The Dead Chill

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The Dead Chill Page 20

by Linda Berry


  “Tell me more,” Tegan said impatiently.

  Moolock sighed, reluctant to drum up more memories, but he forced himself to continue. The boy had a right to know. “I learned about the shortage of trauma care available to soldiers injured in combat in the Mideast. I admired my father for making the sacrifice to go into a war zone to help others. I thought it was my turn to help. Long story short, I joined the army. I ended up serving as a trauma surgeon for four years on a forward operating base out in the middle of nowhere in Afghanistan. My team took care of soldiers with life-threatening injuries. We saved countless lives.” He swallowed, and his voice grew softer. “I met my second wife there. Emery. She, too, was a trauma doctor. Emery was gifted. Beautiful. Brave. We worked side by side. We lived in a tent, worked in a tent, ate in the cafeteria with hundreds of soldiers, in a tent.” Moolock smiled. “Guess that’s where I learned to live simply. Yet, I was happy. Fulfilled.” He paused a few beats as his thoughts traveled back in time. He recalled the scent of the desert, the earsplitting sound of bombs, the acrid smell of explosives, the agonizing cries of wounded men.

  “The working conditions were dangerous,” Moolock said. “Almost every day we had incoming rocket attacks and indirect fire. We’d hear the siren and have to get down because the rockets had been loaded with shrapnel. Taking care of patients under those conditions, putting on our Kevlar and blocking out what was going on around us, was difficult. In the end, Kevlar couldn’t save us. A rocket exploded right outside our surgery tent.” Moolock’s voice hardened. “Everyone died. Horribly. The other doctors, the nurses, the patients. Emery. Only I survived. I sustained a traumatic brain injury that put me in a coma for weeks. When I woke, and found out what happened, I died inside. My spirit, my will to live, shriveled up like a plant that gets no water. No sunlight. Part of me wanted to be with Emery.”

  Moolock gritted his teeth and forced the memories of his painful recovery, the mind-numbing grief, back into the shadows. After a few long moments, he was able to speak again. “I was in rehab for months, recovering from the brain injury. I had to relearn how to talk without slurring, how to think straight. Going back to work was out of the question. I was damaged. Emotionally. Physically. I couldn’t function in the busy world anymore. What I needed was simplicity. Quiet.”

  “Is that why you came here?”

  He nodded. “Miraculously, I found Elahan…Mother…by going through my grandfather’s old records. When I called her and identified myself, she didn’t say anything for a very long time. I thought she didn’t want to meet me, but then I heard her sobbing. It broke my heart. We spoke several times over a period of weeks, and I eventually explained my situation—that I was suffering from a TBI, and taking enough prescription drugs to numb a horse. She took charge, which is what I desperately needed. She commanded me to come to Oregon. I did. Like an arrow launched at a target, I was irrevocably drawn here. That was five years ago. Mother helped me to live on my own, to replace the drugs with natural remedies. I couldn’t be around people. Anyone. Only her. I couldn’t be in a house. Too stationary. Structures felt like targets waiting for a bomb. Irrational, I know. But I’m not an entirely rational man anymore.” He gestured to his living arrangements. “As you can see.”

  “Over time Mother taught me native ways. She helped me heal. In short, she saved my life.” Moolock heaved out a deep breath, feeling drained, and bruised by the battering of remembered grief. He stood and walked to the wall of frozen water, closed his eyes, and tried to empty his mind of wildly ricocheting thoughts.

  A tap on his shoulder made Moolock open his eyes. Tegan’s face was tilted up to his, his dark eyes brimming with tears. “I’m glad you came home to us.”

  Moolock wrapped his arms around the boy’s slender frame and hugged him fiercely.

  “Can I touch your face?” Tegan asked. “I want to know what you look like.”

  In answer, Moolock squatted and sat back on his heels.

  The boy read his face with his sensitive fingertips as though studying Braille. “You have a strong nose, strong cheekbones, a broad forehead, light color eyes.”

  “They’re hazel,” Moolock said, soothed by the boy’s gentle touch, his gentle voice. Moolock’s anxiety lost its sharpest edges.

