by Calinda B
Chia tossed the brush on the shiny tray next to the gurney, and stalked across the room. She reverently peeled back the crisp, white sheet, revealing the corpse of her grandmother.
Her grandma’s cheeks were rosy bright with powdered blush. Garish red lipstick had been applied to her lips. Her eyelids had been smeared with blue shadow.
“Oh, hell, no! She looks like a hooker after a hard night.” Dropping the sheet, Chia whirled around and leaned against the steel gurney, clutching the metal sides. After taking a couple deep breaths, she said, “Look, I know you’re just doing your job but these are my grandparents.” She said the word like it would explain everything. “They were my…” Her chin quivered. Tears assaulted her eyes. “Can I please have a moment with them? I just need to be with them for a minute. I promise I’ll be in a better mood once I’ve had a chance to clear my soul.”
The artist looked at Walt.
“Go ahead,” he said to her. “Take a break.”
She shrugged and stood. She walked across the tiled floor, her Birkenstocks and stockinged feet poking out from her long brown skirt.
“Meet me in the break room next door,” Walt said to the artist, a hush to his tone.
She nodded and exited.
“We’ll be in the room to the right when you’re done.” He swished his hand in the air. “I’ll leave the door to the break room open. Take your time.”
Chia regarded him somberly. It was the first thing he’d said to her that seemed genuinely compassionate.
“Thank you.” She bit her lip to keep from sobbing.
He practically tip-toed out and softly closed the door behind him.
Chia strode to the stool next to her grandfather’s body. Unable to stomach his made-up face, she chose to simply sit with him, keeping the sheet in place, speaking from her heart.
“Oh, God, grandma and gramps. I’m not ready to let you go.” Sobs tore from her throat. Unable to repress them, she broke down and bawled. When she could manage a sentence or two, she said, “I don’t know what to do without you. I’ve never lived alone, let alone cooked for myself. You’ve been so good to me, taking me in and…and thank you for deeding me the property but I wish you were still alive.”
A fresh wave of sorrow pushed through her lungs. She scanned the room, searching for a tissue or a paper towel. Unable to see where they were kept, she lifted the corner of grandpa’s sheet and dabbed at her snotty nose and teary eyes. He wouldn’t care.
“There’s so much about your life I don’t know. You said you’d start teaching me about the ancient ways of the land. I wish we’d have gotten to that. I figured we had loads of time.” She sniffled. “How will I find my way?”
As she sat on the pivoting stool, she swore she heard him speaking.
“We share the blood, sweetheart.” His rich voice rang out, as clearly as if he were standing next to her.
She sat up straight, looking right and left. “Granddad?”
“I’m in your heart. You’ll find your way. It’s in your blood.”
“What’s in my blood?”
That same warm buzzing spread through her limbs. She cocked her head and listened intently for more instruction.
Nothing came. No more words were spoken.
“That’s all you can say at this moment, huh?” She stood and bent forward, kissing his cool, lifeless cheek through the sheet. Propping her hands on her hips, she said, “Nothing else?” She paused, waiting. When nothing more was said, she sighed. “Alrighty, then. I’m really going to miss you both.”
A gentle stream of tears flowed from her eyes, instead of a raging river. She stepped over to her grandma and kissed her cheek, in the same way—through the sheet.
Then, she turned and walked out the door.
“It’s all yours,” she called to Walt and the make-up artist. “Thank you for this moment.”
“Of course,” came Walt’s voice from behind the break-room door.
She lifted her hand over her head in farewell. Resolutely, she strode up the stairs in the direction of her new life. He said I’d find my way. He’s always steered me true. There was no reason to believe he’d fail her, even though he lay dead. She scratched her head, then muttered to herself, “You know you don’t believe that, right? Suddenly you develop some sort of blood fever? How do you know it’s not a tragic illness, like a brain tumor?”
Sighing, she headed for her Jeep. For the moment, she had a perp to put away and a town to run. She’d figure out things like “humming blood” when she had the chance.
