Thicker than Water

by Danae Ayusso

  James followed him. “Agent Hammil retired three years ago,” he said, and Colt mumbled something under his breath. “How’d you want to do this?” he asked, hopeful.

  Colt stopped and looked at the ground before shaking his head. “You’re the Sheriff, Jimmy. You’ll do what they pay you for and I’m going back to my workshop.”

  “Colt, I need you,” James pleaded.

  As much as a small part of Colt wanted to, he couldn’t. Going back to his old life wasn’t an option, and he had a sneaking suspicion that it was exactly what Pope wanted.

  “If I were you, I’d grid out the area in two-by-two sections and have the Hardy Boys back there gawking grab some shovels, hot plates, buckets, and some clean, double trash bag lined sixty-gallon trash bins, and start melting down the scene to see if there is anything the perp missed.”

  Colt and James looked to the interloper standing off to the side of them, her eyes moving over the victim studiously.

  “Why isn’t the scene secured?” Colt hissed.

  James sighed. “She found the body. Cat Rogers, Detective Colt Fury,” he introduced.

  “Former,” Colt grumbled under his breath. “Ma’am,” he said, his deep voice made his drawl even thicker.

  Cat simply nodded. “I wouldn’t waste your time going more than six inches deep unless there are obvious depressions or disturbed snow. It’ll save you hours.”

  James started to nod then stopped. “Hey, why aren’t you handcuffed in the back of Mickey’s cruiser?” he asked, scratching his head, and motioned for his deputies to get what she asked for: hotplates, buckets, trash bags, trash bins, shovels, yardsticks, and evidence tags.

  She shrugged and tossed something to him.

  Colt’s hand snapped out and caught it. He held his hand up and the handcuffs dangled from his finger; he cocked an eyebrow.

  “I was, but I got tired of watching from the cheap seats,” Cat said with a mischievous smirk.

  Colt handed the handcuffs to James and studied the woman curiously, then pulled the notebook from his jacket pocket.

  “You won’t need that for me,” Cat said without turning to regard him.

  Colt continued to look at her but didn’t put his notepad away. In fact, he flipped it open to a blank page and started taking notes just to spite her. He’s never seen or heard of Cat Rogers before, but it was to be expected since he had been a complete recluse for the past five years, and there was something about her that just didn’t sit right with him. Her hair was completely tucked under a stocking cap, and she donned thin gloves and running shoes that weren’t weather appropriate in the least. She wore an extremely fitted, black, long sleeve shirt that zipped all the way up her neck and hugged her curves. The matching pants made her backside appear rounder than it might have looked in Levis but Colt wasn’t complaining...which wasn’t right and wasn’t like him; Colt hadn’t thought of a woman besides Vicks, ever. There was something about her face that was off. That was the only way he could describe it. Her complexion was pale, creamy ivory, her cheeks were flushed a dark shade of rose that seemed unnatural despite the chilly breeze nipping at what little exposed skin she had, and her eyes were a color that didn’t fit either, in his opinion.

  Cat, sensing she was being watched, looked over at him and cocked a black eyebrow. “Are you done checking out my ass?” she asked.

  Colt was put off by her bluntness, and yet he felt the need to push her to see even more of it. His eyes burned into her murky, drab brown eyes but he found nothing there; the woman was as unreadable as stone.

  “Did you touch the body?” Colt asked in a quiet, authoritarian tone that made it more than obvious to James that Detective Fury was back.

  “No,” Cat said, her tone made it more than apparent that he just asked the dumbest question possible.

  And now she had his entire attention.

  “You came across a body in the middle of nowhere, naked and bound, and you didn’t go over to see if she needed help?” Colt asked, his voice low and deep, it was almost a menacing growl and was heavily laced with accusation.

  It didn’t intimidate Cat in the least.

  “No, I didn’t.”

  James patted Colt on the shoulder to keep him from addressing her attitude, as he knew Colt wanted to do. “Cat,” he said with a small smile, “why didn’t you think to go over and check to see if she needed help?”

