by Vella Munn
“I leaned against a tree and closed my eyes. I introduced myself to, I don’t know, Mother Nature, for lack of a better explanation. Told anything that might be listening that I wanted to get serious about my spirit search. I needed a sense of direction for my life, some hint of how to start.”
“I see,” Mia said when Niko stopped talking. She did, just not enough.
“Yeah, well, hear me out, okay? Don’t judge.”
“I would never do that.”
“No, you wouldn’t.” Niko again locked her gaze on Mia. “I started feeling this presence, so I opened my eyes. It might have been the grays, but I wasn’t afraid. I kept hoping I’d see them—that they’d trust me enough to reveal themselves to me. I kicked myself for not getting my camera out but—the sensation faded when I opened my eyes, but then it returned. That’s what it was, a sensation, a feeling.”
“I’m sorry it wasn’t more.”
“It’s all right because— Mia, he was there. I’m certain of it.”
“He?”
“Ice. He crawled inside my mind, or something. Told me he’d been nearby when the other elk was shot. He saw the grays go after Grover. They took him fast, killed him slow.”
Mia shuddered. “Their brand of revenge.”
“Yeah. Ice said he only had a little time for me, but…”
The way Niko was rocking back and forth, Mia was concerned she’d lose her balance, so took hold of her shoulder and waited for her friend to continue.
“Ice told me to keep searching for my spirit. That if I did it right I’d be rewarded.”
Chapter Twenty
“His truck’s at his place, but Ram didn’t answer when Darick knocked. Darick left another message on his cell and slid his card under the door. There really isn’t anything more he could do.”
Jeff and the others had taken more than an hour to document the scene and place Grover’s body in the bag. The officers had searched for the grays, but all they’d found were prints and trampled ground. There were dog hairs on Grover’s clothes.
Now they were at the sheriff’s department parking lot. Several officers had already gotten into their patrol cars and left to finish their shifts. The other wildlife officers were on their way back to their jurisdictions, while the vehicle with Grover’s body in it had broken away from the others, heading for the coroner’s office. Jeff needed to write up his report, but it didn’t have to be done right away. He had a short reprieve, unless the media ran him down.
“What are you going to do now?” Mia asked him. “You deserve to take the rest of the day off.”
“Not yet. Ram’s truck is at his place, which means he’s around. Of course, one of his buddies could have picked him up like when they went after the grays.”
“Who knows what the grays consider a capital crime,” Niko said. “If they go after rabbit trappers and dog abandoners, they’ll have a never-ending agenda.”
“That’s true,” Jeff said. “As long as they’re around here, or there’s a possibility they are, they’re part of my watch. But if nothing happens to Ram over the next few days, maybe that means they’ve moved on, like they did when things got dangerous for them in Oakwood County.”
“Good point,” Mia said. She wasn’t sure she was ready for the grays to have left. They’d be safer if they did, but they represented something beyond the world she’d always taken for granted, a way for her to stretch her mind and heart in ways she hadn’t known were possible.
“Are you planning on trying to see Ram this afternoon?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“Then I’m going with you.”
“What? No.”
“Yes. He might listen to me more than he would you, take the warning more seriously. Possibly believe it.”
Jeff frowned. “He’ll be defensive about what he did to Lady.”
“Let him try to wiggle out of that one,” Niko said. “I hope seeing and hearing Grover being killed is giving him nightmares.”
I know what those are like.
* * * *
Jeff stopped at the entrance to his place. “I love the setting,” he told Mia. “Particularly being so close to the creek, but I’m starting to have second thoughts about what I’ve gotten myself into.”
“It looks like you need a new roof.”
“There’s no if about the electrical,” he admitted. “I had it examined last month, because the circuits keep blowing. The electrician said he couldn’t give me a final price until he’d punched into a few walls, but if it was his, he’d replace everything. The next time I fall in love with a location, I’m going to take a closer look at the ‘as is’ clause.”
She laughed. “How old is it?”
“Going on seventy years, and don’t ask about the plumbing.”
“My house is even older. Fortunately, there’s been some updating, but the to-do list never ends.”
He eased his foot off the brake and started forward again. He’d love to give Mia a tour of the place including walking down to the creek, but that wasn’t why they were on Sawyer Road. Maybe on their way back—
“Any regrets about where you live?” he asked. She was too far away in the SUV’s cab, but it was better that way because he didn’t trust himself to touch her. Only one neighbor was close enough for them to see each other, but people occasionally came down the road. He didn’t want to think about what would happen if a driver spotted a couple steaming up an official vehicle’s windows.
“Not really,” she said. “Don’t forget, I grew up in a cabin.”
Yes, she had. A cabin far from others. About as isolated as it could get. Maybe that was why she’d let Ram into her life and bed. There couldn’t have been many men before him. She had little experience in judging a man’s value.
What did she think of him? Twice now he’d been given a demonstration of her reaction to his naked and ready body, but there was nothing ordinary about their relationship. How long would it take for what had initially brought them together to fade so they could really get to know each other?
“You didn’t give your place the most enthusiastic sales job,” she said, “but it’s a palace compared to Ram’s trailer.”
