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“Thank you both. I don’t know what I would have done if either of you had freaked out with me. I know that I more than likely would have been shot.” He looked out in the parking lot to see that the coroner was there. “Wait, a second and a third have pulled into the lot too. If you want to know the names on the side, for now, all I can read is Forensic Van. I guess it could be from anywhere.”
Merrick had given him clothing when he had time to pull them from his trunk. He’d not realized how old the man was until he saw him with the light of the trunk. Ayden thought for sure that he would have been retired by now but didn’t comment. The man was keeping everyone from freaking out, and that helped a great deal.
It was nearly midnight when he saw his brother and Brandy. The others, including his brothers, had come along to help search for the bodies if they needed them. Merrick said that they were all young pups so that they’d have a better chance of finding, as their ‘sniffer’ would be younger, too. As each one of them began to head for the woods, he still stayed where he was. He was afraid of messing up the plan that they had of him dying by a gunshot wound when the two men had chased him out of the restaurant. He was helpful by telling Merrick and the Feds, who had finally shown up where the bodies were. His family had been given bright green flags to put where the scent was that they’d found.
By the time the sun was coming up, they’d found sixty spots where the scent of blood was. In the first shallow grave, they found four sets of human appendages. Ayden thought that they’d find twice that many the longer his family was out there sniffing around. Brandy had made arrangements for food and water, as well as light food for the men working. Coffee was a huge seller, he noticed. Then Brandy came to sit on one of the few chairs and talked to him.
“I’m going to have to be more careful with people from now on.” He didn’t say anything because he was sure there was more to come. “I can’t handle this shit anymore. I’d just like to stay at home, pound your brother, and, when the time comes, play with our baby. I’m seriously thinking of closing down this part of my business.”
“What will you do with all that free time on your hands? Besides pounding my brother—which, by the way, is way too much information.” She laughed like he hoped that she would. “I don’t blame you one bit.”
“A few weeks ago, a friend of mine was working at a bakery. He was, like you’re doing, looking to see what was happening in the warehouse where things were sent from. Not only were the employees smoking and in the kitchen barefooted? But the place was so infested with rats—rats, not mice that when the bulldozer tried to take down one of the buildings, rats swarmed the man and his crew by going up the dozer and running after them.” He told her to never tell him the name of the bakery. “I won’t. Lica said the same thing when we were driving here. You’ll be happy to know that I’ve never seen any of the product in any of your homes.”
“Thank goodness for that.” They both laughed that time. It relieved so much stress about this place. “I wanted to ask you something. I was wondering if you could give me a reference so that I could get a car loan. Doing this is wonderful, but I’m going to need a part-time job to make ends meet.” She turned and looked at him.
“You should be getting paid?” Ayden told her that he didn’t need to be paid so long— “No, I’m serious, you should be getting paid all along. I’d never expect anyone to be working for me that isn’t going to get paid. That’s not…I’ll look into what’s happened in the morning. All this time, I thought…Do you think that your brothers aren’t being paid either? Christ, when I think about how many billable hours I’m going to owe Devlin if he’s not being paid either. I might have to keep my doors open just to pay him off.”
“He’d not want you to do that, Brandy. I hope you know that.” She laughed, telling him that she’d been kidding. “Good. That kind of scared me a little bit.”
By the time they were all headed home, over two hundred shallow graves had been found. A great many of them only had one person’s parts in the grave, but a lot of them had more than three sets. It was enough to give him nightmares for the rest of his life.
Climbing into his bed, he was going to use some of his money. He hoped it was enough to get him a new mattress. Maybe some new towels. He laughed when he thought of some of the towels that his family used when living at home. The first towel that he ever had with nap and was thick was when he moved in with the Wilkins family when his mother had been arrested. He was going to get him some special things that he had picked out. He didn’t care if they were new or antiques. Ayden wanted a home that was his and his alone.
“If only I’m going to be making enough money.”
