by Stacy Green
He stayed out to watch the area. The killer is probably long gone, but just in case, Cage wanted to stand guard.
I’m scared he’s out there all alone.
I roll over in the lumpiest bed on earth. Bonin checked us in to some motel on the outskirts of Jasper, and my air conditioner is wheezing. It’s at least eighty degrees in here.
I run my fingers over the ring, memories of Gran—Charlotte—coming fast. Tears well in my eyes. She deserved better than cancer.
I deserve better than this. So did Lyric and Mickie and the others he stole.
My chest burns. My muscles feel stretched and thin. I’m breathing too fast.
I will not freak out.
Deep breaths. Close your eyes. Visualize something that makes you feel calm.
I have to keep my cool, or Cage won’t let me near the burial site tomorrow. I need to be there.
Sunday dinners with Charlotte and Miss Alexandrine. Watching the little kids play in the sprinkler.
I grab the white doll and the torn Tarot card and press them to my chest. I count to one hundred, the anxiety easing enough my lungs no longer hurt.
I think we were kept in the barn. In the horse stalls, probably. Were we chained? Or did he use rope or twine? Did he rape us in the barn? It seemed too dirty.
But there’s no house. He wouldn’t just stick us in the barn and leave us, would he? Go back to town?
Maybe he camped out. The doll seemed to shiver.
Sweat broke out over my upper lip. The blue pickup’s rusty hitch.
My feet dragging across the dry, dusty clearing. Staring at the back of his head and wondering what sort of weapon would knock him out.
The squeak of a door opening.
Metal steps descending.
I sat up in bed. “He had an RV.”
38
Mobilizing resources took too damned long. Out of respect, Cage notified the Jasper County Sheriff first, but let him know the nature of the case meant his next call would be to the Texas Rangers. His belief the victims crossed state lines meant informing the FBI.
Bonin switched places with him in the dawn hours, and he went back to the hotel to shower and get an hour of sleep. Now he and Annabeth were heading back to the body dump.
“You’re sure about the camper?”
She sucked on a bottle of orange juice. “Am I sure as in, it’s fact? No. But my gut is positive.”
A camper made sense. Easy to pick up and take off, with enough amenities to survive.
“I think Lyric is still alive.”
Giving her false hope would hurt her more than the truth. “He killed her after you escaped. I’m certain of it.”
Annabeth shook her head. “You’re wrong.”
“Okay. Then how do you explain your vision? How did her spirit come to you?” Cage still believed it was her memory breaking through, but he needed to prove a point.
“Gran taught Lyric Voodoo her entire life. She told me that I—Lyric—had as much skill as she did. And there are ways to call on the spirits to help you make contact with another living person.”
He understood taking comfort from her religion, but she was setting herself up for major disappointment. “I know you think her being alive will make you feel better.”
“No,” she said. “I just know she is.”
He kept his mouth shut and focused on the road. Annabeth would have to deal with the reality soon enough. The more important question was Lyric’s role in the kidnappings. What had she done to stay alive after he took her? Or had she gone willingly instead of going back to Charlotte like everyone wanted to believe?
Ranger Lewis shook Cage’s hand. “The land owner’s name is Joel Rogers. He lives up north in Illinois. Leases four hundred acres to hunters through a local company and probably makes a ton of money.”
Cage liked the brawny Texas Ranger immediately. He didn’t seem to have any issue with Cage being out of jurisdiction or getting glory. He wanted justice.
“Rogers bought the property at auction in fall 2010 after the owner defaulted on the loan,” Bonin said. “The previous owner was L.M. Gaudet. Bought the land in November 2005.”
“Sonofabitch. He used her name. And she never came up as a missing person because everything went to shit during Katrina. Is the realtor still in town?” Cage prayed that was the case. Lyric being complicit would add to Annabeth’s guilt, and she would obsess over Charlotte’s spirit never being at peace. She would never be able to move on.
