After the Storm
But I feel his eyes on me as I walk away.
CHAPTER 4
He’d given up baseball practice for this. According to his mom, he was probably going to have to forgo the away game on Saturday, too. Twelve-year-old Josh Pennington loved baseball almost as much as he loved being an Eagle Scout, but his mom had laid down the law: He couldn’t do both. It’s too much, she’d said. You have to choose. Luckily for Josh, his dad—who’d been an Eagle Scout and played shortstop—saved the day and told him as long as he kept his grades up, he could do both.
It was a lot harder than Josh thought. He’d had to get up at 5:00 A.M. this morning and be at the school by 6:00, where he met the rest of Troop 503 for the bus ride to Painters Mill. It was volunteer day, and they were going to spend it picking up trash and debris left by the tornado that hit the day before. First stop was a farm—or what had once been a farm, anyway—on the edge of town. Scoutmaster Hutchinson had instructed them to clean up the area, and boy was it a mess. Big trees had been knocked down. Men with chainsaws had left an hour ago, leaving branches and trash and chunks of crap everywhere. Tin shingles and splintered pieces of lumber from the old barn that had been blown down. It was a good thing most of the troop had turned out, because it was going to take all damn day. If they had to camp, Josh was going to miss practice for sure.
His scoutmaster had started two piles: one for deadfall and lumber, which would be burned later; another pile for any type of steel, which would be loaded into a truck and taken to a recycling center. So far this morning, Josh and his partner for the day, Scott, had been concentrating on dragging branches from a felled maple tree to the fire pile. Hopefully, they’d get to have a bonfire later and maybe some hotdogs and s’mores. Mr. Hutchinson was usually pretty cool about stuff like that.
“Hey, Josh, let’s get all them boards over there.”
Dropping the branch he’d dragged over to the bonfire, Josh walked over to where his friend was standing and looked down at the old wooden siding scattered over an old concrete footer.
“Musta been a hell of an old barn,” Josh said.
“Or a big fuckin’ outhouse.”
Both boys cracked up at that. Josh’s mom didn’t like Scott. She called him a smartass and said he cursed too much. Josh didn’t tell her those were the two things that made Scott so fun to hang out with.
“Let’s do it.” Josh bent and picked up a six-foot-long plank. One side had once been painted red, but that must have been a long time ago because most of the paint had faded to gray.
For twenty minutes the boys picked up two-by-fours and busted-up siding and a door that had been split in half, and dragged all of it to the woodpile. Josh was thinking about the bonfire and wondered if Scoutmaster Hutchinson would buy some hotdogs. It wasn’t yet noon and already he was starving.
He tugged a long plank from the collapsed floor, when something round and white rolled out from beneath it. At first, Josh thought it was a rock, but it was a little too round and rolled easily. Too light to be a rock. Definitely not a soccer ball. Dropping the plank, he walked over to it and knelt, rolling the thing over with his hand. That was when he saw grinning skeleton teeth and the black holes of eye sockets.
“Holy shit!” Josh lunged to his feet and stumbled back so fast he lost his balance and fell on his butt. “Scott!”
Vaguely, he was aware of his friend laughing as he walked over to him. “If you’re freaking out over a mouse, I swear I’m gonna tell Missy Hansch, and she’s going to think you’re the biggest pussy that ever walked—” Scott let out a short little scream. “Whoa! What the hell is that?”
“It’s a fuckin’ head!” Josh swallowed a big wad of something gross at the back of his throat.
The two boys exchanged looks. Scott’s mouth was open so wide Josh could see the cavities in his back molars. “You mean like a human?”
“Well, duh. You ever seen a cow with teeth like that?”
Both boys crept closer, their eyes glued to their macabre find. “I wonder who it is,” Scott whispered.
“I wonder why it’s here and not buried in a cemetery or something,” Josh said.
“We’d better let Hutchinson know.” Scott sighed.
“Jeez, I hope we still get to have a bonfire,” Josh said.
