Be Afraid

by Mary Burton

  Rick and Bishop moved back to the pond in time to see Georgia struggling to get out of the muck without dropping her camera.

  Georgia shook her head. “Don’t even try. The mud will suck you in and ruin your pants.” Two more steps and then a hard pull on her right foot and she stepped up onto the grassy bank.

  “What did you find?” Rick asked.

  She huffed out a breath and brushed a curl off her forehead with the back of a gloved hand. “As I told the uniforms, it’s a child. I can’t say for certain about the sex or cause of death. I can tell you the child was very young. Judging by the size of the skull I’d say five years old but in cases like this . . .” Realizing her tone grew increasingly bitter, she paused. “Children who’ve suffered a history of abuse often can be small for their age. Malnutrition.” Again a heavy silence. “I’d say female judging by the pink blanket but that’s just a guess at this point.”

  “A pink blanket,” Bishop said more to himself. “Fuck me.”

  “It could be a sign of remorse,” Rick theorized, his voice even. “The killer didn’t intend to kill the child and when it came time to dispose of the body, guilt kicked in hard. The pink blanket may’ve been a favorite of the child’s.”

  “I’m going to enjoy catching this son of a bitch.” Bishop, for all his jabs and digs, was a good cop with a stellar close rate.

  Rick shared his partner’s sentiments but kept his emotions buried well below the surface. “When can you remove the body?” Rick had already made a mental shift. He couldn’t think of the victim as a living, breathing child. Cases like this required a step back. Distance from the victim kept emotions in check and heads clear.

  Georgia, like Bishop, wasn’t adept at separating from cases like this. “Any minute. The medical examiner should be here any moment. I’ve all the photos and sketches I need so I’ll wade in now and pull the body free.”

  “Can I help?” Rick asked.

  “You got boots?”

  “Boy Scout’s got enough equipment in those storage bins to supply a small army,” Bishop quipped.

  At this point, Rick actually welcomed a verbal jab. It helped put distance between him and what he and Georgia needed to do. “I’ve got waders.”

  She looked as if she’d argue against the walk into the pond, which wouldn’t be easy for him. But instead of speaking her mind, she swallowed the comments. “Suit up, Bro. You can get a good view of the scene and I could use your muscle.”

  Bishop rested his hands on his hips, tapping his index finger against his belt. “I’ll do it. Better to get the extraction right.”

  “No,” Rick cut in. “I got this. I’ll be right back.”

  “It’s more important we do this right. You falling isn’t going to help solve this case.”

  “I’m not going to fall.” He left Bishop by the pond and he and Tracker made their way back to his car. He put Tracker in the backseat, switched on the car engine and A/C, and promised to return soon.

  Rick, like most cops, kept his vehicle stocked with a variety of items. Change of clothes, extra ammo, MREs, and, in his case, boots. No one ever really knew what the day would deliver, so most were ready for all scenarios. And Rick could admit that Bishop was right. Rick had overstocked his supplies.

  He removed his tie and folded it carefully before placing it to the side. He removed his shoes and placed them next to the tie. From his trunk he fished out waders, which he slid over his feet and pants. In the growing heat of the day the nasty, smelly muck gained strength as the wind shifted in his direction. He cursed, remembering his trip to the dry cleaners yesterday. He stripped off his dress shirt and put on a faded Titans T-shirt.

  When he returned, Georgia greeted him at the edge of the pond and handed him a shovel. She dropped her voice so that only he could hear. “You going to be able to do this? It’s a short walk but a tough one.”

  He kept his gaze on the pond, refusing to consider failure. “I’ll be fine.”

  “Detective High-and-Mighty can’t hear. I could make up an excuse . . .”

  Annoyance snapped like a rubber band against naked skin. “Georgia, even if we were here alone, I’d still do this. Let’s retrieve the body.”

  She studied him a beat. “Bishop’s an ass. He wants you to fail.”

  He grinned. “Good thing I’m not going to. Let’s go.”

