by Desiree Holt
In a moment, Dana heard Cole’s voice, rough-sounding through the static. “Where are you, Gaylen?”
“On my way to you. I, um, have a passenger with me who stopped in to see you. I thought you’d want me to get her away from the news vultures cluttering up your parking lot. The television folks you predicated all showed up.”
There was a crackling moment of silence before Cole spoke again. “I assume she can hear me?”
Gaylen held the microphone in front of Dana’s mouth.
“Hello, Cole. I don’t want you to think I have an ulterior motive here, but I’ve worked with SAR teams before.”
Another pause. “You told me you often see things with a different eye. Pick up things someone else might miss.”
“That’s right. Not always. I’m not a trained investigator, but I’ve learned a lot while researching my books.” She cleared her throat. “And unfortunately, I’ve found more than my share of bodies.”
“Fine. But anything you learn out here stays locked down until this case is over. Are we clear?”
“I understand.”
“All right. Gaylen, bring her right to me as soon as you get here. Tina’s arrived and we’re about to get things organized.”
Chapter Twenty
He chuckled at the chaotic scene on television. He was alone at home, sucking on a beer and amusing himself with the media circus. They’d find Shannon soon enough. He’d made sure to leave her where it wasn’t too obvious but easily discovered. Just like with Leanne. After all, what was the fun of doing it if he couldn’t show off?
He laughed to see the young sheriff spinning his wheels, trying to cope with a situation far beyond anything he’d expected when he took the job.
He leaned back in his recliner, popped the lever and put up his feet. He’d give them another day. Maybe two. Then he’d be after his next victim. He couldn’t move too slowly. He had to get to Dana Moretti before she dug too deeply into the past and found information better left buried. Or worse yet, found a thread somewhere that led to his current activities.
No, he needed to keep his focus and finish the job he left undone twenty-five years ago.
Chapter Twenty-One
He had finally decided to drive to the sheriff’s office and scope things out. He was always so visible people would think it strange if he didn’t show up. But by the time he got there, most of the crowd had left. Even the news vans were gone, probably chasing after the sheriff.
“Hey.” Wanda from Harry’s diner came jogging down the steps from the building. “I figured you’d show up down here sooner or later. Work or play, you never miss a chance to help out.”
“Glad to do whatever I can,” he smiled. “Terrible thing, you know. Just terrible.”
“That poor girl,” Wanda agreed, her voice filled with sadness. “I just hope we find her alive.”
He dropped his eyes to hide the salacious glee that gripped him. “Yes, so do I. So where is everyone?”
“Sent off by the deputies to search the areas around where they live. This is a big county. We don’t need everyone searching in the same place.”
“Have they finished looking close to her home?” He tried to make the question as casual as possible.
“Beats me. I heard Cole called in Search and Rescue, so maybe he’s got them covering that area. Gaylen took that writer woman out there, too, though I sure don’t know what anyone thinks she can do. She needs to get out of here.”
Oh, no, I have plans for her.
“Maybe so.”
Wanda pushed up the sleeves of her blouse. “Well, I’m heading back to the restaurant. Harry’s making extra coffee and setting up donuts and stuff to take out to the volunteers. See you later.”
He watched her go, trying to decide what his course of action should be. He looked at his watch. Best to go on home and monitor things from there. He didn’t want to do anything that would call unusual attention to him.
Still, he wished he could be there when the body was found.
Meanwhile, he could make a little more mischief.
****
As they approached their destination, Dana saw two SUVs from the sheriff’s department set up as roadblocks. A deputy recognizing Gaylen waved them on, and they bumped along on the shoulder for about a hundred yards.
Dana spotted Cole next to his vehicle. He was talking to a tall blonde in jeans and a black T-shirt with some kind of logo on it. Several more cars were parked on the shoulder and a large group stood silently waiting. Behind them in the field were two four-door cab trucks with Solize SAR painted on the doors. Next to them were three men wearing the same black T-shirts as the woman, all looking as if they were carved from granite, faces included.
