“Good girl,” Circe said with enthusiasm at the same time she pulled the fleece toy out of her waist pack. Zelda kept her eyes on the toy, though Circe still made Zelda wait as she walked closer. Finally, as she stood very close to her, she said, “Okay.” At the same time she tossed the fleece toy. Zelda sprang up and raced after the toy with joy and enthusiasm in every step.
Brian marked the spot with red flagging tape, while Circe continued to play with Zelda and her toy. His face was somber as he stared down at the piece of ground. “I was afraid we’d find something,” he said. “Everything I’d managed to pull together seemed to point to this place. As much as I was hoping I was wrong, I had a really bad feeling about this one.”
The bad feeling had eluded Circe until the dead woman showed herself. After that, she’d had a hard time avoiding the dread that shadowed her like a dark cloud. Too often the dead that came to her were victims of violence. That’s why they lingered. They were searching for peace or perhaps a way home. It never failed to make her feel sad even when she realized she could help in some small measure.
She’d like nothing better right now than to load up and go home, except that wasn’t the way she did her job. Glancing down at her GPS, she saw a fair amount of area still left open and unchecked. If she went home now, all she’d be able to think about was quitting before the job was done. “We’ve covered only about a quarter of the designated area,” she said. “Shall we do a quick run-through of the rest?”
She’d learned early on in her search training never to walk away, even if she discovered remains quickly. Her teachers and mentors had drilled a mantra into her: always, always finish the entire area. Besides, it went against her own internal code to do only half a job.
“Yeah,” Brian said as he tucked the roll of marking tape back into his pocket. “This should be it, but let’s see what Zelda has to say.”
She liked working with Brian so much because he respected her dog. Anyone who genuinely liked Zelda and appreciated what she could do was pretty darned fine in her book. She nodded and motioned to Zelda, who ran back and dropped the toy at Circe’s feet. She picked it up and tucked it into her waist pack once more. Then she looked down at Zelda, who stood gazing at her with intensity. She leaned down and quietly said to her, “There’s more.”
Those two words sent Zelda off running again, with a renewed expression of deep concentration. She’d had her time to play with her toy, and now it was time to work again. She loved her job and would search for hours if Circe asked her to. In fact, Circe would wear out long before Zelda would.
Circe glanced down at her GPS to make sure she was maintaining the pattern she’d decided upon earlier. So far, so good. It wasn’t a large area, and so the remaining search should go quickly.
No big deal to finish up. Or that’s what she thought until ahead of her another young woman rose from the ground. When the woman was on her feet, she stilled, with her head down and her hands clasped in front of her. She was young, maybe sixteen or seventeen, with short dark hair tinted holly red and styled into spikes that stood up from her scalp. Seconds after Circe saw her, Zelda caught the scent, so Circe didn’t have to alter her pattern to bring her into the scent cone. Beneath a tall pine, Zelda dropped her head low to the ground and sniffed back and forth until she was satisfied she’d located the right spot. Then Zelda alerted a second time as she looked up at Circe once more.
“Ah, Brian,” she said. “We have another one.”
With agonizing slowness, the young woman’s head came up and her green eyes held Circe’s gaze. Unlike the first woman, she made no attempt to speak to her, at least not verbally. The sadness radiating from her eyes tore at Circe’s heart. She was, or had been, young, yet the pain etched on her face spoke of a life filled with very real nightmares. She hated to even consider what horrors had created those shadows.
Once Brian stood beside Zelda, Circe looked away from those sad eyes and again fished the toy from her pack. She tossed it to Zelda, who caught it easily and began to run with joy as she shook her head from side to side.
“Ah, sonofabitch,” Brian muttered as he took the roll of marking tape out of his pocket and began to pull a length of it off the roll. “This, I wasn’t expecting.” His face was grim and his hands shook as he set about marking the spot Zelda had pinpointed for them.
While he worked, she continued to play with Zelda, tugging on the toy and tossing it for her to chase. When Brian was done she told Zelda to bring it in, her command to give the toy back. She didn’t have to ask twice. Zelda trotted up next to her and dropped the toy.
The second woman was a sad surprise, particularly considering that the area they were searching wasn’t large. It was bad enough that one woman had lost her life. Two was unthinkable. She’d never found remains this close together before. From all appearances, someone didn’t want to be bothered with doing a good job covering up their horrid deeds. Then again, she’d been hunting for dead bodies long enough to know that when it came to murder, there were no rules.
“This is fucked up,” Brian muttered as he stuffed the roll of flagging tag back into his pocket. “I need to call in the SPD investigators and crime-scene unit. This is going to be big.”
Though the area they were dealing with was small, it still technically fell within the jurisdiction of the Spokane Police Department, or the SPD, as everyone around here referred to them. Brian was working an active case that had originated in the county, though his investigation had brought him to this spot within the city limits. In order to conduct this search, he’d coordinated it with the SPD.
Now, he had to let them know the areas Zelda had alerted them on. They would approach the marked areas as potential crime scenes because only Circe knew for certain that bodies were buried there. Of course, she couldn’t tell Brian that the bodies were buried beneath the pine-needle-strewn ground. He wouldn’t believe her anyway. Brian, and the rest of the local enforcement community, did, however, trust Zelda’s nose firmly enough for her findings to stand up in court.
