“First of all, Sheriff, let me start the introductions. I’m Director Special Agent Ethan Blackhawk, and the young thing is Director Special Agent Elizabeth Blackhawk. We both dislike your derogatory reference to calling her young thing, pretty, or any other word that comes to your mind. In fact, as her husband,” he waited for the man to register it, “I find it personally insulting to my wife and my partner in the field. If you feel like filing that report, go for it, but know that it’ll be on my desk first, and it won’t ever see the light of day. In my opinion, you crossed the line first and that’s exactly what my counter report will state if you pursue this. Next, this is Callen Whitefox, and he’s Chief of Police for the reservation.”
Sheriff Pavette sighed and gave up. There was no dealing with the FBI, they were a bunch of red tape bureaucrats. He should have known it was coming. “Are they Indian bones?” he asked. “Going to claim jurisdiction on behalf of the tribe?”
“Native American,” answered Whitefox. “At least be PC and try to have some respect.”
“Great, one of those Native Americans,” he mumbled.
Whitefox restrained Elizabeth when he saw the murderous look on her face.
Blackhawk was about to make a comment until the sheriff noticed the FBI ME van pulling up. The smirk on the man’s face said plenty and none of it complimentary.
“The ME? Are you people nuts? What you got is a bunch of bones,” he started to laugh. “The ME deals with dead bodies not skeletons.”
“Oh this one’s mine,” she said, touching her husband and brother-in-law’s arms, and they both moved apart to let her through. “Well Sheriff,” Elizabeth drawled standing toe to toe with the man. “If you would have walked your ass around the perimeter and searched, you would have noticed the arm coming out of the ground.” It gave her great satisfaction to point down at the hand that they just found.
The man stared open mouthed.
“Oh lookee here, there seems to be flesh on that arm. I do believe that makes it a body,” she stated, waiting for him to say anything else. “A body that requires the ME to be on scene. But again that would be basic forensics, to which you apparently just proved again that you have no knowledge regarding.”
“You’re over the line and insubordinate, Director Special Agent Blackhawk.”
Elizabeth laughed in his face and looked over her shoulder. “Gentlemen, do you find this pretty young thing, insubordinate?”
Blackhawk laughed, knowing where she was heading. “Deja vu.” He remembered her having this conversation with the mayor of Salem a midst the serial killer investigation.
“What do I know?” shrugged Whitefox. “We Indians are pretty accustomed to insubordinate behavior from the white man.” He laughed when Elizabeth winked at him.
“If you don’t mind Sheriff, I think I’ll go demonstrate the correct way to run a crime scene for you,” she drawled with her southern accent that she whipped out when people thought she was some incompetent southern hick. “Take notes and stay the hell out of my way, because unlike my two associates behind me, I will ass kick you into the river without a second thought.” With that, she walked away to go get the ME.
“You should probably head back to your office, Sheriff. If and when we have anything conclusive you’ll be the first to know.”
Whitefox added, “When the pretty young thing gets over you being a big jackass.”
Sheriff Pavette muttered something unflattering and turned on his heel.
Whitefox flinched, but his brother didn’t.
“He’s lucky she didn’t hear that,” smiled Blackhawk, thinking back to the time his wife nearly skinned the Baptist minister and his wife for similar words.
“Why?”
“Elizabeth once told off a minister and his wife, all while dropping the F word in their church. The wife had commented on my heritage. Elizabeth Blackhawk gets feisty when anyone talks shit about her husband.”
“Yeah, I’ve noticed.” Callen Whitefox couldn’t help but laugh. Not only did he really like his sister-in-law, but he knew she’d fit into the family nicely.
It appeared that Elizabeth Blackhawk was going to be one of the Blackhawk boys after all.
~ Chapter Six ~
Thursday late afternoon
It was a long hot day in the sun. The mosquitos didn’t make it any better, and neither did the attitude of the sheriff and his men. They were being obstinate and difficult, and they were more than happy to watch and commentate from their location behind the crime tape. The FBI moved them back, and they weren’t happy about it. They were making it well known.
There was a crowd gathering on the roadside, trying to get a view of what was happening. People could be so morbid when they heard there were remains. Everyone from the FBI pitched in, helping to dig out the river bed in search for any more bodies. The tech team earned their paychecks that day and a day off, if they ever were up to full staff. The ME worked on the body and excavation, carefully making sure any of the decaying flesh remained on the bones. The anthropologist was called in to control the collection of bones, and he made sure it was done above reproach, especially after hearing how the sheriff and his men carelessly handled his dead.
Elizabeth Blackhawk, Ethan Blackhawk and Callen Whitefox were down in the hole, slowly moving layer after layer of dirt off the body. It was extra arduous, since they needed to be careful to not step on appendages and shatter any of the bones of the dead- damaging the evidence.
What they expected to find they most certainly did. The woman was starting to decay, stuck in the wet dirt, trapped in a grave that she didn’t want to ever see.
