Bones of the Lost

blankly.
    “She needs to fumigate?”
    “Oh, no.” He shook his head. “She’s spray-painting antique bottles to use in the centerpieces. Or some damn thing. It’s supposed to look artsy.”
    Wedding talk. Nope.
    A short, thrumming blast of Bob Marley, and we were at theCarolina Ale House, a multiscreened extravaganza on the ground floor of a steel-and-glass tower in the heart of uptown. Pete managed to secure a table away from the bar. Not quiet, but out of the no-talk zone.
    A waitress greeted Pete with more teeth than a radial saw and favored me with a millisecond of eye contact while mumbling that her name was April.
    “Fat Tire ale?” April beamed another dental stunner at my ex.
    “Good memory.” Pete did the finger-pistol thing.
    I asked for Perrier and lime.
    Pete chose the baby back ribs. I went for flatiron steak.
    Food and drinks ordered, I pulled the documents from my purse and laid them in front of Pete. He glanced at them but did not pick them up.
    A void stretched across the table, a bubble of quiet amid the din around us. So little paper. So few words for a love that had produced hopes, dreams, and a beautiful daughter. A love destroyed by an act of betrayal.
    There should have been some ceremony. An unwedding? A rite of dissolution? Something beyond a Settlement Agreement and Verification. At least a better font.
    “Sorry it’s taken so long.” I broke the awkward silence. “No excuse. I should have—”
    “It’s not a problem, sugarbritches. I’ll have these filed before noon.”
    “Don’t call me that.” Reflex.
    “Okay.” The old Pete smile. “Cupcake.”
    Pete slid the papers into the snazzy jacket pocket, then patted my hand.
    The touch. His skin on mine. So familiar.
    I groped for neutral conversational ground.
    “Your wrongful-death case, barrister? How’s it going?”
    “I won’t know until my doctor gets deposed in the morning.”
    I told him about the criminal misdemeanor trial from which I’d escaped. He told me about a tooth that was causing him grief.
    Mercifully, April arrived with our drinks. Pete chugged. I sipped.
    “And you?” After another awkward pause. “How’re things with Monsieur Le Dick?”
    Monsieur Le Dick, Pete’s flip name for Andrew Ryan, Lieutenant-détective, Section des crimes contre la personne, Sûreté du Québec. My colleague when I consult to the Laboratoire de sciences judiciares et de médecine légale in Montreal. My on-and-off lover. Off now. Off forever?
    “He’s good.”
    “Bon.”
Pronounced “bone.”
    “Never speak French, Pete.”
    And don’t ask about Ryan. Don’t force me to voice my anxiety over his recent coolness. His distance.
    If Ryan and I truly were finished, the split wouldn’t be as wretched as the one from Pete. There would be no bitterness, no angst. No stunned child to whom an explanation was due. No moving out. No division of property. No standing in line at the DMV to record change of address. With Ryan, there’d be nothing but a murky trench of sadness.
    I couldn’t bear to talk about it. To think about it.
    “I’m swamped with work here,” I said.
    “Anything interesting?”
    “Four mummified dogs from Peru.”
    Pete cocked a questioning brow.
    I told him about the confiscation by ICE at the Charlotte airport.
    Our plates arrived and, for a full minute, we focused on salt and pepper, steak sauce, butter, sour cream, and ketchup. April asked if I needed more ice.
    Inexplicably, my thoughts went to the child in the cooler.
    “We’ve also got a teenage girl,” I said to Pete. “Run down last night near Old Pineville Road.”
    “The parents must be devastated.”
    “We don’t know who she is.”
    “Jesus. Larabee’s case?”
    I nodded. “There are a couple of leads. If Slidell would get off his fat ass. In his mind—”
    “Which is small.”
    I smiled. “In his small mind, she’s an illegal turning tricks.”
    “Proof?”
    “A pink purse, needle tracks, and bad teeth.”
    “That’s it?”
    “Bleached hair, a dark complexion, and a Spanish note in her purse.”
    “Skinny thinks she’s from south of the border.”
    I nodded.
    Pete chuckled and shook his head. He’d met Slidell, knew how pigheaded the man could be.
    The clamor of voices hushed. Then a multi-throated groan filled the room. Some sporting event was not going well for the home team.
    Pete’s ribs were stripped and stacked when he laid down his utensils and wiped his mouth.
    “Can I roll something by