The Unquiet Bones

by Loreth Anne White

Their vow to each other came in the form of a terrible secret that the six of them guarded from the rest of the world. Him, Cara, Jill, Rocco, Mary, and Claude. Bob

In addition to herself and Duncan, her team of detectives includes Tank Coker, a grizzled veteran of serious crimes; Yursa Ghait, a newly minted investigator who grew up in Egypt and speaks fluent Arabic and Farsi; and Melissa Brand, a tech and admin whiz.

“We can confirm that the biological sex is female.” Ella glances at her students. “To be clear, in our field the term sex is used very specifically to denote the genetic construction of an individual—

the X and Y chromosomes—and is not to be confused with gender, which relates to our personal, social, and cultural choices, and which may be at odds with our biological sex.

But what if what Cara said is truer—that Isaias actually was the human face of her own guilt from that fall of 1976?

The need to belong is a basic survival instinct more powerful than logic. Biologically it can override the most rational of thinking.

The things we do, for our children—to keep them safe, to atone for our own childhood sins, when inside our aging bodies we’re all really just still frightened and bullied children ourselves .