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they got wherever they were going, though.”
    “You think that’s them in there?” Corso asked.
    She shrugged. “I peeked in and poked around a little before we sealed it off.” She looked down at Corso. “We don’t have our own lab or technicians. We’ve gotta wait for the state boys to show up. But the fake dental work looks a lot like Eldred Holmes to me.” Before Corso could ask the obvious question, she went on. “When we were kids, he used to scare the heck out of all the other kids. Had this big old set of snaggle teeth stuck out from his lips. Then, later on, he got ’em fixed. Had ’em pulled and a bridge put in. I know because he pulled it out and showed it to me once. Right in the middle of Royals Drugstore.” She jerked a thumb back over her shoulder. “Looked a lot like the one in the mouth of that skull in there.”
    Thirty yards away, two teams of emergency medical technicians emerged from the house, carrying Dougherty on a gurney. Her hands were wrapped like a boxer’s. The gurney’s wheels were unable to negotiate the snow, so they had to carry her toward the rear of the waiting aid car. She waved a pillowed hand at Corso. He waved back, as they folded the aluminum legs and slid her into the ambulance.
    A black Lincoln Town Car nosed into the far end of the driveway. A plume of exhaust settled over the back half of the car like a cloak. The door opened. A thick-set man in a black overcoat stepped out of the car and began to make his way gingerly toward the house. The sheriff shaded her eyes with her hand.
    Two-thirds of the way down the driveway, he spotted the sheriff and began to veer in her direction. She muttered something under her breath as he approached, but Corso couldn’t catch the words.
    He was a blunt-featured man somewhere in his sixties. His eyebrows were grown out and curly, while his mustache was neatly trimmed. The overall effect lent him a somewhat scholarly quality. “Judge,” the sheriff said, without offering her hand.
    “What do we have here, Sheriff?” he demanded.
    “We’ve got some bones buried under the floor of the shed, Your Honor.”
    Before he could ask another question, she said, “That’s all we know right now, Judge Powell. We’re waiting on the state boys to get a forensics team here.”
    The judge set his jaw like a bass and started for the shed. The sheriff barred the way with her arm. He looked down at her arm with a mixture of anger and disdain.
    “Don’t you dare—” he began.
    She met his irate glare. “We’ve got an active investigation going on here, Judge.” She motioned toward the yellow tape surrounding the general area of the shed. “I’ve got it sealed off,” she said. “State Patrol hates it when they get a contaminated crime scene. Gets ’em thinking we’re a bunch of hicks.” She dropped her arm. “I’m gonna need to keep everybody out until they get here.”
    His lower lip quivered as he swallowed whatever he’d intended to say next. Instead he took a deep breath and expelled the air through his nose in a pair of locomotive plumes. “You’ll keep me posted,” he said. It wasn’t a question.
    “Of course,” she said.
    He shot Corso a look and then went back to glaring at the sheriff.
    “I’ll be in my office,” the judge said. “I’ll expect to hear from you before the end of the day.”
    “The timelines are not under my control, Your Honor,” she said. “The state boys will—”
    He cut her off. “By the end of the day,” he repeated, before turning on his heel and marching off. She stood silently, watching him make his way back to the car. Followed the big black car with her eyes until it was out of sight. Sighed.
    “Richardson,” she called.
    Across the trampled expanse of snow, a tall guy in a matching brown uniform turned toward the voice. Instead of the warm flaps-down model the sheriff was wearing, Richardson wore one of those state trooper military model hats with the leather strap so tight