Fall Hunter

by M K Dymock

  “I’ve never seen bikers here.”

  Elizabeth stood to take in the area. The hills were low and rocky, offering nothing to the bikers who had some of the best trails in the Rockies on the opposite side of the county. “No, people wouldn’t bike here.”

  “There’s no bike tracks either,” Gauge offered.

  Elizabeth knelt again next to the tracks. “They could be hiking shoes,” she said, this time with less certainty.

  She made a complete circle of the trough, taking in all the country. Nothing about this made sense, but somehow it did, or at least it should. These men could be pulling her away from where Keen was, but she had no other place to search. “Let’s go back. We can let Sol know; he might be able to understand it.” She snapped a quick picture of the track with her phone.

  Ferguson nodded. “Good idea.” She had yet to meet someone who didn’t think everything of Sol.

  She got back in the truck with them for the ride home, a little more comfortable. If they were going to kill her, it would’ve been there.

  Blake returned to the body as Clint took photos of the scene. “Get the phone on?” Clint asked.

  Before he could respond, footsteps sounded on the trail below. “We’re up here!” Clint yelled out.

  “Cover the body,” Blake whispered. “Now.” He grabbed the tarp and after a moment of surprise, Clint grabbed the other end and they pulled it over the remains.

  “No sense letting Sol see the body unless he has to,” he replied to his deputy’s confused look.

  Sol came through the trees. “Mina found a body?” he asked.

  “Yep, probably belonging to the trail you were chasing down.”

  “I knew I shouldn’t have abandoned those tracks.”

  Blake glanced behind him to make sure the body was completely covered. “Wouldn’t have mattered; she’s been here a while.”

  “She?”

  “That’s what we’re thinking. I’m mad, too. We had searchers all over this mountain, thought we’d covered everywhere.” He hadn’t anticipated Sol coming up here so quickly, but now that he had, maybe he could use it to their advantage. Blake just had to make sure the chief didn’t look under the tarp. Nobody should have to see that, let alone Sol.

  “This is the wilderness; there’s no such thing as looking everywhere.” Sol picked up a small rock and hurled it off the mountain like he was skipping it across a pond. “About ten years ago a four-year-old wandered away from his family’s campsite. They noticed him missing within twenty minutes, and within three hours search and rescue were up there looking under every rock, literally. We never found him. Four years old,” Sol added, almost to himself. “How fast could he have been going?”

  Blake didn’t offer his theory, and that was the family either did something to the kid or lied about how long until they noticed him missing. He learned enough about people to know you can’t always tell a liar when he’s standing in front of you.

  “Manage to get any sleep in the last couple of days?” Blake asked as he led Sol away from the body and around to the cliff above.

  “No, always hard to sleep when Daisy’s gone.”

  “How long she gone for?”

  Sol didn’t answer that question. “Is it Keen? It would have to be.”

  Now it was Blake’s turn not to answer. They reached the cliff above the body.

  Before they could walk to the edge, Sol put out a hand to stop him. “See how the edge there has fallen away?” Blake nodded. “Bet it overhangs on the other side. You think you’re standing on several feet of solid ground, then it crumbles beneath you.” He squatted down to look closer at the soil. “Your dead body, is it at the bottom here?”

  “Yes, at the base.” A few birds tweeted out from the trees, but other than them, the silence permeated through the forest. “What do you think happened?”

  “The trail I followed walked alongside a bike, but then I lost it. I picked up similar shoe tread later, but no bike. That’s why I thought it was Keen. You sure it’s not her down there?”

  “Why don’t we go down and look? See what you think?”

  They made their way down. As always, Sol surefooted in his steps while Blake slid. Clint, who had been hammering in a few stakes to run string around the body, stood. “Why don’t we let Sol look around?” Blake asked

  As the deputy surrendered the area, Blake pulled out his phone and launched his sound record app.

  Sol ignored the body in favor of searching the site. He pointed up the cliff. “You see what I mean about the edge. She was probably standing there when the dirt collapsed.”

