Their Frozen Graves: A completely addictive crime thriller and mystery novel

by Choudhary, Ruhi

  Mackenzie winced. Sterling Brooks, assistant district attorney, was Mackenzie’s husband of three years. Their marital bliss had shattered when Sterling had cheated on her earlier in the year. He had had a fling with a waitress who he’d hooked up with after a few drinks. It had taken Mackenzie a while to wrap her head around it and confront him. But when she did, she kicked him out of their house, wanting space and time to think. Now he seemed determined to earn her trust back.

  “What did he want?”

  “Looking for you. You didn’t tell him where you were. He was panicking.”

  Mackenzie rolled her eyes. “Yeah. I was preoccupied.”

  “Did you make up your mind?”

  “About what?”

  “Sterling!” he said, exasperated. “Isn’t that why you took off? To think things over?”

  Mackenzie swallowed. She hadn’t thought of him nearly as much as she should have. “Still deciding. Anyway, what did I miss?”

  Nick’s eyebrows dipped, assessing her. She met his scrutinizing eyes with a composure practiced and perfected over decades. Eventually, he let it go. “Crime’s up. I just came from throwing a pickpocket in jail. That’s how bad it’s gotten. All departments are short-staffed. Peck’s gone. We have a new lieutenant—Atlee Rivera. Transferred from Ohio.”

  She opened her mouth to inquire about Sully when the door to his office opened and a stranger’s face poked out. The woman was middle-aged, with olive skin and dark hair pulled back from her square face. Her eyes were narrowed above her broad nose.

  “Detective Price?” She cocked a brow.

  “Yes.”

  “Could I see you in here, please?”

  Mackenzie stepped into Sully’s office. It was filled with packed boxes and papers—no place for whatever his latest hobby was.

  “I’m Atlee Rivera.” Atlee shook Mackenzie’s hand. “Good grip.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Sorry about the mess!” She looked around the office and hopped over the boxes to get behind Sully’s desk. “My office isn’t ready, so all my things are here. Sergeant Sully’s been kind enough to lend it to me. So, you’re Mad Mack.”

  Mackenzie suppressed a groan. “You can call me Mack.”

  Atlee chuckled. “If they’ve given you a nickname, it’s a compliment. It means you stand out. Worth remembering. I was in Savannah for a few years before moving to Ohio. They called me ‘the Razor.’”

  “Why?”

  “I was cutthroat.” She leaned back on her chair. “I had the chance to address this department a few days ago, but you were out sick?”

  “Flu.”

  “From what I’ve heard you never take any time off, so you must have been really sick.”

  “All good now, ma’am.” Mackenzie’s smile was strained.

  “Call me Lieutenant. Good job on your previous case. From what I hear, it changed a lot of things in this town.”

  “For the better,” Mackenzie said, almost defensively.

  “We’ll see about that.” A corner of Atlee’s mouth raised in a half smile. “Justice doesn’t always bring peace, unfortunately. Anyway, the reason I called you in was to introduce myself. I’ve been told that I’m the first female lieutenant in the history of Lakemore PD, and you are the only female senior detective in this unit. Police work is still considered a man’s job, especially in small towns like Lakemore. I don’t know about you, but I have dealt with my fair share of old-school thinking and boy’s club culture. I won’t make any assumptions about this office, but I wanted to let you know that I have an open door and an open-mind policy. If there’s anything I can help you with, I’d like you to come to me.”

  She smiled warmly, but Mackenzie could detect a steely composure underneath. Instinctively, she could tell Rivera wasn’t the kind of woman who needed to raise her voice to intimidate. A woman with clear intentions, who was not easily fazed. “Thank you. I’ll keep that in mind.”

  Atlee nodded. “Glad that’s settled, then.”

  There was a knock on the door, and Nick peered in. “Sorry to interrupt. Mack, we have to leave. Two bodies at Woodburn Park.”

  “Where’s Sully?” Mackenzie asked, following him out and getting her jacket from her cubicle.

  “Rounding up graffiti artists.” Nick smirked.

  “He’s out on the field?”