  Cat chuckled under her breath and looked over at them. “Are you two seriously going to play good cop-bad cop?” she asked, overly amused.

  Neither of them said anything.

  She huffed and wrapped her arms around her chest to fight the chill that felt as if it was settling in her bones. “It’s twenty-eight degrees out,” she said. “Snowed earlier, I ran through it for over an hour. The thin dusting on the body wasn’t melting, thus the body temperature was below the proper core temperature required for normal metabolism and body functions, and the fact that none of her wounds were bleeding strongly suggests that there’s no heart beating to pump the blood out.”

  James opened his mouth but Colt raised his hand to stop him.

  “You marked off the crime scene,” Colt said.

  “The Hardy Boys would have destroyed any evidence, if there was any to find,” Cat said, looking at the body. “Is there a religious or cult correlation? Dei Sponsa is Latin for Bride of God. The crown of thorns, barbwire in this case, is referenced in Christianity. The crown of thorns, one of the instruments of the Passion, was woven of thorn branches and placed on Jesus Christ before his crucifixion. It was referenced in the King James Version of the Bible in Matthew twenty-seven twenty-nine, Mark fifteen-seventeen, and John nineteen-two and five.”

  They knew she was right, and it was something that they’d checked into after they found Vicks’ body, but they hadn’t an answer for her. The FBI profilers thought it was Satanists, then possibly a cult, that turned into a religious fanatic, and then they said nothing. After four bodies, their profile was as useless as each cold lead.

  “Sir, where do you want us to set up?” Deputy Jack Morrow asked.

  James looked between Colt and Cat, their eyes were locked on each other’s as if sizing the other up. “Set it up in the road and have Raven mark off a footpath and make sure none of you deviate from it. When Dr. Marks gets back from Church he’ll be out to release the body so let’s work on clearing north to south towards the body.”

  Jack nodded, then he hurried back to bark out orders to the others in an attempt to impress Detective Fury.

  “I’ve seen Colt stare suspects down for hours, Cat,” James said, stepping around them. “It’s pointless, he’s the stubbornest man I’ve ever met. When we were kids, he even tried to stare down the moon simply to say he beat it.”

  The corners of her mouth twitched.

  Was that a genuine smile at my expense? Colt wondered, but he wasn’t entirely sure why he cared, especially since there was a body not more than twenty-feet from them.

  “For some reason, watching paint dry as a past time in Eureka doesn’t surprise me,” Cat said, then looked at James. “I’m headed home. I’m cold and hungry. You know where to find me.”

  James forced a smile. “Thanks for-”

  “Preventing your officers from contaminating the crime scene?” she finished for him with a quizzical brow.

  He blushed. “Yeah, there’s that.”

  “Keep your chin up, Jimmy,” she said, an accent slipping in her speech and it caused Colt’s head to tilt to the side to regard her. “You’ll get the sonuvabitch this time. Fury,” she added with a curt nod then turned on her heels and headed back towards the road.

  “Thanks,” James said and forced a smile, then jumped when Colt smacked him in the back, giving him a look. ‘What?’ he mouthed.

  Colt cocked an eyebrow.

  James, not understanding, offered him the handcuffs Cat had somehow slipped.

  “Tell me you are not that dense,” Colt mumbled under his breath and took the
keys hanging from James’ belt and jiggled them.

  “Huh?” he asked, scratching his head. “Oh! Cat, it’s cold and you’re barely clothed, why don’t you let me...er, Colt, um...Detective Fury take you home?”

  Cat didn’t stop. “It’s only ten miles, Jimmy,” she called out and waved over her head before she started jogging down the road.

  Colt and James’ heads tilted to the side in unison, both of their attention on the firm backside running away from them.

  “I have a sneaking suspicion that she’s had a staring contest with the moon as well,” James said, then chuckled, “only she most likely won.”

  Seriously, you just can’t reel it in, can you? Cat mentally groaned. You marked off a damn crime scene and started processing it while you waited for the cops...the real cops! Actually, those weren’t cops. Do they have random drawings at the county fair to see who’ll be the next badge-carrying member of the community for the year? I have never seen such lazy, discombobulated, inept, rookie police work in my life! She continued to mentally complain as she jogged down the snowy road at a hurried pace; she needed to distance herself from the temptation of police work.