Chapter 6
Despite being inside that God-awful mortuary, and viewing her dead grandparents with their clownish costume make-up, a cleansing wind had stormed through Chia’s system. It came from the conversation she’d had with her grandma and grandpa, and from letting out some of her sorrow. She practically waltzed to her Jeep. When her smart phone rang, she looked at the display before answering. Chief Cisco. Now what?
“What can I do for you, chief? Miss me already?” She smiled into the device, hoping the gesture might stave off any bad news. She wanted to hang on to the shred of peace inside.
“He’s gone,” Chief Cisco said in a rush. “You need to get out of sight. Hide. Go to a friend’s. Just don’t be visible.”
“Slow down, chief. Who’s gone? What the heck are you talking about?” She pivoted and leaned against the Jeep, crossing one leg over the other.
“The bounty hunter. One second he was in the cell, the next minute he vanished. No trace. Gone.”
He’s got to be some kind of shifter.
“All right, all right. When did this happen?”
“Just now. I called you straight away. He could have a vendetta against you. I’ve issued a BOLO. We’ve got a manhunt going. In the meantime, get somewhere safe.”
“Calm down, chief. I dealt with him before, and I can deal with him again.” She pressed the key-fob to open the Jeep door lock and climbed in the front seat. “Don’t you worry about me.”
“Girl, you’ve got to be the most stubborn female in Alaska. Don’t go thinking you’re immortal. Leon would crawl from his grave and fetch me to be with him if anything happened to you on my watch.”
Her heart stirred at his words. “Okay. I promise to go somewhere safe.” Eventually. After I’ve checked around for some clues to the hunter’s whereabouts. “Do you think he knows Megan’s dead?”
She slid the key into the ignition and powered the engine on.
“I don’t know but I doubt it. How would he have heard? He was in lock-down. Gotta run. This is serious. Every officer from here to Anchorage needs to be on alert. I just wanted to give you a heads-up. You promise you’ll get yourself out of danger, right?”
“Right. You have my word.” By the end of the day or maybe tomorrow. She thumbed the disconnect button and tossed the phone on the seat. “Where to next?” she asked her ghosts.
The red non-Brant ghost settled on her shoulder, while the other five crowded along the passenger seat in one giant rainbow mush-ball.
“Now where would I go if I were a bounty hunter wanting to get out of town?”
One thought immediately came to mind: Haunted Bear Glacier. If she were a shifter, it would be the obvious choice for escape.
The bounty hunter would most likely be caught if he used the main road heading out of Charming.
The Haunted Bear Glacier, a valley glacier, provided a doorway to a mountain range directly behind her grandparents’ land—now her land—which lay to the southeast. No human trekked through those mountains. Too many people had died making the journey. But shifters? Shifters were another breed altogether.
Knowing she’d be out of cell range once she reached the out of town area, she pulled to the side of the road and called Rachel, letting her know she’d be out the rest of the day.
“We understand,” Rachel said in her soothing voice. “You’ve been through enough. There will be time to settle into your job. Don’t worry. I can manage things w
hile you’re away.”
“Thanks, Rachel. You’re the best.” Chia smiled into the phone.
“No, you’re the best,” Rachel gushed in a fan-girl kind of voice.
Chia held the phone away from her ear, staring at it. Compliments seldom settled well with her. Usually, she wondered what the person wanted if they felt the need to gush over her.
“Why, thank you,” she finally said. “I’ll be in tomorrow morning, promise.”
“Take your time. I’ve got this.”
Chia disconnected the phone, and then pulled out to the street.
Once she reached the county road, she bumped along on the pot-holed road heading toward her home. The further she got out of Charming, the more relaxed she became. The wilderness soothed her.
Before she arrived at her property, she turned on the barely-there road that led toward the glacier. Her bloodstream did that strange, new humming thing as she proceeded. When there was no road left—only a tree or two and the pristine Two-Mile lake leading to the mouth of the glacier—she parked the Jeep and jumped out. Her glance caught the flutter of birds in the sparse trees.
