“All right.” Ben glanced at his watch, and then replied, “ETA thirty minutes.”
“Roger, out.”
“She’s up a little early,” Vera said. Even though Vera wouldn’t admit it, she was somewhat jealous of Roxy, and rightfully so, as Ben sometimes spent more time with his deputy at the office or out in the field than he did at home with his wife.
Not to mention, Roxy was a smart, attractive young woman with a Navaho heritage and had been crowned prom queen at Yucca Basin High.
Rather than go on to college, Roxy had chosen to sign up at the sheriff’s training academy for a rigorous 23-week course in law enforcement and finished in the top ten of her class. Despite her young age and being an inexperienced cadet right out of the academy, Ben recruited her once he learned she was interested in returning home from the apartment she was renting in Albuquerque and serving her community, which she had been currently doing for the past six months.
He had to admit he felt a little protective knowing that it wasn’t easy for her moving back home when both her parents had passed while Roxy was a junior in high school and she didn’t have any living relatives except for two older brothers that had long moved out—kicked out being a better word—and were constantly in and out of trouble.
Even though Ben thought of Roxy as more of a daughter, he knew Vera didn’t share the same sentiment. “I have to go,” he said. He went over and kissed Vera on the neck, placing his mug on the edge of her table. “You can finish my coffee if you want. See you later.”
Walking toward the sliding glass door, Ben caught Vera’s reflection in the glass the exact moment she tossed her paintbrush into his mug.
3
BITS AND PIECES
Roxy had parked the Mustang Police Interceptor well away from the main highway since she had run the vehicle through the self-service carwash earlier that morning as it had been covered in dust from the previous night’s sandstorm. The patrol car glistened like a glossy black emerald.
While waiting for Ben to arrive, she had taken the initiative to dig out the sand blocking the front passenger door of the wrecked car that was partially buried in the parabolic dune, using her folding survival shovel she kept in the trunk of her cruiser.
Wearing a pair of disposable blue nitrile gloves, Roxy had gained access to the car and removed the registration card from the glove compartment. The vehicle belonged to Dan Willard, co-owner Mae Willard. By the looks of the camping gear in the back, the married couple had been vacationing in the desert.
Roxy heard an engine approach. A dirty white Chevy Tahoe pulled up and stopped on the shoulder. Ben opened his door with the Yucca Basin Sheriff’s Department insignia on the side and climbed out.
A mechanical street sweeper plowed by churning up sand that had deposited on the asphalt. Ben turned his head so as not to be blinded by the swirling grit.
Another large truck followed behind, a vacuum sweeper making the second pass, only this one had sprinklers spurting jets of water intermittently on the cleared road as it went by and left a large puddle of mud by the side of Ben’s Tahoe under his door. His truck was dirtier than ever.
“Thanks for nothing,” Ben said, scowling at the road maintenance trucks continuing on down the highway.
Roxy looked over at the Mustang cruiser, and smiled. Somehow the flying dust had missed settling on the recently washed patrol car.
Ben trudged along the soft-packed sand over to Roxy.
“Morning.”
“Morning, Ben.”
“What do you have?”
Roxy handed Ben the registration. “These are the owners.”
Ben studied the card. “Came all the way from Yuma.” He looked at Roxy. “No sign of them, huh?”
“You better take a look inside,” Roxy said.
Even though it was mostly buried in the sand drift, the raised RAV4 chrome emblem was visible on the back door of the utility vehicle. The rear window had been lowered all the way down.
Ben stepped up to the back bumper.
“Before you—”
Upon sticking his head in the opening, Ben immediately backed away and waved his hand in front of his face. “Jesus, you might have warned me.”
“I was trying to. Sorry. It’s pretty bad.”
Roxy watched Ben cover his nose and mouth with his hand and take another look inside the car, his eyes watering from the stench. The headliner and the inside of the windows were speckled with blackish blood splatter. Swarms of black flies congregated on pieces of raw meat that had to be human flesh as there were tattered strips of clothing stuck to the chunks.
“What do you think?” Roxy asked. “Puma?”