  Tegan fingered his hair. “Your hair is sable. Like a fawn.”

  “You are correct.”

  “You’re handsome.”

  Moolock smiled.

  “What’s your white man’s name?”

  “Forest Wainwright the Fourth,” Moolock said. “I’m afraid my grandparents weren’t too imaginative.”

  “I like Forest. Full of trees. But I like Moolock better.”

  “Me, too. It’s the name my birth mother gave me.” He caught Elahan’s beatific expression, the adoring light burning in her eyes. His gaze fixed on hers and he placed his hand on his chest. “The name I feel in my heart.”

  “So, Moolock,” Tegan said. “What’s the plan? How long do we stay in this cave?”

  “Not long,” he said, brushing Tegan’s hair back from his eyes. “I’m leaving in the morning. I won’t be back until it’s safe for you to return home.”

  “You’re going out there to kill a man.” Tegan’s voice vibrated with emotion. “Take me with you. I can help you.”

  “That’s not an option,” Moolock said. “Please don’t try to follow me. Don’t leave your nana here alone. Can you promise me that?”

  The boy’s expression was crestfallen. He nodded.

  “It’s late,” Moolock said. “Time to get some rest.”

  “First we must pray to our sacred spirit,” Elahan said. “We must ask for your protection and guidance. Come sit.”

  The three sat cross-legged in the flickering firelight and Elahan began chanting in her native tongue, low and soft, with a surprising lilting sweetness to her voice. Then Tegan joined in, his voice clear and strong and sure. Their voices rose and fell—at times deeply melancholy, at times soaring and exuberant like birds bursting into the sky. Moolock had never participated in ceremonial chanting and had not used his voice in song for years, but he felt an irresistible urge to join them. He hummed along, softly and tentatively, then he awkwardly repeated the simple lyrics. He lost track of time and after a long while the chanting became instinctual, and he felt his spirit freeing itself from the encumbrances of the physical world. The harmony of voices—rhapsodic and evocative—carried Moolock’s spirit to a place of lightness, wellbeing, and eternal knowledge. He came to understand and accept that his fate tomorrow was already destined.

  He would do everything in his power to eradicate the malicious threat facing his loved ones. The man he would encounter was cunning, ruthless, and as ghost-like in the wild as Moolock. Whether Moolock would survive the day, he did not know, but the powerful magic of spirit would be with him. He would fight his enemy to the death, if need be.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  SIDNEY PUSHED OPEN the door and she and Amanda entered Grisly’s private domain. Sidney could not have been more surprised. Though Grisly lived off the grid with no electricity, and his barn looked like the devil went on a killing spree, his cabin was clean and organized. Kerosene lamps hissed from three corners of the room, casting flickering light across the sparsely furnished interior. A fire crackled in a wood stove in one corner, emitting welcoming warmth. The rustic kitchen counter held a large, shallow sink with a pump handle. The shelves above the oil stove were filled with orderly stacks of dishes, pots and pans, and foodstuff. A small, square table and two upright wooden chairs, an old but serviceable couch, and a desk that held a laptop computer and printer took up the living room. Between the wood stove and the door was a floor to ceiling bookshelf crammed with books. A rustic ladder led to a loft bedroom, tucked beneath the rear half of the roof’s steep pitch.

  “Looks like Mr. Clean just torpedoed through this place,” Sidney said. Even the plank walls looked sanded and finished.

  “Cleaner than my place.”

>   “You have a two-year old. You get a free pass.”

  “Thanks, I’ll remember that the next time I step on a squeaky toy in the middle of the night. Get a load of all these books,” Amanda said, reading titles. “Tony Hillerman. Jack London. Everything Louis L’Amour ever wrote. I’d have guessed he was illiterate.”

  “Me, too. But have they been read?”

  Amanda leafed through the pages of a couple paperbacks and found the pages worn and dog-eared. “Yep. Several times.”

  “Different world in here from the barn,” Sidney said. “No dead animals. No pelts. No smell. How’d he keep that stench from coming in?”

  “Good question. Must’ve showered in the barn, or rolled around in the snow like a polar bear.”

