Page 4 of How to Annoy a Mountain Man

The records I’d found for this place were piecemeal and incomplete at best. My first task was to clear the big debris off each marker and map them out.

Midnight Mercer had made this place famous due to one grave with the name missing. Not that it was never there, unmarked graves were heartbreakingly common. This grave had a name, then someone chipped it away. Mercer didn’t care who the person was, or the truth about why the stone was damaged.

I did.

And to give that person back what was lost, I needed to know everything about this site. The truth, not what got the most clicks.

I got to work cleaning and mapping, always feeling like I was being watched. Not in the haunted graveyard sense, more in the cranky security guard sense. This wasn’t my first argument with security and it wouldn’t be the last. It was just part of the job, and being here at night didn’t make me seem less suspicious. It would have been nice to do this in the daytime, but the light was best in the evening. Besides, the museum, archive, library and government offices were only open during the day. That left research during the day and the real work to happen at night.

The graves were all from the 1800s, needing some restoration for sure but mostly just a good cleaning. I took note of the condition of each one and moved on.

I got to the last grave in a row, dropped to my knees and cleared debris from the top. It was rougher than the others, the stone scratching at my hand. I kept clearing debris, waiting for more to appear besides a gray slab. Maybe a carving, filigree, an angel, something.

Nothing.

This was it. The nameless grave.

It was at the end of the row, but didn’t seem like it was set apart from the others. Why would a small community cemetery have one stone different from the others? And could I figure it out when the man guarding the place wanted me out?

Chapter Three

Jonah

Suspect number one: Cemetery Woman. Briar Hart, according to the paperwork she showed me.

Crime: Not sure yet.

But why would someone go through all the work of applying to the county to get permission to clean up an old cemetery?

She was up to something. Storming into my boring work site wielding a toothbrush of all things. There was more to her story, and I needed to figure out what it was.

She had permission to be there, I couldn’t deny that. But that didn’t mean she wasn’t helping the guy I was told to keep out.

I pulled out my phone to text Alden.

Me: Dig up what you can on a Briar Hart

Alden: ?

Me: Cleared to do restoration work on the property, not listed in the file

Alden: 10-4

I sent him a picture of the paperwork Briar had shown me and started a slow walk of the perimeter.

I tried not to let my eyes wander to her too often. I was here to keep unwelcome people out, and apparently she was welcome. Even so, I didn’t like it. Her attitude, the fact she was dressed in all black, how many supplies she had with her. It spoke of a level of preparation that I wasn’t sure what to do with.

She was making my job harder, and I was too annoyed to leave it alone.

As night gave way to early morning, I stalked over to where she was loading a bin into the backseat of a gray sedan.

“I don’t want to see you here tomorrow night.”

She jumped.

“Can you wear a bell or something? How are you so damn sneaky when you’re this big?” She gestured toward me.

I was well over six feet tall and was covered in enough muscle that I deterred more fights than I fought. She didn’t seem scared though, what did that tell me?