Finders Weepers
By Belinda White
2nd Edition
Copyright 2018 Belinda White
Kindle Edition
Cover Image by Livali Wyle
This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be resold or given away to other people.
Disclaimers:
While the location of this story is set in a real-life town and State Park, all the characters within are works of fiction, existing only in the Author’s somewhat warped mind. Also, I have the highest regard for the Owen County Sheriff’s Department. I hope they forgive me for my creative differences in how they are portrayed.
Author's Note: Please note that the word "were" does double and triple duty in this novel. Beyond the normal meaning, to a Benandanti, Were can also mean a creature. And 'to were' can be interchangeable with to shift or change form.
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Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
A Note From Belinda
Chapter 1
I'M A FINDER. IT'S what I do. Not small things like keys and such, although I suppose I could find them, too, in a pinch. I'm just better at finding living things. The misplaced husband, the rebellious teenager, the lost dog...I'm great at finding dogs. I can even find a missing cat, though why anyone would bother looking is beyond me.
I have this quasi-supernatural kind of psychic gift. Bring me an item touched by the one missing, and I can psychically trace their movements. Sometimes I can actually link with them and see out of their eyes. Linking can make Finding much easier.
Other times, I have to do things the hard way. It isn't so much that I mind the hard way. It's just that it's so much darn, well, harder. Harder on the body, on the mind, on the paws. Oh yeah, I'm a Benandanti werewolf.
Not that I would admit that to anyone. I enjoy living a normal life without the fear of looking down the barrel of a gun straight into a glint of silver. I would love to send a newsflash to humans: Werewolves are not all evil, we just are. We exist, just like humans. We have our good ones and our bad ones, just like humans. We live in houses and earn our livings, just like humans. We wear clothes and flea collars, just like... . Okay, maybe without the werewolf humor.
So, I'm a Finder. To supplement my inconsistent earnings as a stone carver, I find misplaced people. Even if they don't want to be found. For a price. Usually, I make it a rule to only find the living. If my psychic trail turns dark, I don't take the case. Period. Almost always. Unless, of course, I am at the moment financially insolvent. Or, in layman's terms, flat broke. Which unfortunately was the case when the parents of Jimmy Riley showed up on my doorstep.
THE SOUND OF GRAVEL crunching alerted me to uninvited company. By the time I had made myself somewhat presentable, my door was vibrating under heavy knocking. I threw it open to stop the noise, and the overpowering scent of chickens, live and on the claw, came rushing at me.
A fist hovered scant inches from my nose, seemingly hung in suspended animation. The owner of the fist blinked as if wondering what to do now that the door wasn't there to wham on. After a moment, the fist lowered, which allowed me a better view of my visitors.
The woman reminded me of Ma Kettle from the old-time movies I watched as a kid. Tall and stocky with scraggly gray hair down to her shoulders and beady little watering eyes that looked like they hadn't seen sleep for days. Behind and slightly to the right of her stood the other half of the couple. Pa Kettle in the movies was always easy going and friendly. The man did not remind me of Pa Kettle. About the same height as the woman, he outweighed her by a good 50 pounds. He was dressed in bibs with a stained white t-shirt so thin you could make out the individual hairs on his chest. The glare he directed at me made me feel our positions should have been reversed.
I stared at them, waiting. For a moment, no one spoke. Then the woman burst out crying. It was going to be one of those days.
"You Tazlyn Hunt?" the man asked. It sounded more like an accusation than a question.
I nodded, not wanting to waste words from a dry throat that hadn't had its first glass of diet soda for the day.
The woman gasped in a large sobbing breath and blurted out, "Sheriff Dunwood said maybe you could help find our boy. Please, you gotta help. We brung money."
Normally I meet with clients in the small office area of my workshop, but at this hour of the morning, I hadn't started up the stove yet. So, I could invite them into my personal living space, or be cold for the next half hour or so while the office warmed up. Grabbing my jacket, I led them over to the outbuilding.
An antique pot-bellied stove served as a heat source for my workshop. It had its drawbacks, sure. The main one being that it could roast your front while your backside was still freezing. But it had its perks, too. I could warm up a pot of soup without leaving the office, and I always had a kettle of hot water for tea or coffee. Plus, I like simple. And I really like cheap.
I lit the stove first thing as we walked in, but didn't apologize for the cold. If they had called ahead, it would have been warm. Then I remembered why they were there.
"Sorry for the cold. The fire will catch soon." I pulled the two plain wooden chairs I used for the odd client over within the heat range of the stove along with my rolling office chair. We sat.
Beyond their first words, the couple hadn't spoken. The woman had settled into a steady sobbing and snuffling. The man had settled into a stony expression that clearly stated what he thought of my reputation as a Finder. Great, should be fun.
"Are you Mr. and Mrs. Riley?" I asked.
The woman sniffed once more, loudly, and threw a glance at her husband that clearly said 'I told you so'.
He snorted. "Heavens, woman, she ain't gotta be psychic to know who we are. Our durn pictures have been plastered all over the news."
