Carved in Bone

corners of the wooden box. As he was unlocking the cuffs, Steve asked her out on a date; two years later, they got married. I catch up on them—they have three stair-step kids by now—every year or so, whenever I run into Steve in a courtroom or at a crime scene. I have a sneaking suspicion that my Osteology class wasn’t the only time handcuffs have figured in their relationship, but I’m afraid to ask. I’m afraid he might actually tell me.
    I had brought along my TBI consultant’s badge—I’d had one for years, ever since the agency’s director issued it to me in exchange for free scientific work—and I asked Steve if I should show it to the guard at the checkpoint. “Only if it makes you feel good,” he said. I noticed that Steve wasn’t wearing his shield clipped to his belt, as he normally did; instead, clipped to his shirt, he wore a laminated plastic tag with his photo and name. “The feds aren’t impressed by TBI credentials—in fact, I think the security guard actually laughed the one time I showed him mine.” After unloading my pockets and making it through the metal detector, I handed the guard my driver’s license, which he scrutinized for a long time, checking me closely against my photo. Then, once he was satisfied that I was indeed the person that both the TBI agent and I claimed I was, he waved me on. Steve led me to an elevator.
    “So why are we meeting in the federal building?” I asked once the doors had closed on the two of us. “Last time I checked, the TBI office was over on the north side of town.”
    “It is. But we’re not the only ones interested in this.” He didn’t seem inclined to elaborate, so I didn’t press him.
    The elevator doors opened on the sixth floor, opposite a big FBI logo. Steve led me to a receptionist sitting behind bulletproof glass, like a convenience store clerk in a bad neighborhood. She slid a form through a small slot at the bottom of the glass, and once I’d signed in, she buzzed us into a mazelike warren of offices that claimed the entire floor. After several turns in either direction, we entered a conference room occupied by half a dozen or so state and federal law enforcement types—I could tell by the dark suits, serious ties, and conservative haircuts. They were seated around an oak table worthy of King Arthur. Steve introduced them quickly; I’d met one of the FBI agents, Cole Billings, on a forensic case a few years before, but I didn’t know the other Bureau man and woman, nor the DEA guy, nor the second TBI agent, as best I could recall, though that one—Brian Rankin—looked vaguely familiar. Clearly I’d been invited to a breakfast of champions. The League of Justice.
    The female FBI agent—Special Agent Angela Price—seemed to be running the show. “Dr. Brockton, first of all, let me express our appreciation for your time today. Second, I need to stress that everything discussed in this room today stays in this room. That probably goes without saying”—I gave a nod—“but I’m saying it anyway.” I nodded again, just to be sure I was on record as a good listener and cooperative fellow.
    “It’s been awhile since I worked with an interagency task force,” I said. “Last time was probably fifteen years ago, with Agent Billings here—the Fat Sam kidnapping and murder case.” Billings smiled at the memory of the bumbling counterfeiter, who’d been bilked by a slicker counterfeiter and had turned ineptly vengeful.
    Price frowned, shook her head slightly, and held up a finger. “This is not a task force, Dr. Brockton, simply an informal joint investigation. Depending on what we turn up, we could ratchet this up to a task force, but that would require a lot more predication—evidence of wrongdoing—and a lot more paperwork. For now, we’re just trying to get a handle on what’s going on up in Cooke County.”
    Price recapped some relevant Cooke County history. Back in the early 1980s, a joint FBI–TBI task force—the full-fledged version—spent two years investigating corruption in Tennessee sheriff’s departments. They found a lot of it: more than one-quarter of the state’s sheriffs were indicted and sent to prison. It had been an embarrassing time for Tennessee’s sheriffs’ departments in general, and for Cooke County’s in particular: the sheriff at the time had been caught running both a brothel and a cocaine-trafficking ring (complete with its own private airstrip). He ended up getting a