  With a shrug of her narrow shoulders, she moved into the mire. She staggered in mud that quickly reached her calf but kept moving. Rick followed. Immediately, he realized this was going to be tougher than he’d imagined. What was that line in the movie about his ego writing a check his body couldn’t cash?

  Swallowing an oath as his hip burned, he kept walking, his gaze nailed to the center of the pond and the splash of pink that made him forget all his pain and frustration. Several times he used the shovel to steady himself. When he arrived at the center of the pond his breath was faster. The sun had burned away the morning mists and heat beat down directly onto the site.

  He glanced beyond the threads of pink to the small skull cradled inside. “Have you examined the skull?”

  “No, I’m afraid to handle the bones too much. They could be very fragile. I want to pull it all out as one unit and let the medical examiner do her thing.”

  “Fair enough.”

  “Let’s see if we can dig her out. Start at least a foot away from the remains. If we can loosen the bag we might be able to get her out easily.”

  “Stop saying her, Georgia. It’s only going to make this harder.” Mental distance had saved him more times than he could count. “We’re retrieving evidence, not a child.”

  With the back of her hand, she pushed aside a tendril of damp hair. “I don’t have your ability to detach, which you’ve elevated to a superpower, Bro.”

  He offered no sympathy. “You aren’t doing yourself a favor. Work now. Feel later.”

  Blue eyes snapped. “Oh, like you’re going to feel that hip pain later. You know you’re not doing yourself a favor by mucking through the mud. And yet, here you are. What does that say about you?”

  Sweat dampened his T-shirt between his shoulder blades. “We’re both dumbasses. Let’s dig.”

  That coaxed a smile. “What kinds of people do this work for a living?”

  “Insane people.”

  The two began digging a couple of feet out from the body. With the first shovelful of dirt, the muck and mire sunk in on itself, filling the hole quickly. Cursing, Rick dug faster, determined that the mud would not win. As he shoveled dirt, Georgia’s breathing grew more labored.

  “What’s wrong, Sis?” Aggravation had always coaxed her out of a mood. “Haven’t been hitting the gym lately.”

  She hissed out a breath. “I work out.”

  Laughter rumbled in his chest. “You’ve never worked out a day in your life.”

  “I joined a gym last year.”

  “How many times did you go?” He worked out regularly. Running wasn’t an easy option anymore, but he found weight training very effective. Biking also worked well and he’d learned to love swimming. Surrounded by the cool water and cut off from sound, he discovered each stroke calmed his mind.

  “Twice.”

  He laughed.

  Again she brushed the unruly curl from her forehead with the back of her hand. “I’m not a fan of sweating.”

  “Really? How do you like it now? I bet you’re doing a hell of a lot.”

  “Now’s different. It’s work. Gym sweat is boring. Mindless.” Her voice faded, her body demanding she hold on to her oxygen.

  “Right.”

  Finally, they got ahead of the mud. It took them another twenty minutes to dig deep enough so that the plastic bag could be lifted out of the mire.

  The medical examiner technician arrived with a body bag. While Georgia cradled the plastic bag, cocooning the pink blanket and bones, Rick went to shore and took the bag. When he returned, she laid the body into the bag and he zipped it up. Georgia and Rick carried
the body out together. Walking in muck while balancing the bag took more effort and by the time they handed the bag to the technicians, both were hot and winded.

  Rick watched the techs put the bag on a stretcher in the back of the van and then slam the doors shut. The humid morning air seemed to thicken with each passing second. He’d sweat through his T-shirt and pants and smelled of the foul mud.

  Georgia unzipped her jumpsuit, revealing a sweat-stained shirt. A swipe of mud brushed across her pale forehead.

  Bishop approached but stopped short as the wind shifted and he got a good whiff of them both. He stepped back. “Nice work.”

  “You should’ve joined us for the fun,” Georgia quipped. “That fancy suit of yours is perfect for this kind of work.”

  “I tried. Boy Scout wanted this gig.” Bishop’s leveled, calm gaze stoked her short temper.

