by Alex Kava
Norwich introduced him as Deputy Danvers. Now back inside the forest, she seemed a bit frazzled as soon as she realized she’d lost any reliable cell phone reception.
Creed’s first priority was to get his crew out of the forest. Grace’s ears had been pinned back for the last ten minutes or so. He knew she could smell the approaching storm. Ever since March when the two of them got caught up in a tornado, Grace had become anxious when the ozone changed. She was already exhausted from the heat.
In his daypack he included a mesh travel pouch that Grace fit into. It had an adjustable strap that went over his head and crossed his body. He’d used it to carry her before when she was injured. He was taking it out now and hoping she wouldn’t put up a fuss.
Scout bounded out of the trees, excited and panting. He brushed against Creed’s leg, started to nose Grace then backed off. Even he could sense her distress.
“Scout and I marked three possible sites,” Jason said coming out of the trees. “Are we sure this is only one guy?”
“Good question,” Maggie said, overhearing from behind them.
Brodie and Vickie were with her. Each of the women carried more gear than they came in with, duffel bags that held the evidence samples they’d collected. Creed could see more blue tarps beyond the trees. The splashes of blue looked like a tossed campsite.
He could feel the wind pick up, and instinctively he turned to Maggie, checking to see if she was okay. When she caught his look, she held his eyes. It was only for two or three seconds, but enough time to see her concern. The panic would still be fresh.
He wanted to reassure her that it was only a thunderstorm. Not a tornado. But they were in the middle of a forest where lightning strikes could topple a tree or set it on fire.
“We need to move, people. Now!” Norwich told them, taking charge, despite her face painted red and dripping sweat.
That was the thing about these late afternoon storms. The wind would kick up. The skies would darken, but the heat and humidity never relented. In fact, after the downpour it would be more oppressive, adding moisture to the already saturated air.
“Can you get us back out of here?” Norwich asked Brodie.
Creed noticed that his sister, who had been bright-eyed and excited all day, suddenly looked exhausted. Before he could say anything, Jason stepped up.
“Scout led us in here,” he said. At the mention of his name the big dog wagged, tail thumping one tree and another. “He can get us back. Isn’t that right, boy?”
Ropes of saliva drooled from his smile as he took Jason’s hand in his mouth. Creed couldn’t help thinking these two had come a long way in two short years.
Jason, Scout and Brodie took the lead. Creed offered to bring up the rear. He placed Grace inside the mesh carry bag, and she was content to snuggle against his hip. With every low rumble of thunder he could feel Grace’s body stiffen against him. He should have gotten her home sooner.
He kept a hand pressing her close to him and making sure none of the branches scratched or snagged her or the bag. It slowed him down, but Norwich slowed his pace even more. She was five feet in front of him, and he could hear her heavy breathing. She grabbed onto tree trunks to pull herself along and keep her balance. Any minute now the downpour would start, a new threat to upending her already shaky foothold.
They had trailed back so far that he couldn’t see the others. Her men knew better than to backtrack and check on her. Actually, Creed was surprised that Norwich didn’t leave Deputy Danvers to guard the crime scene. Perhaps protocol didn’t allow it when lightning was concerned. Maybe it didn’t matter. If the killer returned overnight what could he do? Mess up the scene even more? Drag bodies out? He supposed anything was possible. Norwich obviously wasn’t willing to risk the safety of one of her deputies out in the middle of a storm.
The rumble of thunder had become constant, so when the crash came, it jolted both Norwich and Creed.
He heard her mumble something, but the wind kept taking it away from him. It couldn’t be much farther, yet he didn’t recognize anything. As the forest darkened, it was getting difficult to see ahead. The only way he knew they were still on the right path were the broken branches, shrubs stripped of leaves and the stomped down grass from those before them.
Creed could hear the rain before he felt it. The thick canopy overhead acted as a barrier, delaying the droplets. Above them the storm heaved and howled. Then the deluge came and there was nothing to slow it down. After a day of skin slick with sweat and heat, the rain was shockingly cold.
He put out a hand against Norwich’s back to steady her. The ground had flattened but the pine needles and leaves that covered the forest floor would quickly turn it into a slippery slide. He caught her elbow and braced her up. His other hand stayed on Grace, cradling her against his side. He could feel her trembling through the thin mesh fabric of the carrier.
Norwich leaned her back against a tree. She hesitated. Face down. He couldn’t see her eyes. Couldn’t hear her through the pounding rain. Using his arm she pushed forward only to slide back against the tree.
Then suddenly, Creed felt a hand on his shoulder.
Maggie!
She wrapped her arm around Norwich’s waist. The sheriff allowed it and draped her arm around Maggie’s back. The trail was too narrow to walk side by side. Maggie sidestepped, pulling the older woman along. Creed was able to hold Norwich’s other arm. Between the two of them they kept her upright and moving along.
To Creed, it felt like a long slog. It was impossible to see. His hiking boots became heavy and caked with mud, concrete blocks threatening to trip him. The flashes of lightning stayed above, a constant strobe light. But the cracks of thunder vibrated all the way down to the ground. It felt like it rocked the earth below his feet, adding to the unsteady trek that was already an obstacle course with the gnarled roots and fallen branches.
