Winter's Mourn

by Mary Stone

  “You know, I’d like to consider us friends.”

  She rolled her eyes at him, and he didn’t miss the flash of…something that crossed her face at his words. Guilt?

  “Sure, Dalton. We’ve been friends since I took you down in front of the Director of the FBI Training Academy.”

  I gave her a good-natured snort. “Darlin’, you’re remembering it all wrong. I took you down.”

  “My elbow in your sternum said otherwise.”

  “Fine, I’ll be a gentleman and let you think you won.” He needed to steer this conversation back on track. “Anyway, friends talk to each other.”

  Noah took out a well-worn deck of cards from his pocket and unwound the rubber band that held them together. He cut the deck with practiced ease, shuffling both stacks into one so quickly, they were a whispering blur. He’d found people were more willing to talk when they didn’t think you were paying them your full attention. But it didn’t take any attention at all to shuffle a deck of cards.

  “We can talk to each other in the morning, Dalton,” Winter huffed, exasperated. “We’re meeting for a run in less than seven hours, remember?”

  “What do you think of Officer Benton?” Noah cut the deck again, ignoring her rhetorical question.

  “I think he’s a douchebag. Is that what you came over here to ask me?”

  “Poker?” he offered, riffling the cards for effect, keeping his face carefully neutral. “Doesn’t have to be strip, unless you insist.”

  She just shook her head, sighed, and climbed up on the bed, propping pillows behind her. She grabbed the remote off the nightstand and flicked on the postage-sized TV across the small room. The soothing drone of a nightly news meteorologist’s voice rolled out on low volume as he gave the weather report for the next day. The late-September warm stretch would continue. Partly sunny, high of seventy-five. Good day to visit an old crime scene.

  “I knew Benton,” she finally said. “In middle school.”

  “Small town. Figures you’d know some people. Was he a douchebag back then?”

  She barked out a laugh. “Weren’t all teenaged boys?”

  “I wasn’t. My mama told me so.”

  Winter clamped her hands over her face and sagged down into the pillows. “Why was I assigned to this case? Did you talk Max into putting me on this with you?”

  He didn’t bat an eyelash at her change of subject. Noah knew it had been bothering her. It was out of character for any Special Agent in Charge to put a rookie and a relative rookie on a case together, and she’d have to be dumb not to realize that. Winter wasn’t dumb.

  “Miguel Vasquez was going to take it, but his appendix exploded, and he’ll be down for a couple weeks. I was his backup. Everyone else is tied up with that credible terrorist threat that came in last week.”

  Her hands dropped to her lap, her fingers twisting together in a rare show of anxiety before she pulled them apart. “Why didn’t Max assign it to you, then? You’re the one with four years of actual police experience. I’ve only got a degree. Why make me the case agent?”

  “Because I asked him to.” He held up a hand, forestalling her argument. Her eyes flashed in warning. “You did well with the jogger rapist. I’m still pissed you went off script on that one, but you got him. You need another win to cement your spot in the Violent Crimes unit.”

  “Jeez, Dalton, you’re just as much of an FBI rookie as I am. Who are you to give advice to the SAC?” She turned off the TV and shot to her feet, pacing the narrow width of the room. It looked like steam would erupt from her ears any second, but at least she had some color now. She didn’t look so haunted.

  Noah shrugged, giving her one of his most irresistible grins. He tipped his chair back on two legs, knowing the cocky pose would rile her up even more. “I’m charming. Everyone likes me. Even you, and you don’t like anyone.”

  “I don’t like you much right now, either.” She lashed a foot out to connect with one upraised leg of his chair on her way past him, and he teetered for a second, bracing a quick hand on the wall to keep from tipping over. “Did it have anything to do with the fact that these bones might be Justin’s remains? The initial report said they belonged to a male. Probably between six and ten years old. And they’ve been in the ground for a long time. Years.”

  There it was. The wound was lanced, Winter’s pain out in the open.