  “We found a phone under her. Thinking maybe she was hoping the cliff would give her a signal.”

  Sol turned back to the tarped body. “I want to check her treads, see what tracks she’s leaving.”

  Blake leapt between him and the body, grabbing his arm and pulling him back. “Sol, before you do that, there’s something I need you to look at. Why don’t we walk over here while Clint gets the tarp adjusted?” Blake led him several feet away before pulling out the phone, now wrapped in a Ziploc bag. “This look familiar?”

  Sol squinted at it. “Looks like an iPhone.” Blake hit the home button and the screen lit up. Daisy, a smile as wide as the sky, stood next to Sol, who managed to look content. Sol ripped the phone out of Blake’s hand. He stared at it, then the tarp, his eyes back and forth. “No, she’s …” He wrenched his arm away from Blake toward the body.

  Clint, who had stood by silently, jumped across the tarp and grabbed Sol around the chest, almost tackling him.

  “It’s not her!” Sol yelled. “I’ll show you it’s not her.” Blake jumped into the wrestling match. They pulled Sol to the ground.

  “What does she wear?” Blake asked.

  “What?”

  “When she goes biking, what does she wear?”

  Sol stopped struggling. “I don’t know. Gray shorts, different shirts.”

  “Does she have a camel pack?”

  “Everyone does.”

  Blake gestured to Clint. “Pull back the tarp enough to show the pack.”

  Clint looked to his boss and back to Sol. Understanding and sympathy crossed his face. “Blake, I don’t know …”

  “Just the pack, nothing else.”

  After another glance at the tarp, he pulled out the digital camera they used on crime scenes. “I have a close-up of it.”

  At the picture of the pink and gray zippered camel back, Sol let out a scream. Clint and Blake tried to hold him back, but their strength couldn’t match his pain. He tore the tarp off the body. Its mangled sight dropped Sol to his knees, all fight gone. It took both of them to half drag, half carry Sol down the trail to get him in the Tahoe.

  “I can’t leave her up there alone,” he sobbed. They both had to promise the body would be brought down soon by the state crime lab.

  “Why didn’t you tell me it was her, McKenzie?” he sobbed. Blake didn’t reply.

  More rain came during the night, and the sleeping bag let in enough of it that Keen shivered more than slept. Sometime during the course of her travels, the fabric on the cheap bag tore, letting in cold water. She gave up on sleep and paced around. Her shivering became so harsh that she risked chipping a tooth. The clouds and darkness made navigating impossible, so she continued in circles.

  “I’m moving; I’m staying warm,” she muttered until it became a chant. It seemed very important to communicate that as she stumbled in the mud, the sleeping bag wrapped around her shoulders. She’d long since learned to ignore the hunger pangs. While the rain kept her thirst abated, it was like tossing a drowning person a bucket of water.

  The shivering stopped; a sign of the next stage of hypothermia.

  She leaned on a stick as she walked, leaving a deeper indentation than her feet. Movement became possible only out of habit. Each fall in the mud took longer her to get up from.

  A warmness crept over her, almost a searing heat. The sleeping bag aroun
d her shoulders scalded, and she dropped it in the mud. She didn’t need it anymore, not now. Even without it, the first few steps felt sweltering and she wondered if this is what real humidity was like. She didn’t have much experience with it, being raised in the mountains. She unzipped her shirt as far as it would go and debated taking it off entirely, but some faraway thought told her not to.

  “Hot,” she slurred to the darkened sky. She sat on the cold ground, which brought some relief. I’ve been roofied; I shouldn’t have left my drink alone. Thought that only happened in movies.

  She rubbed mud onto her skin, drawing lines down her arms. The mud alleviated some of the heat. Reclining backwards enabled her view of the sky, and she reached out to touch each star. How did the poem go again? She needed a wish. “Star so bright, on this star … Crap, the sleeping bag; it’s new and I can’t lose it. Dad will be mad.” She crawled a few yards until she got her feet under her. Within a few steps, she tripped over the sleeping bag as it tangled her legs. She fell flat on it.