It must have lasted only fifteen or twenty minutes. By the time they reached the edge of the forest, the sun replaced the lightning with streams breaking through the clouds. Rain still fell. Softer, gentler now. The wind had quieted. Creed noticed birds were chirping again. But a new rumble in the distance behind them announced it might not be over.
The others were waiting for them despite the kennel and house now visible and less than a hundred feet away.
“Well, this day just gets better and better!” Vickie said.
Finally out of the woods, Maggie and Creed eased their grips on Norwich at the same time. And the sheriff collapsed to the ground.
Chapter 26
Later Creed would learn that six of the seven of them knew CPR. That should have been comforting. If only Norwich would have responded.
The trek through the storm had seemed like an unending journey but waiting for the LifeFlight helicopter felt like an eternity.
Creed was surprised that Jason had been the first to react. He’d immediately dropped to his knees. He was still counting and doing chest compressions while Creed gestured, pin-wheeling his arms to direct the LifeFlight crew to the open field close by. Vickie had joined Jason on the other side of Norwich. She was doing the rescue breaths while Jason continued the chest compressions.
Hannah had brought out a blanket and towels. But everyone stood stock-still, watching, waiting. All of them soaking wet.
Creed squatted down next to Grace and Brodie, but he didn’t take his eyes off of Norwich’s body. In his head he heard a mantra pounding against his temples: Breathe, breathe, breathe! It was taking too much time. Way too much time.
The paramedic and flight nurse took over. When Jason stood up, he stumbled a bit. Scout, who had been staying back, because Jason had told him to do so, went to Jason with head down, humbled and quiet as he brushed against Jason’s leg.
Creed moved closer to Grace, still sitting back on his haunches. He leaned over and put a hand on Brodie’s shoulder. He couldn’t stop thinking how red Norwich’s face was as soon as she’d arrived in the forest. Her breathing
was heavy even back then. He should have known. He thought she might have been suffering from heatstroke, but she seemed better after the ice pack and some water.
He looked up at the sky. The clouds were rolling in again. The crew told him they had a small window of time. Creed knew they meant the storm, but he knew it was a small window of time for Norwich, too.
Actually, Creed had been surprised they sent the unit, and he wondered what Hannah had told them. As soon as Norwich collapsed, Creed had called Hannah instead of 911. Knee-jerk reaction. And he wasn’t sure his signal would last long enough for detailed instructions or explanation.
They should have stayed put. Hunkered down and waited out the storm. Hurrying back had only made it worse.
He felt Maggie’s presence before he saw her. Just like in the forest. She squatted down beside him, leaned against him as she put her hand through his arm. Then she said as if reading his mind, “You couldn’t have known.”
Was he that transparent? Or did she just know him too well.
He overheard the flight nurse tell Jason he’d done a good job. Then he heard her say they had a pulse.
There were no sighs of relief. No celebratory cheers. No one said a word. All of them seemed to know a pulse meant nothing.
All of them except Brodie.
“Is Sheriff Norwich going to be okay?” she asked.
No one answered. They watched as Deputy Danvers helped the flight crew carry the stretcher across the meadow to the waiting helicopter.
Creed leaned over Grace, and this time he wrapped an arm around Brodie’s shoulder.
“I don’t know,” he told her. “I hope so.”
He glanced over at Hannah. Spiritual inspiration was supposed to be her wheelhouse.
“She’s in the best possible hands,” Hannah said. “We’re not doing her any good by standing around. Y’all look like you’ve been swimming in the mud. Come on and dry up a bit.”
Then she headed for the house, and one by one the rest of them followed.
Chapter 27
K9 CrimeScents
Florida Panhandle
Creed knew there was nothing that would have made Hannah happier than to soothe their souls with her food. She invited everyone to stay for an early dinner, but the blank eyes and exhausted faces reiterated that it had been a long day. The shock of watching Sheriff Norwich’s incapacitated body being carted away had not worn off.
They mumbled plans for the next day then shuffled off: Danvers and Hadley together back to the sheriff’s department; Vickie with her evidence bags to the medical examiner’s office; Jason and Scout to his trailer; Brodie upstairs to her room; and Hannah to her kitchen. Ryder, Maggie and Grace were the only ones left on the front porch of the big house. Without the other vehicles, Norwich’s Sheriff’s Department SUV stood alone under the shade of a magnolia tree.
Creed offered Maggie to stay, even suggesting one of the many bedrooms in the house if she wasn’t comfortable in his loft. He was being a gentleman, when he really just wanted to take her hand and lead her to his bed. But every step of the way in this relationship, Creed had allowed Maggie to call the shots. It wasn’t something he was used to, but it seemed like the right thing to do.
No, not just the right thing, but the necessary thing.
When she didn’t automatically leave with the medical examiner, and asked if he would drive her, Creed hoped it was because she really wanted to stay. Now he wondered if she had simply been worried about him. Her remark earlier about Norwich not being his fault, stuck with him. He was a big boy. He didn’t need anyone worrying about him.
Maggie insisted all of her things, including a change of clothes, were in her rental car. They had originally planned to have dinner this evening in Pensacola, but the day’s detour had put a damper on that.
