by Alex Kava
This, she did remember. They warned her that he might be asking, maybe begging for her to pick him up.
“That’s against the rules, Eric. You did agree to do this on your own. In fact, you chose this place.”
“I know, I know. But something’s not right.”
She rolled her eyes and stopped herself from saying anything.
“Remember the guy that was here with me? My roommate, Simon?”
She remembered that he had a roommate. She didn’t remember his name. The guy who wore black-rimmed glasses that he constantly shoved up the bridge of his nose. He stared at her the whole time she was there and never said a word even after introductions. The guy was definitely not right. Kayla chalked it up to the drugs or the withdrawal. Supposedly, he was a veteran, too, but to Kayla, he looked like some loser who probably still lived in his parents’ basement.
Eric had gone silent, and she pulled her cell phone away from her ear to see if she’d lost the connection.
“Sorry, someone walked by.”
“So what happened to Simon?” Kayla asked.
“That’s the thing. He’s gone.”
His whispers were muffled now, and she wondered if he was hiding in a closet or worse...under the covers.
“What do mean, gone?”
“They said he’s been dismissed.”
“He’s probably gone home, Eric.”
“No way. The guy’s mind is like gumbo soup. He can’t put his socks on unless someone helps him. He doesn’t even know what you call socks.”
She’d never heard Eric like this. He didn’t just sound paranoid, he sounded afraid. During all of their phone calls while he was deployed in Afghanistan, Eric had probably been scared at times, but he’d never once let Kayla know or hear it in his voice. This had to be the drug withdrawal.
“Shhhh...” Eric shushed her, and she wasn’t even talking.
But then she heard another voice and realized he was trying to hide the phone.
“How are you doing today, Eric?”
Wherever the phone was hidden, Kayla could easily hear the thunderous voice that stood above it.
“I’m fine, Doc.” And Eric did sound surprisingly fine.
“I was told you’re not taking your meds. Is there a reason for that, Eric? You know you can’t get better unless you trust me.”
“Just really nauseated. I thought they’d make me throw up.”
“Oh sure. I can order some injections instead.”
“No, no,” Eric answered quickly, and Kayla recognized her husband’s panic slipping again. “The pills are good. I should be okay for the bedtime dose.”
“One other thing. I didn’t realize you’re married. You never mentioned it.”
“Didn’t I? Is that a problem?”
“No problem. Most of the guys recommended by veterans’ organizations don’t have any family.”
“If you’re worried about whether I can pay—”
“Don’t worry about it,” the doctor told Eric, but even through the muffled phone, Kayla sensed it was, indeed, a problem.
Immediately, she wondered how much the ritzy resort-style place would cost them. Eric promised it was covered. She missed the rest of the conversation as she calculated in her head what the daily rate might be.
“Kayla, you still there?” Eric sounded more like himself now.
“How much does this place cost, Eric? You said your veteran’s benefits would pay for it. Why does he care if you’re married?”
He was quiet again. She was probably too loud.
“Kayla, listen to me,” he finally whispered.
She expected him to go into a long explanation of how he had all this covered. That she needed to trust him. Don’t worry about it, just like he told the doctor about the pills.
But instead, she heard the fear again when he said, “Get me the hell out of here.”
Chapter 16
Blackwater River State Forest
Maggie devoured the last bites of Hannah’s sandwich despite the putrid smells surrounding her. She hadn’t eaten since early morning before she caught her 6:00 am flight, so when Brodie asked if anyone was hungry Maggie wasn’t shy about accepting. She sure had come a long way since her first crime scene when she needed Vicks VapoRub and still ended up tossing her cookies.
She washed down the sandwich with warm water while taking in the scene. And all the while, she kept wondering how long it would be before Ryder Creed’s indigo blue eyes wouldn’t completely disarm her. It wasn’t just his eyes. It was that hitch of a smile and the feel of his carefully manicured, bristled jaw.
She was a seasoned professional, an expert in her field. She chased serial killers, for God’s sake, and yet this man had the ability to make her feel like a silly, lovesick schoolgirl.
Just minutes ago, she’d watched him as he disappeared into the forest with Sheriff Norwich to show her the spots where Grace had alerted. He left Brodie and Maggie in the shade to finish their sandwiches and make sure Grace did the same with her own lunch. The little dog’s ears twitched, still listening to his voice despite her nose in her bowl.
“Grace doesn’t like to be without him,” Brodie said.
Maggie knew the feeling, although she hoped she wasn’t as transparent as Grace. Fact was, she had been looking for an excuse to see Ryder for months now. They talked on the phone regularly, but of course, that wasn’t the same. And she wouldn’t dare ask him to come to Virginia. He had Brodie to look after and so many other responsibilities with a kennel full of dogs.
At least that’s what she told herself. Maybe a part of her worried that if she asked and he said “no,” it would forever change things between them. “Things?" She wasn’t even sure what to call it.
From a distance it was easy to say she liked her life just the way it was. She was busy putting together a new investigative crime unit. The new FBI director had chosen her specifically, and so far, he had given her wide latitude. It was one of the reasons she was personally able to respond to Escambia County Sheriff Clayton’s request.