Circe looked down at her GPS and sighed. Despite the two discoveries, they still hadn’t covered a chunk of the land. For a small area, it sure was taking a lot to time to check it all. She was pretty confident they wouldn’t find anything else, but she couldn’t walk away without doing the job correctly. True, Brian had asked her to come out and search for a body, as in a single body, and as tragic as it was, they had found one. Locating two was a fluke. Despite the two finds, they wouldn’t go home until they cleared every inch.
“Come on, Zelda,” she said and waved her arm to her left to let her know the direction she wanted her to cover. This was another skill they’d learned as a team, directional signals. Search up, search down, search left, search right, and she communicated all those instructions with the simple wave of the hand. “There’s more.”
As before, Zelda took off with her nose low and her eyes focused. Circe and Brian followed her. Every so often Circe glanced down to make sure they were traversing the ground they needed to. It pleased her to see the lines on her GPS were relatively straight and that with two more passes, they’d have covered it all.
They were halfway through with the second pass when a sound floated across the wind. Slowly, Circe turned her head. She noticed two things at once: Zelda was giving her alert, and right behind her stood a woman whose soft voice was saying, “Help me.”
*
Paul Garland draped his jacket over the back of his chair and dropped heavily into it. For the hundredth time he wondered whose dumb-ass idea it had been to move in with Brenda. Oh yeah, it was his dumb-ass idea, and in fact, he’d been the one to suggest they do it in the first place. Talk about a total disaster. Six months ago he got her to leave, and he’d love to say it was over except that wasn’t how it was going down. No matter what he said, she still wasn’t letting go. She might be physically out of his house, but she was most certainly not out of his life.
Today was another one of those days.
After arming the alarm system, he pulled the back door shut and had put one foot on the step when he stopped momentarily. He silently prayed he was simply hallucinating, except he wasn’t that lucky. There she stood with several of his shirts and a plate of his favorite cookies, right next to his car where he’d parked it in the driveway last night. If he hadn’t been too lazy to pull it into the garage, he’d have been safe, or not. The lack of a car in the driveway probably wouldn’t have stopped her. Instead of waiting for him by his car, she’d have been knocking on the back door. She gave new meaning to the term undeterred.
Head up, he kept going down the steps and hoped she didn’t notice that her appearance rattled him. Calm, collected, and as awful as it sounded, cold, was the only way to approach her. Right now, he didn’t look at the shirts, and he sure as hell didn’t take the cookies, even if, truth be told, she baked a mean cookie. From painful experience he’d learned that any tiny bit of kindness from him and she was packing her things to move back in.
Stalker was the first word that came to mind, but he didn’t want to go there. Experienced police detectives did not have stalkers. He was a goddamn professional and should know better than to get involved with someone unbalanced enough to become a terrorizing factor in his life. Except that’s exactly what he did, and now he couldn’t seem to extricate himself from an untenable position.
At least this morning, his strategy of ignoring her had worked. When he refused to make eye contact or acknowledge her presence in any way, she hadn’t tried to stop him when he got in his car and slowly backed out of the driveway. It took effort not to glance into the rearview mirror to see what she was doing. For all he knew, she was still standing there, shirts in one hand and cookies in the other, her hair perfect and her makeup flawless.
Now, he ran his hands through his hair, thinking he needed a haircut, then almost laughed. With the Brenda problem on the front burner, the last thing he really cared about was a stupid haircut. First things first: get Brenda out of his life and then a haircut. Besides, there could be an upside to letting his appearance go. Maybe if he let his hair get long and shaggy he’d look like shit and Brenda would lose interest in him. At this point he was willing to try anything.
“What’s up, pretty boy?”
He smiled at the sound of his partner’s voice. He sure wished Diana played on his side of the fence because she was the kind of woman a man could count on. Honest, straightforward, and beautiful, she was special and he adored her. He knew he rated high in her book too, but she’d never be interested in him. Wrong sex. Even if he wasn’t, it was never a good idea to mix professional and personal. He was resigned to be content with the relationship as it stood. He’d rather have her as a partner and a friend than not have her in his life at all.
“Nothing that can’t be fixed,” he shot back. Man, he hoped that was true.
“Ya sure?”
Slowly he nodded. “Yeah.” He was trying to convince himself as much as he was trying to convince Diana.
So much for trying. She studied him with her deep-brown eyes and obviously didn’t believe him. He also knew she wouldn’t press the issue further. It was one of the things that made this partnership hum. They always had an unspoken communication, and it worked better than with any other partner he’d ever worked with in the past. She knew when to push and when not to.
“Well, let me know if I can help,” she said as she patted him on the shoulder and headed to her desk, which was right next to his.
“Copy that.” As much as he appreciated the offer he wasn’t about to take her up on it right at the moment. Maybe someday, far down the road, though he doubted he’d ever share this debacle. Even as close as they were, the situation with Brenda was too embarrassing to share. No way did he plan to tell anyone in the department what was going on with the crazy ex-girlfriend. Ultimately, he’d handle it himself without it ever needing to go public. Some things were best kept in the closet with the door bolted.
