AllFreeNovel
Share Us
When our awkward exchange petered out, I checked my surroundings. The room was cramped and stuffy and had no view to exploit. Photos of Queen Elizabeth II and the island’s governor, Nigel John Dakin, hung on one wall. With the queen having passed not that long ago, I wondered vaguely if someone had dropped the ball by not putting the image of King Charles up there. Did British territory police departments get demerits for such things?
Minutes dragged by.
Five.
Ten.
Flores and I repeatedly checked our watches. Our phones. Neither of us commented on Musgrove’s tardiness.
Perhaps uncomfortable with the silence, perhaps out of genuine curiosity, eventually Flores asked about my field. I explained forensic anthropology, then queried her training.
Flores held a doctorate in naval architecture and marine engineering from the University of Michigan and had interned with the US Department of Defense. She’d passed both the FE, Fundamentals of Engineering, and the NCEES, National Council of Examiners for Engineering and Surveying exams. She’d worked for ExxonMobil, MAERSK, the Virginia Department of Transportation. She was currently employed by the McKee Engineering Group, a private outfit headquartered in Miami.
No question the woman was qualified.
By eleven we’d both checked our mobiles a billion times. And we’d both run out of patience. I wanted to begin examining the two sets of bones. Flores undoubtedly had plans of her own.
“This is bullshit.”
I looked up.
Flores eyes were on me, showing a ferocious and somewhat unnerving intensity.
“Let me phone her,” I said.
“I did that.”
“I’ll try again.”
I dialed. Got voice mail. Left a less than serene message.
“Shall I go out front to see if she’s called the main line here?”
Flores nodded.
The cop at the desk was not the same one who’d parked me with Flores. This guy was short with well-muscled arms. Or maybe he carried his height in his legs. His name tag saidR. Chanson. He was perusing a copy ofPopular Mechanics.
R. Chanson was exceedingly uninformative. Or skillfullyevasive. He knew nothing about Musgrove’s nonappearance. Offered to phone her mobile. When I told him I’d done that, he shrugged.
I asked R. Chanson to contact Delroy Monck. Knowing who I meant, he punched a few keys. Listened.
Voice mail, he explained, cupping the receiver.
I requested that he leave my name and number. Provided both.
R. Chanson did as asked, disconnected, and picked up his magazine. I was being dismissed.
I rejoined Flores. A yellow legal pad now lay on the tabletop before her. A pen.
I shook my head to indicate that I’d learned nothing.
“Look, I can’t fuck around here all day.” The cant of her neck and shoulders told me she was pissed as hell. “I have things to do.”
“As do I.”
“Here’s how it’s going to play.” Jabbing the pen toward my chair.
Irked at Flores’s arrogant tone, I took my time sitting.
