This time it was banging that breached the thick wall of sleep.

I awoke disoriented.

From a dream? I couldn’t remember.

The room was dark.

Fragments began to congeal. The sugar shack. The barrel. The autopsy.

Pomerleau.

Had I imagined the pounding?

I listened.

The thrum of traffic. Heavy now, uninterrupted.

No sleet or wind thrashing the window.

“Brennan.” Bang. Bang. Bang.

8:05.

Shit.

“Ass out of bed.”

“Coming.” I pulled on the clothes I’d worn the day before. All I had.

The sun blinded me when I opened the door. The storm had ended, leaving an unnatural stillness in its wake.

Aviator shades distorted my face into a fun-house version of itself. Above them, a black wool tuque. Below them, windburned nose and cheeks.

“You’re here.” Lame. I was still wooly.

“You should be a detective.”

One of Ryan’s old lines. Neither of us laughed.

“Rolling in ten.”

“Twenty,” I said, shielding my eyes with one hand.

“I’ll be in the Jeep.”

Twelve minutes later, I was buckled in, fingers curling around a wax-coated polyethylene cup for warmth. The Jeep smelled of coffee and overcooked pork.

“Anyone could have boosted this ride.”

“No one did.”

“I need this Jeep.”

“I’m sure it needs you.”

“You’re not vigilant.”

“Ease up, Ryan. You had keys.”

“Leaving it at the medical complex was just plain lazy. Good thing Karras let me know.”

An Egg McMuffin lay in my lap, grease turning the wrapper translucent in spots.

“How did you get here from St. Johnsbury?” I asked.

“Umpie hooked me up with a lift.”

It was Umpie now.

“Where are we going?”

Ryan merged into traffic. Didn’t answer.

I unwrapped the sandwich, took a few bites. Minutes later, we fired up the entrance ramp onto I-89. Heading north.

“There it is.” I pointed at Ryan. “There’s that smile.”

He was clearly not in the mood for teasing.

Fine.

I watched Vermont slide by.

The morning sun was melting a world made of ice. Still, the countryside looked glistening brown, caramelized. Perhaps coated with maple syrup.

“Okay, sunshine. I’ll start.” Jamming my McMuffin wrapper into the bag between us. “It was Anique Pomerleau in that barrel.”

The aviators whipped my way. “Are you shitting me?”

“No.”

“How’d she die?”

“I can tell you how she didn’t.”

I outlined the autopsy findings. Ryan listened without interrupting, face tight and wary. When I’d finished, he said, “Rodas’s team tossed the property top to bottom. Found no drugs or drug paraphernalia.”

“What was in the house?”

“Crap furnishings and appliances. Canned food in the pantry, cereal and pasta that delighted generations of rodents.”

“With readable expiration dates?”

“A few. The most recent was sometime in 2010.”

“What about the refrigerator?”

“Variations on rot. Bugs, mouse droppings, mold. Looks like the place was occupied for a while, then abandoned.”

“Abandoned when?”

“Old newspapers got tossed into a basket. Burlington Free Press. The most current was from Sunday, March 15, 2009. That and the food dates suggest no one’s been living there for over five years.”

“Did you check light switches? Lamps?”

Ryan slid me a look. “All were turned off except a ceiling fixture in the kitchen and a lamp in one bedroom. Those bulbs were burned out.”

“Were the beds made?”

“One yes, the other one no.”

“Whoever was there last made no effort to close up. You know, clean out the refrigerator, strip the beds, turn off the lights. They just left. Probably at night.”

“Very good.”

“How’d the papers arrive?”

“Not by mail. The post office stopped service because the resident at the address provided no mailbox.”

“When was that?”

“1997. According to Umpie, there’s no home delivery.”

I thought a moment. “Pomerleau did her shopping in or near Burlington.”

“Or at a local store that sold Burlington papers.”

“Any vehicle?”

“An ’86 Ford F-150 was parked in one of the sheds.”

“That’s a truck, right?”

“Yes, Brennan. A half-ton pickup.” Ryan jumped my next question. “Quarter tank of gas in the truck. No plates. Obviously no GPS to check.”

“Obviously. Anything else in that shed?”

“An old tractor and cart.”

“I assume the house had no alarm system.”

“Unless they had a dog.”

“Was there evidence of that?”

Ryan only shook his head. Meaning no? Meaning the question annoyed him?

“There were no close neighbors,” I said to the windshield, the armrest, maybe the air vent. “No one to notice if lights failed to go on and off.”

Ryan cut left to overtake a Budweiser truck. Fast. Too fast.

“Did the house have a phone?” I couldn’t recall seeing wires.

“No.”

“I’m guessing no cable or Wi-Fi.”

No response.

“What about utilities? Gas? Water? Electric?”

“They’re on it.”

“The Corneaus died in 1988. Who paid the taxes after that?”

“They’re on that, too.”

“Do you really think Pomerleau was living there, tapping trees, and keeping a low profile?”

“One bedroom had a collection of books on maple sugar production. All the equipment needed was already on-site.”

“What do the neighbors say?”

“They’re—”

“On it. Why are you being such an ass?”

Ryan’s hands tightened on the wheel. He inhaled deeply. Exhaled through his nose. “We found something else in there.”

“Must have been flesh-eating zombies, the way you’re acting.”

It was worse.

CHAPTER 24

“ME?”

“Yes, Brennan. You.”

“What magazine?” My gut felt like I’d just drunk acid. It wasn’t the McMuffin.

“Health Science.”

“I don’t remember being interviewed—”

“Well, you were.”

“When did the story appear?”

“2008.”

“What was the subj—”

“Only one page was saved. A picture of you measuring a skull in your lab at UNCC.”

A vague recollection. A phone call. A piece profiling changes in physical anthropology over the past five decades. Would I comment on my subspecialty of forensics? Could I share a graphic?

I’d thought the article might dispel Hollywood myths about crime scene glamour and hundred-percent solve rates. Had it been six years?

The heartburn was spreading from my stomach to my chest. I swallowed.

Pomerleau had clipped a photo of me. Had known I lived in Charlotte. Had known since 2008.

Lizzie Nance had died in 2009. Others had followed. Estrada. Leal. Maybe Koseluk and Donovan. ME107-10.

Before I could comment, Ryan’s phone buzzed in his pocket. He checked the screen, clicked on, listened. “Pomerleau.”

The expletive was muted by Ryan’s ear. Questions followed. Ryan responded with mostly one-word answers. “Yes.” “No.” “Undetermined.” “Suspicious.”

“I’ll put you on speaker.” He did, then placed the phone on the dash.

“How’s it going, Doc?” Rodas.

“Hunky-dory.”

“Here’s what we’ve got so far. A canvass of the neighbors took about five seconds, practically no one out there. The couple to the south are both in their eighties. Can’t hear, can’t see. They knew the Corneaus, said they used the place in spring for sugaring, sporadically in summer. Lamented their passing. The husband thought a granddaughter lived there for a while.”

“When did he last see her?”

“He didn’t know.”

“Was she blond?”

“I’ll ask.”

“I’m sending two images. An age progression done on Pomerleau’s mug shot.” As I texted the files. “And a close-up I took at autopsy. Show those to him.”

“Will do. The neighbor to the north is a widower, stays out there only part of the year. He knew zilch. Ditto for those living along Hale.”