The Buried (The Apostles) (4 page)

As she sped around a corner, she slammed on her brakes to avoid hitting a sheriff’s department SUV parked in the middle of the road. Her ribs contracted, squeezing her heart. Lia. Something must have happened.

Grace jammed the car in park and dove out the door. No deputy. No construction workers. She followed a trail of fresh footprints along a patch of camellia bushes and spotted a man in a hard hat leaning against a ditch digger. She tapped his shoulder.

The construction worker jumped, letting out a breathy curse. “Whoa there, Miss Courtemanche! You scared the snot out of me.”

“What’s going on? Why is the sheriff’s department here?”

“Delbert over on the back hoe found something. Has everyone a little spooked.”

“Lia Grant? Did he find Lia Grant?”

“That little gal who’s missing? Nah. Don’t think it’s her. Least I hope not.”

Her chest tightened. “You don’t think? What’s going on?”

“Delbert was digging stumps and found some old bones in one of the sand hills.”

Grace’s ribcage let go of her heart. “Of course you’re going to find bones around here. Lamar Giroux’s hounds spent sixty years burying them.”

“Not these kind of bones, least I hope not.” He led her through the camellia patch to a shallow ditch where a half dozen construction workers and a sheriff’s deputy stood in silence.

“What kind of bo…” Her voice trailed away as she studied the land where her new tennis court was scheduled to be built. Poking up from No Man’s Land, the section between the baseline and service line, was a human skull.

E
xcuse me, Agent Hatcher, but your son is ready for you.”

Hatch’s fingers froze midway through the inch-thick folder the Franklin County Sheriff’s Department had gathered on thirteen-year-old Alex Milanos, his
son
.

“Normally we don’t keep children overnight,” the clerk continued. “Not for something like this, but his grandmother didn’t know what to do.”

And I do?
Hatch ran a hand through his hair.

He’d docked
No Regrets
at the Cypress Point Marina in Apalachicola Bay early this morning and hitched a ride to the sheriff’s station where he now sat in a small conference room wondering how the hell a thirteen-year-old kid could have amassed an inch-thick rap sheet. And not just any kid. His kid, one he didn’t know existed until twenty-four hours ago. He ran his other hand through the other side of his hair. He was still getting his head wrapped around the idea of
being
a father, and here he was expected to
act
like one. Was he supposed to give the boy fatherly wisdom? Tough love? A boot in the ass? The floor shifted beneath his feet.

“Alex is in one of the holding rooms, Agent Hatcher. You can talk to him there.”

He was supposed to
talk
with this boy.
That
he could do. He thumbed through the mountain of papers. Alex was his son, but he was also a kid in a crisis situation, and in those cases, Hatch had plenty of miles on his dock shoes.

Hatch took a final look at Alex’s file. Truancy. Underage driving. Curfew violations. The latest infraction: The boy and two unknown accomplices broke into Buddy’s Shrimp Shack and lifted forty bucks from the register. As they tried to escape, the manager nabbed Alex. The other two got away. The kicker was that the manager agreed not to press charges if Alex would ID his fellow delinquents. The kid refused. On top of that, Alex had taken a swing at the deputy bringing him in.

Hatch slapped shut the file folder. This kind of crisis he could handle. “Let’s sail.”

The clerk, a twenty-something named Susie who had a sunny smile to match her bright yellow heels, led him down the hall toward the holding area. “Are you really one of Parker Lord’s guys?” When he nodded, she leaned toward him as if to tell a secret. “You know he’s one of ours, a Florida legend. Agent Lord first worked human trafficking in Miami, but I hear he’s become a real maverick, butts heads with FBI brass on a regular basis. Is it true he answers only to the president?”

Hatch scrubbed the stubble at his chin. Parker Lord was called many things: maverick, mad man, God. And although his boss worked for the FBI, he served justice, which could never be fully embodied in a single institution or one man with presidential powers, both of which had proven sorely fallible over the years.

“Parker Lord answers to his conscience,” Hatch said. So did the entire SCIU. It was what set them apart. And it ruffled a whole hell of a lot of feathers. Not that any of his team cared much about pillow ticking.

Hatch followed the clerk through a keypad entry door when something crashed at the far end of the hall, followed by a shout. He ran down the hall, pulled up beside a holding room, and inched his head around the doorjamb to see a red-faced deputy standing in front of a kid with shaggy blond hair. The kid’s lip curled in a snarl, and the chip on his shoulder was so big it cast a shadow over the entire room. Definitely Hatch’s flesh and blood. And the kid apparently had the same teenage disposition Hatch once had.

God had one cruel sense of humor.

Alex’s hand jerked, and he poked a jagged chunk of wood at the deputy. From the looks of the broken chair in the corner, Hatch had a damn good idea where the kid had found his improvised weapon.

