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“Apparently not. How about you? How goes your island quest?”
“It’s not a quest. A dog named Thursday found the bones before I got here. We spent the past two days collecting them.”
“You and Musgrove?”
“And her CSU team. They’re quite good.”
“Now what?”
“Today, an engineer from Miami inspected the boat carrying the five DOAs. Tomorrow, he briefs us on what he’s learned.”
“Have the vics been IDed?”
I listed the names and described their manly bonding scheme.
“Sounds like exceptionally dumbass thinking.”
“The passengers are all from Florida.”
“Makes sense now.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
Ryan stifled a yawn.
“Am I keeping you up?” I asked.
“Not very well. Why are dead boaters your concern?”
I’d asked myself that same question.
“Musgrove can be very persuasive,” I said. “How’s Birdie?”
“Displeased with the canned food I bought.”
“He only likes the pâté style.”
“Now you tell me. When do you think you’ll return to Montreal?”
“Soon,” I said, not really believing it.
A little mushy stuff from Ryan, then we disconnected.
I was asleep by ten.
The Honda was there as promised, a boxy affair whose mustard yellow paint was losing its battle with rust. I guessed the thing hadrolled off the assembly line back in the sixties. And had a hard life since. The windshield was cracked. The AC worked but had only a vague understanding of what it was supposed to do.
Fifteen minutes after setting out, I pulled into the lot at the RTCIPF Grace Bay Station. Inside, a uniformed officer inspected my ID, then led me down a short hall to a small back room. Offered coffee. Disappeared.
Luna Flores, the forensic engineer, was already there. And contrary to Musgrove’s assumption, Floreswasn’ta guy but a sister double X—I refer to chromosomes, of course.
Flores’s hair was black and styled in a no-nonsense boy cut, her skin cinnamon, her eyes a heart-stopping blue. Based on a hint of jawline sag, crinkling at the eye corners, and the presence of a few renegade gray hairs, I guessed her age at mid-fifties minimum.
Flores wore cargo pants, probably size six extra-long, and a shirt several shades quieter than her eyes. Small gold hoops hung from both ears.
She was seated in one of four folding chairs at a government-issue gray metal table. She rose when I appeared. Following a handshake and self-intros, I took a place opposite her.
Like me, Flores didn’t excel at casual banter. We exchanged a few comments about breakfast, the weather, her flight to Provo. The woman’s accent and vocabulary suggested she’d probably grown up rough. Maybe Miami. Definitely south Florida.