  “I think he’s trying to make a good impression on the lieutenant.”

  “What do you think of her?” Mackenzie asked.

  “She’s hard to read. We’ll see.”

  “Is the crime scene secured?”

  “Yeah. Justin is holding the fort.”

  As they approached the exit to the building, sirens blared loudly. Several officers shot past them toward the parking lot. Mackenzie and Nick exchanged a bewildered look before shouldering their way outside.

  Mackenzie’s breath caught in her throat. A police squad car was on fire.

  Fire trucks were turning round the corner, zipping past the traffic. As they entered the parking lot, the sirens drowned the drone of the crowd. Black smoke jetted upward. Even from several feet away, Mackenzie could feel the heat on her cheeks. The view of the lot behind the car rippled. Flames danced higher, licking the air. Suddenly, the windshield of the squad car cracked and shattered. An explosion, and chunks of the car fell to the ground, still on fire. The toasted car was disintegrating when the firefighters began dowsing it.

  “What happened?” she whispered, turning to Nick.

  He looked at her. “Lakemore happened.”

  Two

  Mackenzie remembered coming to Woodburn Park as a child. It was a fleeting memory, like a vague dream on the brink of being forgotten. She recalled chasing her father along the edge of the lake. She closed her eyes and saw him from behind; he looked so much bigger and stronger. It must have been a time before the alcohol took over his life and brought him down brick by brick. She heard his laugh, cheery and guttural.

  Woodburn Park had changed over the years. What was once a hangout spot for families was now abandoned and creepy. Westley River—one of the two major rivers in Lakemore—cut through Woodburn, opening into Crescent Lake before continuing on its way and finally draining into the sea at Riverview, a neighboring town. There were cabins in the park, but they were all rundown. The exodus had started when drugs came to the area, and the woods became a spot for dealing. Some teenagers were found having overdosed. Arrests were made. The police eventually cleaned up the area, drove away the dealers and users, but a bad reputation was more durable than a good one.

  Now, Woodburn stood lonely. Safe, but haunted by the ghost of its treacherous past.

  There was a single trail that ran through Woodburn and was used to access most of the cabins in woods. Before the drugs, it was used for hiking. Walking through the woods was difficult with wild thickets and shrubbery covering nearly every inch of ground.

  Mackenzie scowled at her feet cracking a frozen silver puddle. The thin blanket of snow was crushed and brown under their feet as they walked. Weathered leaves hung from lifeless, barren branches. The cold came suddenly and would leave just as quickly. A blip in the otherwise predictable wet winter of Lakemore.

  “How’s Luna?”

  “Good. I’m getting her for Christmas this year,” Nick beamed.

  “How come?”

  He rubbed the back of his neck. “Shelly’s going on a vacation with her boyfriend.”

  “She has a boyfriend? Since when?” Mackenzie almost slipped on a thin sheet of black ice. She gripped the mushy bark of a tree to balance herself. “Damn it.”

  “Few months now. If she’s going on vacation with him, means it’s serious.”

  Mackenzie dusted her muddy hands. “Ordered a background check on him?”

  Nick turned and raised an eyebrow.

  “What? This man might become Luna’s stepfather.”

  “Already did it. He’s a widower with only a few parking tickets to his name.”

  “How did hi
s wife die?”

  He threw back his head and laughed. “Are you seriously suspecting he killed his wife?”

  Mackenzie shrugged innocently. “Maybe?”

  “It was cancer.”

  Mackenzie could see the shore of the lake a dozen feet ahead of her. The frozen river upstream was pristine white from a distance. She spotted the yellow tape and the crime scene unit dressed in jackets. Detective Justin Armstrong, a junior detective, looked over the area with his binoculars. He had been with Lakemore PD two years and was often assigned to assist Mackenzie and Nick on their cases. His build was beefy but muscular, a moustache sat on his upper lip, and a contemplative frown always clouded his face. His discipline and mannerisms were military-like, and Mackenzie appreciated his unwavering focus.