  As gray slipped over a faraway mountain, Keen curled on top of the bag to sleep, the sweet abyss claiming her consciousness. Maybe she’d finally go home.

  38

  Saturday Evening

  The state crime technicians showed up in time to watch the sun set. The body would be left, covered, for the night before she could be carried out safely. One of the technicians drew the short straw and would spend the night camping by the body. No one told Sol about the change in plans.

  When they got back, they left Sol in Blake’s office to mourn in private. The man had no family left in the area. Blake had offered to call one of Sol’s sisters, but he refused. Said they hadn’t thought much of Daisy when she was alive.

  Charlie had left somewhere in the neighborhood of twenty messages on the office phone, wondering if anyone was in charge of the actual search except him. The last message had been especially terse. “So am I the only one searching for Keen? I’ve got a few hundred people wanting to know what tomorrow will bring.” There were several messages from Elizabeth wanting a return call.

  Blake called Charlie for the update, which was no change from that morning. Blake told him to send everyone home for the night. They’d regroup tomorrow.

  Once he hung up, Clint repeated the question Sol had asked. “Why did you bring him out there, knowing it was her?”

  “How do you tell your good friend you think he might’ve murdered his wife?”

  Clint shook his head. “Sol, never. He loved her.”

  “Men kill the women they love all the time. She’s been gone a week, and he claims he didn’t notice.”

  “Then why bring him up at all?”

  “I wanted to see his reaction to the site, see if there was any recognition or fear.” Blake rubbed his chin, which over the last few days had gone from stubble to full beard.

  “And?” Clint asked. “What did you see?”

  “That I don’t know my friend as well as I thought. And two missing women in the same area in the same week may not be a coincidence.”

  Blake knocked on his office door where Sol mourned before opening it. The gray day made the office darker than usual at that hour, and he switched on the light. Sol stood at the window, blinking back the sudden light. “Is she down?” Sol asked. “Can I see her?”

  “Let them check her first.” Blake joined him at the window, wanting to keep the conversation as informal as possible. “You said she went to California for the weekend?”

  “You know I told her not to marry me. Told her that she’d get sick of the small-town life. Out there at my old place, there was nothing for miles. Not even a neighbor to talk to. But she said she loved me and the mountains. We moved to a house in town, but then both of us struggled. Not enough people for her, and too many for me.”

  Blake put a hand on the man’s shoulder. “Sometimes compromise in marriage just means neither one of you is happy.”

  Sol glanced over at him. “But we were happy, mostly. We just needed to figure it out.” His voice faltered. “Until Daisy came, I preferred the company of rocks and trees.”

  “But you didn’t realize she was gone.”

  Sol’s face dropped and he went silent. One of the best lessons Blake learned as a cop is to wait out the silence. People will admit to a lot to fill the void.

  “We had a fight.” Then comes the truth. “She … Daisy wanted us to live part of the year in California. Blake, we couldn’t even afford the house we bought. And we’re supposed to live in two places.”

  “She threaten to leave?”

  “No, of course not.” He hesitated. “She said maybe she’d go to her parents’ house for the weekend. They were doing a big beach party for the holiday.”

  “When was this?”

  “Last Wednesday. Then I had to guide a fishing trip. When I got home Monday, she was gone.” He sank into a nearby chair. “She hadn’t left me any messages, and I thought she was still mad. When Keen went missing, I stopped noticing.”

  Blake sat across from him. “Sol, I have to ask. Did you hurt her? Maybe your fight—”

  Sol leaped to his feet so fast that he knocked over his chair. “I would never hurt her!” he yelled. “How could you think that?”

  “A full week you didn’t know your wife was missing. I’m not the only one who’s going to ask. Her body was found on national forest land; that means the Feds will be coming in.”

  “You arresting me?” Sol’s dark eyes bored into Blake.