  “Saves water,” Sidney chuckled. She studied a handful of framed photos on one of the shelves. Most depicted Grisly with hunting buddies posing with their kill. One surprised her, taken about a decade ago. Clean shaven, hair neatly trimmed, dressed in khakis and a polo shirt, Grisly stood in front of a small but respectable suburban home on a sunny day. One arm was wrapped around the waist of an attractive woman and the other around a six or seven-year old boy. All three grinned at the camera, squinting against the sun. An average American family. Comfortable. Happy. Sidney removed the photo from its frame and read an inscription on the back, scrawled in a feminine hand.

  Stokes family—Jessica, Grisly, and Justin. Jackson, 2008.

  “Looks like he once had a normal life in Jackson,” Sidney said. “What happened to his wife and son? How’d he end up living in the woods like Liver-eating Johnson?”

  “Who’s Liver-eating Johnson?”

  Sidney met Amanda’s widened eyes. “He was a trapper who lived in the 1800s. His wife, from the Flathead Indian tribe, was killed by a Crow hunting party. Johnson took out his revenge by killing and scalping more than 300 Crow Indians, and eating their livers.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Seriously.”

  “Yech. Makes Hannibal Lector look like a choir boy.”

  Sidney replaced the photo in the frame. “Grisly the violent rapist with the torture chamber barn sure doesn’t jibe with this photo. Or this cabin. It’s too clean, too normal.”

  Amanda shrugged. “I don’t get it either. Maybe he’s in witness protection and had to leave his respectable life.”

  “Maybe he has dual personalities,” Sidney quipped. “One a respectable citizen, the other a hostile redneck.”

  “Or this is a twin brother, and Grisly’s the evil twin.”

  A knock at the door announced the arrival of the reserve officer with the warrant.

  Sidney thanked him profusely for coming out in these weather conditions.

  Now they could legally search the premises. “Well, let’s get to work. Not much here. Shouldn’t take us too long. Hopefully, we’ll find some answers.”

  She and Amanda worked in companionable silence for twenty minutes, sifting through household items in drawers and cabinets. Grisly’s gun cabinet was unlocked and a rifle appeared to be missing, corroborating Sander’s version of the shootout.

  While Amanda sorted through folders in Grisly’s desk drawers, Sidney climbed to the loft, which was occupied by a double bed and an old cedar chest. Inside the chest she sorted through folded clothes and old shoes, and discovered a photo album. Sitting on the bed, she leafed through a chronology of Grisly’s life, which included photos of his wedding, the birth of his son, and holiday celebrations. In one shot, Grisly posed in front of a van with a business name and logo painted on it: Stokes Plumbing. A folded newspaper clipping was tucked into the last page. Sidney unfolded the worn and yellowed page. The headline made her breath catch.

  Woman and Child Found Dead in Jackson Home

  A 29-year-old woman and a juvenile were found shot to death in an apparent

  murder-suicide. Investigators believe the woman shot the child before shooting herself.

  The woman’s husband discovered the bodies when he arrived home from work.

  Sidney scanned through the rest of the article, which stated the husband had a history of domestic abuse. The police had responded to calls by Jessica Stokes on several occasions. In addition to serving a short stint in jail, her husband, Grisly Stokes, had completed an anger management course.

  Sidney refolded the article, closed the album and sat quietly. She didn’t hear Amanda come up the stairs and was startled when she heard her voice.

  “Sorry, Chief.”

  “No worries.”

  “Nothing downstairs. You find something?”

  “Yeah. The reason Grisly did an about face. He came home from work and found the bodies of his wife and son in a murder-suicide.”

  “That’s horrifying,” Amanda said, eyes wide. “A woman killing herself is bad enough, but taking the life of a child…” She shuddered. “Unthinkable.”

  “Something a person never recovers from. He’d been abusing her. Must have pushed her to the brink.”

  “She took an abused woman’s ultimate revenge,” Amanda said. “That would make any man run for the hills and hide out.”

  “Didn’t cure his penchant for violence, though.”

  They heard the cabin door open downstairs and Darnell called out, “Chief?”

  “Up here,” Amanda called back.

  “We’re coming down.”

