Dead Past by Beverly Connor Page B

well.”
    “That would be a yes,” said Neva.
    “It’s good that you did. McNair is telling the commissioner we’re compromising the evidence. I just want to make sure when push comes to shove, we have some leverage to shove really hard. I knew I could count on you.”
    “You should talk about me. Who took photographs on her cell phone—from her closet, yet—just a few months ago of her ex-husband sneaking into her bedroom?”
    Diane smiled. “David, I like you the way you are, paranoia and all. I wouldn’t change a thing.”
    “Why is McNair doing this?” asked Neva.
    “It’s a control thing. Why do control freaks like to control?” She shrugged. “In this case, probably because it’s such a high-profile crime. He must think it will launch his career or his fortunes or something.”
    “The guys who work for him really aren’t that bad when he’s not around,” said David. “They know their business and I get the sense that they don’t like him very much.”
    “Do the best you can. I’m having Garnett work on the problem. That’s all I can do at the moment. If he comes back and starts pawing through sealed evidence again, call me.”
    “Will do,” said David. “We’ve sent you a truckload of bones. The nearer to the heat of the blast, the more loose bones we find.”
    Diane sighed. It still surprised her that someone who is alive and vital one minute can, in a moment, be reduced to bones.
    “Then I’d better get back to work,” she said.

    The morgue tent looked just as it had when she left—blackened bodies on every table. Jin was at her table laying out bones. Archie was at his table sorting through boxes of objects and medical information collected from parents of missing children. It frightened Diane to think that with the slightest change of fate, he might have been filing Star’s identifying information. She shivered. All of them looked up when Diane walked in.
    “We were all so glad to hear that you found Star,” said Lynn Webber. “It was as if she belonged to all of us.”
    “I appreciate that, guys. I can’t tell you what a scary night it was until we found her. She was doing what she should have been, studying for finals with a friend.”
    She paused a moment as she took her place at her metal table. “Her friend, Jenny Baker, was asked to go to the party by Bobby Coleman. She decided to study instead.”
    “Bless her little heart,” said Lynn.
    “I know the Bakers, too,” said Archie. “I’m glad I won’t be going to her funeral as well as Bobby’s.”
    “You know,” said Rankin, “maybe they should have brought outside people in to identify the bodies. We’re going to know so many of these students. I know the parents of one of the kids in the hospital. They’re trying to save his arm.”
    “I know,” said Diane. “One of my museum staff is in the hospital in a coma.” Diane put on her lab coat and latex gloves. “But who could do a better and more careful job than we can? If it’s hard on us, just think of the parents and relatives who are our friends and colleagues.”
    “You’re right about that,” said Rankin. “I guess it’s what we do.”
    “Is there anything new here?” asked Diane.
    “They found another charred body in the basement rubble,” said Lynn. “That brings the total to thirty-three. Garnett assigned priority to all the basement bodies. He wants to know who was found in proximity to the lab. Brewster identified two more bodies of students from their dental charts.”
    Another body. Diane hoped that was the last one. She looked at the bones in front of her. Jin had laid them out on labeled trays.
    “I thought this might be the best way,” said Jin. “Each tray represents the grid they were found in. When you have examined them, I’ll pack them up and take them to the lab to extract DNA.”
    Diane nodded and picked up a charred triquetral—one of the carpal bones in the wrist—and began her measurements.
    “I understand you