Birthright (4 page)

She wiped her hands on the thighs of her jeans, straightened up. “Rhyolite. There was plenty of it in these hills. And this . . .” She turned the sealed stone in her hand. “This looks like rhyolite to me. Could be this was a camp—Neolithic campsite. Could be it was more. People of that era were starting to settle, to farm, to domesticate animals.”

If she'd been alone, if she'd closed her eyes, she could have seen it in her mind. “They weren't as nomadic as we once believed. What I can tell you, Ms. Campbell, from this very cursory study, is that you've got yourself something real sexy here.”

“Sexy enough for a grant, a team, a formal dig?”

“Oh yeah.” Behind her tea-colored lenses, Callie's gaze scanned the field. She was already beginning to plot the site. “Nobody's going to be digging footers for houses on this site for some time to come. You got any local media?”

The light began to gleam in Lana's eyes. “A small weekly newspaper in Woodsboro. A daily in Hagerstown. There's a network affiliate in Hagerstown, too. They're already covering the story.”

“We'll give them more, then bump it up to national.” Callie studied Lana's face as she tucked the sealed bag in her pack. Yeah, pretty as a sunbeam, she thought. And smart, too. “I bet you come across real well on TV.”

“I do,” Lana said with a grin. “How about you?”

“I'm a killer.” Callie scanned the area again, began to imagine. Began to plan. “Dolan doesn't know it, but his development was fucked five thousand years ago.”

“He's going to fight you.”

“He's going to lose, Ms. Campbell.”

Once again Lana held out a hand. “Make it Lana. How soon do you want to talk to the press, Doctor?”

“Callie.” She pursed her lips and considered. “Let me touch base with Leo, find a place to stay. How's that motel outside of town?”

“Adequate.”

“I've done lots worse than adequate. It'll do for a start. Okay, let me do some groundwork. You got a number where I can reach you?”

“My cell phone.” Lana pulled out a card, scribbled down the number. “Day and night.”

“What time's the evening news?”

“Five-thirty.”

Callie looked at her watch, calculated. “Should be enough time. If I can move things along, I'll be in touch by three.”

She started back toward her car. Lana scrambled to catch up. “Would you be willing to speak at a town meeting?”

“Leave that to Leo. He's better with people than I am.”

“Callie, let's be sexist.”

“Sure.” Callie leaned on the fence a moment. “Men are pigs whose every thought and action is dictated by the penis.”

“Well, that goes without saying, but what I mean in this case is people are going to be a lot more intrigued and interested in a young, attractive
female
archaeologist than a middle-aged man who works primarily in a lab.”

“Which is why I'll talk to the TV crew.” Callie boosted herself over the fence. “And don't shrug off Leo's impact. He was a digger when you and I were still sucking our thumbs. He's got a passion for it that gets people stirred up.”

“Will he come in from Baltimore?”

Callie looked back at the site. Pretty flatland, the charm of the creek and the sparkle of the pond. The green and mysterious woods. Yes, she could understand why people would want to build houses there, settle in by the trees and water.

She suspected they had done so before. Thousands of
years before.

But this time around they were going to have to look elsewhere.

“You couldn't keep him away. By three,” she said again, and swung into the Rover.

She was already yanking out her cell phone and dialing Leo when she drove away.

“Leo.” She shifted the phone so she could bump up the air-conditioning. “We struck gold.”

“Is that your scientific opinion?”

“I had a femur and a spear point practically fall in my lap. And this is in some hole dug by heavy equipment where people have been tramping around like it was Disneyland. We need security, a team, equipment, and we need that grant. We need them all ASAP.”

“I've already pulled the chain on the funds. You take on some students from the U of M.”

“Grad students or undergrads?”

“Still being discussed. The university wants first crack at studying some of the artifacts. And I'm doing some fast talking with the Natural History Museum. I've got a buzz going, Blondie, but I'm going to need a hell of a lot more than a couple of bones and a spear point to keep it up.”