She couldn’t have been more right, he acknowledged as they bumped over the rutted drive. Evergreens had claimed every bit of ground that wasn’t too rocky to sustain life. He would have liked to see how they’d gotten the singlewide in. Rough as the dirt road was, he was surprised it hadn’t fallen apart.
“Did he say why he chose to live clear out here?” he asked. Ram’s bright red, nearly new three-quarter ton four-wheel pickup was parked in front of the trailer. Jeff wouldn’t be surprised if it cost more than his so-called house. How much did Ram have left over after making the monthly payments on what had to be a status symbol for him?
“He hates nosy neighbors.”
“He has even fewer than I do, none in fact. That’s Forest Service land all around.”
She reached for the door handle. “He says they’re always throwing regulations at him.”
“Wait.” Jeff touched her arm. “I’d like you to stay in here where while I knock.”
Judging by her expression, he thought she might refuse. Instead, she nodded. “I don’t want to make your job harder than it has to be. The two outbuildings—” She pointed. “One’s a shed really. The other is a garage he told me he’s turning into a workshop. That old garage helped sell him on the land. If he isn’t in the trailer or fishing nearby, I’m guessing you’ll find him in there.”
“Unless the grays—”
She held up her hand. “I’m thinking about what Niko said. Leaving a dog behind or trapping rabbits isn’t the same as slaughtering elk.”
* * * *
After knocking on the trailer’s only door, Jeff walked around the singlewide. By the time he returned to where he’d started, Mia was standing there. She, too, had knocked, calling Ram’s name as she did. Mia’s frown said she was getting concerned. Much as he wanted to
send her back to the SUV, she didn’t need nor want to be protected.
The garage with the heavy sliding door half off its railing confused Jeff. He wasn’t sure what he expected, probably a well-equipped work shop, but there was hardly anything in it, and no electricity as far as he could tell. It smelled like the surrounding forest.
“What’s this about?” Mia asked. “The way Ram talks about tools—maybe he’s afraid they’d get stolen because he can’t lock the door.”
“Maybe he stores them in the shed.” Jeff didn’t care. He just wanted to give Mia something to focus on.
“I’ve never been in it. The way it leans—I told him he could put a rope around it, hook the rope to his truck’s hitch, and pull it over. He said he’d been thinking about it.”
The shed was on the opposite side of the trailer from the garage, with a well-trod path connecting them. As he and Mia walked toward it, Jeff’s thoughts returned to Dark Mountain. He tried to tell himself he was dreading looking inside the shed because the memory of Grover’s savaged body was so strong. Then, as they stood outside the decrepit building with its new door, Mia’s drew a ragged breath and his hesitation increased.
“What is it?” he asked.
“The door,” she whispered. “Why did he bother?”
Jeff turned the knob and pulled. The air that spilled out smelled like blood.
“Don’t go in,” he warned.
“Too late,” she whispered. “I know that smell.”
They couldn’t have found Ram’s body, he tried to convince himself. If the grays had found the man in here or had dragged him inside, the door wouldn’t have been closed.
Side by side, Mia and he entered the small, dark space. As he waited for his eyes to adjust, he placed his arm around her shoulder. Felt her shudder.
“Oh god no,” she said under her breath. “Damn him. Damn.”
A doe’s carcass hung by its rear legs from the rafter. It had been gutted, the body cavity open and empty. Sightless eyes stared at a corner. Its free legs dangled.
“Damn.” Jeff increased his hold on Mia. “Ah, damn.”
“Fresh,” she said after a short silence. “That’s why the blood smell’s so strong.”
Brought back to reality by the word ‘fresh’, he released Mia and made himself touch the cavity. “It’s still warm.”
“How—?”
“Either he killed it after getting home yesterday or earlier today.”
Cursing, Mia walked behind the body. “There’s a hole at the shoulder. I don’t think it’s from a bullet. Jeff, Ram told me he likes to hunt with bow and arrow because it’s more of a challenge.”
“And because the sound of an arrow doesn’t travel. Why, with everything that’s been happening, did he decide to go hunting?”
“He wouldn’t have to go far because there’s all that Forest Service land around. The opportunity presented itself and he—damn him.”
“It isn’t hunting season.”
“No, it isn’t. And this is a doe. If there’s a fawn—I hate him!”
Even as appalled as he was, he knew she needed to let her fury out. Hadn’t it occurred to Ram that someone, like him, might come out here? Why had Ram taken the chance, done something so incredibly stupid?
“Jeff,” she whispered.
Alerted by the fresh horror in her voice, he joined her. She was still near the doe but not staring at it. Her attention was on a table in a corner of the shed—a table with antlers littering it. More antlers, including two elk racks, were on the floor.
She leaned against him. “How many has he killed? Where did he find so—?”
“Maybe at his secret place.”
She shuddered. “Where Grover was killed.”
“Yeah.”
* * * *
Jeff didn’t have to spell out the reason for the apples and carrots on the ground near the creek at the back of Ram’s property, because Mia knew. Obviously, Ram had used the produce to bring deer close enough for him to easily kill them. Judging by the pile’s condition, some of the fruit and vegetables had been there for a long time. Eventually, Jeff and other wildlife officers would be able to document how many deer and elk Ram had killed. She didn’t want to know, but didn’t have a choice. Whatever Jeff had to face, she’d do the same.
