Page 56 of The Wolves Come at Night
The dogs woofed.
Marcus staked out a perimeter for them to follow, and Donna let the dogs nose around the graveyard for a few. Both dogs alerted, sitting, vibrating with repressed excitement, which wasn’t unexpected. Donna marked the spots, and then led the dogs to the northern perimeter, rubbed them on the chest, called “Search!” and unleashed them to do their jobs. She started back toward Taylor but was almost upended when the dogs rushed past her, right back to the graveyard, alerting again.
“Not there.” Donna led them back to the northern perimeter. They went straight back to the graves. The Bernese added a mournful whine to her alert bark.
Taylor shrugged. “Maybe we need to take them farther away?”
Donna had a small shovel and brush out. “I might as well take a quick peek. They’re pretty adamant. Until I look and satisfy their curiosity, we’ll be here all afternoon watching them run back. It’s strange, though. They’re usually so good about listening when I give them a boundary. Give me five, we’ll clear this area and start again at the northern perimeter.”
Taylor walked to the edge of the path and checked her cell phone—the signal was down to one bar. “Marcus, how’s your phone? Do you have a signal?”
“Got a hot date, Cap?”
She smiled. “Have you met Baldwin? I always have a hot date. I just wanted to check if there was anything new on that crazy website you love so much.”
“WebDetectives? They’re not crazy. They’re—”
“A bunch of amateurs who like to cause trouble,” she replied. “But a thread started yesterday that was interesting, about Georgia Wray being ambushed by a really aggressive fan a few days ago outside a nail shop. I thought we might track down the poster and see what they actually know. With all the accusations her parents made, I don’t want to let anything slip through the cracks.”
“‘The Rules According to Taylor. Follow every lead, no matter how obscure.’ I’m on it.” Marcus looked at his phone, smiling. “Though my signal’s crappy, too. I’ll track them down when I get back to the office. I’m looking forward to Linc’s briefing on Bloom. Could be something there.”
“Agreed. There’s just enough weirdness going on that I’m quite relieved we’re looking deeper. The notebook paper, for starters. It doesn’t match any of the notebooks in the house. Granted, it could be Georgia’s. We need to nail that down. You up for another look through both their places?”
“Definitely.”
The dogs began to bark, and Taylor looked over her shoulder. Donna was kneeling but rocked back on her heels, a look of sheer consternation on her face.
“What is it?”
Donna looked up and sighed. “The dogs are right. These graves have been disturbed, recently.”
Taylor’s stomach dropped, an awful burning sensation that signaled a spike in adrenaline and despair. “Disturbed?”
She moved closer. It didn’t take her mind more than a second to process what she was seeing. The long, thin whiteness of a bone. A leg bone, split apart in a compound fracture. White bone. Not the burnished look of one that had been buried for centuries.
Carson. Damn.
“Ah, hell.”
“Did we just find Carson Conway?” Marcus asked, voice low. No one bothered answering.
The Bernese whined. Donna shifted out of the way and Taylor saw the rest. A shock of blond hair, a piece of fabric. The body was clearly female, facedown. And beside it, a deep hole with a jumble of bones, hidden beneath the silty earth. Definitely fresher than she would anticipate from a grave nearly 250 years old.
Donna stood up, dropped her trowel, and whipped off her gloves. She pulled the dogs ten feet away and gave them a reward in the form of a hot dog split between them that she had in a baggie in her jeans pocket.
“Sorry, Taylor. I think we’re going to need some more help.”
More help needed was an understatement. They couldn’t just start yanking remains from the ground. While Taylor and Marcus paced and planned, dread building, Donna made some calls, pulling together her team.
“They’ll be here in an hour,” Donna said. “I don’t want to unbury her until we’ve had a chance to do a forensic sweep.”
“Makes sense,” Marcus said, brushing dirt off his jeans. “I’ll go down and meet them, bring them back up here.”
Taylor shook her head. “No, that’s okay. I’ll do it. I need to call Avery Conway anyway.”
“Is that the mom?” Donna asked.
“Yeah.”
