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Faith wasn’t sure she agreed that running next to a graveyard was peaceful, but she nodded and said, “Okay. Thank you.”
“Are they okay?” Kendra asked. “Whoever’s… I mean, you think someone’s buried alive, right? Like, by accident?”
“Yes,” Faith replied. She chose not to point out that the affirmative was true only for the first part of the question.
Actually, it was true only for the second part of the question. The answer to the third part was a definite no, and as for the first part? She could only hope they had made it in time.
“Faith!” Michael called, his voice carrying over the sound of the digger.
Faith sprinted back to the grave, leaping athletically over headstones as she took the most direct route toward the grave. She reached it just in time to see Michael’s and Missy’s sober expressions. Michael pointed into the grave and Faith looked into it.
She saw a torn, dirt-covered men’s sports coat, a large, Faith guessed.
The coat was empty, as was the grave except for the sports coat and a crumpled piece of paper.
“Should I keep digging?” Missy asked.
Faith shook her head. “No, you’re six feet down already. This was just a diversion.”
“He dug two graves in one night?” Missy asked. “I seriously doubt that.”
Just then, Turk barked and sprinted away from the empty grave. Faith and Missy shared a look, then Faith sprinted after him while Missy jumped into the digger and followed.
Faith swore silently, as frustration and desperation turned into anger.
He was playing with them. He was toying with them. Faith wasn’t sure how he had managed to dig two graves without being caught and without using digging equipment, but it was clear that he had buried that jacket to distract the police.
Well, joke’s on you,she thought,I have a dog.
A mocking voice in her mind reminded her that Turk had been fooled as much as they were. The voice sounded disturbingly like the soft tenor lilt of Trammell, and she shook it away irritably.
Turk stopped in front of a grave, but this one had a headstone. When Faith approached, she could see it belonged to Camille Anderson, b. 1933, d. 2023. And there was another bell.
Missy pulled up in the digger a moment later and hesitated when she saw the headstone.
“The dirt’s freshly dug,” Faith said. “This grave is either new or it was opened.”
Missy nodded, and without further hesitation, she began to dig.
They found the coffin ten minutes later. Faith didn’t bother to ask if they were too late. When the uniforms forced open the coffin, and one of them immediately turned away and vomited, she knew the answer.
Someone tapped her shoulder, and she turned to see Michael staring at her grimly. He handed her a piece of paper, the one crumpled at the bottom of the first grave.
Faith unfolded it and when she read the note, her blood began to boil.
Gotcha!
***
Faith and Michael sat dejectedly next to the grave while Missy talked on the phone with the Andersons, informing them of the desecration. Turk sat at Faith’s feet, his tail thumping sadly on the ground.
“He got lucky this time,” Michael said. “He saw the freshly dug grave and took advantage of that to throw us off the scent.”
Faith shook her head. “No. This wasn’t luck. This was planned. He wrote us a note and dropped it and the sports coat into the other grave and buried his victim in this grave to taunt us.”
“We don’t know that, Faith.”
“We might as well assume he did,” Faith replied. “He wrote a note gloating about fooling us and threw Turk off the scent intentionally.”