“A big cat wouldn’t take both of them.”
“Coyotes, maybe?”
“I doubt they would be bold enough to jump into the car and drag away the bodies.”
You don’t think someone saw they were in trouble and stopped?” Roxy said.
“What, like a Good Samaritan?”
“Or someone else.”
“See a chainsaw lying around anywhere?”
Roxy knew he was playing with her even though she could tell by the look in his eyes he took the situation seriously. It wasn’t uncommon for people to up and disappear, especially in the desert. “Maybe they wandered off and got lost.”
“Let’s take a little walk,” Ben said. “Better grab your twelve gauge and a trauma bag.” While Roxy went back to the cruiser to retrieve her gear, Ben grabbed a canteen and locked up the Tahoe.
Once they were ready, they started out onto the flat playa.
“I doubt we’ll find any tracks after that storm, but you never know,” Ben said.
Roxy and Ben marched across the sand through the thin vegetation of creosote bushes and bullet-shaped cacti with needle spines. They stayed clear of small piles of rocks that might serve as ideal hiding places for rattlers and coral snakes; one strike of their venomous bites fatal if not treated right away, which was one reason Roxy had brought along the emergency medical kit.
She scanned the ground ahead and spotted something in the sand. “Over there,” she said and pointed.
Ben walked over and dropped to one knee. He found a twig that had fallen from a nearby honey mesquite tree and used it to prod the sand.
Roxy stood behind Ben and looked down over his shoulder while he cleared away the sand partially covering a blood-stained left hand. The thumb and forefinger had been chewed off. A woman’s wedding band was on the ring finger.
He continued to scoop away the sand unveiling more of the body. “Ah, jeez,” he said when he uncovered the mutilated face. “I’m beginning to think that she didn’t get lost in the storm, and whatever did this, buried her out here.”
“That’s something a big cat would do.”
“Exactly,” Ben said.
“You want me to keep looking for the husband?”
“Go ahead,” Ben said, and then glanced up. “Be careful. Whatever did this could still be out here.”
Roxy nodded and walked with her tactical shotgun in the ready position, her right hand gripping the stock behind the trigger guard, her left hand on the ratchet if she should suddenly need to ram a shell in the chamber in the event of a large predator attack.
A quick glance at her wristwatch told her that it was only 9:00 AM. She could already feel the desert heat on her face, the fabric of her uniform warming her body, the hot sand baking the soles of her feet through her boots. She’d often laugh whenever she heard Ben complaining about the scorching temperatures, especially when it got in the three-digits.
Roxy’s credo was always “The hotter, the better.” She was thankful to her Navajo heritage for making her a strong-willed woman though it was her devoted father that taught her how to survive in the harsh desert.
When she turned 14-years-old, her father began driving Roxy to remote regions of the Chihuahua Desert and dropping her off with a full canteen of water, a hunting knife, and only the clothes on her back, ex
pecting her to find her own way home.
She would endure sweltering heat by extracting eatable fruit and drinkable liquid from both the prickly pear and barrel cactus. Able to create her own fire with a self-made hand drill, Roxy feasted on cooked jackrabbit, king snake, and even roasted scorpions.
Often she would have to set up a temporary shelter for the night, the grueling hikes back taking her sometimes two or three days.
She figured if her brothers had survived the same punishment, so could she.
Roxy heard the drone of flies on the other side of a purple flowered Indigo bush just up ahead.
She stepped around the shrub and saw a bloody trail of intestines strung out on the sand next to the man facedown on the ground. His clothes had been ripped to ribbons leaving his viciously slashed back and buttocks exposed. His left arm had been wrenched from the shoulder. She spotted the missing limb lying in a clump of beargrass.
The right leg had been chewed off at the knee leaving a stump of splintered bone.
She looked down and saw a paw print with claw marks on the ends of four widely spaced toes in front of a very large pad. Even though it was huge, she knew it wasn’t a mountain lion as big cats rarely left claw marks and these impressions were too elongated. She saw another paw print six feet apart from the other one, which meant it had a very long stride, considering the length of her gait was normally 24 inches.
