course, see her as a suspect for buying stolen antiquities. That would be a blind alley, and valuable time
would be lost. But leaving out important information
when talking to the FBI was very risky business. Diane
was beginning to feel stuck—like she was fighting wars
on too many fronts.
She got back on the phone with Andie. ‘‘Ask him
to wait in my office. I’ll be right there.’’
‘‘Where are you coming from exactly?’’ asked Andie. Diane smiled into the phone. ‘‘I’m in the crime lab.’’ ‘‘Oh, okay. I’ll tell him you’ll just be a few minutes,
then,’’ she said.
‘‘Thank you, Andie.’’ Diane hung up the phone. ‘‘We will be in the area a few more days,’’ said
Merrick. ‘‘If...’’
‘‘Why are you still on the case?’’ asked Riddmann.
‘‘We have jurisdiction now.’’
‘‘Because we don’t have Clymene’s body,’’ said
Merrick. ‘‘It makes the paperwork harder.’’ Merrick turned to Diane. ‘‘If your apartment is a
crime scene, where will you be staying?’’
‘‘I’m staying with Frank Duncan; he’s a detective
in—’’
‘‘We know Frank,’’ said Drew. ‘‘We apprehended
one of his white-collar fugitives. Good guy to work
with.’’
‘‘If we need you, then you will be either at his house
or here, somewhere in this building,’’ said Merrick. ‘‘Yes,’’ said Diane.
She saw them out of the crime lab on its private
elevator side, the side that didn’t go through the museum. She supposed she should be grateful that Riddmann appeared to be satisfied with her apology, but
the whole thing left a sour taste in her mouth. By the
time he got to his office, she imagined Riddmann
would have the story embellished to the point that
Diane got on her knees and begged him to forgive her. Before leaving the lab and going to her museum
office, she called down to the basement. She was right.
That’s where her crew was waiting.
‘‘How’d it go, Boss?’’ said Jin.
‘‘I’ll tell you later. I have to go meet with the FBI
now,’’ said Diane.
‘‘Gee, Boss, you don’t get a break, do you?’’ he
said.
‘‘Apparently not. I want you to know I appreciate
you guys,’’ she said.
‘‘Sure—’’ he began.
‘‘Jin, did you find anything about the artifacts—
anything on NSAF?’’
‘‘The artifacts. Right. The girdle, the one that looks
like it was made of cowrie shells, was stolen from the
Cairo Museum in 1957,’’ he said. ‘‘It was the only one
of the artifacts in the database. The stone artifacts had
soil residue on them, but I haven’t had a chance to
process the sample yet. We’ve been kind of busy.’’ ‘‘I know. Thanks, Jin. It’s about time for you guys
to go home,’’ she said.
‘‘We’ll wait. We want to know what happened with
