The Bear

by Dustin Stevens

  “Never,” Reed said, already knowing that if the man was calling – especially at such an hour - it was with good reason.

  “Can you get to your computer?” Deke asked. No further explanation given, just a single short question, enough to draw every possible fear Reed had spent the night conjuring back to mind.

  “What’s up?” he asked.

  “Lots,” Deke said, “but most of it can wait. The big thing is, we’ve got a body.”

  Sitting straight up in bed, Reed pressed the phone tight to his ear. The opposite hand went to his scalp, palm running down the back of it and along his neck.

  Adrenaline shot through his system, his heart rate increasing threefold.

  “Serena Gipson? There’s a positive ID?” Reed asked, rattling the questions off. “Where?”

  “No, not Gipson,” Deke said. Pulling back, he said, “Sorry, I should have led with that. Just, can you get to the computer?”

  Hand still pressed to the back of his neck, Reed glanced over to Billie. Having seized on the bodily shift, on the sudden spike in internal activity, she was up on her feet, her nose just millimeters from his waist.

  Energy practically rolled off her, her entire body coiled, ready to move whenever Reed gave the word.

  “But we’ve got a body?” Reed asked, confusion pinching his eyes shut slightly.

  “Computer,” Deke said, the closest thing to an order Reed had ever heard him say. “I just sent you something, and it’s easier if you’re looking at it while I explain.”

  Handfuls of questions sprang to mind, Reed forcing himself to hold off on each one as he peeled the covers back across his body. Not bothering to put on anything more than the gym shorts he was wearing, his bare calf brushed against Billie’s fur as the two of them stepped out of the bedroom.

  Moving as quietly as possible, he slid into what would eventually be the den, the place so far containing only a desk with the computer atop it, a rolling leather desk chair, and multiple stacks of boxes.

  Stepping inside, Reed closed the door behind him before crossing over and taking a seat. With a single shake of the mouse, he brought the screen to life, the bright light causing his pupils to dilate as he winced just slightly.

  “Okay, I’m here.”

  “Email,” Deke said.

  Doing as instructed, Reed opened an internet browser and punched in his information. Settling in against his leg, Billie stared at the screen beside him, the light illuminating them both.

  “Alright,” Reed said as the program came to life. “I see it here.”

  Clicking on the entry from Deke with a timestamp of 3:18 a.m., he pulled up a blank message box with two attachments hyperlinked at the bottom.

  “I sent you two photos,” Deke narrated for him. “The first one is the driver’s license photo I found of Serena Gipson, taken three months ago.”

  Raising the first link to full screen, Reed was greeted by an enlarged image of an Oklahoma driver’s license for Gipson. On it was listed her home address and pertinent information, the girl standing five-seven and weighing one hundred and thirty-one pounds. Not needing vision correction of any kind, she was listed as an organ donor.

  How Deke had managed to get inside the State of Oklahoma DMV, Reed didn’t bother asking. Instead, he focused on the image before him, the photo largely aligning with what he remembered from a few nights before.

  A clear mix of Caucasian and Native American features, she had high cheekbones and a sharp chin. Long, dark hair framed an open face with a wide smile and full lips.

  Overall, a quite attractive girl.

  Considering her deference to social interaction, and the requirement that every person re-up their driver’s license on their twenty-fifth birthday, it was likely one of the most recent photos of her in existence.

  “Okay,” Reed said.

  “Now look at the second one,” Deke said.

  The next link pulled up another driver’s license photo. Made out to a woman named Darcy Thornton, the girl was eight months older than Serena, lived in Muskogee.

  Much like the first image, Reed scrolled through the information in short order, his focus landing on the image beside it.

  “Jesus,” Reed whispered. Palpitations rose through his chest, feeling like tiny pinpricks as he brought the image of Serena up beside the new one. Moving only his eyes, he flicked his attention from one picture to the next, staring at what Deke had found.

  The resemblance between the two was more than uncanny, going well beyond anything a mere coincidence would allow. Both of mixed ethnicity, they had similar facial structures and features, the sole differences that jumped out being that Thornton’s chin was a little more rounded and her hair had been curled.

  Otherwise, the two could easily pass for relatives, if not siblings.

  “Yeah,” Deke agreed.

  “Are they-” Reed began, cut off before the entire question was out.

  “No connection I can find whatsoever,” Deke said. “And believe me, I’ve been looking.”

  Staring at the two images side-by-side, Reed let his vision glaze over. The screen before him became nothing but a blur of color as he thought on things, deciphering what this could mean and how to proceed with it.

  “After we talked,” Deke explained, “I started doing the usual stuff. I won’t go into all of it now; it’s in a file I’ll be sending over shortly.

  “Eventually, I remembered you telling me that there hadn’t even been an official investigation launched, so I did a search for any unidentified women that had turned up in the area recently.”

  Blinking to clear his vision, Reed stared back at the image of Darcy Thornton. He took in the smile on her face, a hint of defiance in her eyes.