“Hello, birds,” she said.
They chirped to one another, probably telling their friends to stay watchful—human in the vicinity.
She made her way toward the back of the vehicle, and opened the cargo hatch. With a hop, she settled on the cargo hold. From her perch, she swapped out her knee-high leather boots for the sturdy hiking boots she always kept in the Jeep.
Overhead, a hawk circled.
“Don’t look at me,” she said to the bird of prey. “Not dead and not planning to be anytime soon.”
Once she had her hiking boots laced, she pivoted to retrieve items for her search. First, water. She unwrapped the new case of plastic bottles and pulled one free. Then, she retrieved her Ruger from the gun case, loaded bullets into the magazine, and shoved the magazine into the butt of the gun. She positioned everything within reach and hopped out of the truck.
The humming in her bloodstream increased. It’s like I can sense when I’m on the right trail.
She glanced at her ghosts.
They soared overhead with the hawk.
“You’re not responsible for this humming, are you?” she called. “No? Well, then.”
Huffing out a sigh, she dug around for an energy bar or two. Satisfied she could scout around for a couple of hours and stay fortified, she turned around.
She gasped.
An extremely long gun muzzle, held by an incredibly sexy man—maybe the sexiest man she’d ever seen—was pointed right between her eyes.
Chapter 7
Having a gun pointed at her face left Chia very few options except to slowly raise her arms overhead. Having the weapon pointed at her by the extremely sexy hunter holding the rifle? This made her heart beat a little faster, her knees about to collapse, and the urge to lay him out and climb on top, right here in the mud, a whole lot greater. She swallowed, deciding to yield to the threat of death staring her right between the eyes.
He tilted his head and studied her. The sun cast light into his eyes making them appear brilliant hues of blue.
Gathering her resolve, she let her eyes narrow. “Care to tell me where you came from so quietly and why you want to kill me?”
“Nope.”
She stared at his finger on the trigger. Her eyes crossed.
She gulped again, focused on his face, and said, “If you’re a friend of that guy who murdered an innocent woman, I assure you, you’re going down. I’m the new town manager. If I don’t show up to work tomorrow, I guarantee I’ll be missed, and you’ll be a wanted man.”
The too-handsome hunter with the chiseled jaw covered with dark blonde scruff, and the dark blonde hair, and the sun-kissed blue eyes and the muscular six foot plus physique—not that she noticed any of those features—had the nerve to smirk. “You’re a saucy one. Easy on the eyes, too.”
His eyes made a slow sweep of her body, from tip to toe and back again, coming to rest on her face.
His smirk disappeared, replaced by a grim line. “But no, I’m not here to shoot you. Where’s the bastard who shot the girl?”
She reached up and moved the barrel of the rifle to the side with her fingers. “Nice rifle. A Ruger Hawkeye Alaskan. Out bear hunting, are you? I’m afraid you’ll have to head out of the vicinity. We don’t allow hunting in these parts.”
“I see you know your guns. Impressive, but that’s not what I’m here to discuss. The bounty hunter…where is he?” He swung the gun back in front of her face.
“I’m afraid I have no idea.”
“Don’t lie to me, sexy. I know you brought him in, and now he’s gone. You found him once. You can find him again.”
He thinks I’m sexy?
She huffed out a sigh at her foolish reaction to him. “Do you mind putting that rifle away? Funny, but I can’t think when I have a gun to my head.”
He tilted his head slightly, appearing to consider her request. Finally, he lowered the weapon.
She let out a long breath. “I don’t know where he is, I swear.”
The hunter paced in a short tight circle. He turned to face her again, bringing the Ruger back to her head. Narrowing his eyes, he studied her for a few seconds, before stroking her cheek with the cool metal.
She jerked her head away.
“You know more than you’re saying. Where is he?”
Her heart rattled against her ribcage. Is this guy insane, or what?
“I really don’t know where he is…honest.”