Whatever it was, it appeared to be walking not on four, but two legs.
Roxy continued to follow the trail, which ended abruptly when the ground hardened on a flat span of bedrock.
She gazed back, and when she was sure Ben couldn’t see her, she removed the tracks with the bottom of her boots.
4
THE HEALER
Miguel Walla spotted an official looking white SUV with emergency lights on the roof and a black police cruiser abandoned on the shoulder of the road. He slowed his truck, leaned on the steering wheel, and glanced over at his wife, Maria, who was staring out the passenger window.
“Do you see anyone? I don’t,” Maria said.
“I want to see.” Their 9-year-old daughter, Sophia, stood up in the crew cab, both hands on the top of the front seat.
Maria turned around. “Sophia! Put your seatbelt back on.”
“Ah, Mom.”
“Better do as she says. The last thing we need is an out-of-state ticket.”
They gazed at the vehicles parked suspiciously on the side of the road but didn’t see any law enforcement officers around.
“That’s odd,” Maria said. “Wonder where they went?”
“Who knows?” Miguel said. After they drove by, he sped back up to the posted speed limit.
Miguel glanced over his shoulder. “Seatbelt.” He heard Sophia plop back on the seat and waited for the click of the buckle. “Thank you.”
“What’s it been, five years since the last time we were out here?” Maria said.
“Something like that,” Miguel replied. “Hard to believe.”
“What did Camilla sound like when you talked to her on the phone and told her we were coming?”
“She’s excited to see Sophia.”
Maria turned in her seat so she could face Sophia. “Wait till she sees how big you’ve grown. You were only four last time she saw you.”
“I wish we could bring Rosie,” Sophia said.
“I know, but it’s better she stay with Jack and Nora while we’re away. It’s much too hot here and Abuela doesn’t have air-conditioning.”
“Does she still have Astuto?”
“Oh, I’m sure she does,” Miguel chimed in.
“When are we going to eat?” Sophia asked.
“Soon.” Miguel turned off the main highway and drove onto a dirt road that stretched for miles into the desert. He glanced in the rearview mirror and saw a plume of dust trailing behind them. “We should be at Abuela’s in another twenty minutes.” Abuela was Sophia’s pet name for Camilla; a Mexican nickname many children called their grandmother meaning ‘dear grandma.’
Even though the crude road was not a public thoroughfare it was marginally drivable despite enduring years of erosion and wind, and the occasional flash flood—the rest of the way bumpy and jarring.
Finally, Miguel saw Camilla’s house nestled at the base of a mesa. The modest home was mission style with a salmon colored tile roof slanted over a large front porch with a white railing and two support posts on either side of the front steps. An armchair, rocker, and porch swing were by the front screen door.
A garden area was on one side of the house along with a chicken coop and a rusty pickup truck twenty years older than Miguel’s Ford F-150.
A dust-covered sedan that could have been green or blue was parked ten feet away from the front of the house.
Miguel pulled under the shade of a yucca pinterest that was actually two trees that had grown from one stalk with bare trunks and green pointed leaves at the tops that looked like spiked hairdos. He turned off the engine.
Sophia unbuckled her seatbelt and stood up. “Well, aren’t we going in?”
“Not yet,” Miguel said.
“Why not?”
“Abuela has company,” Maria said, glancing at her cell phone. “Oh darn. Looks like we’re not going to get a signal out here.”
“I could have told you that. Welcome to the desert.” Miguel undid his seatbelt harness and twisted around with his back against the door so he could see his daughter. “Your grandmother helps people in the area.”
“You mean she’s a doctor?”
“Not exactly. She’s what’s called a healer.”
“Abuela’s a shaman,” Maria said.
“What’s that?”
“It’s like a medicine man, or in your grandmother’s case, a medicine woman.”
“Does she do magic?” Sophia wanted to know.
“Somewhat,” Maria said.
The front screen door opened and an elderly man in his eighties stepped out onto the porch. He looked spry for his age and did a little dance before racing down the steps.
