Alex Kava Bundle - Alex Kava [483]
As Henry assessed the man standing in front of him, he couldn’t help thinking that Luc Racine appeared the picture of health for a man in his sixties. Except for that blank stare, the one that came out of nowhere. The one staring back at him right now that looked lost, gone, miles away.
“I think there are others,” Luc said, reaching under his trademark black beret and scratching his head, his fingers digging into the shaggy hair as if penetrating his scalp would help him remember.
“Others?” Henry checked Luc’s eyes. Was this part of the disease? What was he talking about? Did he forget where he was? Did he forget what had just happened? “Other what?”
“Bones,” Luc said. “I think ole Scrap maybe brought me some others. He’s always bringing me stuff, scraps, bones, old shoes. But the bones…I just thought he found leftovers from the coyotes’ kill. You know, from down by the pond.”
“Do you still have any of them?”
“I don’t.”
“Damn.”
“But Scrapple probably does. I’m sure he’s got some of them buried around our place somewhere.”
“We’ll need to look. You don’t mind us doing that, do you, Luc?”
“No, no. Not at all. Do you think the bones belong to that lady in the barrel?”
Before Henry could answer, one of his deputies, Charlie Newhouse, yelled for everyone’s attention. Charlie and two of the crime lab guys had been trying to carefully lift the barrel with the woman still inside down off the rocks. All the photos had been taken, the evidence gathered, and the assistant M.E. had made his initial examination. It was time for the transport, but Charlie seemed all excited about something. Charlie Newhouse, the one guy Henry remembered never getting excited except after a few beers and then only when the Yankees managed to make a triple play.
“Okay, you got our attention.” Henry joined the others and looked up at Charlie, putting his hand to his forehead to block out the sun. “What the hell is it, Charlie?”
“Might not mean a thing, Sheriff,” Charlie said, securing his balance as he paced from rock to rock, looking down into the pile as if trying to locate lost change. He then squatted to get a better look. “Might not mean a thing at all, but there’re more barrels under here. And something sure smells to high heaven.”
CHAPTER 9
Adam Bonzado shoved aside Tom Clancy with one hand while he maneuvered the winding road with the other, twisting and pulling at the stubborn and cracked vinyl steering wheel. At each incline the old El Camino pickup groaned as if there were another gear it needed to be shifted into. Adam stirred up the pile of cassettes strewn across the passenger seat, the pile that somewhere included the other three cassettes for Tom Clancy’s Red Rabbit. He searched with stray glances for something else, something that fit his mood. All he knew was that Clancy wasn’t going to cut it. Not today.
Sheriff Henry Watermeier had sounded strained, may be even a bit panicked. Not that Adam knew Henry all that well. They had worked a case last winter. A skull found under an old building that was being demolished in downtown Meriden. All Adam could determine was that it was a small Caucasian man older than forty-two but younger than seventy-seven who had died about twenty-five to thirty years ago. It was difficult to tell with only the skull. The body must have been buried somewhere else. With all their digging, they had found nothing more, and so, the time of death had been a major guess, based more on architectural facts than archeological ones. Despite the lack of evidence, Watermeier seemed convinced it had been a mob hit.
Adam smiled at the idea. He couldn’t imagine the mob operating in the middle of Connecticut, although Watermeier had quickly filled him in with a couple of tall tales. Or at least that’s what they sounded like to Adam, who had grown up in Brooklyn and figured he knew a little something about mob hits. But he also knew Henry Watermeier had begun his career as a New York City beat cop, so maybe ole Henry knew a thing about mob hits, too.
Adam Bonzado couldn’t help wondering if that was what they