  “Yeah,” Noah said quietly into the stark silence that followed her words. “I thought if there was any chance it could be your little brother, you’d want to be in on it.”

  “You were right. But I don’t need your Texas charisma or whatever,” she waved one hand, “to smooth the way for me.”

  “I didn’t expect you to thank me,” he replied, sober as a judge. “But I could think of a few ways you could go about it.” He gave her a lewd look and wiggled his eyebrows.

  “No fraternizing, Dalton.” A grin twitched at the corner of her lips, spoiling her severe expression just as he’d hoped it would.

  “But what about that night you got tanked, and I drove you home—”

  “Out. Now.” To emphasize her point, she flung open the door, whacking it against his outstretched foot.

  Laughing at her obvious discomfort at the mention of their one not-very-memorable kiss, he stood up and whipped the rubber band around his card deck. “See you in the morning. I’m right next door if you change your mind.”

  She snorted and locked the door behind him with a decisive snap.

  The smile slid from his face the second the sound faded, and he looked out across the dark parking lot. The itch at the back of his neck was mostly gone. So was the rusted-out blue Chevy that had been parked in the lot earlier. Curious, he jogged down the stairs that led to the main floor units and stepped off the curb, walking to the back row in the lot where the driver of the Chevy would have been. An oily spot marked the asphalt.

  He looked up and could make out Winter’s silhouette through the too-thin beige curtains. He hadn’t teased her enough to pull her out of her funk. She was back to pacing again.

  And if the man inside the truck was still there, he’d have had a perfect vantage point for looking in Winter’s hotel room window, watching her work out whatever was bothering her.

  2

  Winter didn’t sleep that night.

  The photo under her mattress seemed to be burning a hole in the bed. The man who had killed her parents and taken her brother had been in her hotel room. The Preacher. What a hateful, hateful name. Sacrilegious.

  How had the bastard known she’d be there, what room she’d be in? She had no idea. Did someone do it for him? Was he a Harrisonburg local? An adult she’d known growing up? His kills had been scattered across the country, so it wasn’t likely. But she was sure the photo had been left by him, or at least at his direction.

  Should she have told Noah? Turned the photo in for evidence? Instinctively, she knew there wouldn’t be any prints. No one had managed to catch him in decades, and she doubted he’d resurface after all these years just to give himself away with a careless mistake.

  Sliding the photo under her door had felt like a personal message. That was fine.

  Finding and taking down The Preacher was a very personal vendetta. An eye for an eye. She didn’t plan on sharing that with anyone, either.

  Rolling over, her legs tangled in the blankets, she punched her pillow, trying to get comfortable. The red glow of the alarm clock told her it was after three. She tried to shut off her brain, close her eyes, but it was impossible.

  Winter finally gave up as the weak gray light of dawn began to illuminate the hotel room. She rolled out of bed and pulled on a pair of stretchy yoga capris and a loose tank top over a sports bra. She’d brushed her teeth and was tying her running shoes when Noah tapped on the door. She stepped out and locked up, tucking the key into the tiny inside pocket at her waistband.

  Noah was big, handsome, and irritatingly cheerful for this side of six a.m. His dark hair was growin
g out from his short military cut and stuck up a little on one side where he’d been sleeping on it. He had on a pair of black basketball shorts and a wrinkled red Texas Longhorns t-shirt. If not for his sharp green eyes and wicked grin, he’d have looked about twelve years old.

  Winter felt an unwelcome wave of affection. He really was a great guy. It was damned near impossible not to like him.

  “Ready to rock and roll?” His tone was light, but he studied her face like he was searching for something. She stuck her tongue out at him and headed down the stairs to start stretching.

  “We’ll run to the park at the edge of town. Easy warm-up, just a few miles. One loop on the trail once we’re there, and then first one back buys breakfast. That way you can’t claim I’ve got home-turf advantage.”

  They set off at a comfortable pace. A light, cool breeze banished some of the previous night’s cobwebs and the only sounds besides their rhythmic breathing came from a few passing cars and birds chirping their morning greetings.