“The ground was purchased from the bank,” Bonin said. “They want a warrant, all the bells and whistles. I’m working on it.”
“I’ll give the president a call,” Ranger Lewis said. “He’s helped out on a couple of fraud cases.”
Small and compact, her eyes hidden behind her sunglasses, FBI Agent Tims had listened to the briefing in silence. Her youth made Cage nervous. Inexperience came with the drive to prove you belonged on the job. She stood like a solider at attention, a kinetic energy radiating from her.
“Lyric Gaudet may have been an accomplice,” Tims said. “It wouldn’t be the first time it’s happened.”
“No.” Annabeth’s sharp voice cracked. “She was a victim, and she let me go.”
Tims didn’t look at Annabeth. “I’m aware. But the reality is she could have started out as a victim and ended up an accomplice. Or she was in on it all along. I’ll need to debrief the witness before I get started.”
Bonin gave Cage a knowing look. Ranger Lewis jammed his hands in his pockets and sighed.
“Annabeth’s been debriefed. Detective Bonin and I can fill you in if that becomes necessary.”
“If it becomes necessary?” Tims said. “This case is FBI jurisdiction. It’s mine.”
“How many major cases have you worked?” Ranger Lewis asked.
“That’s irrelevant.”
“So, the answer would be not too damned many,” Lewis said. “All due respect, ma’am, but you need to prioritize. Instead of worrying about calling the shots, focus on solving the crime. That’s what matters.”
“I am focused on solving this. But rules are rules.”
“You sound like a stereotypical feeb,” Bonin said. “Not the way to make a solid reputation.”
Tims glared at her. “Look, if we don’t have a structure in place, this investigation will be a muddled mess. It’s bad enough you two just rode into town and started digging on private property. How do you think that’s going to come off in court?”
“Who gives a shit?” Annabeth’s face burned pink. “You think these girls give a rat’s hairy ass who’s in charge? Stop waving your dicks around and start digging!”
Ranger Lewis stared. Tims’s face pinched into a scowl. “I’m not sure who you think you are—”
“She has a traumatic brain injury,” Bonin said. “Sometimes she can’t control her anger. You’d know that if you read the full briefing we emailed.”
Annabeth shook her head, eyes flashing. “I know damn well what I’m doing. These girls were used and discarded like trash. One of them helped me escape, and she planted those flowers so the rest of the victims could get home to their families. I’ll tell you again, stop waving dicks and dig.” Her last few words became a scream. She looked ready to pass out.
Cage stepped between Annabeth and the others, blocking her view. “Look at me.”
“I swear to God, if you try to make me go to the car, I will fight you.”
“I can toss you over my shoulder and carry you back without much effort.”
“As temping as that is, Agent Sexy, try and you won’t be making any more babies for a while. I have a right to be here.”
“I get it,” Cage said softly. “But you have to handle these people the right way—even if it means swallowing some pride—so let me deal with them.”
“When are they going to start digging?”
“The forensic anthropologist from Texas State and her team have to do that, or we’ll destroy evidence,” Cage said. �
�They should be here soon.”
Ranger Lewis cleared his throat. “I apologize, miss. You’re right. We all need to work together, and we will. Just let us get the logistical bullshit out of the way so we’re ready when the doc gets here.”
“And I still want to talk with you,” Agent Tims said. “We need more information about your escape and abduction.”
“There’s no more information right now.” Cage spoke before Annabeth exploded. “It’s coming back to her in bits and pieces.”
“Once Mickie’s body is identified, we’ll have proof he crossed state lines. Then it’s officially my case. You won’t be able to shield her.”
“I won’t work with you,” Annabeth said. “You’re a stuck-up bitch who’s looking for glory. Cage and Detective Bonin are the only ones I trust.”
Agent Tims looked ready to slap the girl. “There are legal ways I can make you talk.”
“I’ll sit in a cell,” Annabeth said. “And Miss Alexandrine will fix you. Promise that.”