The deputy, a bear of a man with two chins, pointed his index finger at the kid. “Put that down, boy, before someone gets hurt.”

Alex’s fingers tightened around the splintered chair leg. “Don’t tell me what to do! I’m tired of everyone telling me what to do.”

“Make a few good choices, and folks’ll talk a might different to you.” The deputy slid a club from his belt.

Hatch ground his back teeth.
Idiot
. And he wasn’t talking about the boy.

“Fuck you, dickhead!”

The deputy tapped a club against his thigh. “I think someone needs to take soap to that mouth of yours or maybe a strap to your backside.”

Wrong words. The whole thing was wrong. Hatch stepped into the center of the doorway. “Yea, fuck him, fuck the whole thing.”

Alex looked up. The wood slipped from the boy’s hand, but he grabbed it before it hit the ground. “Shut up! I don’t need nothing from
you
.”

Hatch needed coordinates. He needed to know exactly where this kid stood. “You know who I am, Alex?”

Those eyes narrowed into slits, as if trying to block out as much of Hatch as possible. “Granny told me she was going to call the old man. Said that since you were some high and mighty FBI guy, you’d take care of everything. I told her don’t bother because you’re nothing.” He jabbed the splintered chair leg at Hatch. “You hear that? You’re fucking nothing to me!”

The words crept past the badge and slammed into the center of Hatch’s chest. He took a step back as Alex’s anger, wave after wave of rippling heat, filled the room. The deputy lifted the club, and Hatch gave his head a shake. Words hurt, but they were also the most powerful weapon known to mankind.

“You’re right.” Hatch leaned against the door frame. First listen. Then empathize and build rapport. Finally exert positive influence. Hostage Negotiating 101. The kid needed to be in control, or more precisely, Alex Milanos needed to
think
he was in control.

Hatch tipped his head toward the deputy who wore a nametag that read
W. FILLINGHAM
. “You want Deputy Fillingham here to give you some room?”

The boy shrugged one shoulder then the other. “Uh, yeah, that’s what I want, for Deputy Dickhead to get off my ass.”

With a tilt of his head, he motioned the deputy to walk toward the door. The lawman trained narrow eyes first on Hatch then the kid.
Now
, Hatched mouthed the single word. The deputy backed out.

Now time to distract the boy from that giant pot of anger and resentment he was brewing. Hatch took a bright yellow scarf from his pocket and snapped it in the air. He made a fist with his other hand and tucked in the scarf. Waving his fist in the air, Hatch opened his fingers one by one and revealed an empty palm. The kid stared at his hand, which gave Hatch a moment to study this thirteen-year-old in crisis. Alex Milanos was no longer a boy, but not quite a man. He was in that awkward, in-between stage where nothing fit. Not his clothes, his words, his emotions. Everything was off kilter.

Hatch took a seat at the table centered in the room. He opened the fist of his other hand, and a royal blue silk scarf floated to the table.

Alex tapped the scarred wood against his leg. “This is bullshit.”

Hatch flattened the scarf on the table.

“The break-in—hell, no one got hurt. We didn’t even have a real weapon, just a little pocket knife.” Alex swallowed hard. “A stupid one I used at Boy Scout camp, and the only time I had it out was to pick the lock.”

Hatch folded the scarf three times and nodded thoughtfully.

Alex waved the stick around the holding room. “This is stupid. All this for forty bucks.”

No, this wasn’t about forty bucks. This was about one angry, screwed-up kid who just wanted to fit in.

Alex’s hand shook, the stick bobbing. “It wasn’t even my idea. I told the guys we wouldn’t get anything. The shrimp shack doesn’t keep much money in the cash register on a weeknight, but I went along, and I was the one who got caught. The deputy said he’d release me if I squealed, but I can’t do that, can’t rat on my guys.”

“It’s important to look out for your buddies. I don’t blame you for keeping quiet.”

The stick grew still. “You don’t?”

“My guys, my team, I’d do anything for them.” It was the dead truth. Hatch would put his life on the line for his teammates, and he had, many times, and they for him.

Alex slumped into the chair across from him. “I’m in big trouble, aren’t I?”

Finally. An opening. “Depends on what you do from here.”

The chair leg in Alex’s hand clattered to the table. “Am…am I going to prison?”

“Nah, the state of Florida doesn’t imprison thirteen-year-olds for taking forty bucks from a shrimp shack.” Hatch casually reached across the table, palmed the chair leg, and slid it to his lap. “But you can do time in juvie for threatening a peace officer.”

The boy’s Adam’s apple bobbed. “Oh shit.”

“That about sums it up.”

“Granny is going to kill me.”

“Yep, pal, I’d be pretty concerned about that, too.” Hatch waited. The kid’s actions and the repercussions of those actions needed to pound his head, loud and painful, like the sound of the chair crashing into the wall.