  “Sleep okay?” Noah asked, just into their second mile.

  “Like a baby,” she lied. “You?”

  “Yep.”

  Winter, adjusting to the déjà vu feeling of being back in her hometown, didn’t mind their companionable silence. They passed her fourth-grade teacher’s house, a small brick bungalow on the main street, roses blooming on trellises next to the wide front porch. She wondered if Mrs. Jensen was still teaching. The woman had seemed ancient to Winter back then, but she’d probably only been in her late forties.

  They passed the small town’s only grocery store, the Shop N’ Stop. The building had gotten a facelift since she’d last seen it. She remembered putting in her first job application there at the beginning of that last fall. She’d wanted to be a grocery bagger, had dreamed of having extra spending money.

  Her dad, a quiet man with a kind, bearded face, had been an English professor at James Madison University. Her mom, sweet and vivacious with long black hair like Winter, had been a housewife. Winter had wanted the after-school job since her small allowance had barely kept her in Bonne Bell lip gloss, but never found out whether the grocery store would have hired her or not.

  The sun was just rising when they reached the park, the playground deserted.

  The merry-go-round was the same, warped steel with knobby rivets covered with chipped green paint. She’d sat on the metal edge with Sam countless times, Huffy bikes abandoned in the grass nearby. They’d kick lazy circles in the sunshine while they shared a bag of half-melted M&M’s they’d bought at the gas station.

  Behind the merry-go-round, swings with weathered seats made out of recycled tires dangled from thick chains, and they clinked and squeaked gently in the breeze. You had to be careful holding those chains while you pumped your legs to go higher. Sometimes, the links would pinch your palms, leaving a painful little blood blister behind.

  A new play structure had been put in, painted in bright primary colors. But the old brown metal horse on his huge, rusted spring was still there. She could almost picture Justin in the shadowy morning light, yelling, “Yeehaw,” as he rocked wildly, almost touching the gravel as he lunged forward and back.

  Winter picked up her pace, leaving the memories behind.

  The past would never change. Right now, she had to focus on what today would bring.

  Noah had taken an instant dislike to Officer Thomas Benton the day before, and twenty-four hours hadn’t improved his opinion. The guy was petulant, sloppy, out of shape, and chock-full of bad attitude. In short, he was a dick.

  And, Noah thought, Officer Benton was currently bristling like a pissed off Bantam rooster, his beer gut threatening to pop a uniform button or two.

  “I still don’t know why the FBI had to be called in on this,” Benton bitched. “We can handle this just fine at the local level. We don’t even have anything back yet from the medical examiner.”

  Winter, her blue eyes glittering, slapped down the pitifully thin manila folder they’d been given to review. “How exactly are you handling this? By doing the bare minimum required by procedure until you can toss this in your cold case file? Have you even started checking missing persons records?”

  Gary Miller, the Harrisonburg police chief, cleared his throat firmly. The man looked to be in his late sixties, with wispy gray hair that barely covered a shiny scalp, and the weary face of a man past ready for retirement.

  “Tom, we’ve talked about this. We welcome our friends at the FBI.” Chief Miller gave them a wry smile. “We’re on the same team here. Play nice.” He shot Winter a narrow glance, including her in the rebuke.

  She nodded back, stiffly, but stood down.

  It was time to smooth some feathers.

  “We appreciate y’all letting us in on this,” Noah said, laying his drawl down extra thick and giving both men a warm smile. “Mind if we head on out to where y’all found the bones? Seems like a nice day for a walk in the woods.”

  He and Winter took their own vehicle and followed the chief and Officer Benton in their squad car. “Come on now, Winter,” Noah said as soon as they pulled out onto the road. “Douchebag or not, you heard what Miller said. He’s going to make sure Officer Benton plays nice, and in return, you’re going to hide the fact that you think he’s completely incompetent.”