Diana’s cell rang just as she dropped down into her task chair, and he listened to her side of the conversation with interest. It wasn’t that he was being nosey. To the contrary, picking up on a few key phrases, he could tell it was a call-out and so he listened openly. When she put the phone back in the holder at her waist, she looked over at him and nodded toward the door.
“Three bodies down in People’s Park.”
“Seriously?” That place drew all sorts of people, like nudists, dope smokers, nature lovers, runners, and cyclists. Murderers weren’t the typical park user. At least not in recent years. When he was a kid it was a dangerous place, but that time was decades past, and now it was as safe as any place in an urban area.
“As a heart attack.”
He grabbed his jacket and followed her out the door. If nothing else, this promised to be very interesting. At least for a few hours, he wouldn’t have to think about Brenda, and that appealed to him on a grand scale. Nothing like a murder or two to take his mind off his own problems.
So far at least, Brenda had kept her impromptu visits on a personal level like at his house, the gym, or the grocery store. He’d changed gyms and grocery stores, and would move except he refused to let anyone push him out of his own home. In the last six months at least she’d steered clear of his office. His mother had always taught him to be grateful for the little things.
“I’m driving,” Diana said when they were outside in the parking lot.
“Oh, come on, Dale Earnhardt. I think it’s my turn.” To say Diana had a lead foot was being polite. She had to have been a Formula One race-car driver in a former life while he was more like the city bus driver, always looking out for the safety and comfort of his passengers.
“You drive like an old lady.” She didn’t even glance at him as she opened the driver’s side door of the unmarked cruiser and got in.
He’d be offended if her remark hadn’t contained a grain of truth. “And you should have your license suspended.” Another grain of truth.
She was sliding on her black, wrap-around sunglasses. “Blah, blah, blah. Just get in, buckle up, and shut up.”
He shook his head. In his time with Diana, he’d also learned that it wouldn’t do him a bit of good to argue. The woman possessed an impressive stubborn streak. If she wanted to drive, by God, she was going to drive, and he really couldn’t do much to change the situation. The fact that he was taller, heavier, and carried a bigger gun didn’t faze her. He got in, buckled up, and shut up.
Chapter Two
Two words rolled through Diana’s mind on the short drive from the Public Safety Building to the parking lot at People’s Park: serial killer. Her dad had been part of the team that ultimately took down serial killer Robert Yates. Unfortunately, not before Yates killed thirteen women and terrorized an entire city. Even after they put him in prison for the rest of his life, her dad was convinced there were more victims. While still on the job he pushed hard for the city and county to keep searching. It didn’t do any good. They couldn’t afford to spend more tax dollars on a killer who’d never be free again. Retired now, her dad was still working the case, though so far he hadn’t been able to prove his theory. Dad was a good detective, and ultimately if more bodies turned up, he’d solve the case. She believed he was right, and not just because he was her father.
By the time they arrived in Peaceful Valley, marked cars blocked both Riverside Avenue and Clarke Road, barring entrance to the People’s Park parking area. A cruiser backed up enough to let her pass through the barricade, and she parked next to a dark-blue SUV with a National Search Dog Society sticker on the back window—the K9 handler’s rig.
At the south end of the Sandifur Bridge, Brian Klym from the County Sheriff’s Department was standing beside a woman holding a loose leash with a bored-looking German shepherd at the end of it. The HRD dog that discovered three bodies in the park brought back all the memories of the days when her dad worked 24/7 on the Yates case. He was a big proponent of utilizing whatever resources w
ere available, and that included dogs. His respect for what dogs could do was well-known, and he would approve of what this dog was able to highlight today. Dad had also taught her there was no such thing as a coincidence, and three bodies buried in one area less than five acres total was no coincidence. Something very bad had happened here.
“Come on,” she said to Paul. “Let’s see what Brian has for us.”
“Hey, Erni, Garland, ’bout time you two got here.” Brian held out a hand.
Diana took his extended hand and shook it. “Got here as quick as we could.”
“Hey,” Paul said as he also shook Brian’s hand.
Brian and Paul had gone through the academy together, and Paul always said he was a good guy who would probably end up being sheriff someday. It was nice to know he was someone they could work with, since this would more than likely end up being a joint investigation. Most of the time the two departments worked fine together, but occasionally tension and power plays made it difficult. She didn’t think this would turn out to be one of those times.
Brian inclined his head toward the woman with the dog. “This is Circe Latham and her K9, Zelda. Circe, these two are detectives Erni and Garland from the SPD.”
Paul stepped forward and offered his hand to Circe. “Call me Paul.”
Diana also shook Circe’s hand, whose grip was firm and confident. She liked that. “Nice to meet you Ms. Latham. I’m Diana Erni.”
While this wasn’t the first time she’d heard of the extraordinary team of Circe Latham and Zelda, it was the first time she’d actually met them. Word in the department was that this dog was hands down the best HRD K9 in Eastern Washington and that they were the go-to team whenever there was a search for remains. Hard to see it right now, considering Zelda was currently sprawled out on the ground looking singularly uninterested in the humans around her.
Necromantia Page 2
