Tombstone Courage by J. A. Jance

Author:J. A. Jance [Jance, J. A.]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2009-03-17T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eighteen

Joanna WALKED back to where Yuri Malakov was sitting on the running board of the decommissioned fire truck.

He moved aside far enough to make room for her. Sinking down beside him, she wiped her clammy forehead with the sleeve of her jacket and closed her eyes, trying to shut out the memory of Harold Patterson's eerily blank eyes.

She wanted to forget how they had caught the glow of Ernie Carpenter's flashlight and stared dully back up at her through the darkness.

Yuri glanced at Joanna with some sympathy, and he seemed in tune with her reaction. "Is bad thing," he muttered. "Very bad thing."

Joanna studied his broad face. Thick eyebrows hunched over heavily lidded eyes. Although from a distance he had appeared to be relaxed and snoozing, she realized now that his carefully hooded eyes were observing everything about him with intense interest.

Ernie Carpenter, leaving the glory hole for the moment, carted a cumbersome suitcase of equipment from his traveling crime-lab van to a newly dried puddle in the road. There, on hands and knees, he was attempting to make plaster casts of the fire tracks left in crusted mud. Meanwhile, Dick Voland stood beside Ernie's van, speaking into the radio microphone and gesturing with his other hand.

"Detective Voland is trying to locate a sump pump," Joanna explained.

"A what?"

"An emergency pump and a generator to run it. They need to empty the water out of the bottom of the hole before they attempt to bring up either body, Patterson or the other one."

Suddenly, Yuri Malakov was no longer lounging against the side of the truck. He loomed over Voland and Joanna, dwarfing them both. "Two bodies?" he demanded, his smoldering dark eyes boring into Joanna's. "More than one? More than Mr. Patterson?"

Joanna realized at once that she had blundered and spoken out of turn. That kind of information about an ongoing investigation shouldn't have been casually mentioned to a passing acquaintance who happened to appear at the crime scene. But it was too late to take it back, and there didn't seem to be any justification in lying about it.

She nodded. "Detective Carpenter seems to have found another body, a skeleton, under Harold Patterson. He had fallen directly on top of it."

"Who?" Yuri asked.

"We don't know that," Joanna answered. "The other victim has been dead for a long time, most likely. Until they can search the glory hole for evidence, there's no way to tell."

Yuri Malakov lurched to his feet. "Ivy must know about this," he declared.

"No," Joanna objected. "That kind of news should come from one of the investigating officers, from someone official."

Yuri shook his shaggy head impatiently. "Investigators busy. I am not busy. I tell her."

With that, Yuri stomped away toward the Scout, leaving Joanna no choice but to trail along after him. He was a huge man. The idea of her physically restraining someone his size was laughable.

Joanna glanced back toward Dick Voland, who was still talking on the radio. He would be of no help. Besides, she didn't want to tell him about this.

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