As Jeff and she stood staring at the creek, where a gentle slope provided easy access to water for wildlife, she imagined Ram coming here either late yesterday or this morning. Maybe he’d simply gone for a walk in an attempt to clear his mind of the horror of his friend’s death, but maybe he’d been intent on finding another way to distract himself. Whatever the reason, the doe had been at the wrong place at the wrong time. She’d paid with her life.
“Where is he?” Jeff spoke for the first time since they’d found the apples and carrots.
“That’s what I don’t understand.” She felt marginally better standing close to Jeff. “If he’d responded to the messages we left, we wouldn’t be here.”
“The grays…”
She shook her head. “They were still on Dark Mountain when you were there late yesterday. There’s no way they could have tracked him down so soon.”
He slid his hands over her shoulders and brought her in front of him so they were face to face. “I’ve been thinking about that. I saw one gray. What about the others?”
“Oh. They might have split up,” she finished. “We have to find him.”
“We?”
“Yes.”
“I’m the one who decided being with you last night was more important than trying to find the man who abandoned Lady. If he’s dead, the blame lies with me.”
“No,” she shot back as she slid her fingers over his ribs. “Don’t you dare go there.”
“But—”
“No. Listen to me, Jeff Julian. You wouldn’t let me play the blame game over my uncle’s drowning. I’m not going to let you get away with it now, understand?”
“Where do we look?”
* * * *
They found what was left of Ram among the trees, where the level land near the creek ended and a steep hill started. Holding hands, they’d been studying the ground close to the shed when she’d spotted a dark splotch.
“Blood,” Jeff had said.
“But not the doe’s.” Judging by a larger stain, she had bled out near the apples and carrots.
Drawing on her years of tracking animals in Alaska, she’d followed Ram’s final journey. There was the disturbed rocks where Ram must have tried to dig his boots into the ground, trampled undergrowth caused by the claws of large dogs, the skid marks left by a dragged body. With every step she took, Mia heard Ram’s screams, but she had no sympathy for him. He deserved what his judge and jury had done to him.
His left hand had been ripped free and discarded at the base of a massive evergreen. The grays had left his right hand some twenty feet from the left. Mia nearly stepped on a chunk of human hair.
Ram’s arms and legs were outstretched, his head thrown back and his dead mouth open in a perpetual cry. Not much was left of his clothes, but his boots and feet were intact. The same wasn’t true of his throat, armpits, belly and groin.
It was after seven in the evening by the time the sheriff’s department finished and the SUV that had carried Grover’s body off Dark Mountain arrived to haul Ram away.
By then, Mia was beyond wanting to talk.
Chapter Twenty-One
Fog seldom reached the tree farm, but it had snuck in from the coast while Mia was inside working at her computer. She put on a weatherproof jacket as protection from the cool damp air and clapped her hands, letting Banshee and Lady know she wanted company as she took a final look at this year’s seedlings before it got dark. Both dogs woke and jumped off the couch, Banshee reaching the front door before Lady did. Only a week had passed since she suspected the dogs had mated, too soon to determine if puppies were in the works.
“You better be prepared to pay child support,” she warned Bansh
ee, as the three went outside. “Just because you’re mine doesn’t mean I’m going to let you off the hook.”
Neither dog seemed to take her warning seriously. She watched as they headed toward the trees. Soon the thick, cool fog enveloped them, leaving her feeling alone. She patted her pocket to assure herself that her cell phone was there. Jeff hadn’t said when he expected to get off work, because most days that was out of his control.
If she strained to see, she might catch a glimpse of the great shadow that was Dark Mountain, but she knew better than to risk getting sucked back in time. After hunching over her laptop for hours, walking felt wonderful. If she picked up her pace and stayed at it long enough, hopefully she’d get through the night without a nightmare.
“Are you guys out there?” she asked the now-inseparable dogs. “Don’t forget you’re supposed to be looking for rabbits to run off. Neither of you are taking your job seriously.”
When they didn’t appear, she hesitated. Fear hadn’t been part of her makeup. Even when she’d been concerned a bear or wolf might be nearby, she’d relied on logic and experience to get her back to the cabin. The same mindset had always held here. What was acres and acres of healthy growth by daylight didn’t spawn monsters after dark.
Unfortunately, what she believed about her world had been permanently changed.
Determined not to let last week win, she straightened and picked up her pace. Two of her commercial accounts had increased their order, and the cost of fertilizer hadn’t gone up. She might, just might, turn a profit this year. If she did, what should be her priority? Her road was a disaster, but other things weren’t in much better shape. Maybe—
The phone in her pocket vibrated, startling her. Irritated by her reaction, she held it up. Summer was calling.
“How are you?” she asked by way of greeting. “What’s it been, three days since we talked?”
“About that. I just wanted you to know Kendall’s condition has improved. If he gets through the night with no sign of infection, they’ll take him out of ICU tomorrow.”
