Free Cut to the Bone by Jefferson Bass Page B

stomach.”
    â€œNot my fault you didn’t eat at noon,” I pointed out.
    â€œIt’s not? Wasn’t it you who told me to finish grading those exams by two?” He did have a point there. “Besides, we’ve passed a dozen fast-food places since we left UT.”
    â€œYeah, but the sheriff called thirty seconds after you finished grading,” I said. “And we don’t have a lot of daylight left.” I glanced again at the sun, already nearing the ridgeline. “A couple hours, tops, now that the days are getting short.” I did feel bad about dragging him to a death scene unfed, though. “Look in the glove compartment,” I told him. “I think there’s a Snickers bar in there somewhere.”
    He pushed the button; the door popped open and a box of surgical gloves launched itself at him, latex fingers twitching in midair. Tyler rooted through the recess. “Papers. Registration, insurance, maintenance records, owner’s manual,” he itemized. “No Snickers.”
    â€œKeep digging,” I said. “I could swear there’s one in there.”
    â€œOh,” he said after a moment. “Yeah. Down here in the Jurassic stratum, I think I’ve discovered a fossilized candy bar.” He fished out a Snickers, the wrapper rumpled and misshapen, and peeled it open. Inside was a cylinder of graying chocolate, misshapen from numerous cycles of melting and resolidifying. Tyler eyed it with distaste. “Oh, did I say candy bar ? I meant coprolite .” I had to admit, the lumpy extrusion did look remarkably like fossilized poop. He chomped down on it and wrestled a chunk free. “Mmm,” he mumbled sarcastically. “Tasty.” He took another bite.
    The traffic was crawling. The right lane was slowed by a flatbed trailer hauling a bulldozer up the mountain; I had no idea what a bulldozer’s top speed was, but I suspected it couldn’t be much slower than the snail’s pace at which the truck was transporting it. In the left lane, cars were bunched up behind a coal truck, which was creeping past the bulldozer at what appeared to be half a mile an hour faster.
    â€œWish they’d warned us about the rolling roadblock,” Tyler mumbled through the caramel. “We could’ve zipped in and out of that Hardee’s back at Lake City without losing any time. Forensic anthropology, NASCAR style.”
    â€œIf you want to jump out and run back, go for it,” I said. “You could probably catch up with me by the top of the mountain.” He grunted and popped the last lump of the Snickers into his mouth.
    Just as we crept over the lip of the mountain, the coal truck eased into the right lane, allowing the long line of cars to begin passing. As we drew nearer, I noticed both trucks turn and lumber down an exit ramp. “Nice,” Tyler fumed at the coal truck. “Cause a bottleneck for dozens of cars, just so you can get to the exit two seconds ahead of the bulldozer.”
    â€œNo point getting mad,” I said. “Doesn’t get us there any faster, and it sure doesn’t hurt the truck driver. Just makes you feel worse. Don’t they teach you that kind of stuff in yoga? Ommmm and all that?”
    Tyler turned and stared at me. “Where was that laid-back vibe two hours ago, Mr. Mellow, when you were flogging me to get those papers graded?”
    â€œThat’s different,” I pointed out. “Those trucks aren’t in my power. You, on the other hand . . .” I didn’t need to finish the sentence; Tyler knew better than anyone that “graduate assistantship” was synonymous with “indentured servitude . ”
    He tapped his window and pointed. “Classy,” he said. I looked out and saw the coal truck and the bulldozer-hauler both turning into the parking lot of a garish, neon-lit store—XXX Adult World—advertising books, videos,