Hatch fingered the scar on the right side his jaw. He’d weathered a few crashes, poundings, too, most of them of the self-destructive nature, but lucky for him, he also had a great aunt Piper Jane who’d hauled his sorry, fifteen-year-old ass out of juvenile detention and onto her thirty-five-foot Tartan. Together, the two of them had sailed around the world.

Those first few months he pulled ropes until his palms bled, buffed teak until his shoulders flamed, and went hungry because he burned his dinner on the galley stove. For more than a year, his life was the sun and sea and sails. No time for stewing and brewing. Somewhere around the Canary Islands his blisters turned into calluses. At the Suez Canal he officially went from deck hand to first mate. And by the time they sailed past Bali, Hatch knew the secret to the perfect pan-seared grouper. Keep scales on one side. Baste with butter twice.

That sail and the sailor behind it had saved his life. Unfortunately, Great Aunt Jane Piper was docked in the Sydney Harbor, which left him holding the compass for Alex. God help them all.

Hatch cleared his throat. “Well?” He held his breath, surprised at how much he wanted the answer to that question.

Alex studied a scab on his elbow. “What would you do? Being FBI and all?”

The tightness stretched across Hatch’s throat eased. Alex had made some piss-poor choices, but he wasn’t dumb. “First I’d tell that deputy I made a bad choice and apologize for threatening to break a chair leg over his skull. Then I’d hand over the names of my two buddies. Then, pal, I’d get down on my knees and pray there’s an organization in town that needs a whole hell of a lot of community service this summer.”

The kid picked at the scab, and a dot of blood trickled down his elbow. Hatch handed him the blue scarf. Alex’s lip curled, contorting his face. Hatch lifted both hands. Okay. He was backing off.

A minute ticked by. Another.

Time to close the deal. Hatch stuffed the scarf in his pocket.

“Fine.” Alex swiped the blood on his jeans and looked Hatch in the eye. “I’ll do it.”

Hatch shot prayers of thanks to God, the boy’s Granny, and anyone else who’d been guiding his son these past thirteen years. Alex was in choppy waters and rudderless, but he wasn’t completely lost. Not yet.

“Hey, that magic trick with the scarf.” Alex spat the words. “I know how you did it. It’s fucking stupid.”

Grace’s construction crew had left, replaced by members of the county’s forensic unit who’d roped off a section of the construction site with crime scene tape and colored flags. With tiny shovels and feathery brushes, they sifted through sandy soil, unearthing bones.

Old bones
, Grace assured herself as she paced along the crime scene tape. Denuded of all flesh and gray in color, these bones could not belong to Lia Grant, who was still missing. She’d wanted to head into the swamp at sunup to continue the hunt for the girl, but the detective investigating the grave demanded she stay put until he had a chance to question her about the bones.

Not bones, but a human being. The person cradled in the earth where her dream home would be built had once been a living, breathing human being. Until now. Until her. Her feet stilled, sinking into the damp earth. In the courtroom she was no stranger to uncovering old skeletons rattling in defendants’ pasts, but there was something disturbing about putting down roots over someone’s grave.

A siren wailed and lights flashed as Lieutenant Lang pulled up to the excavation site. She hopped out of the SUV and jogged to Grace’s side. “Any ties to Lia Grant?”

Grace shook her head. “Not that I’m aware of. Still no news on Lia?”

The lieutenant wore wrinkles, swamp mud, and grim lines around her mouth. “Not a damn thing. I stopped by to see if this buried body might shed light on the one I’m looking for.” Lieutenant Lang ducked under the crime scene tape. “Pretty desperate, huh?”

Because Lia Grant may be running out of air. Grace followed the lieutenant. “With the sun up, we can get more searches on the Point.”

“Absolutely.” Lieutenant Lang picked her way through the camellia bushes.

“And we can get some deputies over to the medical center where Lia’s car was found.”

“That’s the plan, but first, the bones.” The lieutenant stopped at the depression and nodded at the tech from the forensics team. “What do you have?”

The man in the pit dusted the sand from his hands. “Given cranial development and femur length, definitely an adult. Pelvic tilt and girth suggest a female.”

Like Lia. Grace knotted her fingers behind her back.

“How long has she been here?” Lieutenant Lang continued.

“Hard to determine at this point. Years, probably at least a decade.”

“Anything unusual found with the body, like a phone?” Grace asked. If that was the case, they could be looking at a serial offender. A shiver rocked her spine at the thought of madness multiplied.

He shook his head. “Nothing yet, but we still have a lot more dirt to move.”

“Any religious symbols or markings?” Lieutenant Lang studied the surrounding area, which consisted mostly of camellia bushes and a few sycamores. “It’s possible Grace’s crew stumbled on the Giroux family cemetery.”