I nodded. I was sure they had been. Of course, I wouldn't know it. My budget didn't allow for cable or satellite programming, so my TV watching consisted mostly of DVDs rented from the local library. A radio, however, was within my means, and I'd heard about the missing Riley boy from the local news program. I gave Mrs. Riley what I hoped was a sympathetic smile. Mornings just don't see me at my best.
"It wasn't hard to figure out who you were," I admitted. "Jimmy's been missing for a couple of days now, right?"
The man threw a disgusted look at his wife but nodded. "If the Sheriff's department cain't find him, I don't see how's you can."
"She's psychic, James," Mrs. Riley said, briefly running out of tears. I handed her a box of tissues and she smiled weakly. "I seen on the TV how police use psychics th
ese days to find people like our Jimmy. And Sheriff Dunwood, he wouldn't a sent us out here if'n Miss Hunt wasn't a true psychic. Ain't that right, Miss Hunt?"
I winced. I would owe Dunwood for this one. Chances were good he sent them out here just to give his department a breathing spell. But I had to be diplomatic.
"I have some very limited psychic talent, Mrs. Riley. I'm actually just a really good tracker. My dog and I have worked with the Sheriff's Office in the past. He probably sent you here to see if we could track Jimmy down by scent." For the first time, the scowl left Mr. Riley's face. He might not understand psychics, but he understood trackers.
"You got a bloodhound?" he asked.
"Actually, he's more wolf than dog in a lot of ways. But I'd trust his nose over any bloodhound I've ever met. Did you happen to bring something of Jimmy's? To use as a scent?"
Mrs. Riley opened her purse and the smell hit me hard. She had brought a pair of Jimmy's underwear and it didn't seem likely that Jimmy followed my mother's advice of wearing new underclothes every day. These smelled like he'd lived in them for at least a week.
"Hope you don't take offense, but the sheriff said shorts worked best."
"He's right," I said, breathing through my mouth to avoid the heavy scent. "Jimmy left your house on foot?"
She nodded. "He was hunting the coyotes that been taking our chickens."
I stiffened. Chickens are almost an addiction with coyotes. They simply can't resist them. Now I have no great love for coyotes. They are all just a bunch of wolf wannabes and aren't much use for anything other than trouble. But still—they're family, in a long distance kind of annoying cousin way. So I take exception to rifle-toting coyote hunters like Jimmy Riley. To make matters worse, my gift kicked in and my psychic tracking sense raced along Jimmy's trail to find utter darkness. Little Jimmy wouldn't be found alive.
So, with two strikes against him, why did I take on this case? I'd like to say it was a sixth sense that warned me that this case was important to my continued way of life. But the truth is, my Jeep needed new tires.
Chapter 2
We stood close to the northwestern boundary of McCormick's Creek State Park. Being late October, the weather in Indiana had finally turned cold after the long hot summer and the leaves that remained on the trees were a variety of bright, vibrant colors. By contrast, the leaves that covered the small mound in front of us were brown and brittle. It seemed fitting.
I looked over at my barrel-chested, golden-haired partner, Rebel, and shook my head. "Do you have any doubts the trail ends here?"
Rebel just looked at me. Being a wolf-shepherd mix, heavy on the wolf, he was the strong, silent type. If he ever shifted into human form, I'd be in heaven.
We both looked at the grave and sat down on the leaf-covered ground. It had taken us the better part of the afternoon to follow Jimmy's trail. I glanced up through the trees, trying to gauge how much daylight we had left. Maybe a couple of hours. As chilly as it was now, it would turn even colder when the sun went down. I was thankful I had packed a fleece throw in my backpack. Reb had his fur, but I had to stay in skin for this one.
"Well, at least they paid up front. So we're a couple hundred up for just one day's work." Past experience had taught me on the rare occasions I took a death case to be sure to get the money up front. Clients did not seem to feel obligated to pay if their loved ones weren't found alive.
I flipped open my phone and called Sheriff Dunwood. A short conversation later, I looked back to Rebel. "It'll take them about an hour to gather everyone together and get out here. So you have about sixty minutes of freedom if you want to take a run. Just run that way." I motioned back the way we had come, away from the mound of dirt and leaves. "It's only a couple of miles to the house if you want to go home. It looks like it's going to be a late night."
He made a harrumphing sound and laid down next to me, lowering his head onto his paws.
"Thanks, Partner," I said, scratching between his ears. "I won't leash you till we hear them coming."
Reb and I had been together for years. I'd learned over that time that his vocabulary was almost as good as mine. Just because an animal can't speak is no reason to think they can't understand when you do. But then again, it's entirely possible that Rebel is one of a kind.
I hate to admit it, but I'm actually envious of Rebel for a multitude of reasons. One, he gets way more fur-time. Two, I'm the one who has to work to feed us and clean up after us. The whole opposable thumb thing is far over-rated. And three, he gets all the really good scratches. I hadn't had a really good head scratch in sixteen years. Since I lost my family to the Beast.