  The stretch of river meeting the lake was thawing and the brilliant wintry light made the surface glitter like crystals. As they got closer to the shallow bank, she saw the thin layer of ice on the surface was cracked. Pieces drifted away from each other, revealing the gushing water underneath.

  “Detective Price,” Justin tipped his head. “Welcome back, ma’am.”

  “Thanks, Justin. What do we have here?” She and Nick donned disposable suits, latex gloves and skullcaps before getting close to the crime scene.

  Justin pointed at two men sitting on a boulder with blankets around their shaking bodies. “Those fishermen caught two bodies instead of fish around an hour ago. First they caught the victim wearing the blue sweater in fishing net. When they were rowing to the shore, their boat hit the other victim floating just under the ice.”

  “Any other witnesses?” Nick asked.

  “None, sir. No one else is in the area. The cabins look unoccupied.”

  Nick made his way to speak to the spooked fishermen. Four personnel from the medical examiner’s office huddled together, blocking Mackenzie’s view of the bodies. Two of them collected samples from the soil and the bodies, while the third one made an inventory. The fourth person took pictures.

  They moved, giving Mackenzie full view. Two women lay side by side on the shore, several feet apart. Their eyes were open, milky white and bloated. Their skin glistened like wax, matted with mud and sand and remnants of the lake. They both had long dark hair like tattered ropes, the same length, tangled with weeds and debris. One body was wrapped in a fishing net. Both barefoot, their skin was covered in bruises and cuts.

  The woman in the net was dressed in jeans and a full-sleeved blue sweater, the other in a brown woolen dress and stockings. Their clothes were bloodied, the epicenter being their abdomens, but otherwise largely intact. There were some rips, likely from being underwater—no obvious signs of deliberate tearing or removal, which could have indicated sexual assault.

  Mackenzie noted their similarities: bone structure, rosebud mouths, height, and build. They were bloated and their skin was clammy and translucent, a blue tinge coming from their veins.

  “Did they have ID?” Mackenzie asked Justin.

  “No. It’s probably at the bottom of the lake somewhere.”

  Mackenzie nodded and continued staring at the women’s faces. They looked too similar. Were they related? She wouldn’t be surprised if they were twins. But being underwater had morphed their appearance.

  “Looks like they were stabbed,” Nick noted as he joined them. “No other major injuries visible that could lead to death. Sexual assault looks unlikely. They were thrown in the water instead of being positioned a certain way, so no ritualistic killing either. Robbery gone wrong?”

  “I don’t think so, sir. One of the bodies is wearing a wedding band and a necklace,” Justin pointed out. “The necklace looks cheap, but the ring is probably gold.”

  “They look very similar, but they’re bloated and have all these marks,” Mackenzie said.

  “Probably from the water. This lake is forty meters deep and pretty rocky at the bottom. There can be strong afternoon winds here, causing currents.” Nick frowned. “I swear I’ve seen someone like them before.”

  “Where?”

  “I don’t know…” He shook his head and leaned on his haunches to get a closer look. “I’ve definitely seen this face somewhere.” He pulled out his phone and typed something. He handed it to Mackenzie. “One of them could be her?”

  She stared at the picture. It was slightly pixelated, but the woman smiling at the camera bore an uncanny resemblance to both corpses. “Who is that?”

  “Katy Becker.”

  “The social activist?” Mackenzie raised her eyebrows.

  Katy Becker was a well-known name around Lakemore. The short, slender-framed woman had worked relentlessly to raise money to restore several state parks and construct homeless shelters around the city. She dodged direct media attention, preferring to work from behind the scenes, but was big on social media. Authorities knew her—or at least of her. Mackenzie had never spoken to the woman, but on several occasions they had been present at the same event. Last year, Katy had organized a protest outside city hall demanding better wages for schoolteachers. Mackenzie had been deployed to handle the crowd in case things spun out of control. She remembered watching Katy shouting slogans into a microphone. She was passionate and determined, everything Mackenzie prized in a citizen of Lakemore.

  “Maybe it’s someone who just looks like her?” she suggested.

  “We should wait for Becky to confirm,” Nick said, referring to the chief medical examiner. “But what a waste if it is her.”