Dana followed Gaylen to where the group was gathered, waiting for Cole to spot her. He looked up and motioned Gaylen over, then shifted his gaze to her.
“Hang on,” he mouthed.
She nodded and moved to the side. Shoving her hands in her pockets, she scanned the crowd and realized they weren’t your average volunteers. At least half of them were wearing Solize T-shirts, which made them regulars. The others were talking quietly among themselves while awaiting instructions.
Dana wandered toward a car parked away from the others. One look at the weeping woman inside and the man with his arm around her was enough to tell her they were Shannon’s parents. Another man sat in the back seat, leaning forward, obviously talking to them.
Dana’s heart pinched. She knew full well the terrible place these people were in. Like the Kellys and her parents. She prayed that Shannon would be found alive, but the sick feeling she had inside told her it was already too late.
A hand tapped her shoulder, and she turned to see Cole standing beside her.
“Tina Solize is the best there is at Search and Rescue, but we’re only surmising Shannon’s…Shannon will be found here. We divided the county into five sectors, but we’re starting here, closer to her home. This is where she was last seen. There are a lot of hiding places so we’re hoping to get lucky. We’ve got air support coming shortly. You say you’ve done this before?”
She nodded. “I’ll help in any way I can.”
“Come on then.”
When Cole introduced her to Tina, the woman held out her hand. “I’ve read several of your books, Miss Moretti, and I’ve talked with teams you worked with before. They say you’re an excellent spotter.”
“Thank you. I told Cole I’m here to do whatever I can. Where and how are we searching?”
“Okay.” On the hood of Cole’s SUV, she smoothed out a large aerial map with a segment marked off. “The bus left Shannon right there at the head of the road. The driver says she started off toward home, and that’s the last anyone saw of her. Cole and one of his deputies have gone up and down both sides of the road and haven’t found a thing.”
Dana studied the map. “Where was Leanne’s body found?”
“At the park where the other kids were waiting for her to come back.” She pointed with her finger. “Close enough so if her friends looked, they’d find her.”
“That’s probably what he did here.” Dana said. “And having a helicopter will help identify likely areas. I’ve learned there’s always a pattern. Each of the serial killers I’ve written about had a special pattern for disposing of the bodies. One guy always used pools, another flowerbeds. One had his own killing ground on a piece of land he owned. Usually related to whatever the trigger was from their past.”
Cole frowned. “So…similar places?”
She nodded. “Just like in the child killings. He wants his victims found without too much trouble and makes it just enough of a challenge to prove how much smarter than us he is. So. He’ll pick someplace close but not obvious. I’m pretty sure we’ll find her somewhere in this area.”
“I hope you aren’t still trying to connect the two cases,” Cole warned.
She shrugged. “You have to at least consider the possibility.”
�
��Let’s find Shannon first, before we go off on any tangents.”
“I just don’t want you to write it off completely.”
Tina snapped her phone shut and rejoined them. “The helicopter will be here in less than five. I’ll have them overfly this area first. I marked out a five-mile radius to start. No more. We can always widen it.” She looked at Cole.
“Good.” He turned to Dana. “Don’t go anywhere. I still need you.”
“I’m not leaving,” she assured him.
“Smart lady,” she heard Tina say to Cole as she turned back to the topographical map. “Not at all what I expected.”
“Me, either,” Cole said, and Dana swallowed a tiny grin.
Dana listened while Marty Ahern, the pilot, ran his finger over the five-mile area Cole had outlined on the map.
“I’ll take one wide pass,” he explained. “Then I’ll fly an X pattern. Corner to corner. Tina, give your dogs a good sniff of something of the girl’s. Then take them out to the corners of this space and work toward the middle. If she’s not here, we’ll move to the next section. Your regulars know what to do. They can instruct the others.” He turned to Cole. “Sound okay to you?”