  “This girl was found by a farmer three days ago outside of a place called Checotah,” Deke said, mispronouncing the name, though Reed didn’t bother to correct him.

  Far from being important at the moment.

  “But you said you searched for unidentified women?” Reed prompted.

  “I did,” Deke said. “And she was when she came in. Wasn’t until they ran prints on her that they got an ID.” Pausing, he added almost as an afterthought, “She works for a financial brokerage in Muskogee, so they were on file.”

  So many questions swarmed to the front of Reed’s mind, he didn’t know where to begin. Barely lasting long enough to become fully formed, one would be shoved out of the way in lieu of the next, his mind working much too fast for the limited information he had.

  “So, she’s from Muskogee, but found in Checotah,” he whispered, pronouncing it the same way Deke had for the sake of ease.

  “And is currently sitting in the coroner’s in Tulsa,” Deke said. “I guess they handle pretty much everything in the area.”

  To that, Reed grunted, nodding in affirmation. As the second largest city in the state, it was a fair assumption that much of the requisite government affairs would be concentrated either there or OKC.

  For a full minute, neither side said anything, each processing the new information and what it might mean. His vision again returning to the pictures before him, Reed continued to shift from one to the other, staring at the similarities.

  “Anyway,” Deke eventually said, “I found this girl and thought you’d at least want to see her. I mean, I know there are a lot of Indians still in Oklahoma, but...”

  He let his voice trail off, not needing to finish the thought for Reed to know exactly where it was going.

  The semblance would have been too strong for him to ignore as well.

  “No, this is excellent,” Reed said. “Thank you.”

  Pausing, he thought another moment before continuing, “And actually, I wonder if you could maybe run with this a bit? Go back further, see if anybody else matching this description might have turned up nearby?”

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  An unheard sound alerted Billie that they weren’t alone, her ears drawing upright on her head. Turning to face th
e door, she pulled Reed’s attention with her, both of them staring that way as a single creaking floorboard could be heard.

  A moment later, a light tap sounded against the solid wood barrier, followed by his father’s voice. Barely more than a whisper, he asked, “Reed?”

  “Yeah,” Reed replied. “Come on in.”

  The hinges on the door squealed just slightly as Rhett Mattox eased it back. Leading with his head, he leaned into the room, taking in Reed and his partner before looking to the computer screen and the myriad images strewn across it.

  Sliding his body inside without opening the door any further than necessary, he closed it and leaned back against it, both hands clasping the knob behind him.

  “Did we wake you?” Reed asked.

  How that would have been possible, he didn’t pretend to know. Since getting off the phone with Deke, neither one had moved for over an hour and a half, absorbed by the information before them.

  How much of it would prove to be relevant remained unknown, though Reed was getting a pretty thorough picture of Serena Gipson.

  For better or worse.

  “No,” Rhett said. “Mother Nature did. And since I was already up, I didn’t want to wake your mother, so I came downstairs, saw the light on under the door.

  “You been at it all night?”

  “No,” Reed replied. “Deke called a couple of hours ago with something, and I’ve been going through the rest of his notes since then.”

  Pushing himself away from the door, his father took a step forward. Moving again in the pained gait of a man that was beginning to feel his joints, he narrowed his gaze, staring to the screen.

  “Deke? He was-”

  “Riley’s friend, yeah. He’s been helping us out a lot the last year or two.”

  Adding nothing more, he heard his father grunt softly in understanding.

  “He called to say his notes were ready?”

  Allowing Rhett to get a little closer, Reed rotated in the seat to face forward. Using the mouse, he pulled back up the two images that Deke had first forwarded him, blowing them up so they filled the screen.

  “He called to show me this,” Reed said, waiting until he felt his father lean forward, peering over his shoulder, before explaining everything that Deke had.

  When he was done, he fell silent as his father stared at the images, his face pinched in, just as Reed’s had been a short time earlier. He stayed that way for almost a minute before leaning back slightly.

  “Hell of a catch,” he said.

  “Definitely,” Reed agreed. “I’ve got him digging now to see if anybody else has turned up in the last few years matching that description.”

  Taking another step away, his father turned his body perpendicular to Reed’s. Leaning his backside against the stack of boxes resting alongside the desk, he braced his hands against the front edge of them, the glow of the computer monitor and the first bits of dawn rising outside illuminating his features.

  “Few years? You’re talking about a serial,” he said, disbelief threaded through his tone. Pausing, he considered it a moment before shaking his head, his glance finding Reed. “You think something like that’s going on in Warner? Hell, we just moved here.”

  Outside of trying to determine what had happened to Serena Gipson, that single thought had been the prominent thing that kept popping up in Reed’s mind throughout the last twenty hours. The very reason his parents had left the city was to get away from the bustle and the crowding and all the other things that demarcated urban – or even suburban – life.

  To step away, giving up the arts and culture and restaurants that so many people claim to want but never actually make the time for, replacing it with a quiet existence.

  A conscientious step backward, if not in time then at least place, to a point where things were easier and happiness didn’t require quite so much effort.

