Bones on Ice: A Novella by Kathy Reichs Page B

you need from me?”
    “All the dirt you have on your new pals.”
    “In my office?”
    “Over lunch.” Slidell again lumbered to his feet. “You’re buying.”
    —
    Slidell’s choice of eatery didn’t surprise me. The King’s Kitchen is one of his favorites, topping Wendy’s and Burger King by a hair. What did surprise me was his selection of salmon over the “Southern meat and three,” his usual. I didn’t ask. But something was up.
    I went for a chicken salad sandwich. Filled him in between bites. To his credit, Slidell listened with little interruption. Then, “So this kid, Brighton Hallis, whistles her merry crew up Everest to make dead Daddy proud. They come down, she doesn’t. Turns out she’s stuck to the mountain like a tongue to a flagpole.”
    “At that altitude, a person freezes in place within an hour.” Ignoring Slidell’s unsettling simile. “One climber, David Sharp, stopped to rest in a place called Green Boots Cave, so named because of the
other
dead climber inside.”
    Slidell’s fork paused, butter beans halfway to his lips.
    “More than thirty climbers passed by as Sharp sat immobile and hypothermic. By the time someone realized he was still breathing, it was too late to pry him loose. Had toleave him to die. Now he’s a guidepost along the route.”
    The beans made it into Slidell’s mouth. Didn’t slow his speech. “You say your vic was dead before she hit the snow.”
    I nodded. “One way or another. With her injuries, she wouldn’t have survived a descent down the mountain, even if she wasn’t dead when her killer left her.”
    “That don’t equal murder.” Still resistant? Or playing devil’s advocate?
    “You need to talk to Hallis’s climbing team. They’re like a motive vending machine. Pick your flavor.” I spoke around a mouthful of cornbread. Complimentary upon request. Mind-blowing upon ingestion. “Maybe I’m misreading them, but no one seems to be mourning Brighton’s passing.”
    Slidell summarized what I’d told him. “So the boyfriend maybe wants to move on. The girlfriend wants the boyfriend. The college pal owes a chunk of change. Everyone’s dying to be star. And the business partner looks like a creep.”
    “Okay. Maybe Damon James doesn’t have motive,” I conceded. “But he has a name like a bank robber.”
    Skinny ignored my joke. “All sucking the Brighton Hallis teat.”
    “As far as I know, she underwrote only Gass’s trip. But I’ll bet my grandma’s china everyone benefited from her trust fund.”
    “Coin is what gets most folks clocked,” Slidell agreed. “Not to devalue sex and drugs.”
    “And you’re right. Everyone wanted a piece of the reality show action.”
    “I’ll run down this Gass character.” Skinny wiped his mouth and inspected the napkin. “What kind of assclown calls a kid
Eee
-lon?”
    “He’s on some sort of expedition in Russia. Supposedly back soon.”
    “I’ll put the screws to the three stooges first, see if something shakes loose.” Pushing back from the table, he tossed a “Thanks for the grub” over his shoulder and left.
    I paid the bill, leaving extra for the soup kitchen supported by the restaurant, then headed back to the lab. En route, I phoned Blythe Hallis. Hands free. Gotta love Bluetooth.
    Raleigh answered, as before asked me to wait.
    “Ms. Brennan, you have news?” Blythe Hallis’s overly long vowels glided like silk across the line.
    “We’ve completed a full-body X-ray on your daughter. As I feared, the damage caused by recovery was extensive.”
    “I’m confident you’ll overcome.”
    “I did notice some anomalies.” I paused to gather just the right words. “Based oncertain injury patterns, we believe your daughter may have been the victim of foul play.” Not quite fair to use the plural pronoun, but I did.
    Nothing but a sharp intake of breath.
    I made a left, then a right. Pulled into the MCME lot. Finally, Hallis spoke, voice modulated as always. “Are you