Then a fleeting thought gave him pause. Maybe this was her way of inviting him to her hotel room on the beach. Maggie O’Dell was complicated. He knew there were emotional scars—from her childhood and from her marriage—that hadn’t fully healed.
By now, he’d hoped they were beyond playing games. They had shared their pasts, their secrets. They had even saved each other’s lives. They obviously trusted each other with everything. Everything except their hearts.
When Maggie suggested Grace come along “for the ride,” Creed tamped down any last hopes for romance or an overnight stay.
Grace was much better after the storms had cleared, and after she had a meal in her belly. But she still insisted on going along. Ever since the tornado, she didn’t let him out of her sight. Hannah said the little dog cried if he left her behind. Cried like Hannah had never heard her cry before.
She’d always been attached to Creed since that day he’d found her, half starved and abandoned at the edge of his property. People had long ago gotten into the habit of leaving their unwanted dogs at the end of his driveway. That was how Scout came into their lives, too.
Creed caught Scout’s owner dumping the mother dog late at night into the ditch. Good thing Creed had caught him, because the man also had a burlap sack filled with her puppies that he was going to dump in a river.
That was almost two years ago, and Creed could feel the anger sizzle in the pit of his gut. At the time, he let Bolo, a Rhodesian ridgeback, hold the man down and scare the crap out of him while Creed rescued the female black Labrador and the bag with her puppies. Scout was one of five. Since then, the mother made her home in their kennel, as did his siblings.
Creed had given Jason the pick of the litter when Jason first came to work and live at the facility. But the others were being trained as medical alert dogs. It was a rare training opportunity, since it was best to start with puppies. Creed and Hannah’s rescues usually came to them a bit older.
In fact, Scout’s sister, Sarge would be ready to go to work this fall. Jason and Hannah were training her for one of the vets who played poker with Jason at the Segway House. Eric Hudson’s little boy, Luke, had type 1 diabetes.
So many of their searches included death and destruction, it would be good for all of them to see more positive results.
There were still a few hours of daylight, so Creed asked Maggie if they could take a detour.
“I promised Sheriff Norwich that I’d find a place for her team to launch a boat,” he told her. “That’ll be the best way for them to bring out the remains.”
He remembered an old two-track off one of the gravel roads, but it was a long time since he’d used it. The path was easy to miss. No signs. Overgrown grass and a line of trees hid the area. There wasn’t an official boat launch, but the clearing provided plenty space once you made it through the entrance.
The two-track was bumpier than Creed remembered. Deep ruts were filled with the recent rain. After a short drive through the woods, a sandy beach appeared. As he parked in the clearing, he could see tire tracks cut into the tall grass. Marks were left in the sand, too, where someone had backed a boat trailer right to the water’s surface. It was the perfect place to launch a boat without dropping off a steep bank.
Both of them got out of Creed’s Jeep at the same time without a word.
Then Maggie asked, “Do a lot of people know about this area?”
“Locals do,” Creed said. “It’s not a secret. Most of the canoeing outfitters use Blackwater River. They usually start up north in the park. Current brings them down river.”
“Going from here to the crime scene is against the current?”
“Yes.”
“And this isn’t Blackwater River?”
“Coldwater Creek.”
They stood shoulder to shoulder looking out over the water. The creek was wide here, but Creed remembered that it quickly narrowed.
He glanced at Maggie. Her eyes darted around, searching the surrounding woods and the tree line on the opposite bank. Only now did he notice her shoulder holster and that the snap over her weapon had been undone.
He’d forgotten what she had gone through two years ago when
a madman managed to coerce Maggie and her FBI partner into the forest. He’d planned to hunt them down. If Creed and Bolo hadn’t found him first, the guy might have succeeded. It was one of those scars. One that he knew about.
“You were clear on the other side of the park,” he tried to reassure her.
She didn’t look at him. Only nodded, acknowledging that she knew exactly what he was referring to.
They both heard the sound at the same time. Half whine, half growl. When Creed looked over his shoulder, he saw Grace with her nose and paws up against the back window, staring in the direction of the sound. Then she started frantically scratching at the window.
“That wasn’t human,” Maggie whispered, and Creed saw her hand on the butt of her gun.
Chapter 28
Between the long shadows Creed could barely make out the eyes and snout peeking through the shrubs. He approached cautiously, aware of the mud sucking at his boots, and of Maggie two steps behind him.
“It’s a dog,” Creed told her over his shoulder, keeping his voice low and calm. “I think he’s injured.”
The eyes watched. There was no attempt to run away. Perhaps the injuries wouldn’t allow it.
Creed had slowly moved within three feet when the animal lunged out of the brush. Jaws snapped. Nostrils flared. Its stocky, muscular body pushed up but not far.
Creed heard a click behind him. He gritted his teeth and stopped himself from looking back at Maggie.
“You didn’t just pull your gun,” he said, keeping his tone calm and steady, despite his irritation.
“He’s ready to attack,” she countered, not as good at disguising her panic.
“Put it away and back toward the Jeep.”
“But you don’t know—”
“Put your gun down and back away.”