What they didn’t expect to find was the full on grave beneath her body, containing the remains of four bodies. All of them were in various stages of decay. Elizabeth nearly wept for them when she brushed dirt aside the skeleton, and nestled in the belly were the bones of another skeleton. It was a baby that never had the chance to see life, only darkness and then nothing more. Something in her rolled with rage and collided with the immense sorrow, leaving her unable to speak without the dam of emotions breaking free.
Ethan Blackhawk watched his wife, and how she delicately pushed the dirt aside, and traced the delicate bones of the fetus. He knew what she was thinking and his own heart squeezed in his chest, as he pictured the tiny life growing within her body. The horror she was feeling was evident on her face.
As she let out a sigh and brushed hair from her cheek, she looked up at the sky just trying to fight to get composure at the senselessness of it all. Before he could move to her side, his brother beat him too it. Crouching down beside her and whispering something to her. Whatever was spoken gave her a little push, and she nodded and returned to work. These two people were his family, and he felt a little less crushed seeing them beside him despite the grim circumstances.
They worked through the heat and the mess, and then stared silently as the woman was lifted from the hole, wrapped in the tell-tale black zip up bag. Off to a table at FBI West. She was set free from her grave, and she would eventually be given respect with a name and a proper burial. She was their first priority in that mess, but she wouldn’t be their last. They had more dead to stand over, kneel over, and remove from the careless grave beneath their feet.
Blackhawk made his wife take a break, handing her a bottle of water, and whispering in her ear that their child needed her to rest. Where he thought Elizabeth would fight, she didn’t. She sat on the edge of the hole, staring down at the bodies, such a look of sadness and determination on her face. After finishing her water, she handed her bottle to a tech and climbed back into the slop to carry on until all the victims were free. He knew what pushed her on; it was all the tiny fetus bones that had yet to ever be given a chance at life, or given their first breath.
When they reached the bodies beneath with faces eaten off by decay and bacteria, they were forced to take a break. There now was the need for the special suits to keep from contaminating the sludge that was accumulat
ing in the murky hole. It too would have to be collected, to capture all the bone chips, and trace evidence. Now it was just a soup of fluids, mud, and dissolving flesh. It had to be the worst job they had ever had to witness, and where they all thought they had seen plenty of vile things done to the human body, this was probably the winner hands down. A mass grave of pregnant women and their unborn went down in the record books as horror beyond horror.
When Elizabeth sat in the hole, her hands carefully handing up the skeletons of the fetuses, marking the little trays they were being held in, she thought her heart would break apart from all the sadness of it all. These little lives needed to have justice found for them, and she would make sure it happened. For the mothers that fought to carry them and try to save them, they too would have their justice. With each one, she made a silent promise that their lives wouldn’t be tossed away and forgotten. Definitely not by her and the team that had rescued them from the grave on that day. To everyone there they mattered.
This day would never be forgotten as long as she lived. She swore it was truth, because nothing so vile had ever touched her life before. After it was all said and done they collected five bodies from the hole, all of which were apparently pregnant women. Throughout the river bed three more bodies, scattered about haphazardly were picked up and carried away. Seven in all, and it was seven too many. As the ME and the anthropologist loaded the victims into their vans, all three unzipped out of their protective suits and gloves, ending the job for the day. Even protected they reeked of death and loss.
“Wow, you FBI people go hardcore,” said Whitefox. “I thought you had people to do the gruesome work.”
“We choose to run FBI West a little differently. Here it’s all hands on deck, and especially now while we’re short staffed,” his brother answered. Blackhawk put his arm around his wife, just because he needed to, after watching death all day. “We should have a preliminary in a few hours. The tech team will email me what they find. Tomorrow we’ll swing by the ME’s lab to view the bones and victims.”
Elizabeth still said nothing.
“Hey, Elizabeth are you going to be okay?” Whitefox touched her arm gently.
“Yeah, I’m just thinking about how I can bury the killer like he did those women and get away with it, or if my husband would rat me out to the Feds.”
Blackhawk kissed the top of her head. “That’s my baby. Planning someone’s murder and speculating if I’d be her accomplice or alibi.”
Elizabeth looked up at him and patted his cheek. “You know me, Ethan. Let’s go home. We’ve had a really long day.”
“I’m not cooking tonight, Lyzee, not after this day. You’re going to have to deal with take out, if you can even eat after this.”
She laughed, and it felt good after what they just waded through. Even though after seeing all this she had no appetite, she knew the little life inside her needed to be fed and nourished.
“Every night is takeout for me,” Whitefox said, grinning. “No dishes to clean up.”
Ethan Blackhawk had an idea. “I’m going to be working on some of the information as it arrives. If you want Callen, you can come over and have takeout with us.”
Elizabeth patted her husband’s back, proud that he was starting to let the past go. “I’m already calling pizza, so you both have to deal.”
Callen Whitefox looked over at his brother surprised that he was being invited to their home, especially after their past. Ethan Blackhawk wasn’t one to ever forgive easily in his youth. There was this little inkling that maybe he was going to get his brother back again. “I’ll bring the beer.”
Blackhawk scribbled his address on a piece of paper. “Give us at least ninety minutes to get to the house and shower and then swing on by.”
