Dance of the Bones

“What’s that?”


“The way Ken talked about John Lassiter, it was almost as though he blamed himself that his friend was rotting away in prison. A -couple of times he said things to me about going back and ‘making it right.’ But then, almost overnight, he started talking about our having some kind of a big payday coming and about our being able to move into an actual apartment. It was like he expected to come into a sum of money—-a lot of money.”

She paused and looked at her husband as if pleading for assistance.

“What Callie is trying to say,” Dale Grover said, “is we think there’s a good chance Kenneth knew who killed Amos Warren. As for that expected payday?”

I could see the pieces falling into place. “Blackmail?” I asked.

Calliope Horn--Grover nodded as a pair of tears slid down her weathered cheeks. “Yes,” she said softly. “That’s what I think now, too. He knew something about what happened and was maybe even involved in it, and that’s where the money would have come from—-blackmail.”

That’s the moment I realized why Calliope was really weeping. It wasn’t just because she had lost the “love of her life.” It was worse than that. She had always thought of Kenny Myers as the one who got away. Even though he had left her, she had still thought of him as a “good guy” in her interview with Sue Danielson. Now, though, she was faced with the grim possibility that almost none of that was true. And if Kenneth Mangum/Myers had been involved in some kind of blackmail scheme, there was also a chance that he had been involved in something much worse—-the murder of Amos Warren.





CHAPTER 23




SPEAKING SOFTLY, OWL TOLD SHINING Falls to wake up and follow him. When she tried, Owl could see that she was no longer all asleep, as she had been, but she was not yet fully awake, either.

Evil Giantess had used some red feathers when she put Shining Falls to sleep, and because Owl had no red feathers, he could not bring her completely awake. Owl decided that he would take Shining Falls home with him until he could find some red feathers.

Slowly the girl followed Owl until they came to a water hole surrounded by large rocks. When Shining Falls stepped on one of those rocks, it made a sound. Owl tried to call out a warning, but it was too late. Evil Giantess had heard the noise, and she was awake. Her hair spread out like an evil cloud, and Owl’s feet got tangled in her hair. While Owl struggled to get free, Shining Falls fell into the water.

IT HAD BEEN YEARS SINCE Ava Martin Hanover Richland had actually cleaned a house. She had -people to do that detestable chore just as she had -people to carry out her other orders. That afternoon she did the work herself, however, and she did a thorough job of it, too. Looking up from her vacuuming, she peeled back the top of her latex glove and studied her watch. In an hour or so, John Lassiter would be a thing of the past. An hour or so after that Henry Rojas would be gone as well.