The storage unit’s contents were strange enough to warrant a look. So she’d arranged the trip along with dinner with Ryder. She knew she could tack on a couple of days off, if need be. She thought she’d play it by ear. See if the storage unit required a closer look. Or decide if she had the courage to stay and spend more time with Ryder.
Her brother Patrick, a firefighter who shared her home, was off duty for a week and had already agreed to take care of her dogs, Jake and Harvey. There was nothing stopping her from staying. Nothing, except herself. Then she looked into those indigo blue eyes, and suddenly, she couldn’t remember why she was tiptoeing around her feelings.
Now she saw the medical examiner gesturing for Maggie to join her. Earlier, Vickie had handed out shoe covers and latex gloves. Maggie pulled them on now.
“You two good?” she asked Brodie and Grace before she left.
Brodie nodded. Grace was still focused on Ryder’s voice.
When Maggie joined Vickie, she immediately wished she had waited a few more minutes.
“Maggots,” she sighed as she watched Vickie scoop up a handful and drop them into a specimen cup already filled with isopropyl alcohol. “I hate maggots.”
“Really? I would imagine you see a good deal of them on a regular basis.”
“Doesn’t mean I have to like them.”
“Sometimes they can tell a piece of the story that we’d never know without them.”
Maggie couldn’t argue with that. As disgusting as they were, what they devoured, and when they devoured it, could end up providing important evidence.
“But these aren’t quite maggots,” Vickie said. “In this heat, that means he hasn’t been dead for long. Possibly less than twenty-four hours.”
The medical examiner marked the specimen cup, stood up and backed away. Then she said, “Tell me what’s wrong with this picture.”
Maggie noticed the woman was quieter out here in th
e field. The chatter from the storage unit was long gone. There was a serious calm to her now. Maggie thought she seemed contemplative but with a slight edge. Something had unnerved her.
Maggie came in for a closer look. The man was lying face down. The wound on the back of his head had still been bleeding when he arrived at this site. The blow may have been administered here. There was enough blood on the leaves and surrounding dirt to support that theory.
Sandy dirt covered him up to his waist. The grave was shallow, almost as if the killer had only dug the length and width of the body, about a foot deep—if that—rolled the body in and didn’t bother to cover it entirely.
That’s what it looked like at first glance.
Then Maggie saw what Vickie was alluding to, and she winced. Why hadn’t she seen it immediately?
The man’s arms were up over his head, his elbows bent. But the arms hadn’t simply flung up as his body was rolled over and into the grave. She squatted down and leaned over him. She swatted at the flies, but it didn’t make a difference. They weren’t leaving.
Carefully with gloved fingers, she lifted one of the victim’s hands. It was stiff with rigor mortis. She glanced up at Vickie who noticed.
Without prompting, the medical examiner said, “So he’s been here less than thirty-six hours.”
But Maggie wasn’t focused on that. Instead, she was shocked to see the scratches in the dirt. They confirmed what she already suspected. Leaves were clutched in his hand and dirt embedded under his fingernails.
She stood back up, and her eyes darted around. Sheriff Norwich was at the other end of the clearing and on her cell phone. Maggie could hear her giving instructions. Ryder and Grace were with Brodie in the shade and out of earshot. She turned her back to all of them and looked directly at Vickie.
“He was still alive when the killer buried him,” Maggie said.
Chapter 17
Did the killer not know?” Maggie asked, “Or maybe he didn’t care.”
“Motive is your department,” Vickie said as she unpacked another specimen cup and several evidence bags. “There could be other injuries.”
Maggie walked the length of the body, examining and searching.
“Doesn’t look like there are any drag marks,” she said.
She could see the scuff in the dirt where Brodie must have stumbled. Her footprints were much smaller than the other ones trampled all around the grave. She glanced back at Ryder and saw that he wore his low-profile hiking boots. They’d be easy for the crime scene techs to discount. The other prints were distinctive, too. Footprints—because of sole patterns and debris stuck in the treads—could be as incriminating as fingerprints.
“If you eliminate Ryder and Brodie’s shoe prints, it looks like there’s only one pair,” Maggie said.
“Which means this gentleman didn’t walk to his grave.” Sheriff Norwich had finished her phone call and wandered close enough to hear.
“Sheriff,” Vickie said, “you’re right. But it looks like he wasn’t dead when the killer buried him.”
Norwich blinked several times before her head pivoted and her eyes darted down.
She looked up at Maggie and asked, “Do you think he knew his killer? Was this personal?”
Maggie understood what the sheriff was asking, almost hoping. If it was personal, it might mean that this man wasn’t a random victim. Sometimes it was easier to find a killer when there was a connection.
“Even if it was,” Maggie told her, “it doesn’t explain the others.”
Norwich drove her hands into the pockets of her uniform’s dark green trousers and shook her head.
“I have a CSU tech and a deputy on their way. Jason and Scout are bringing them in. Sounds like the spray paint is helping.”
Vickie grinned even as she sunk a thermometer into the brown mass of maggots.
“We’re going to need an easier way in and out of here,” Norwich said. “I can’t imagine hauling equipment and personnel back and forth through that jungle.”
