“I can’t find anything new on the case,” Cate muttered, still studying her phone. “I know Phillip would have told me if it’d been solved. I just sent him an email asking for an update.”
There was a sharp knock on the door, and Deputy Tessa Black let herself in the room. “Where is it?” she asked without greeting anyone. Bruce pointed, and Tessa stepped closer, her gaze locked on the bone on top of the box.
“Are you sure it’s real?” she asked.
“Yes.” Henry had no doubt.
“Age?” asked Tessa.
“Three,” said Cate, still focused on her phone.
“That’s assuming it belongs to who you think it does,” said Tessa. She lifted a brow at Henry, silently asking his opinion.
“Age two to five,” he said. He’d done his own Google search to age the mandible by eruption of the teeth. “There’s a lot of leeway.”
“You’re sure this is related to your old case?” Tessa asked Cate.
“I’m ninety-nine percent positive this is from my old case. See the tiny silver crowns on her front teeth? And the silver fillings in the back? During the investigation, I talked to the dental student who did that work on Jade before she vanished. The FBI has dental x-rays of the girl’s mouth before and after the work was done. She had rampant tooth decay from the mother putting her to bed every night with a bottle.”
“I’ve seen toddlers with that before,” added Henry. “Sometimes they have to sedate the child to do the dental work. The parents are always upset to learn that what they thought was a comforting measure to help get their kid to sleep resulted in pain and a lot of dental work.”
“The mom, Kori, asked the dentist if it would be better to put diet soda in Jade’s bottle at night,” Cate said. “The poor guy was stunned. He said he had to tell her a dozen times that water was the only acceptable liquid.” Cate gave a sad smile. “Kori never finished high school and was very naive in many ways.”
“But there is a chance this bone could be from a different child,” Tessa stated.
Henry grimaced. “It’s possible but highly unlikely. Why would someone go to the extreme measure of finding a mandible of the right size with extensive dental work and deliver it to Cate if it wasn’t about her old case?”
“Who knows why people do anything these days,” said Tessa. “Who delivered it to Shiny Objects?”
“There’s no delivery label on the box,” said Cate. “I think it was dropped off by someone who didn’t want to be seen. Marsha assumed it was from a legit delivery service. And no, she doesn’t have cameras.”
“Hardly anyone on the island uses cameras,” said Bruce.
“I use them,” Henry stated firmly. A break-in at his medical clinic had once resulted in the loss of important police evidence. He’d installed cameras soon after. He wasn’t just the sole doctor on the island; he was also the coroner.
“Why wouldn’t they want to show their identity?” asked Bruce.
“Good question,” said Cate. “Someone feels nervous contacting law enforcement. Or they’re involved or don’t want to answer questions . . . but they want some truth to come out.”
“Start from the beginning, Cate. Tell me the whole story of this little girl,” Tessa ordered.
Cate pulled out a chair at the table and sat, taking a deep breath. “It’s been seven years this coming September. It was a kidnapping by the father. The mother came to us—”
“She went directly to the FBI?” Tessa asked sharply.
“No.” Cate pressed her lips together as she thought. “The case started with the Snohomish County Sheriff’s Office. A young woman reported her three-year-old daughter had been kidnapped by the father. The three of them lived together in a small house near Oso, Washington, which is about an hour north of Seattle. It’s not really a town; it’s too small for that. It’s more like a community . . . the type of area that has a general store, a gas station, and not much else. The FBI was contacted two days after Jade Causey disappeared.”