One Grave Less

break-in. It was clear that Vanessa hadn’t told Laura about Simone Brooks. That was what had Diane worried at the moment. What was that about?

    It had been a long day. Diane had thin-sectioned the bone—cutting a paper-thin slice from it for examination under the microscope. The thin-section revealed that the child had normal bone growth. He or she wasn’t undernourished and the bone showed no sign of disease. A healthy child before tragedy struck.
    When Diane finished her examination she took a bone sample down to Deven Jin, the director of her DNA lab in the basement, for stable isotope analysis. The types, numbers, and ratios of stable isotopes absorbed from food and water the child had consumed would tell them the types of foods that were in the child’s diet. If they were lucky, they would be able to identify the area from which the foods had come—maybe even pinpoint the local population in which he or she had lived. That could lead to a DNA comparison. Then, perhaps, someone would know who the child was.
    It was late when Diane left the museum. Frank would probably be home already. She lived in his home. He kept telling her it would be their home, but she had resisted calling something hers that he had nurtured for years.
    Frank’s Queen Anne-style house sat several hundred feet back from the road amid huge oak trees. It was a lovely house and well maintained—like Frank—grounded in fine tradition and possessing of a sound structure.
    His white Chevy Camaro was parked in the driveway. She pulled in beside it and hurried into the house, glad to be home. Frank apparently heard her drive up and was putting dinner on the table—one of his favorites and hers too—spaghetti.
    Frank kissed her and took her purse and guided her in to the living room. Frank was about three inches taller than Diane’s five-nine. He had salt-and-pepper hair that was still mostly pepper. And the most beautiful blue-green eyes. She never tired of looking at him or the way his eyes crinkled at the corners when he smiled.
    He had been out of town for several days and this was the first she had seen of him since the events at the museum. She hugged him again.
    “Miss me, did you?” He grinned. “I understand you had some excitement. Sorry I couldn’t call last night.”
    Frank was a detective in the Metro-Atlanta Fraud & Computer Forensics Unit and he traveled periodically in connection with his cases.
    “It’s all right. How was your case?” she asked.
    “Not good. The guy escaped from the courthouse and now the U.S. Marshals get to deal with him.”
    He stood a moment looking at her. She didn’t know what emotion was playing around his lips. It was something between amusement and dread.
    “What?” she said.
    “Might as well get the bad stuff out of the way first. Then we’ll eat and catch up,” he said.
    Diane stepped back. “What bad stuff?”
    He took a breath.
    “You have an enemy out there,” he said. “I’ve received several calls telling me that you’re seeing men while I’m out of town.”

Chapter 11
    Maria jerked her hand with the gun from behind her and fired at the hulk on her. She felt the sound of the blast ripple through her chest. It was an earthquake shaking her bones, but instinctively she knew she was not shot. She did not feel the trauma telling her that her flesh had been pierced or torn. What she saw was the shock in the eyes of the man on top of her. She shoved him and he fell onto his back, crying out as he hit the ground. A large stain of blood was spreading on his shirt. Maria knocked his gun away from him.
    The gunshot had hit his shoulder. He was now incapacitated in both arms. She grabbed the kerchief from around his neck and stuffed it under his shirt and over the wound. That was the extent of mercy she was willing to give him. She began searching his pockets.
    “Damn you,” he groaned, and tried to head butt her.
    But he was slow and Maria hit him in the side of his jaw with her fist. His head jerked back and hit the ground.
    “You don’t have the right to my life,” she croaked at him.
    All the adrenaline that had been keeping her going was fading. She ached and itched all over. She was hot, hungry, and scared—and she smelled bad. But she forced herself to continue searching him, choking back feelings of guilt. Her fingers shook as she went through his pockets aided by the light from the flashlight that she set on the ground.
    She found another set of keys, more money,