She stepped back away and gestured to Ryder and Brodie.
Maggie knew Ryder and Norwich had shared some harrowing experiences during the Alabama tornadoes in March. Earlier, she wasn’t surprised to see him administer first aid to the sheriff. It was part of his nature. However, she was surprised to see the proud and tough sheriff accept. There was obviously a mutual respect between the two. But given all that, Norwich missed what Maggie saw just now. Ryder hesitated with a quick, involuntary glance at Brodie.
Ever since they arrived on the scene, Maggie could see he was uncomfortable and concerned about Brodie being here. She knew firsthand what the young woman had gone through. Only eight months ago a crazy woman and her son were still holding Brodie captive. Brodie’s tall, thin body was still recovering from the effects of malnutrition and also the damage from the drugs her captors used on her. Maggie didn’t pretend to guess her mental state, but Brodie certainly didn’t appear upset.
Ryder instructed Grace to sit, and he attempted to leave Brodie, along with the dog, in the shade. But Norwich waved for Brodie to come over too. She stepped away from the body and shielded it with her own. Maybe she wasn’t entirely oblivious to Ryder’s concerns.
“You two know this area. Do you know of any paths to a road?”
Maggie watched as Brodie shook her head then said, “I’ve never been in this area before today.”
“I might be able to figure out what direction the killer came from,” Ryder said.
“You can tell us that?”
Maggie started smiling even before Ryder told Norwich, “I can’t, but Grace might be able to.”
Chapter 18
Creed wasn’t sure if this would work. He’d never asked one of his dogs to follow scent beginning from footprints alone. Using a piece of clothing worked best, especially fabric worn close to the body. An individual’s scent—including skin rafts, sweat, body chemistry and even traces of hygiene products—was a combination specific to that person.
Footprints carried some of that scent, too, but he was simply hoping they highlighted where lingering scent might still be in the air. Following the footprints would also indicate where odor molecules might have collected on grass or shrubs.
There were a lot of prints pressed into the dirt. Some were so distinctive he could see the tread pattern of the sole. Grass and debris had been trampled. Leaves were smashed into the soil. But the tracks appeared to go in every direction.
To Vickie and Maggie he asked, “Most of these prints look like they were made by one person. Does that sound possible?”
Maggie nodded and said, “We were just talking about that.”
Both women had stepped aside to let him and Grace have access and to watch. Norwich and Brodie had come over, too. Usually he’d ask people to back all the way up, but truthfully, Grace didn’t mind as much as he did. Too often people watched like they were expecting to witness a magic act. This audience didn’t fit in that category.
“Are you telling me she can sniff out where the killer came from just by using footprints?” Norwich asked.
Creed was disappointed to hear doubt in her voice. Just three months ago Sheriff Norwich had watched Grace find a baby still in his car seat. A tornado had thrown the child over three hundred feet and left him in the middle of a field under a line of downed pine trees. So he was disappointed to think Norwich might still be one of the “magic” believers.
“Footprints can leave a trail of scent,” he explained. “But they can also point out where he was and where his scent might be lingering.” He looked to Maggie and Vickie again. “It depends how long they’ve been here. Do you have any idea?”
“We still have rigor mortis,” Vickie told him. “So less than thirty-six hours. Also the masses of blowfly eggs are only starting to become maggots. In this heat, that could mean less than twenty-four hours.”
“Odor molecules diffuse into the air,” Creed continued. “Humidity keeps them closer to the ground. These
steps might still have a faint scent. His last steps will have a stronger scent. And remember, he was here again today. Chances are, he came back into the forest the same way.”
“I forgot about that,” Norwich said.
Creed didn’t like to think about it. That the killer came back to the scene of his crime, saw them—spied on them—and followed Brodie.
Chased her.
His footprints and scent were definitely here but narrowing them down and getting Grace to find the path to his arrival could be challenging. Especially since the guy may have tracked all around the site before he took off after Brodie.
Creed found one of the prints that was deeply embedded in the soil and called to Grace. He gestured and pointed directly to the ground, asking her to sniff it. Her nose immediately started twitching. Like bloodhounds, Grace worked the scent with her nose. But instead of sniffing close to the ground, she poked the air checking for matching scent clinging to the landscape. He pointed to the next closest print. And then another.
The air was filled with different scents. Grace had been overwhelmed all morning, finding and alerting. But those were decomp odors. He was asking her now to separate out and search for an individual’s specific smell.
Grace snuffled the surrounding trees and shrubs. She stopped at one spot where the grass was smashed down from something that had been placed on top of it. Perhaps something belonging to the killer.
They had gone over almost a dozen prints when he finally decided it was time. Grace definitely had identified this new scent.
Creed glanced around and found his audience had stayed in the shade about twenty feet away. He gestured to Sheriff Norwich.
“Usually when I ask one of my dogs to follow an individual’s scent, I know the name of the person lost or missing,” he told her. “I call the scent by the person’s name.”
“I remember your handler, Jason doing that,” Norwich said. “That young girl we were looking for last fall.”
“I’m going to call this scent Predator.”