* * *
I’m standing in the middle of a street littered with twisted sheet metal, pieces of vinyl siding, a paneled door, and other unrecognizable debris. A few feet away, a flowered sofa that’s remarkably clean sits in the grass near the curb with a young maple tree draped across it. Farther down, a mangled car has been dropped down on top of an otherwise undamaged double-wide. On the lot next to it, someone has pounded a T-post into the ground and raised an American flag.
A dozen mobile homes are crushed as if some drunken giant staggered through, stepping on everything in his path. Several were blown off their foundations. At least two are completely gone, the pieces of which are yet to be found. At the end of the street, a bulldozer pushes debris into a pile that will eventually be loaded into a truck and hauled to the dump. Pieces of peoples’ lives gone in an instant.
Tomasetti and I had risen at the crack of dawn, downed a cup of coffee, and then he’d driven me up to our farm, where I picked up the Explorer. We parted ways after that. Neither of us broached the subject of last night’s discussion, and we didn’t revisit the death of little Lucy Kester.
The American Red Cross, with its iconic red-and-white disaster-relief step van and a small army of volunteers, was already on scene when I arrived, handing out bottled water, serving up hot food, and passing out teddy bears for the traumatized kids.
“Bad as this is, it’s a miracle more people weren’t killed.”
I turn at the sound of Glock’s voice to see him come up behind me. His usually crisp uniform is damp with sweat and streaked with dirt. His trousers are wet from the knee down and clotted with mud.
He shoves a steaming cup of coffee at me. “Thought you might need this.”
“I do. Thanks.” I sip, burning my lip, but it’s worth that pain because it’s hot and strong and just what I needed. “You been out with search and rescue?”
He nods. “No sign of the kid yet.”
“God, I hope they find him. I can’t imagine what the parents are going through.”
“No one’s going to give up.”
I nod. “You know I’ve got you covered with OT, right?”
“Doesn’t matter.” Looking out over the destruction, he sips coffee. “I’da been out looking for him anyway.”
“I know.” I’ve just taken my second sip of coffee when my cell phone chirps.
“Chief.” It’s my dispatcher, Lois Monroe.
“What’s up?”
“I just took a call from a Boy Scout scoutmaster by the name of Ken Hutchinson. He’s got a bunch of kids out at that old barn on Gellerman Road that got hit by the tornado, cleaning up, and he says a couple of boys found a human skull.”
I nearly spill my coffee. “Is he sure it’s human?”
“He seemed pretty adamant.”
Gellerman Road demarks the village limits on the north side of town. Everything north of the road falls under the jurisdiction of the Holmes County Sheriff’s Department. Everything on the south side belongs to me. This particular property is on the south.
“Notify county, will you?”
“Roger that.”
“Doc Coblentz, too.” Dr. Ludwig Coblentz is a local pediatrician and part-time coroner for Holmes County.
“Will do.”
“Lois, did Hutchinson say if the skull had a body attached to it?”
“He said there’s no skeleton, just a bunch of bones scattered all around.”
“I’ll be there in five minutes.” I hit END and dig for my keys.
“You know it’s going to be an interesting call when you have to ask if the skull is attached to the body,” Glock says.
“That just about sums it up.” I start toward my Explorer. ??
?I’ll keep you posted.”
* * *
I’ve driven by the old farm dozens of times over the years. It’s the kind of place you never take notice of because there’s not much there: a dilapidated barn, a couple of smaller outbuildings, a rusty silo set among hip-high weeds. It’s background noise in a landscape you never look at twice. Back in the 1970s, the house was struck by lightning and burned to the ground. There’d been no insurance, and the elderly owners—Mr. and Mrs. Shephard—moved in with their grown children, who continued to farm the land.
The first thing I notice is the debris, scattered wooden siding and a big black walnut tree that’s been stripped of its leaves. I make the turn into a gravel lane overtaken by weeds and clumps of knee-high grass. The lot looks barren without the old barn, which has been reduced to piles of wooden siding, mangled tin shingles, and massive beams. I see the remnants of a concrete foundation that juts a foot out of the ground like an old man’s teeth. The Boy Scout troop is still there, but they’re no longer working. Mostly preteens, they’ve congregated into a circle, sitting on logs or rocks or cross-legged on the ground. Someone has given them bottled water. The boys stare in my direction, and I see several point.