  Thus far, Reed had witnessed a kidnapping, had been chastised by the chief of police, and was staring at a potential pattern offender.

  Not exactly what any of them had imagined.

  “Unknown,” Reed said. Pointing to the image of Darcy Thornton, he said, “This girl was from Muskogee, found over near Checotah. She’s sitting in a cooler in Tulsa now, so in a couple of hours, Wyatt and I are going to head that way, see what we can find.”

  Grunting softly, his father bobbed his head. He thought on it in silence for a moment, clearly still mulling what had been shared, before cutting his gaze back to Reed.

  “You know, I’ve actually got a friend I played ball with years ago that’s been with Muskogee PD for decades. If you want, I bet I could give him a call and get you in to talk to him on your way back down after.”

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  The scent of burnt flesh still clung to The Bear’s clothes as he stepped inside the mudroom outside the kitchen behind his home. After more than a full day in the confines of the holding room and the small viewing room attached, it felt good to be back out in the world, free to move around as he pleased.

  Not to mention other tertiary benefits, such as feeling the sun on his face and the breeze blowing across him.

  As much as he had enjoyed the last thirty hours, and no doubt would enjoy countless more in the future, it was important not to become too absorbed. The girl was a means to an end, a small subset of his life, but she wasn’t everything.

  Forgetting that was how he had gotten into this situation to begin with.

  Starting with his boots, The Bear stripped away the jeans and flannel he wore. After that came his socks and underwear, everything save the pocket watch he carried everywhere, pulled off and stuffed into a black plastic garbage bag.

  Years of going through the process had imbued him with certain facts. Bits of knowledge he had learned through trial and error, things that were perpetually being cleaned up, each run better, more successful than the one before.

  Such as the knowledge that no matter how hard he tried, there was no way to ever salvage anything he’d been wearing after the branding. The smell of singed leg hair and charred skin was just too strong, too evocative, to ever trust that the slightest wind wouldn’t somehow unearth the scent from deep within the clothing fibers.

  Back in the holding room, the scent was no doubt still at a peak. So strong it was probably causing the girl to gag, The Bear would allow it to linger for another day or so, reminding her just who was in charge and how little she could do about it, before finally aerating the space.

  With it, he would strip away the blankets from the bed and the clothes she was wearing, adding it to the bag now in hand, ready for it all to go into the incinerator.

  Along with every other indicator that Serena Gipson any longer existed.

  The corner of The Bear’s mouth curled up in a smile as he left the sack outside the rear door and stepped into the house. Well beyond the edge of town, he made no effort to hide his nudity, striding proudly through the empty space.

  The tile of the kitchen floor felt cool against the soles of his feet as he padded to the fridge. Pulling the door open, he felt the chilled air pass over his core as he surveyed the contents, eventually reaching in for a Coors Light and sliding it from the paper carton.

  After all, he’d earned it.

  Finding Serena Gipson had been a stroke of luck, a one-time thing he’d come across long ago and had the good sense to file away in case the day arrived he needed it.

  Just as it had.

  Much like it always did.

  Pulling the cap from the bottle of beer, The Bear walked past the table and chairs sitting in the space carved out on the far end of the kitchen. Having not been touched in the better part of a decade, a layer of dust had settled, signaling that a cleaning was fast approaching.

  Striding through the open doorway just beyond it, he walked into the living room, the first golden rays of morning pouring in through the picture window on the far wall. Through it, he could see a pair of oak trees in full foliage, leaves dark green, pus
hing in from either side.

  Beyond them, the corn in the front field was already ankle-high, the perfect height for this time of year.

  Giving the scene nothing more than a glance, The Bear stopped just in front of the television. Ignoring the darkened flat screen before him, he instead focused on the pair of framed photos lining the wall above it.

  The very reasons he was doing all that he was.

  On the right were his parents, two people that defined the phrase salt of the earth. Hardworking and God-fearing, they had given The Bear everything he had, from the home he was standing in to the land he worked and the ethic to do it.

  Lifting the bottle in silent salute, he took a long swig, feeling the carbonated suds slide down his throat.

  A couple of the last of the true old guard, those who knew what it was to live the farming life, his parents had imparted as much of their accumulated wisdom to him as possible.

  To their credit, almost all of it had stuck.

  The calendar told him that they had been gone nine years this past winter, though he still refused to believe it. Not with how strong they still resonated in his mind, their approval driving three-quarters of the decisions he made.

  Married more than fifty years before their untimely death, they were the model he aspired to, the reason everything around him looked the way it did.

  Raising the bottle to his lips a second time, The Bear drained the remainder of the contents. Knowing what would happen if he didn’t, having been down this path on more than one occasion, he reached out and placed the bottle down before shifting his gaze.

  In one slow movement, The Bear’s focus shifted to the left, landing on Molly Comstock. His features drew taut as he stared at the dark hair and eyes of the girl in the photo, vitriol rising like bile along the back of his throat.

  If his parents were what drove the majority of what he did, then she controlled the remainder.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven