Read LC 02 - Questionable Remains for Free Online

terrible." Grace bit her lower lip.

    "He was doing that-I can't remember what you call itsome kind of daredevil skiing, where you go straight down
a mountainside. Had a fall. It's a wonder he didn't kill himself then," said Miles. Lindsay could see he was having a
hard time keeping quiet about his brother-in-law. She also
saw that Miles believed Grace's brother's death was his
own fault, and it was only for his wife's sake that he was
going along with asking for Lindsay's help.
    "How did he die?" Lindsay asked, still being cautious.
    "Ken was a caver," answered Miles. "He had a caving
accident."
    "Ken was a good caver. He was safety conscious. He took
care of the people who went caving with him," Grace said.
    "Caving is dangerous," insisted Miles. "Even the best
cavers have accidents. Caves are unpredictable."
    Grace looked at her husband with no malice. "Miles
thinks I'm wrong," she said. "That I'm too grieved. But I
know my brother."
    "We need to just tell her what we know," said Miles. His
wife nodded and looked to him to tell the story.
    Miles went on. "Grace is right: Ken knew caves, around
here and all over in Tennessee and Kentucky, too. But he
would sometimes go off caving with friends and not tell anybody where they'd gone. They might've taken off to Atlantic
City or California as far as anybody knew."
    "Ken was always a little wild," said Grace, "full of life.
He liked to see and do things."
    "Two years ago, Ken and a couple of friends went off like
that, not telling anybody, and just didn't come back.
Nobody knew where they were. The sheriff thought they'd left town. His buddies were just as likely to up and take off
as Ken was."

    "He had a business," said Grace. "He wouldn't have left
his business. Ken was serious about that."
    "That's true," said Miles. "He sold sporting equipment,
expensive stuff. Did pretty good. He was in it with his wife.
It was her money that started it."
    "It was her that killed him," said Grace. "She got a ton of
insurance money. Extra for accidental death."
    "How was he finally found?" asked Lindsay.
    "Some other cavers in Tennessee found him," Miles said.
"Just this past May. We'd not been back a month from our
vacation. The cavers just happened on his remains, his and
his friends'. I understand it was a pretty hard cave to
explore, one of the most dangerous. That's why it took so
long to find them. The cave is on private property, and hardly anybody goes there. Apparently a cave-in of some sort
trapped them." Miles took Grace's hand. "They died there."
    "Jennifer arranged it. I know she did."
    "Is his wife a caver?" asked Lindsay.
    Grace stared at her a moment, puzzled at the question.
"No, I-"
    "It would be hard to arrange a cave-in so that you wouldn't get caught in it, too, and so that the authorities wouldn't
find evidence," said Lindsay.
    "There was some talk of Jennifer having an affair with
some guy," offered Miles. "Grace thinks that the two of
them killed Ken and his buddies in the cave, then somehow
removed the evidence."
    His wife nodded. "When they were found, they were
nothing but bones. We were thinking that maybe you might
be able to see something from the bones that the authorities
missed."
    "Surely they are already buried," said Lindsay gently.
    "That's true," said Miles. "But the sheriff took pictures
when they were found, and I had them blown up." Miles picked up the manila envelope from the table and opened it.
Grace averted her eyes.

    Lindsay looked at the black-and-white photographs he
handed her. The first one showed a pile of rocks with blue
jeans and boots sticking out from under the rubble. The next
photograph showed three individuals who had been
crushed under the rubble, looking all the more flattened
because they had been skeletonized. The other photographs
were close-up shots of bony hands that were still articulated.
The skull of one of the skeletons had rolled away and come
to rest about two feet from the