Whitefox took the paper, he read it and then stuck it in his pocket. “My house isn’t far from yours. I’m on the opposite side of the river on the reservation. It may take me more than ninety minutes though, I’m not sure this death will ever wash out.”
Elizabeth led her husband to the car. “It never does.”
* * *
The killer watched from the roadside as the three entered their cars. They had ruined his collection of precious bones by taking his skeletons and the fetuses. The idiots at the FBI now had almost all his bones, and he was running low. Just the audacity of the three made him want to kill again. He would have to take another woman’s life just to have back up bones. But first he had some personal loose ends to tie up before the hunt could start again for the next woman.
Damn them all!
If they wanted to play a game, he would give them one. Playing with the mind of the raven and fox was going to be fun. Throwing them off balance and making them confused would just be entertaining to watch, paying them back for touching his sacred reserve.
As they drove away the growing dislike for the woman was filling him with rage. Maybe her days were numbered even if she wasn’t pregnant. A bone was a bone and, she could still contribute to his dwindling supply. He would have to think this one out and plan. He scrutinized the brothers at the riverbed the entire day, and what gave him solace was how the raven and fox would soon meet the bull and not live to tell about it.
* * *
Elizabeth swore there was nothing better than a steamy hot shower. This was especially true if her husband was helping her wash her hair. The man just had magic fingers. He joined her in the spirit of saving time, and she knew now they were going to be even later. When he made his move in the warm water, being slick and soapy worked to her advantage, and she kept slipping away. Still it was only a matter of time until he caught her. When she found herself on his lap, sitting on the bench in the shower, she was overwhelmed with his kisses. This time there was no escaping.
“We can’t do this now,” she mumbled against his mouth, as his hands got very busy and explored her body.
“Sure we can.” There was something driving him to take his wife. Maybe it was the fact she was pregnant with their child, or maybe it was the fact that he was trying to lose himself in her, forgetting the ugliness of the day. Either way, he was going to find comfort in the storm with her.
“Ethan, your brother will be here soon, and we really can’t be having sex while he’s on the front porch,” she answered, biting his earlobe in protest, but didn’t show any sign of stopping. “What will he think?”
“Callen is going to think that I’m the luckiest man alive, and that my wife is an animal. I plan to blame it all on you,” he slid his fingers into her warm center, and when she tightened around him, he nearly lost it right there. He pulled her hard against his mouth, holding her there with his hand buried in her hair until she was breathless.
“Oh, Ethan,” she whispered against his mouth, as he lifted her to straddle him. When she felt him pressed against her and ready, she slid down, taking him all in and fitting him perfectly.
“Lyzee, so damn good every time,” he said, as he rested his head back against the tile as his wife rode him. First slowly, and then growing in urgency. “There will never be enough of this,” he whispered, as her mouth moved against his throat and ear, whispering things that made his body tense even more.
Elizabeth felt herself tighten, as her control was slipping. “Not going to make it much longer, Ethan!” she declared, pulling his mouth back against hers, as she kissed him deep, showing him how much she wanted him and always would.
“Oh God, baby,” he said, breaking the kiss. Elizabeth was quaking around his body, threatening to force him out of control. He struggled to hold on just a little longer, but her quick intake of breath and the bite of her nails into his shoulders stole his remaining control. He was lost to it all, and Blackhawk stopped fighting it and let her body lure him into bliss.
They shuddered together in blissful release.
Elizabeth just let her body rest against his unable to move.
“One of us should get up,” he finally said, laughing hoarsely.
“I suppo
se you think because I’m on top it should be me.”
He slapped her on the ass. “That was the general consensus, Mrs. Blackhawk.”
“Then Mr. Blackhawk would be wrong in his assessment. I don’t think I can feel anything from my neck down, and since you caused it...”
Lifting her in his arms, he carried her to their bed and dropped her on it, laughing. “There you go, and if you think I’m carrying you and a baby around the entire time, think again,” he snickered, as he toweled off.
Elizabeth didn’t even move, she was too worn out. “Yeah yeah, I hear you. It doesn’t seem right. You knock me up and then refuse to carry me around. Talk about unfair.”
Blackhawk leaned down over his wife, kissing her slowly. “I’ll carry you anytime. I love you, Lyzee.” Brushing a hair away from her cheek, he couldn’t help but feel panic over the women they’d found today. Once they had been alive, lying on someone’s bed, possibly loved just like she was loved by him.
“Don’t think about it, Ethan. It’s going to just mess with you and screw you up. I’m not them, and I won’t ever be those women.”
“Promise me, Elizabeth.”
“I promise you that you’ll never live that discovery. No worries Mr. Blackhawk. Now let’s get dressed, your brother will be arriving soon, and I’m suddenly starving. Correction, we are starving,” she said, pointing at her midsection. “Great, two Blackhawks that I have to answer to now,” she winked at her husband, as he began laughing.
Callen Whitefox drove into the neighborhood and parked outside the house that matched the address on the paper. He was happy that his brother had escaped the reservation life and made something of himself. From the look of the size of his house, he had a damn good life. The giant stone sanctuary was something of childhood dreams.
Sacred Burial Grounds (An FBI Romance Thriller (book 2)) Page 14