“You're going to get it. It's a settlement, Leo. I can feel it. And the soil conditions? Jesus, they couldn't be much better. We may have some hitches with this Dolan. The girl lawyer's pretty firm on that. Small-town politics at play here. We need some big guns to get his cooperation. Campbell wants to call a town meeting.”

Callie glanced wistfully at the pizza parlor before she made the turn to head out of town to the motel. “I drafted you for that.”

“When?”

“Sooner the better. I want to set up an interview with the local TV late afternoon.”

“It's early for the media, Callie. We're just gathering ammo. You don't want to break the story before we've outlined strategy.”

“Leo, it's midsummer. We've only got a few months
before we'll have to pack it in for the winter. Media exposure puts the pressure on Dolan. He doesn't step back and let us work, he refuses to donate the finds or pushes to resume his development, he comes off as a greedy asshole with no respect for science or history.”

She pulled into the motel's lot, parked and, shifting the phone again, grabbed her pack.

“There's not that much you can tell them.”

“I can make a little seem like a lot,” she said as she climbed out and went to the back of the Rover to pull out her duffel.

With that slung over her shoulder, she pulled out her cello case. “Trust me on this part, and get me a team. I'll take the students, use them for grunts until I see what they're made of.”

She yanked open the door of the lobby, stepped up to the desk. “I need a room. Biggest bed you got in the quietest spot. Get me Rosie,” she said into the phone. “And Nick Long if he's available.” She dug out a credit card, set it on the counter. “They can bunk at the motel just outside of town. I'm checking in now.”

“What motel?”

“Hell, I don't know. What's this place called?” Callie asked the desk clerk.

“The Hummingbird Inn.”

“No kidding? Cute. Hummingbird Inn, on Maryland Route Thirty-four. Get me hands, eyes and backs, Leo. I'm going to start shovel tests in the morning. I'll call you back.”

She disconnected, shoved the phone in her pocket. “You got room service?” she asked the clerk.

The woman looked like an aged little doll and smelled strongly of lavender sachet. “No, honey. But our restaurant's open from six
A
.
M
. to ten
P
.
M
. every day of the week. Best breakfast you'll get anywhere outside your own mama's kitchen.”

“If you knew my mother,” Callie said with a chuckle, “you'd know that's not saying much. You think there's a waitress or a busboy who'd like to earn an extra ten by
bringing a burger and fries, a Diet Pepsi to my room? Well done on the burger. I've got some work that can't wait.”

“My granddaughter could use ten dollars. I'll take care of it.” She took the ten-dollar bill and handed Callie a key attached to a huge red plastic tag. “I put you 'round back, room six-oh-three. Got a queen bed and it's quiet enough. Probably take about half an hour for that hamburger.”

“Appreciate it.”

“Miss . . . ah . . .” The woman squinted at the scrawled signature on the check-in card. “Dunbock.”

“Dunbrook.”

“Dunbrook. You a musician?”

“No. I dig in the dirt for a living. I play this”—she jiggled the large black case—“to relax. Tell your granddaughter not to forget the ketchup.”

A
t four o'clock, dressed in clean olive-green pants and a khaki-colored camp shirt, her long hair freshly shampooed and drawn back in a smooth tail, Callie once again pulled to the shoulder of the site.

She'd worked on her notes, had e-mailed a copy of them to Leo. On her way back, she'd dropped by the post office to express-mail him her undeveloped film.

She slipped on little silver earrings with a Celtic design and had spent ten very intense minutes on her makeup.

The camera crew was already setting up for the remote. Callie noted Lana Campbell was there as well, clutching the hand of a towheaded boy who had a scab on one knee, dirt on his chin and the kind of cherubic face that spelled trouble.

Dolan, in his signature blue shirt and red suspenders, stood directly beside his business sign and was already talking to a woman Callie pegged as the reporter.

She assumed he was Ronald Dolan because he didn't look happy.

The minute he spotted Callie, he broke off and marched toward her.

“You Dunbrook?”

“Dr. Callie Dunbrook.” She gave him a full-power smile. Callie had known some men to dissolve into a panting puddle when she used full power. Dolan appeared to be immune.

