“Are you…going in to work today?”
Another long silence. “They tried to give me the week off, but I’m going in anyway.” She paused, then said: “I imagine there’s a reason you called at six in the morning. I don’t mean to burden you with my problems. What’s up?”
“It’s no burden. I had huge respect for Morwood.” Nora hesitated, but decided to go ahead. “It’s true: we’ve got a little problem out at the dig site, and I was hoping to get your advice. But this obviously isn’t a good time.”
“A good time?” Corrie laughed hollowly. “It’s the perfect time. I could use the distraction. The only way I’m going to get through this is if I bury myself in work.”
“Understood.” Nora swallowed. “One of our scientists, Noam Bitan, went missing. He might be lost. He was way out in the middle of nowhere, wandering around in some hills, and he didn’t return. We sent out search parties this morning and maybe he’ll turn up. But Tappan asked me to check with you to find out what to do if he doesn’t.”
“Whereabouts did he disappear?”
“We think in an area called the Horse Heaven Hills. Northwest of Dead Lake.”
“I have no idea where that is. Is it still in Chaves County?”
“I think so. Is this something the FBI would handle?”
“Only if it connects to the double homicide I’m working on, which seems unlikely. Because it’s outside of a town jurisdiction, it would be handled by the county sheriff.”
“Who’s that?”
“I’ve no idea. I can call Sheriff Watts and find out. It would probably be smart to loop him in, anyway. He’s in Socorro, a few counties to the west.”
“You want to report it right away, or wait until we’re sure Bitan’s missing?”
“Best to report it ASAP,” Corrie said. “If he turns up in a few hours, no harm done. Just to reassure you, the vast majority of missing-persons cases get resolved within twenty-four hours when the person reappears. Let me contact Sheriff Watts and find out who you should deal with. I’ll call you back.”
“Thank you, Corrie. And again, I’m sorry to hear about Morwood.”
“Now I have something to do. Talk to you soon.” She hung up.
The bathroom door opened and Skip appeared in a bathrobe, combing his hair.
“Now you don’t look like a dirty, skinned cat,” Nora said. “Sit down and let me at those injuries.”
He sat down and she examined his nose again. He was going to have a black eye. The cuts and scrapes on his hands were, as he’d said, superficial. She smeared on antibiotic ointment and bandaged everything up.
“Good as new.”
“Thanks, sis.” He paused. “Guess I kind of messed up, didn’t I?”
“What do you think?”
“Tappan is pissed.”
“Probably.”
“He might fire me.”
“Maybe.”
“I shouldn’t have gone along with Bitan and his secrecy. He was so sure of himself. Christ, I always manage to fuck things up.” He dropped his head into his hands.
Nora suddenly felt sorry for him. Poor Skip: he was so impressionable, so easily led astray. “It sounds like Bitan suckered you in. Maybe Tappan will see that.” If necessary, she could talk Tappan out of any really dire punishment. At this thought, her mind flashed back to the brief but wild interlude in his RV. She didn’t ever want to use that as leverage.
“Tappan’s going to fire me for sure,” he said, too preoccupied to notice the flush that came over her face.
“Look, Skip, they’re going to find Bitan, he’ll apologize, and everything will go back to normal. What you said he figured out, that this is just a skip site—it actually makes perfect sense. I wish I’d thought of it. I’ll bet Tappan will forgive him for going a little rogue. We’ll have to find the real crash site now and start digging there.”
“I can’t stop thinking about those lights I saw. I think they were in the area we’d been searching.”
“Maybe it was just a rancher looking for some lost horses. Maybe they were spies. Maybe Bitan was a spy, and he’d arranged to be picked up. In fact, I think that’s probably the most likely.”
Skip raised his head. “Bitan, a spy?”
“It’s possible.”
“Spying for who?”
“I don’t know.” She hesitated. “Between you and me, Tappan suspects there’s a spy on the team. Maybe it was Bitan.”