  Everything was going fine, and they were none the wiser, until Bigfoot showed up. There’s no way he didn’t hear the slip, his accusing tone, intent scrutiny of me...there’s no way his little notebook isn’t filled with hundreds of questions, none of which I will answer. That’s just great. Now I have to scope out another place. Why in the hell didn’t I see that Eureka, Montana, of all places has a goddamn serial killer running loose?!

  Cat’s back stiffened and she stopped, her hand snaked behind her and slipped under the back of her running thermal to the small of her back. Her fingers wrapped around the grip of the Walther PP she had stashed in the back of the waistband holster. When she looked over her shoulder, she growled under her breath and removed her hand, leaving the gun tucked behind her.

  The brown Sherriff’s jeep pulled to a stop next to her and the window rolled down.

  “Ma’am,” Colt said with a nod. “Can I give you a ride?” he asked, his voice deep and gravely and she found it interesting.

  “I already said I got it,” Cat reminded him then started jogging.

  The jeep slowly drove alongside her.

  “Yes, I suppose you do,” he said, his eyes trained out the windshield. “But a cold front is coming in and will drop the temperature to single digits.”

  Cat snorted. “What are you, the weather man now?”

  Colt noted that, once again, an accent flared in her speech. “No, however, I can feel it in my bones,” he admitted and that stole her attention.

  She stopped and looked at him curiously. “Feel it in your bones? Is that a Montana thing?”

  Colt didn’t turn to regard her, instead he kept his attention out the windshield, but he humored her with a response. “It’s an instinct thing.” Then he turned to regard her. “Something you know much about.”

  “You don’t say.”

  “I just did,” he said, turning his attention back out the windshield.

  “And what are your instincts saying about me?” Cat asked; she really needed to know.

  He shrugged his shoulders ever so slightly. “Much and nothing. But at the moment, my instincts say that you’re in trouble.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “Is that right?”

  “Yes.”

  “And what kind of trouble do you think I’m in?” she asked cool and collectively, but she needed to know just how much he knew.

  The corners of Colt’s mouth pulled up on one side. “Trouble which that Walther can’t help you with,” he informed her.

  “You don’t say,” she said again, that time through clenched teeth.

  “I just did,” he said with the unmistakable sound of amusement in his deep voice. “Unless you’re hiding a Winchester three-three-eight in your pants, you might want to rethink jogging home.”

  Cat’s black brows furrowed. “What in the hell does that mean?”

  Colt pointed out the windshield and Cat reluctantly turned to see what he was pointing at, and her eyes widened.

  Standing in the middle of the road, not more than twenty yards from them, was a grizzly bear.

  Cat didn’t think twice and dove through the driver’s side window, crawling up on Colt’s lap. “Shouldn’t that be sleeping?” she whispered, her eyes wide.

  The grizzly slowly ambled down the road towards them.

  Colt rolled up the window, trying to distract himself from the annoying woman who was balled up on his lap, trembling from fear or the cold, he couldn’t tell which. “They wake around this time, come out of hibernation for a meal. It’s approaching early spring...” his words trailed off as if that was explanation enough, and when he took a breath, the smell of cotton, powder, gun oil, and something undeniably feminine flooded his nostrils and it caused his eyes to flutter.

  It had been years since he smelled beautiful.

  “It’s getting closer,” Cat whispered, her fingers knotting in the front of his jacket.

  “She’ll walk past us,” Colt assured her, his eyes moving over the profile of the face of the woman curled up on him, her long legs pulled up tight to her chest, making her appear as a scared child who was armed. Each of Cat’s features were exotic and didn’t entirely look right with her pale complexion: nose was long with narrow nostrils and a ridge of cartilage built up at the base which, ironically in Colt’s mind, gave it a more feminine look; her lips were full but not face consuming; jaw wide; chin and high cheekbones were rounded but defined; her long neck was completely covered but he could tell it was slender. He deduced that her hair was dark because of her black eyebrows. Her large, almond tapered eyes were surrounded in thick, long black lashes, but their coloring was off; a murky, muddy shade of brown that seemed as off on her as her pale ivory skin tone did with her features.