Reb whined and rolled over onto his back for a belly rub. The glutton. The slight change in movement brought me back to the task at hand.
The dirt mound in front of us really bothered me. We hadn't gotten close once we realized what we had found. Police evidence and all that. But what I could see was really worrying me. And what I couldn't smell was worrying me even more.
If there were any tracks around the grave, they had been covered by the leaves, but I doubted there would be any. I tilted my chin up to taste the scents again. Nothing but little Jimmy Riley and coyote. Which would make sense if he had been killed by a pack. But coyotes hunt alone or in pairs. A pair of coyotes isn't a match for a teenage boy with a gun.
Besides, even if the coyotes had managed to take the boy down, coyotes don't bury their kills. This part of the park wasn't part of the trail system and didn't get many hikers outside of mushroom season. Jimmy's scent was the only recent human one in the immediate area. And for obvious reasons, Jimmy didn't bury himself.
My psychic abilities really are limited and don't include premonitions or clairvoyance, but every sense in my body was screaming that this was bad. Very, very bad.
Rebel nosed my backpack, and I came back from my musings to realize there were distant sounds of men coming our way. I swung my pack around and took out the six-foot leash and collar, slipping it over Reb's head. The law said all dogs in public had to be on a leash. They didn't say how tight the collar had to be. In a pinch, Rebel could slip the collar and run. Not that he ever would without my permission. I'm alpha.
The sheriff and his men came huffing through the woods, weighed down with packs and tools. The closest surface road was a half mile away, and they had to hoof it the rest of the way in.
Sheriff Dunwood nodded to us. "Ms. Hunt. Rebel."
As I had told the Rileys, Dunwood and I had crossed paths before, and while he didn't really believe in my psychic powers, he knew my history of Finds. All in all, he was a good man, even if he did make me feel like a shrimp standing next to him. At 6'2" he towered over me by almost a full foot. And where I am fairly small boned, he is broad-shouldered and muscular, with close-cropped brown hair and steel gray eyes. I might even find him attractive if he didn't make me feel so much like a little china doll.
Especially if I could get him out of that brown Sheriff's uniform that simply didn't do the man justice. I was glad of the waning daylight to hide my blush when my errant thoughts ran toward a Dunwood without any clothes at all. But the Sheriff had other things to worry about.
He looked at the mound and sighed. "I take it that's what I think it is?"
"The final resting place of Jimmy Riley," I answered. "This is as close as we got, so anything from here on is just as we found it."
He grunted. "Wouldn't expect any less from you." He glanced around at his men. "Okay, boys, do a thorough sweep of the area. Get those lights set up and comb the grass between here and the site. I think we all know better than to doubt Rebel's nose."
His men did indeed know better than to doubt Rebel. While they may be skeptical of my abilities, they had full belief in the power of Reb's sense of smell. The Owen County Sheriff's Department didn't have the budget for a K-9 unit, so from time to time, they borrowed Rebel. Bomb threats, tracking down robbers that thought they would hide out in wooded acreage, and the occasional sw
eep of schools for drugs and weapons; they would ask for Rebel three or four times a year. Of course, we were a package deal. What we did, we did pro-bono. You never know when you'll need a favor from a law enforcement officer.
Reb and I stayed back and watched them work. It was hours before they had the shallow grave dug out and little Jimmy uncovered. I knew something was up when the deputies started glancing over their shoulders at us.
I stood and stretched, going for nonchalant, the leash held lightly in my hand. I had a really bad feeling about this. Maybe I was becoming a little clairvoyant after all.
Snippets of whispered conversations reached my perked up ears, "mauled...too big for a coyote...bites," and then the final clincher. "Rebel."
I'd heard enough. "What's the story, Dunwood?"
He held up one finger to me and continued his low-pitched talk with the deputies. One of his men, a newbie I hadn't met yet, took a step out from the group. He looked like a freckle-faced red haired kid. Couldn't have been much older than 21. I know they say the older we get the younger the cops get, but this was getting ridiculous. Especially when he took another step toward us and rested his hand on his pistol, unsnapping the holster.
I stepped in front of Rebel and yelled at Dunwood. "Call off your boy there, Dunwood, or things are going to get ugly fast." Being an alpha means protecting one's pack at all costs. If that meant taking out an over zealous red haired step deputy, that's what I'd do.
Dunwood glanced up and saw what was happening. "Cool it, Jeffries."
"He's a wolf, Sheriff, and Jimmy there was killed by something mighty big." Jeffries nodded at Rebel and swallowed. "I'd say about that big."
I could feel my rage building. "Dunwood, you and your men—except maybe this outstanding young recruit here—know my dog. He is practically a member of your department. Besides, dogs don't bury their kills. Neither do wolves."
"No, he was buried by a human," the sheriff agreed. He hesitated a moment too long and I knew what was coming before he even opened his mouth. I waited anyway. Make him work for it. "Would you mind telling us how you happened to find this place?"
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