  Rick knew from experience she’d fire back but he didn’t want to watch the verbal sparring. Too sore and hot to get involved in their skirmish, he headed back to his car.

  His car engine still hummed and a glance in the backseat revealed Tracker, lying with his eyes closed, ears perked. From a storage bin, Rick grabbed a bottle of water and drank. The morning heat had warmed the bottle but he savored the liquid as it washed away the stale taste in his mouth. He stripped off the waders and then pulled off the T-shirt, wiped off with a towel, and put his shirt and shoes back on. At the station, his first stop would be the showers and the lockers where he kept a spare suit.

  At the SUV’s driver’s-side door, Rick was anxious to sit down and get the weight off his leg when Bishop appeared. Without comment, he got in the car and Rick followed.

  Bishop wrinkled his nose. “You stink.”

  Rick put the car in drive. “No shit.”

  Bishop shrugged. “See anything of note around the body?”

  “No. But Georgia and her crew will check.”

  “She’s driven,” he said more to himself.

  Rick didn’t comment.

  “The pond must’ve been drained when the body was buried. While you were in the muck, I talked to the maintenance office.” He flipped pages in his notebook. “Pond was drained seven years ago, twelve years ago, nineteen years ago, and it was built twenty-five years ago. That gives us four windows of opportunity.”

  The air conditioner’s cool air seemed to sizzle as it hit his hot skin. “Will help narrow the missing persons files.”

  “Yeah.”

  Rick drove to the station, put Tracker at his desk with orders to stay, and found his way to the showers. He moved quickly to the locker room, stripping off the morning’s clothes and stepping under the hot spray of the shower. As the water beat down on his sore left side, he breathed a sigh of relief before turning his face to the spray. He soaped liberally and washed his hair, wondering if he’d ever get the smell of the muck from his body.

  Out of the shower, he toweled, glancing only briefly at the scar that ran over his hip and down his thigh. He dressed and found Bishop at his desk on the phone. Tracker stared at Bishop, who looked at the dog and held up a hand as if to say, “What?”

  Don’t let him off the hook, T. Suppressing a smile, Rick poured a coffee.

  Bishop raised a brow at the dog and then turned back toward his desk as Rick approached. “The medical examiner says it will be a day at least before she has an evaluation but she’s making it top priority.”

  “Great. What about Missing Persons?”

  “They’ve sent some folders and are digging out the rest.” Bishop nodded toward Rick’s desk to a stack of manila folders that had to be forty deep. “Files of missing children who fit our rough description and our most recent time parameters. Basically the last thirty years.”

  Rick sat and flipped open the first file and read. Tanya Logan, age four, missing for eleven years. He glanced at the image of the child’s smiling face. “Going to be a long day.”

  “Give me half. Let’s see if we can narrow it down to at least a short list.”

  “There’s no telling if our victim is in these files. No telling if a report was filed.”

  Bishop unfastened his cuffs and carefully rolled them up, revealing muscled forearms sprinkled with dark hair. “Agreed. But we still got to do the work.”

  He handed over half the stack. “I’ll do whatever it takes to catch this bastard.”

  Detective Deke Morgan, Rick’s brother, arrived as he opened the first file. The frown lines in Deke’s forehead and around his eyes were deeper than normal and the graying at his temples had thickened. He wore his customary dark suit and white shirt and simple black cowboy boots polished to a high sheen.

  A perpetual frown deepened as Deke studied the stack of files. “Good, you’re on the case. Let me know when you have something.” Deke had given Rick the nod to join homicide, but if he’d shown any favoritism in that moment he’d not shown any more. He’d chew Rick’s ass as quickly as Bishop’s or any other member of the team. He was all about equal opportunity when it came to doling out crap.

  “I thought you were on vacation.”

  Deke’s frown softened for a split second. “I was. I’m back. What’s going on with the case?”

  Rick shifted as the tension snaked up his back. “We’ll let you know if we’ve any kind of hit.”

  Deke rubbed Tracker’s head. “I’ve had that reporter, Susan Martinez, calling. She got wind of the story and wants in.”