I park behind a yellow school bus. A man in a tan scoutmaster uniform is leaning against an antiquated Jeep, legs crossed at the ankles, talking on his smartphone. He spots me as I exit the Explorer, motions me over, and quickly pockets his phone. He’s a slightly chubby man of about forty with graying hair, a mustache, and sunglasses he’s pushed onto his crown.
“Ken Hutchinson?”
“Yes ma’am.” He strides toward me, looking excited, his hand outstretched.
“I’m Chief of Police Kate Burkholder.”
He shakes my hand with a good bit of vigor. “Thanks for coming so quick.”
Shouts erupt from the boys a dozen yards away. I glance their way to see most of them standing, pointing to where the old barn had been. “It’s over there! Someone’s head! It’s a skull! Over there!”
I offer a small smile. “The kids okay?”
“More excited than upset, I’d say, but then that’s boys for you.”
“We appreciate all of you helping out with the cleanup.”
“Well, that’s what the Boy Scouts do.” He laughs. “Sure didn’t expect to find a head, though. Damnedest thing I ever saw.”
I motion toward the barn. “You want to show me what your boys found?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
With Hutchinson leading the way, we walk along a trampled path that takes us through several inches of mud and knee-high weeds. The sun beats down on my back, and I enjoy the warmth against my skin. I can hear the calls of the red-winged blackbirds as they swoop over the small pond at the rear of the property. We round the fallen trunk of a tree, then I spot the foundation twenty feet away, a worn ridge of concrete. Sure enough, just inside the foundation is the white globe of what looks like a human skull.
I stop outside the foundation and raise my hand to prevent Hutchinson from stepping over it. “Probably best if we don’t get too close,” I tell him.
“Oh. Sure. Of course.”
“Did anyone touch or move anything?” I ask. “The boys?”
“The boys that found it turned over the skull. They thought it was a rock at first. Then they noticed the teeth and those eye sockets.” He shivers with exaggeration. “And they got the heck out of there.”
From where I’m standing I can see small black scraps of what looks like the remnants of a garbage bag that’s badly deteriorated. The ground has been disturbed, by sneakers and perhaps by the storm. Three feet away, I spot the gray-white length of a larger bone. A femur? Part of what looks like vertebrae. Smaller bones of indiscernible origin.
“Is it human?” Hutchinson asks.
“Looks like it,” I tell him.
“Wow. Can’t believe we uncovered a body.” He scratches his head. “How do you think it got here?”
“I don’t know,” I tell him. “But I’d venture to say it didn’t get into that bag without some help.”
CHAPTER 5
An hour later, Dr. Ludwig Coblentz and I are standing near where the old barn had once stood, looking down at a human skull. Usually, a call such as this one—the discovery of human remains—would draw a multitude of law enforcement from multiple agencies. Today, however, most cops in the area are occupied with tornado-related issues, many having worked through the night. Glock swung by earlier to lend a hand taping off the scene, but he got called away on a report of possible looting at a gas station that was damaged by the storm. Until I determine otherwise, this area will be treated as a crime scene.
Mr. Hutchinson has rejoined his scouts, who are now munching on burgers and fries from the McDonald’s in Millersburg. They’ve dragged cut logs into a long row so that they have an unimpeded view of the coroner and me.
“I think they’re enjoying this more than that LEGO movie,” the doc comments as he slips shoe covers onto his feet.
“It beats picking up trash.” I pull on my shoe covers and, together, we enter the scene.
The doc squats next to the skull. “It’s definitely human.”
I motion toward the femur. “What about that? Is it part of the same skeleton?”
“That’s a human femur.” He turns slightly, indicates the vertebrae scattered a few feet away. “Those are human as well.”
“Any idea how long they’ve been here?” I ask.
Grunting, he rises and goes to the black equipment bag he had set on the ground on the other side of the foundation. He removes two sets of blue gloves and hands a pair to me. “You know you’re going to have to get a forensic anthropologist down here to excavate and remove these bones, don’t you?”