Cage didn’t get off on making people feel stupid, but he’d had a bellyfull of Tims. “You understand she’s in my custody? Or did you miss that in the email as well?”
“I don’t care if she’s in your custody,” Tims said. “Once I take over the case—”
“I’m not discussing that right now. We needed FBI resources. That’s why you’re here. Annabeth stays with us.”
Tims jaw looked tight enough to shatter. “We already have Mickie’s dental records and the DNA sample provided by her parents. The match shouldn’t take long. I’ll wait in the car until the dig team gets here.”
“Christ,” Bonin hissed as the agent stalked off. “What a shitshow.”
“Junior agent with no damn clue. I can’t stand cops who don’t put the victim first,” Ranger Lewis said. “Listen, I’ve worked with the forensic anthropologist and medical examiner out of Houston. I’ll talk to them and see if I can express how very carefully they need to examine all the remains before making any formal ID. We don’t want to rush things.”
Cage grinned. Sometimes he loved the good ole’ boy network. “Thanks.”
“I don’t know how much time I’ll buy you, but I’ll do my best.”
39
Body recovery sucked. Every single detail was vital, making the process agonizingly slow. Cage fought the urge to ask the dig team to work faster.
Dr. Carrie Metz from Texas State University was considered among the best forensic anthropologists in the country, and her work with the school’s body farm was nationally recognized. She was meticulous to the last detail.
“These flowers are only over part of the remains.” Metz walked away from the mess of flowers. “This ground is different than the rest of the pasture.”
Cage hadn’t noticed. He still didn’t see any difference.
“It’s about soil density,” Metz said. “We marked off a perimeter much larger than the flower patch and probed through it. I think there are more bodies to the left of the flowers.”
“How many?”
“I can’t say until we start digging,” Metz said.
“Lyric planted the flowers over Mickie and the final girls. Different burials mean different times of death.”
Metz eyed him over the rim of her sunglasses. “You’re inferring. I don’t do that.”
After a small back hoe removed the top layer of soil Metz had marked off, four graduate students set up tents over the dig and began documenting and photographing the site. A third sifted through the soil and destroyed sunflowers. Metz laid out multiple shovels and small trowels on the blue tarp she’d placed next to the sunflower pit. “Let’s see what we’ve got.”
“Freaking media is shady as hell. Some woman conned her way past the barricade up the road and nearly made it to the barn before I caught her. She wasn’t happy about being escorted off the property.” Bonin handed him a bottle of water. “I pulled dental records of the other girls you believed may have been victims. One family had already provided DNA samples to local law enforcement, so I’ve requested that as well.”
“Let’s hope we find enough teeth on the remains to actually get a dental match,” Cage said. “I don’t like the idea of contacting families based on a hunch one of these bodies might be their kid.”
He turned to Annabeth, who sat in a canopied lawn chair Ranger Lewis had brought to her. “You okay?”
“Fine.”
Her pale skin and perpetually wide eyes said differently, but Cage didn’t waste his energy. She wasn’t moving from that spot.
Metz worked the area where Mickie’s necklace had been discovered, and it wasn’t long before she’d reached bone. “This one’s buried shallow. We may not have a full skeleton. Critters like human remains.”
“Once he discovered Annabeth escaped, he had to clean up quickly.” Cage lowered his voice and leaned toward Bonin. “If Lyric’s buried here, she’ll be in the same grave. He wouldn’t have time to dig two.”
“Or he dumped her somewhere else.”
“Ranger Lewis checked the state’s unidentified remains database,” Cage said. “No matches.”
“State line isn’t all that far from here.”
“I’ve already checked Louisiana’s. Maybe he didn’t kill her. He kept her for five years. She might have been able to convince him Annabeth escaped on her own. If she survived for five years, she knew how to deal with the guy.” He didn’t believe it, but if Lyric had somehow survived, Annabeth’s guilt would be partially alleviated.
“You know better than that,” Bonin said. “And her body would have been scavenged quickly if he didn’t have time to bury her.”