“But, you can find him, right?” His grip on the gun began to shake. He looked like one of granddad’s wild-eyed horses when they were being taught to accept the saddle.
“I didn’t find him; he found me. Some girl ran in front of my truck. She was a…” She didn’t know this guy and didn’t want to say “deer shifter.”
“Was she a deer?” Still pointing the gun at her face, he looked at her, his eyes wide, his eyebrows rising high.
“Yes. That’s right. How do you know?”
“Blonde hair?”
“Yes.”
“Where was this? What was she doing?”
Chia squinted. The guy’s actions were so erratic, she didn’t want to make any sudden moves. “We were over on Old Highway 19. She said she was out for a run. She darted in front of my Jeep.”
He leaned toward her.
She stepped back, moving away from the gun barrel.
“She’s okay, right? The girl. You brought her to the hospital?”
Sweat began to roll from her underarms and trickle between her breasts. “No, I…the ambulance did. I called them. Please put the gun down. You’re scaring the shit out of me.”
“She’s alive, right?” He lowered the gun, resuming his pacing, and raked his hair with his free hand.
She bug-eyed the Ruger swinging in his grip. What if it went off accidentally due to his frantic actions?
Putting her palms out, she said, “Mister…put the gun down.”
He stopped so suddenly in front of her she hopped backward.
His piercing blue eyes met hers. “Is she or isn’t she okay?”
Chia hesitated. “She’s, uh…She didn’t make it.”
The guy threw back his head and made the equivalent of a human howl. It came out as a cry of desperation.
It struck a chord in Chia, sounding like the cry she’d made when the police had told her they fished her grandparents from the lake. She put her hands out, palms up, in a placating gesture.
Then, to her horror, she began to stutter-speak, talking one-hundred-miles a minute, the way she did when she was scared. “She was only a girl from town. Not that is makes it okay. She said she was a…She seemed okay when she… Did you know her?”
He stilled, growling out his next sentence from between clenched teeth. “She wasn’t just a girl from town.”
“Okay, okay, so you’re one of the men who had his way with her. What are y
ou, like, twenty-four? Twenty-five? You’re a little old for her, but I can see the appeal.”
Shut up, shut up, shut up.
A sneer formed on his handsome face.
“You have no idea.” His eyes narrowed to slits. He flipped from grief-torn to psycho-rage, lifting the Ruger to her head. This time, his finger curled around the trigger and his eye peered through the scope, even though he was at way-too-close-to-need-it range. “You’re coming with me.”
“Want to bet?” Her patience worn, she shoved aside the rifle and brought her knee to his groin. “I’m done with this little conversation.”
He doubled over in pain.
She dashed to her front seat. She leaped into the Jeep, turned the keys she’d left in the ignition, and threw it into reverse.
The Jeep fishtailed in the mud, almost careening into the lake. She slammed on the brakes to stop the slide. Then, shoving the gears into drive, she gunned it forward, as the sexiest, most insane man in her universe lunged to his feet and raced after her.
Chapter 8
Zooming away from the glacier lake, Chia sped toward the cell phone zone. The Jeep bounced and surged over the bumpy road. Her dopey, useless ghosts pasted themselves to the front window, making it difficult to see through the kaleidoscope of transparent colors. She switched on the windshield wipers.
The energy blips turned it into a game. They chittered and hummed, wrapped around the wipers, swishing back and forth.
“Fucking pests,” Chia muttered.
To see, she rolled down the window and stuck her head out of the window like a goddamned dog.
When the Jeep rolled into the tower zone, she dialed the station. I hope the chief doesn’t answer.
“Officer Beasley here.”
“Mike. Chia, here. Don’t go yapping your mouth to the chief. There’s another gunman. He came after me near Two-Mile lake by the Haunted Bear Glacier.”
“What were you doing out there? Chief Cisco told you to get out of harm’s way. I was sitting in his office when he made the call.”
“I know, I know,” she said. “What the hell happened that you simply lost a guy being held for seventy-two hours? Did you all cut out for lunch and leave the keys in the cell door?”