“I hope you’re right.”
Twenty minutes later, she sat back and swiped her sleeve across her face, leaving a reddish brown path across her cheek. She leaned over again and brushed the dirt from the skull. Her tender administrations reminded him of a mother caring for a young child.
As Kerry continued to expose more bone, Hunter drummed his gnawed yellow pencil on the pad. After another few minutes, she exposed the victim’s hips. He studied the structure. This body’s hips had a wide pelvic inlet. “Looks female.”
She glanced up, her brows raised. “You’re right.”
Guess she didn’t expect him to be able to differentiate between sexes. She probably figured he was just another dumb cop. It was a good thing one of his forensic classes included remains identification.
When she ran a hand gently down the woman’s hips, something unfamiliar tackled his gut, but the sensation disappeared the moment she looked away.
Hunter wrote female on his report, and then peered down at the doctor again. “What about her age?” He dragged a handkerchief across his brow to mop up the sweat.
“I’d say she was in her late twenties, early thirties. Look here.” She pointed to where a shoulder should be. “The growth plate is located at the end of this bone.” She tapped one of the knobby ends. “This is called the epiphysis, which fuses around the age of thirty. This female’s is almost completely fused. That, and the pitting on her ribs, tells me my guess about her age is close.”
Hunter stood to stretch his legs. She looked up at him as though she were seeing him for the first time and held his gaze. Her eyes were a soft, leafy green.
“Thanks, that helps.”
She nodded, blinked, and dropped her gaze.
He ran the Missing Persons cases through his head for a young female who’d been missing for some time but came up empty. “Can you take a shot at her race?” Could Kerry Herlihy make it three for three?
She glanced at her temporary boss. “With so much racial mixing these days, race is a lot more complicated to figure out.”
“If I may,” Ahern said, pointing to the skull’s cheekbones. “The square eye orbits would indicate Negroid, but the fact she has a narrow interorbital breadth might imply classic white European. But then again, her nasal width and prognathic alveolar region push me more toward Negroid and—”
She lightly touched her boss’s arm. “So, what he’s trying to say, Detective, is we don’t know.”
“I see.”
“When I get her back to the lab, I’ll do a bone density scan on her. Those numbers should give me a clearer indication of race.”
“I’ll also need to know her height once you dig out the rest of her body.”
“I’ll have to measure the femur, along with a few other bones, to determine that.”
She knew her stuff all right. “That’s pretty impressive.”
“Thanks.”
Hunter was finished with the crime scene. He planned to run the numbers through Missing Persons when he returned to the station. If luck was on his side, he’d find a match.
“Any idea how long she’s been here?”
A frown creased her brow. “Not without more—”
“Tests?”
A small chuckle escaped. “Yes.”
He nodded to the CSU team leader. “If you guys don’t need me anymore, I’m going to head back to the station and get to work.”
“No problem. I think we have everything covered.”
“Call me if you unearth any personal effects,” Hunter said.
“You can count on it.”
A slight breeze provided temporary relief as he jogged down the uneven path to the cruiser. Phil sat perched on the cruiser’s hood filling out his report.
“Let’s get out of here.” Hunter placed his hand on the door handle.
“Hey, Hunter,” the CSU team leader called. “Hold up a sec.” The man waved him back.
What the hell? How could they have found something in a minute flat?
“Be back in a sec,” Hunter said.
He hurried up the path, his shirt so wet with sweat, the cotton stuck to his back. “What do you have?”
“She found another bone. And not one that belongs to the first skeleton.”
2
Muscles knotting his thighs, Hunter squatted opposite Dr. Herlihy, anxious to view her discovery. “Tell me.”
Back rounded, she ran a hand over a large bone. Some of those green sand spurs that had previously attacked him had found their way into the doc’s curly hair.
She dusted the remaining dirt from the bone’s surface. Once she’d freed the object, she held up what looked like a femur. Angling the bone so that a shaft of sunlight speared her find, she rolled the bone between her fingers. The expression on her face transformed from one of intrigue to acceptance. He said nothing, taking in her intense expression.
She finally placed the bone on a brown paper bag beside her, and then locked her gaze with his. Her green eyes appeared saddened by her find.
“It’s a third femur.”
His gut clenched. Shit. “Female? Or male?” He grabbed a handful of dirt, squeezed the daylight out of it and tossed the sandy heap back on the ground.
“I can’t tell yet.”
The desperation in her voice tore at his protective instincts. The discovery seemed to sicken her as much as it did him. Had the anthropologist who’d found his sister’s body died a little too that day?
Shrouded in hushed silence, she went back to work uncovering more bones. The CSU team, who had crowded around to watch the new find, wordlessly scattered to continue documenting the evidence.
Mud streaked his pants where he’d wiped his hands, and for once, he didn’t care.
Fifteen minutes later, she unearthed a second pelvis and stopped brushing. “It’s a female.” She drew in a long breath, closed her eyes for a moment, and exhaled slowly.
“So we’re looking at two bodies,” he mumbled to himself. Christ. A sharp jab raced up his spine at the thought.
“Yes and we’re not finished digging either.”
An ugly, sludgy sensation grabbed his insides and yanked hard. More digging. Two horrible words he’d heard many times. “We could be looking at a mass grave then.”
Dear Lord. His ribs tightened around his lungs, squeezing the air from them. His chest hurt as he recalled another tragedy.
She lowered her head. “It’s possible.”
Hunter stood and moved away from the mound of pine needle laden dirt and away from the bone doctor, not wanting to take his frustration out on her or any of the other workers. He wanted to strangle the jerk who’d dumped the bodies. Wanted to lock the killer up and make the bastard spend the rest of his goddamn pathetic life digging graves or making coffins to honor the dead. And he really wanted to find the man who’d killed his sister—but that would never happen.
Christ. Right now, he’d be content pummeling anything into a million pieces. He picked up a rock and chucked it a couple hundred feet away from the river. It smashed against a tree and thudded to the ground. Squirrels scurried away.
Phil was already making his way up the path.
“What’s wrong?”
Hunter told him about the second body. “We need cadaver dogs.”
“Good idea. Otherwise, we could be here for days.”
Hunter scanned the large wooded area. Had to be a good thirty acres, but only about four or five of them were free enough of large trees and scrub for someone to bury a body. “Too bad there’s no way to tell if the psycho spread the bodies out or piled more victims on top of each other. Call the captain and see if he can send over a team. Ask him to find Jimmy what’s-his-name.” Hunter snapped his fingers. “The captain will know him. He’s the best technician for leveling the ground.”
“I’m on it like maggots on shit.” Ah, a new and better twist to Phil’s usual spiel.
Once Phil walked away to make his call, Hunter stepped back to the gravesite. Dr. Herlihy carefully removed the bones of the other skeleton and set them aside.
He glanced at his watch. Oh, crap. He’d promised to take his daughter to Burger King, and it was already past five. He’d never make it in time.