  Cat gasped, her head following the path of the slow moving grizzly as it approached. “It’s huge,” she whispered.

  “That’s a small one,” Colt corrected and her eyes widened even more. “Maybe a few years old at most, and female,” he continued.

  When the grizzly was next to them, Cat’s head continued to turn and that was when Colt noticed something. Along the side of her face, behind her right ear, her skin appeared to be streaked, like paint that got wet before it finished drying, but he couldn’t be sure.

  Cat turned in his lap, continuing to watch the large, brown backside of the grizzly as it continued down the road before it veered off into the woods and disappeared. She turned back around, a smile on her face, eyes bright with excitement. “There’s no way in hell a Walther could stop that thing,” she said.

  Colt nodded. “Yes, I know.”

  “How’d you know I was armed?” she asked, making no attempt at getting off of his lap; she was freezing and he was surprisingly warm. The strength of his body under hers was inviting—that was the only way she could describe it—and the feel of his large, callused hands on her hips, firmly holding her to him, was strangely pleasant.

  “You broke the rookie’s nose when he tried to frisk you,” he said, his eyes moving over her face many times. “Then you knocked him out with a sleeper hold, broke out of his cruiser, slipped the cuffs, and walked away as if it was nothing.”

  “It was nothing,” she agreed.

  “It was two accounts of assault on an officer and an account of escape,” he countered.

  “Why argue semantics?” Cat asked with a mischievous smirk pulling at the corners of her full lips. “Did Jimmy send you to arrest me?”

  “No,” Colt said in a clipped tone.

  A smile filled her face. “Aw, and here I thought you didn’t like me.”

  “I don’t,” he informed her, and effortlessly picked her up off of his lap and moved her to the passenger seat. “Put your belt on,” he grumbled under his breath, and put the jeep in drive.

  Cat chuckled at his obvious discomfort and buckled her seatbelt.<
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  “Where am I going?” Colt asked after a mile.

  “Osloski Road,” she said. “It’s that place that borders the Tobacco River.”

  Colt shook his head. “The Paterson estate,” he said under his breath.

  “The small, one bedroom, cabin in the back of the property,” she corrected, looking out the window. “Old Lady Paterson is a bitter old broad, but she lets me do my thing and she does hers. Sunday evenings I have dinner with her and listen to her complain and gossip about everyone in town. She’s a hateful old broad...I like her, she has spunk and reminds me of mio nonna...my grandmother.”

  Again, the accent was back but she was apparently oblivious to it.

  “Where are you from?” Colt asked.

  “The Midwest,” she automatically answered.

  Colt knew she was lying. There was nothing Midwest about her accent, look, demeanor, the way she carried herself, or her way of thinking...nothing Midwest about her at all.

  “That’s more than evident,” he said.

  Cat looked over at him from the corner of her eye. “Was that sarcasm?”

  “No.”

  “Could have fooled me,” she said and leaned her head back against the headrest. “Will you tell me about Dei Sponsa?” she asked after a few miles of silence.

  “No.”

  Cat saw that answer coming.

  “How did you know to mark the perimeter like that?” Colt asked when she opened her mouth to press it.

  “Saw it on Law and Order. Who is Dei Sponsa?”

  “How did you know how to process a snowy crime scene with buckets, heated plates to melt the snow, and screens for filtering sediment?”

  She smirked, looking over at him. “I never said screens for filtering sediment,” she pointed out and he softly growled under his breath. “I saw it on CSI.”

  “Las Vegas has snow?” he countered.

  “CSI: New York,” she instantly corrected. “Nothing is hotter than watching a Staten Island Sicilian running around the streets of NYC. Carmine Giovinazzo,” she said then softly moaned. “Vieni qui e baciami,” she said then kissed the air before chuckling.