostentatious. He had a large leather couch and wide-screen TV in the living room, and his kitchen held good modern appliances. His dining table had been his aunt’s and it was a handsome, carved piece with chairs to match.
She wandered into the office.
“Anything?” she called up to Axel. “You know if he’s just out, and he left his phone in the car or something, he’s going to be pretty ticked at me for searching his house.”
“He’s not in his room, the guest room or bathroom,” Axel called down.
Raina wandered over behind his desk.
She wasn’t sure why—maybe curiosity. They had come this far; they were in the man’s house.
She hit a key to bring his computer to life.
And a picture showed up on the screen.
It was a picture of Jordan and Jennifer Lowry, lovely, happy and smiling with all the life and vitality within her that had been so cruelly cut short.
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