  “No.” Blake didn’t have enough evidence to charge him with anything. “But there’s going to be an investigation. It doesn’t look good, two women disappearing at the same time in the same place.”

  “Where’s Daisy’s body?”

  “Tell me what happened; I can help you.”

  Without another word, Sol strode out the door and slammed it behind him. Blake followed him to where Clint stood openmouthed, watching Sol stomp out. His truck was still up at the trailhead, so Blake assumed the tracker would be walking home.

  Charlie had returned and stood next to Clint, equally stunned. Blake answered their unasked question. “The body is Daisy. She’s been up there about a week. Sol said he had no idea she was missing and thought she’d gone home to visit family.” Saying it out loud didn’t make the story sound any more plausible.

  Clint closed and opened his mouth a few times, trying to process the news.

  Blake pulled out a chair and sat across from where Clint sank down. The sun no longer shone through the window, signaling another night coming, and nobody was closer to Keen. “We have to investigate this as if he’s any other suspect.”

  Clint had finally found his voice. “No way Sol would kill someone. He’s spent his whole life saving people.”

  “We can’t ignore the timing. He even admits they had a fight and were having other problems. Maybe they’re out biking and go at it, and he pushes her of the cliff. Or maybe she accidentally fell. No one knows better than him how hard it’d be to find her.”

  Clint kept shaking his head. “No.”

  “And maybe Keen stumbled into something she shouldn’t.”

  “You don’t believe that?” Clint asked Blake in a low voice. “You can’t.”

  “We don’t get to choose what we believe,” he said, his voice rising in frustration. “We have to question. He fought like crazy since day one to be the only person on those trails, Clint. We have to accept the possibility that he did something.”

  “If we’re wrong, Keen is still out there.”

  “You point me in a direction to search, and I’ll do it.”

  Clint clenched his jaw and stared out the window to the darkening sky. “We just give up?”

  “We investigate the crimes we have.” Blake stood and put on his jacket. “Let’s call it a night. I’ve got some leads I’ll run down at home.” He brushed the mud off his pants, which had accumulated too much for him to walk in his house. “Clint, can you call Elizabeth? She left a lot of messages
and my guess is she wants an update.”

  39

  Elizabeth had left a message with Grace after giving up on getting a hold of Blake directly. She struggled at what to leave in the message—a biker’s footprints in a place no one bikes twenty miles from where Keen had been didn’t sound like much to be concerned with. But it could be something, couldn’t it?

  The message ended with a request to call her back, but the evening passed with no return call. Refusing to wait, she drove to the sheriff’s office. A light rain, little more than a mist, coated her windshield.

  Clint sat at the front desk, talking on the phone. He nodded at her while maintaining his side of the conversation. “The mayor will be giving a statement tomorrow morning at 8 a.m.” She could only assume he talked about their situation and wondered how many people right now talked of Keen. She hoped it was the whole state if that’s what it took.

  Clint hung up the phone and stood to come over and give Elizabeth a hug. “What can I do for you?”

  She outlined her day’s discoveries—the tracks, the shoe, and that it was Gauge who found them. “I know it sounds like a long shot, but—”

  “Gauge found the tracks?” Clint asked.

  “Yes.”

  He walked around to the back of the desk and picked up the phone, but set it down again. “He was one of the last people to talk to Keen before she went biking, wasn’t he?”

  “Other than me, yes.” She attempted to read the perplexed expression on Clint’s face. “You think he’s trying to distract me from where Keen really is?”

  Clint opened his mouth, but hesitated. “It’s hard to say.”

  “There’s nothing you can tell me that is any worse than I imagine every moment.”

  “He may be trying to divert us, or maybe he’s tired of us looking in the wrong place. The attention starts to fade and he can bring it back. Or he knows his brother did something but can’t bring himself to betray him.”

  Elizabeth sank into a folding chair in front of Clint’s desk. “We’re talking about her body, aren’t we?” Her voice came out calm as her soul screamed. She pushed those screams down; they would be about her and everything needed to be about Keen.