  “Yeah, she’s one of the few inspiring figures in Lakemore.”

  “Did you find the murder weapon?” Nick asked Justin.

  “Nothing. Just them.”

  “Think they were murdered together?” He looked at Mackenzie.

  “They were both stabbed in the abdomen. No other major injury marks. The stage of decomposition looks the same. Unlikely they were killed by separate people. When did the lake freeze?”

  “Two days ago. Sunday. The bodies must have been dumped before that.”

  Mackenzie looked out over the broad expanse of the lake with frozen patches. Some cabins were visible along the shoreline. “Justin, can you check if there were any arrests made in this area in the last few days?”

  “Drug activity?”

  “Yeah, I haven’t heard anything, but just to be sure.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  Chris, one of the forensic personnel, came up to them. “Detectives, we’re going to take the bodies to the morgue now.”

  “Thanks, Chris. Do you know where Becky is?” Mackenzie asked.

  “She’s in court testifying on that mall shooting.” He ducked out from under the yellow tape and removed the plastic covers on his shoes. “Okay, c’mon,” he turned to his team. “Need a few hands here!” Together, they lifted the bodies and placed them in black body bags, then carried the gurneys all the way to the van parked at the edge of the woods.

  Justin spoke with the fishermen and gave them his card. They looked relieved to be dismissed. While Nick and Justin discussed the details of keeping the crime scene secured for the next few days, Mackenzie wandered along the shore.

  It was eerily quiet and desolate here. If she closed her eyes, she could hear the icy water tearing apart under the bright sun. All she could see in her mind’s eye was the barren solitude of the park.

  Were the women murdered here, or was this just the dumping ground? It was a good location to get rid of a body. Mackenzie couldn’t think of a reason why the women would be here in the first place. They weren’t dressed to go hiking—not that it was hiking season. Maybe there was still some minor drug activity in the area; Justin was checking on that. But their clothing and faces didn’t show any obvious signs of them being addicts. Nor had she heard of any wrongdoing going down round here for a while.

  But, until today, she hadn’t seen a police squad car set on fire at the Lakemore PD headquarters either.

  “Once we confirm their identity, we’ll inform the next of kin,” Nick said, joining
her. “It’s pretty, isn’t it?”

  “It is,” she acknowledged. “In a creepy way. How long do you think before the rest of Lakemore burns it down?”

  “People are angry, Mack. We all just have to be careful.”

  “Why?”

  “We took away the only thing this town cared about,” Nick commented dryly. He turned in a circle, taking in the area. “Most of this park is inaccessible because of the thick woods. Just the trail and cabins along it. If we can figure out where the bodies were dumped from…”

  She pointed upstream. “The river runs from southeast, pouring into the lake here. The bodies could have been thrown into the river and brought to the lake by the currents, or directly into the lake. Both locations are accessible by the trail. We should check if anyone’s filed a missing person report for Katy Becker.”

  “Good idea.” Nick pulled out his phone. “Ready to go?”

  Mackenzie wanted to stay surrounded by silence and stillness, so removed from the chaos in her life. She felt like she was in a snow globe, trapped and tucked away safely in artificially induced peace. But it just took a flick of the wrist to turn the globe over and disrupt it all.

  Her phone vibrated. She knew it would be Sterling. He had been texting and leaving her voicemails.

  “Can I meet you by the car in like five minutes? Want to make a quick phone call.”

  Nick pressed his lips in a thin line and nodded understanding. When he disappeared behind the frosty trees, she took out her phone. As she’d predicted, her husband had been worried about her. There were over ten voicemails from the last week alone.

  She clenched the phone tight. She was still undecided about him. With an aching breath, she dialed the number to Miller Lodge and asked for Robert Price.

  “Hello?” Her father’s voice came on the phone.

  “It’s me.”

  “Micky!” he gasped. “I thought I would never hear from you. It’s been weeks. I left messages.”

  “I was busy. Can we meet tonight?”

  “Of course. Should I come to you?”

  “No!” Mackenzie said abruptly. “I’ll see you at seven.”