  “He is.” Winter’s voice was flat. She stared out the window at the fields and farms whizzing by, mountains in the distance. “You saw that file. He barely asked the guy who found the bones any questions. He literally hasn’t done a single thing in the two weeks since the bones were taken for analysis.”

  “We’re here now,” Noah said patiently. “We’ll figure this out. We just need to keep things copacetic in the meantime.”

  Twenty minutes outside of Harrisonburg and about ten northwest of Linville, the squad car in front of them pulled onto the side of the road. The land was heavily wooded and sloped sharply upward, with trees lining the west side of the road. A recent trail had been hacked through the underbrush, and it was marked with a small evidence flag that wouldn’t have been noticed immediately from the road.

  They parked behind the squad car and got out.

  “I hope you wore sturdy shoes,” Chief Miller commented, eyeing the steep path. It was clear he’d climbed it more than once and wasn’t a fan.

  They’d come prepared. Noah had on a battered pair of hiking boots. Winter wore a broken-in pair of cross trainers that would do just fine. They started up the side of the mountain.

  “Pretty strange that someone would happen across a burial site all the way out here, isn’t it?” Noah asked.

  Benton, wheezing and red-faced, shook his head. “Hunter and his kid. Going after deer a little out of season, but figured it’d be more important to let us know about the bones.”

  Noah glanced over at Winter. He knew she had to be angsty right about now, but her face was a cool, expressionless mask, looking steadily at the dense thicket around them. Her eyes seemed to take in everything at once.

  The woman had guts. It was a big reason why he liked her so much.

  “Did you charge the hunter?” Noah asked, curious.

  “No,” Chief Miller said, skirting a big fallen branch. “I know the guy. He’s laid off. Probably took the deer to feed his family. Bit of a character.” The last sounded like a warning. “Kind of a conspiracy theorist. Anti-government and whatnot. He only called us because I know him from school.”

  The path finally leveled off, and they moved deeper into the woods. It was shadowy and quiet, the trees looming high overhead and blocking most of the sun. Mostly oak with a few pines mixed in. Probably old-growth, judging by the size of some of the oak trees.

  A few minutes later, they came to a small, natural clearing and Winter seemed to quiver beside him like a hound dog going on point. The ground was more trampled here, and he didn’t need to see the gaping hole in the ground with a tarp still set up over the top of it, or the few scattered evidence flags, to know they’d come to the
right spot.

  “So, walk me through it,” Noah said to the chief. “How’d they find the bones?”

  Beside him, Winter stood silent, studying the trees, the underbrush, the patches of blue sky that showed through the canopy. Everywhere except the spot where a hole beside a freshly turned mound of earth loomed deep and dark.

  Was that where her brother’s remains had been all these years?

  Chief Miller hitched up his pants and headed in the direction of the evidence flags. Noah glanced again at Winter. She was staring at the ground—a mixture of dead leaves and recently disturbed soil—like she could look right through it. Like she could see things he couldn’t.

  Benton was watching her too, the man still huffing and puffing after the exertion of the walk. Noah gave Benton a long look until the man caught him watching and moved away, and then followed the older man.

  “Brian Snyder’s the hunter’s name. He and his oldest kid, Liam, were out with a couple of their dogs. Said they shot a doe and were tracking her when Corker, their younger mutt, went off on a wild scent. Duke, the older dog, found the deer over there.” He gestured in a different direction.

  “Brian followed Duke while Liam went to see what Corker was after. He came back to his dad with a femur. Brian checked out the spot where they’d found it and saw a skull, obviously human, with a hole in the back of it. He got his boy and his dogs out of there, so they didn’t mess things up any further, and came straight to us.”

  “He stop home first to hang that deer up?”

  “Of course,” Chief Miller chuckled, recognizing Noah as a fellow hunter. “No call to waste good meat. The bones had been there a while. They weren’t going anyplace.”

  “We need a cadaver dog here.”

  “What?” the police chief swiveled around while Tom Benton gaped at Winter. They were the first words she’d spoken since they’d gotten out of the car back on the road, and her voice was loud, clear, and decisive.