“What the hell's going on here?” He jabbed a finger at her chest, but fortunately for him didn't make contact.

“Local TV asked for an interview. I always try to cooperate. Mr. Dolan”—still smiling, she touched his arm as if they were compatriots—“you're a very lucky man. The archaeological and anthropological communities are never going to forget your name. They'll be teaching classes about your site for generations. I have a copy of my preliminary report here.”

She held out a folder. “I'll be happy to explain anything you don't understand. I realize some of it's pretty technical. Has a representative of the National History Museum at the Smithsonian contacted you yet?”

“What?” He stared at the report as if she were handing him a live snake. “What?”

“I just want to shake your hand.” She took his, pumped. “And thank you for your part in this incredible discovery.”

“Now, you listen here—”

“I'd love to take you, your wife and family out to dinner at the first opportunity.” She kept the smile in place, even boosted it with a couple of flutters of her lashes, while she steamrolled him. “But I'm afraid I'm going to be very busy for the next several weeks. Will you excuse me? I want to get this part over with.”

She pressed a hand to her heart. “Talking on camera always makes me a little nervous.” She tied up the lie with a quick, breathless laugh. “If you have any questions, any at all about the report or the ones that follow, please ask either myself or Dr. Greenbaum. I'll be spending most of my time right here, on-site. I won't be hard to find.”

He started to bluster again, but she hurried off to introduce herself to the camera crew.

“Slick,” Lana murmured. “Very slick.”

“Thanks.” She squatted down and studied the little boy. “Hi. You the reporter?”

“No.” He giggled, and his mossy-green eyes twinkled with fun. “You're gonna be on TV. Mommy said I could watch.”

“Tyler, this is Dr. Dunbrook. She's the scientist who studies old, old things.”

“Bones and stuff,” Tyler declared. “Like Indiana Jones. How come you don't have a whip like he does?”

“I left it back at the motel.”

“Okay. Did you ever see a dinosaur?”

Callie figured he was getting his movies mixed up and winked at him. “I sure have. Dinosaur bones. But they're not my specialty. I like human bones.” She gave his arm a testing squeeze. “I bet you've got some good ones. You have Mom bring you by sometime and I'll let you dig. Maybe you'll find some.”

“Really? Can I?
Really?
” Overwhelmed, he danced on his Nikes, tugged on Lana's hand. “Please?”

“If Dr. Dunbrook says it's okay. That's nice of you,” she said to Callie.

“I like kids,” Callie said as she rose. “They haven't learned how to shut down to possibilities. I'm going to get this done.” She ran her hand over his sun-shot hair. “See you later, Ty-Rex.”

S
uzanne Cullen experimented with a new recipe. Her kitchen was equal parts science lab and homey haven. Once she'd baked because she enjoyed it and because it was something a housewife did. She'd often laughed over the suggestions that she open her own bakery.

She was a wife, then a mother, not a businesswoman. She'd never aspired to a career outside the home.

Then, she'd baked to escape her own pain. To give herself something to occupy her mind other than her own guilt and misery and fears.

She'd buried herself in cookie dough and piecrusts and
cake batter. And all in all, she'd found it a more effective therapy than all the counseling, all the prayers, all the public appearances.

When her life, her marriage, her world had continued to fall apart, baking had been a constant. Suddenly, she
had
wanted more. She had needed more.

Suzanne's Kitchen had been born in an ordinary, even uninspired room in a neat little house a stone's throw from the house where she grew up. She'd sold to local markets at first, and had done everything—the buying, the planning, the baking, the packaging and delivery—herself.

Within five years, the demand had been great enough for her to hire help, to buy a van and to take her products countywide.

Within ten, she'd gone national.

Though she no longer did the baking herself, and the packaging, distribution and publicity were handled by various arms of her corporation, Suzanne still liked to spend time in her own kitchen, formulating new recipes.

She lived in a big house snuggled well back on a rise and guarded from the road by woods. And she lived alone.