“Tomasetti recommended an FA who’s worked several cases for BCI.” I glance at my watch. “He should be here any time now.” I slip my hands into the gloves. “I thought maybe you could give me a ballpark.”
“Let’s take a closer look.” He kneels next to the skull and picks it up. “There’s no trace of any soft tissue. Even the hair is gone from the scalp. I have no way of knowing if that’s due to time or elements or scavengers. That said, taking into consideration the condition of the bones and our climate here in northeastern Ohio … I’d say these bones have been here at least a decade.” He shrugs. “Depending on the PH of the soil, the bones themselves will eventually disintegrate or even fossilize. So, probably less than thirty years.”
“Pretty large ballpark.”
“You asked.” He frowns, but I see amusement behind his bifocals. “I really can’t get you any closer than that.”
“Can you tell if the person was male or female?”
“There’s no pelvis in sight, but…” Tilting his head back slightly, the doc lifts the skull, brushing away a bit of soil, and studies it through his bifocals. “This isn’t foolproof, Chief, but even with my proletarian eye, I can see that there’s a pronounced supraorbital ridge.” He runs a finger over the spot above the eye sockets, about where the brow would be. “I can’t tell you for certain, but I would venture to say this skull belonged to a male.”
“Age?”
He shakes his head. “No clue.”
I look around. The dirt is smooth and hard-packed. There are several pea-size pebbles and other debris. A few bones scattered about, some partially buried. “There don’t seem to be enough bones here for a full skeleton,” I say.
“You’re right; there’s not.”
“Could be buried.”
“Maybe.” He sets down the skull and looks around. “Or if animals had access to this area, the bones could have been carried off or even consumed over the years.”
I indicate the small fragments of what looks like black plastic. “Those pieces,” I say, pointing. “Is it plastic? Fabric? Clothing, maybe?”
His shoe covers crinkle as he crosses to one of the larger fragments and bends for a closer look. “Some kind of nonporous material. Quite deteriora
ted.”
I squat beside him. “Doc, it looks like pieces of a garbage bag.”
He tosses me a knowing look. “That doesn’t bode well for whatever happened to this individual.”
Uneasy questions pry into my brain. Did this person suffer some kind of fall and die? Was he crawling around under the old barn and got stuck? Was he working down here and suffered a heart attack? Or did someone murder him, place his body in a garbage bag, and dump it?
I think about the scarcity of bones, and something dark nudges at my brain. “If those fragments are indeed from some type of bag—a garbage bag, for example—we could be looking at foul play.”
“Bones always have a story to tell,” the doc says to me.
“I suspect the owner of these particular bones didn’t have a happy ending.”
* * *
It takes nearly three hours for the forensic anthropologist to arrive. I used the time to start documenting the scene, taking several dozen photographs, including close-ups of the bones and the scraps of plastic, as well as the surrounding ground. I also walked the immediate area, looking for anything that might offer an explanation for the bones or for additional bones scattered by animals. I’m sipping a bottle of water one of the Boy Scouts brought over to me, when Tomasetti’s Tahoe, a Holmes County Sheriff’s Department cruiser, and a silver Prius pull in and park in the weeds a prudent distance from the scene.
Doc is sitting in his Escalade, talking on his smartphone. A Holmes County deputy and I are standing near my Explorer, exchanging theories and getting sunburned. Two men I don’t recognize get out of the Prius. Sheriff Mike Rasmussen is the driver of the sheriff’s department cruiser. The four men approach.
“I heard someone found some bones out here,” the sheriff says.
I give his hand a firm shake. “A couple of Boy Scouts found a skull while they were cleaning up.”
“Hope they weren’t too traumatized.”
“More intrigued, I think.”
“Dead bodies always make for good ghost stories.”
Tomasetti reaches us, looking at me a little too intently. “Chief.”
I feel a little conspicuous going through the formality of a handshake; we share the same bed every night, and I’m pretty sure Rasmussen knows we’re living together. For the sake of professional decorum, we go through the motions, anyway. “Hi, John.”