“He buried her. She meant too much to him not to, even with her betrayal.” The kidnapper’s relationship with Lyric was the key to blowing things wide open. She meant something more than the rest—a prized possession.
“Female,” Metz said. “Probably under twenty-five and likely an adolescent. Tibia’s growth plates haven’t fused. Ranges of fusion vary, but she definitely wasn’t done growing. Teenager.”
Cage had memorized Mickie’s outfit from that fateful day. “Any clothing?”
“Not so far, but it likely disintegrated.” Metz continued carefully removing the soil with her trowel while a graduate student bagged and tagged remains.
“She’s got a Mickey Mouse watch on her left arm.”
The words sucker punched him. “That’s how she got her nickname.”
Metz didn’t reply. She wouldn’t make the official ID until she’d completed the entire process.
Cage glanced at Annabeth, who’d come to stand beside him. Silent and pale, she watched the bones being removed. “How many bodies are in that grave?”
“So far, just one.”
“I sneaked Lyric’s missing persons case file out of your briefcase,” Annabeth said. “She wasn’t wearing any jewelry. Will we have to wait for dental records to match?”
“Yes,” Bonin said. “And the FBI’s forensic odontologist knows he’s about to get hammered. He’ll work as quickly as he can. Speaking of the FBI …” Bonin pointed to the barn where Tims and her crime-scene techs had converged. “Searching for trace should keep them occupied for a while, but she’ll eventually get her way.”
“We’ll deal with that when it happens,” Cage said.
Metz called for one of her graduate students. “I need separate evidence collection bags.”
Annabeth grabbed Cage’s arm. “What does that mean?”
“Two sets of remains in this grave,” Metz said.
“Male or female?” Cage asked.
“Not there yet. Let me do my job.”
Annabeth’s short nails cut into his skin. “She’s not dead.”
“It’s not your fault,” Cage said. “Lyric knew the consequences of letting you go.”
Annabeth backed away, shaking her head. “You’re wrong. I don’t care what the bone doctor says. Lyric is alive.” She spun on her heel and stalked off.
“I
’ll make sure she doesn’t get far,” Bonin said. “She’s too attached to you, and this is your show.” She jogged to catch up to Annabeth.
“It’s another female.” Metz’s voice sent ice down his spine. “Skull’s in bad condition, but it looks like she had her wisdom teeth.”
The second body was over eighteen.
40
Four victims so far. And Metz’s team was still digging.
Sickness rolled through Cage as he watched Metz’s team working beneath the blaring Klieg lights. The FBI techs found broken fingernails wedged into the horse stall doors along with a makeshift bathroom area consisting of a five-gallon bucket and long-since degraded toilet paper. A pack of sanitary wipes had also been recovered from the muck. Hopefully the lab would manage to extract DNA.
He’d kept the victims in the barn and probably taken them to his camper for the assaults. A search for an RV in Lyric’s name turned up empty. Looking for a camper registration from seven years ago was like digging for a specific piece of hay in a giant stack, especially since he could have registered it in any state. And Annabeth couldn’t remember specifics about the camper—if it existed. They didn’t have a damn thing to start with.
Local media had discovered the dig. Sheriff’s deputies had already run off three trespassers, but the national affiliates would arrive soon. Once the killer realized his burial ground had been discovered, he’d burrow deeper underground.
“I think this is the last grave, but it might be the most significant.” Metz looked exhausted, a smear of dirt across her forehead. “All the others are female. But the remains in this last grave are male.”
“Are you sure?” Cage expected the bodies to be identified as the missing girls he’d already flagged. This guy had a clear type: young, bi-racial girls with athletic builds.
Metz shot him a dirty look. “Pretty damn sure. He was rolled up in a tarp, so his clothing didn’t completely disintegrate. The bones are nearly a complete set.” She handed Cage a clear evidence bag containing a dirty, fragile knitted patch. He instantly recognized the famous basketball silhouette.