  Memories of the reporter hounding him after the shooting set Rick’s teeth on edge.

  “I know you don’t like Martinez.”

  “I can deal if she can help. I just don’t trust her.”

  Martinez and her crews had been on the scene as rescuers were loading him in the ambulance. Later, after surgery, she’d found him in his hospital room and asked for an interview. He’d been pissed at himself and worried for Tracker and he’d said a few choice words. She’d not scared easily but in the end had left him. She’d covered the shooting extensively, showing the dash-cam footage and interviewing other officers. What was his critical mistake? All agreed he’d made no mistake. The job came with hazards. Few of those quotes had made it on air.

  “If you don’t give her some information, she’ll find some,” Deke said. He glanced toward the coffeemaker as if he needed a jolt.

  The line between cop and brother was thin, but there nonetheless, and Rick had avoided being too familiar with Deke while on the job. Still, he couldn’t resist a tiny jab.

  “You’re looking a little rough,” Rick teased. “Rachel and city life wearing on you?”

  His brother had initially inherited the family home, called the Big House by the Morgan family, when their father had died. However, Deke had no taste for country living and had deeded the house to Rick. Deke had moved into his new girlfriend’s city place six months ago.

  Deke’s frown darkened even as his gaze softened. “She never misses an opportunity to bark at me about the handling of an arrest.”

  “Shouldn’t have moved in with a defense attorney.”

  A slight smile tugged at Bishop’s lips. He had no qualms about a jab or two. “Not just any attorney. Rachel Wainwright. The meanest in the state.”

  Deke shrugged as he poured himself a cup of coffee. “I like her mean. Keeps it interesting.”

  “Like living with a python?” Bishop asked.

  Deke sipped his coffee. “What’s life without a little danger?”

  Danger. They all lived with it every day. It was waiting for them the minute they strapped on a badge and stepped out the front door of their home. Even when they were off duty it was impossible to shut off the defense mechanisms or worries. When Rick ate in a restaurant he always kept his back to the wall and his eyes on the door. He always carried his off-duty weapon and he always knew a room’s entrances and exits.

  “Yeah, can’t get enough of it myself,” Rick said.

  Rick and Bishop had been reading for three hours when Georgia reappeared. She’d showered and changed int
o a clean pair of khakis and a blue collared shirt worn by the forensics team. Her pale skin glowed pink as she tried to scrub the mud, as well as the memory, away.

  Rick leaned back in his chair. “What brings you here?”

  Bishop had loosened his tie but when Georgia spoke he straightened it. His gaze roamed over Georgia, taking in her slim figure.

  She scratched Tracker between the ears. Few touched the canine but his baby sister had never hesitated to pet him. “Any luck on the missing persons cases?”

  He stretched out his leg and rubbed the stiffness banding his thigh. “Some leads but nothing solid.”

  If she noticed he was in pain she gave no sign of it. “What do you think the chances are that we’ll find out who this kid was?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “If you had to bet?” she asked.

  It was Bishop who leaned back in his chair. “Slim.”

  She frowned at Bishop. “Why do you say that?”

  “Too many variables. We can pour through all the old files we like, but if we can’t ID the kid, we won’t get anywhere.”

  Georgia rested her hand on her hip and Rick could almost hear the wheels grinding and turning. “What if you could make an identification?”

  “The medical examiner pushed up her schedule and will have a preliminary report in less than an hour. She’ll have basic physical stats for us. And we might get lucky and find a match in the file.”

  “And if you don’t?”

  “Then we’re SOL,” Bishop said. “A needle in a haystack. We don’t even know if the victim is from Nashville.”

  “I can’t believe this,” she challenged. “All the science and we can’t ID the child?”

  Bishop held up his hands in surrender. “Sometimes the truth sucks.”

  Her frown deepened and her eyes blazed.

  Softening the news with a platitude would only stoke her frustration. “Bishop’s right. If we don’t have a file match,” Rick said, “our chances diminish.”