It's a deadly winter for archaeologist Emma Fielding as she tracks a killer in an old New Hampshire hotel, in this fifth mystery from real-life archaeologist Dana Cameron. Archaeologist Emma Fielding should be on top of the world. Her teaching job secure and home life stable, she arrives at an archaeological conference at a famous old New Hampshire hotel, having outrun the winter storm that's paralysing the East Coast. A rising star in the field, she's in the midst of friends she's known all her life, celebrating the work of Professor Garrison, a venerable legend in the field. When Garrison is found dead on the iced-over lake outside the snow-bound hotel, however, Emma realizes that everyone has something to hide, including herself. While the police determine whether Garrison's death was an accident, suicide, or murder, Emma's intimate knowledge of her colleagues hasn't prepared her for what they're concealing, even from themselves. Emma is also forced to face the fact that the dead man was no friend of hers (or her grandfather Oscar) and that everyone-colleagues, police, and herself included-wonders why her view of him is so very different. The presence of Emma's old flame Duncan brings up bitter memories she'd rather were left buried deep in the past: Duncan wants something from her and Emma can't tell whether it is an opportunity to rekindle their relationship or a way to ensure her silence permanently. Professional jealousies and infighting would be enough added to Garrison's mysterious death, but a series of thefts and attacks in the isolated hotel make the stranded archaeologists ask whether a vengeful ghost has returned, practiced criminals are targeting the conference, or one of their own number has finally succumbed to an array of deadly temptations.

More Bitter Than Death
An Emma Fielding Mystery

Chapter One

I was back at Penitence Point. They say thatevery criminal returns to the scene of the crime, and I surefelt guilty, but I wasn't sure about what. I had a lot to choosefrom, at the moment.

Although we were all stamping and shivering, walking onpaths that were carved out of the knee-deep early Januarysnow, I was knocking almost everyone dead with my tour ofthe site. Nearly everyone had paid attention when I warnedthem to dress sensibly, and the good thing about the gray afternoonwas that it was perfect for imagining what it musthave been like here four hundred years ago when the Englishcolonists were wondering what the hell they were doingstuck in Maine. And frankly, being on the Atlantic coastwhen a storm was brewing, you had to want to be there forsome reason. The snow that was already on the grounddamped out the ambient noise of the twenty-first century, thedull light warning of the promised storm made you pause tothink about life when you couldn't just flick a switch forlight and heat, and the sound of the water brushing the beachand rolling the cobbles lent you a little of the sense of isolation that must have characterized the days of the first Englishsettlers on this shore. I made good use of these pointsas I walked the group over to where we believed the buildingsof Fort Providence once were, and to judge from theresponses -- oohs, ahhs, questions, and laughter in the rightplaces -- I was doing a great job.

This was one of my favorite things: talking about my archaeologicalwork with my colleagues from up and downthe East Coast. The conference we were all gathered for wasone thing -- a yearly archaeological jamboree of hundreds ofkindred spirits -- but actually being on the ground, at the site,in the environment, with a group of people who spoke yourlanguage, should have been sheer bliss.

What was really pissing me off was the two men whowere tuned out, each in his own little world, at opposite endsof the site. The way I see it, if you're not going to pay attention,you shouldn't really take up someone else's space onthe bus. More than that, I couldn't stand how childishly angryI felt with them -- each for separate reasons -- and struggledto focus on what was important.

I kept my talk brief and to the point, however, because thewind whipped right off the water to bite right through to thebone, no matter how many layers of wool or fleece or Gore-Tex you wore. And every time I looked over, they were theonly two not paying attention. I tried funny, I tried seriousreplete with jargon, I tried romance and pathos. The rest ofthe group was right there following along with me, but nomatter what I did, those two just wouldn't react.

I hate when that happens. I hate how petulant I felt, nomatter how well I was hiding it.

What do you want, guys? Archaeology not enough foryou? I can do murder and mayhem, if that's more to yourtaste.

Ah, to hell with them, I thought, and concentrated on thepeople who knew enough to pay attention, strutted and shimmied for them all the harder: archaeology as performanceart. Knowing the older guy was just looking off to the water,and the younger, red-headed guy off to the right was lookingaround like he was waiting for a bus, impatient and bored,just gnawed at me. I had enough on my plate dealing withthe past -- my own personal past in this place -- without themmaking it worse.

It was time to go.

The skies were darkening, low clouds heavy with snow asI finished off the spiel and began to herd everyone up theslope toward the bus, promising coffee and hot chocolateand a warm ride back to the conference hotel in New Hampshire.We'd been lucky so far, but the weather was lookingnastier by the minute and the news had been promising agood solid storm by nightfall. I counted off the folks as theyclimbed on board, accepting praise from some, offers ofdata from others, making sure I didn't strand anyone at thesite: that would have been a little too realistic a historicalreenactment for anyone's liking. Stuck alone, miles fromhelp, with winter's wrath about to unload on them ... Actually,it struck me as a sound punishment for some.

I felt my smile fade as the last person in the line reachedme. I knew why he was last in line, the same way I knewwhy he hadn't been all that interested in my talk. What Icouldn't understand was how quiet he'd been; that was unlikehim. He looked just the same as I remembered from ourundergraduate days. If he was a little more lined about theface, or a little more gray in his beard, the red hair and cockyattitude I knew so well was still there.

At first I didn't think he was actually going to make eyecontact, was hoping he wouldn't, but he surprised me. Notfor the first time. Damn his eyes.

"Good stuff, Em," he said, pausing a little before heclimbed into the bus.

"Thanks." I couldn't bring myself to say his name and coughed to cover my surprise. He didn't look nearly as badas I'd hoped, a little puffy -- tired perhaps. But the horns andsores I'd wished on him years ago were surprisingly absent.I fussed with the clipboard; I was still one body short.

"I've gotta go find Garrison," I said, nodding too briskly. Istepped back and around him, too obviously. Still not fastenough for me ...

More Bitter Than Death
An Emma Fielding Mystery. Copyright © by Dana Cameron. Reprinted by permission of HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved. Available now wherever books are sold.

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Excerpted from More Bitter Than Death: An Emma Fielding Mystery by Dana Cameron
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