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three of them filed out onto the screened-in porch.
    “Whoa whoa,” said another deputy. “Declan, I told you, you can’t come down here. You’ll contaminate the area.”
    “Dick, I think that’s my mother,” said Declan.
    Charlotte gasped.
    “They said the bones were ten years old,” said Charlotte. “Your mother died when you were…”
    “Twelve. Fifteen years ago. And she didn’t die. She disappeared. We never knew what happened.”
    “Well, you can’t come down here right now, Declan,” said the officer. “I’m sorry. There’s nothing to identify, just bones. You’ll have to go to the station and then you can tell us everything you know. What makes you think it’s your mom?”
    “The necklace,” he said, holding up the bag. “I gave my mother this necklace for her birthday, not long before she went missing.”
    “What are you doing with the bag?” Dick shot Daniel a dirty look and snatched the bag from Declan.
    “Sorry,” said Daniel. “I had to give it to him. He looked like he’d seen a ghost.”
    “Where is Sheriff Marshall?” asked Charlotte.
    She hoped Frank might let Declan closer to the body if she asked. After all, she’d given him a coffee mug beer and mowed his tiny patch of lawn for years as a teen. Without her, who would point out on a daily basis that Sherriff Marshall was ridiculous and clearly he should have become Marshal Marshall ? He’d stolen from her the boundless joy of greeting him with “Marshal Marshall Marshall!” in her best Jan Brady imitation. He owed her a favor or two.
    “He left, ma’am, and I’m in charge,” said the reedy officer. He had a humorless disposition. Charlotte wondered if the female officer in her front yard was his sister.
    Declan craned his neck from the porch, doing his best to gain a bird’s eye view of the excavation. Most of the bones still lay half-buried in the dirt. The body lay flat on its back, head missing. Nearby, the skull sat in a clear plastic bag. The jawbone was in the bag as well. Katie had lost all her trophies.
    Dick opened the door to the porch and ushered Declan and Charlotte back into the house. Daniel followed them.
    “I want them out of the house,” said Dick to his partner. He looked at Charlotte and Declan. “Go get a cup of coffee or something.”
    “It’s my house!” said Charlotte, feeling Dick was trying too hard to live up to his name. She’d met him when he was a brand new deputy, green as the sexiest M&M. She’d watched him drop his gun while trying to spin it on his finger like a gunfighter. He had a lot of nerve pretending he was large and in charge now.
    “This house wasn’t even built when she was buried. There aren’t any clues in here.”
    “Yeah, well, I don’t want to have to keep an eye out for you.”
    “Fine, Deputy Dick ,” said Charlotte. “We’ll go. Just don’t try and do any fancy tricks with your gun while we’re gone. I don’t want holes in my walls.”
    Dick pressed his lips into a hard white line and pointed towards her front door.
    That’s right. You remember now. I saw.
    Declan’s face was still ashen; his eyes seemed vacant.
    “Declan,” she said, softly touching his arm. “Let’s go. We can go to Mariska’s. She’s like my mother. Okay?”
    Declan nodded and allowed himself to be led from the house. Charlotte paused to clip a leash on Abby and then navigated them past the female officer. She wasn’t surprised to find the ladies still gathered near her gate. Charlotte caught Mariska’s eye and motioned to her. Mariska nodded and waddled in fourth gear to catch up to them. She had bad legs, so at that pace she looked like a hyperkinetic penguin racing after the last mackerel.
    “They kick you out, dear?” asked Mariska as she grew near. “I don’t know who they think they are. Was it Dick? He’s not the sharpest cheese in the refrigerator, that one. They don’t think you have something to do with the body, do they?”
    “No, nothing like that.