  “Follow me outside,” Darnell said. “You’ve got to see what I found.”

  Deeply curious, Sidney and Amanda pulled out their Maglites and followed Darnell out into the frigid night air, their breath steaming. They rounded the house and their beams illuminated two pathways neatly carved through the snow. One led to an outhouse, the other to a small barn. Sidney saw that Darnell’s earlier boot prints had taken a side trip off the paved path, through the trees, and back again. Before she could comment, he took off in the same direction, stamping new holes in the snow.

  She shone the light on his retreating back. “Where’re you going?”

  “You’ll see. Follow me.”

  About thirty feet in, Darnell halted in front of a metal trap door that he had wrenched open and thrown back against the frozen earth. He directed his flashlight beam into the hole, revealing a sturdy wooden ladder and the corner of an earthen room.

  “How the hell did you find this?” Sidney asked, impressed by Darnell’s investigative skills.

  “I saw a pattern of very faint footsteps leading toward it. Then there was a noticeable depression in the snow the size of this door. I scraped away the snow, and discovered this. Careful coming down. Brace yourself. You aren’t going to like it.”

  “Thanks for the warning.” They descended into the underground dwelling. Feet planted firmly on the earthen floor, they turned and cast their beams across the room from corner to corner. Though prepared, Sidney’s stomach twisted. The cavern, about twenty feet square, held stacks of animal pelts in rows on the floor, some shoulder high. Sidney recognized bobcat, beaver, fox, otter, coyote, rabbit, and others. For a long moment, no one spoke. Finally, Sidney found her voice. “Here’s proof of Grisly’s illegal trapping and hunting business. Looks like it’s been going on for years.”

  Anger rippled across Amanda’s delicate features. “You don’t have to be an animal rights extremist to know this kind of killing is just plain wrong. Letting an animal suffer in a trap, then clubbing it to death to make a few bucks on a pelt, is sick.” She fingered the top pelt on a stack of beaver furs. “It takes thirteen of these to make one knee-length coat. Thirteen animals! Tortured for a single coat. No one needs to wear fur.”

  “Here in Oregon, seven-hundred trappers reported killing 23,000 animals last season,” Darnell said. “Does that seem right to you?”

  “No, Darnell. It doesn’t,” Sidney said. “And a lot more go unreported. Like these. Unfortunately, the fur trade is booming. Millions of animals are trapped every year and their pelts are sold to designers.”

  “Hunters and trappers would drive animals to extinct
ion, if they could,” Amanda said hotly.

  “Unfortunately, that’s happened too many times,” Sidney said. “Countless species have been wiped off the face of the earth. Wolves, trumpeter swans, and Humboldt martens are just a handful of animals hunted to extinction here in Oregon. Swans and wolves are being reintroduced. But there are fewer than two hundred martens left, and it’s still legal to trap them.”

  “If they don’t get protection, they’ll disappear this year, or next,” Darnell said.

  “Poor creatures,” Amanda said sadly.

  Sidney sighed and shifted her attention to the matter at hand. “We’ll have to get a game warden out here to do an inventory of these pelts. We need to find out who was partnering with Grisly and where he’s been unloading this stuff. You’ll have to get into his computer, Darnell. See if you can dig up anything.”

  “Will do. I found something else, too, Chief.”

  Back outside, Darnell slammed the trap door shut and led them along the other path to the small barn tucked away under ponderosa pines. They viewed a small corral dotted with fresh manure and the hoof patterns of a shod horse.

  “Grisly owns a horse,” Sidney said, surprised. “Is it in the barn?”

  “No. Someone took it out for a ride. I followed the tracks into the woods. They lead to White Tail Creek, going west. I’d say the rider left a couple hours ago.”

  “We know the rider isn’t Grisly. He’s dead.” Sidney rubbed her tired eyes, thinking. “So, who’s this mystery rider? This creek runs near Two Creeks Village, doesn’t it?”

  “Runs right through it, Chief,” Amanda said. “The Stalker used it as a route to sneak up on houses. A few times they found his prints, and horse tracks, leading to and from the creek, but when they tried to follow, the tracks disappeared into the water.”

 

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