“Did he just do a jig?” Maria said.
A woman came out of the house. She wore a tight bandana head wrap and a faded blue denim shirt, a long red, orange, and black tri-colored skirt, and gray cowboy boots.
“That’s Abuela!” Sophia shouted.
Miguel rolled down his window and waved to his mother.
She waved back and called down to the old man. “You forgot these,” she said and held up a pair of crutches.
“I don’t think I’ll be needing them, thanks to you, but I’ll take them just the same.” He ran up the steps and collected his crutches. He went down to his car, opened the driver’s-side door, threw the crutches into the backseat, got in, and sped off like the town crier wanting to spread the news.
“As you can see, Abuela’s quite the miracle worker,” Maria said to Sophia.
The family got out of the truck.
“Come here child and let me see you,” Camilla said with open arms.
Sophia dashed across the yard for a big hug.
“I see you have another satisfied customer,” Miguel said, referring to the man that had just left.
“Amazing what a little peyote gel will do for sciatica.” Camilla looked down at Sophia and smiled. “Now aren’t you the little desert flower?”
“Mom says I’m growing like a weed.”
“Many of my medicinal herbs are weeds,” Camilla said. She looked at Miguel and Maria. “Are you all hungry?”
“Starved,” Miguel replied.
“Come inside.”
Maria and Sophia followed Camilla into the house while Miguel grabbed the luggage from the truck.
Miguel came in through the front room, which was sparsely furnished with a single armchair, a couch, a cluttered coffee table, and no television. He stowed the bags in the spare room, and then joined the others in the kitchen. He could smell freshly baked bread straight out of the outdoor kiln and the tantalizin
g aroma of different spices.
Sophia was already sitting at the large table that was nothing more than an oak plank with long benches on the sides and a miss-matching chair at each end.
Lunch was an oval platter of smoked chicken and boiled potatoes, a bowl of pinto beans with chopped onions, a basket of oven-baked bread, a dish of agave nectar sweetener, and a large pitcher of sun tea.
“This looks wonderful,” Maria said, placing the last of the cutlery and plates on the table. She sat down on the bench next to Sophia. Miguel occupied the bench directly across from her so he could be next to Camilla at the head of the table.
“So, how was your drive?” Camilla asked, motioning for everyone to start serving themselves.
“Not too bad,” Miguel said. He grabbed the basket of bread, broke off a piece, and handed the basket to Camilla.
“We saw two police cars on the side of the road on our way over here,” Maria said, placing a slice of chicken on Sophia’s plate.
“Were they a white Tahoe and a black cruiser?” Camilla asked.
“Yes, you know them?”
“That would be Sheriff Lobo and his deputy, Roxy. Did they see you?”
“No. They were nowhere around. The cars were just sitting there.”
“That’s odd,” Camilla said.
Miguel looked over at Sophia’s plate and saw a little hand reach up from under the table and take her piece of chicken. He did his best to keep a straight face.
Sophia had been looking at Camilla and hadn’t noticed. She gazed down at her plate and saw that the food was gone. “Hey, where did my chicken go?”
“Sure you didn’t eat it,” Miguel said, trying not to laugh.
“No! It was right here.”
“Here, have another piece.” Miguel lifted another strip of chicken off the platter and put it on Sophia’s plate. Sophia went to stab it with her fork but the little hand was back, and again, swiped the chicken.
“Hey!” Sophia ducked her head under the table. “I knew it was you!”
Miguel turned and watched the small creature climb up on his bench. Standing only two feet tall, the naked Mexican troll looked like a wrinkly old man with a loincloth of matted fur—the thought it might be pubic hair cringe-worthy—covering its genitals and backside. It looked as though someone had dumped white paint over its greenish coarse skin giving it the blotchy texture of dried salt. Completely bald, it had dark deep-set eyes, a flat sausage nose, and a permanent scowl on its face. Half a dozen tiny spikes protruded from the back of its shoulders. It gobbled up Sophia’s chicken and expelled a crude belch.
Cryptid Frontier (Cryptid Zoo Book 7) Page 2