“Yes. Fine.” He looked at Tina. “Whatever you all think best. I just want to get started. That’s still a lot of ground to cover on foot.”
“All right, then.”
Dana watched as Tina trudged back to her van and took out a paper bag just as the handlers walked up with the dogs. All four animals were German shepherds, straining at their leashes but tuned to the commands of their handlers.
“Listen up, everyone.” Tina pulled a T-shirt from the bag. “We’ll let the dogs sniff this then start at the corners and crisscross the area. Marty’s getting ready to fly a pattern and see what he can spot from the air. Once the dogs are set, everyone load up. Jerry?” She looked at one of the handlers. “Divide up the group, okay? And head for the outer corners of this sector.” She handed each of them a map.
“Where do you want me?” she asked Cole as the four groups loaded up and took off.
“I hope you don’t get air sick, because I’d like you to go up with the helicopter.”
Dana swallowed hard. “I’m okay. Not my favorite ride, but I’ve done it plenty of times before.”
“Here.” Cole shoved a large envelope into her hands. “Take this up with you.”
Marty helped her climb into the helicopter. “I’ve read some of your books. Happy to have you aboard on this one.”
“Thanks.”
She buckled in, hoping as always she didn’t disgrace herself by throwing up. Marty handed her a set of headphones with a lip mic attached.
“You’ll be able to talk to me this way,” he explained. “It gets pretty noisy up here.”
“Been there, done that.” She gave him her best smile. “I’m ready.”
“So I gather. All right, then. You know the drill. If you see anything you think is a likely spot, tell me and I’ll go in lower.”
“Okay.”
As the helo lifted off, Dana felt the familiar sensation of her stomach dropping. She swallowed hard several times, and as Marty leveled off so did her insides. Below, cars and trucks moved out to the corners of the sector and people climbing out and falling in behind the dog handlers.
First, they flew over the entire area Cole had marked out.
“I do this to fix the landscape in my mind,” Marty said over the headsets. “Now I’ll start the pattern.”
Dana kept her eyes glued to the ground, watching for the kind of places she knew men like this liked to leave their victims. In her hands, she gripped the photo from the envelope Cole had given her. It was taken where Leanne was found and she tried to spot something similar.
She could see the four lines of searchers converging slowly from the distant corners of the area, spreading out like an army of ants. The land was mostly pasture, but trees lined one side of Hancock Road and in several places a heavy copse of sycamore and oak broke up the landscape.
Marty was starting the second leg of his pattern when something caught Dana’s eye. Forgetting the comm system, she yelled his name.
The pilot touched his ear. “You can speak normally with the headphones and I can hear you.”
“Oh. Sorry. Look.” She pointed to a dusty ribbon cutting in from a highway at the edge of the sector. “See how that road goes into that thick stand of live oaks? Right there? The really heavily forested one? Can you get any lower?”
“You bet.”
He swooped down, and Dana ignored her stomach and concentrated on the ground below. It was hard to see through the trees, but she was sure she spotted something that didn’t belong there.
“Can you talk to Tina?” When he nodded, she pointed again. “Tell them to move the searchers over to that area?”
“Will do.” He picked up a satellite radio and held it so Dana could hear, too. “Tina, come in. Come in, Solize leader.”
“I’m here, Marty. Got something for us?”
“I think so. Got a spot for you to check. I’ll mark it for you.” He hovered over it, giving her the coordinates.
Immediately, they saw the closest team begin to converge on the spot Dana indicated. Marty continued to hover until the searchers reached it and entered the thick stand of trees. It seemed like forever to Dana before the radio crackled again.
“Tell the lady she’s got great eyesight and better instincts,” Tina said. “We found her. And the dogs are going wild.”
“How come?”
“Wait until you see what this bastard did to kill her scent.” Even over the sat radio Tina’s voice held barely contained fury.
“I’m taking my passenger back to Cole,” Marty told her. “I’ll pick him up and bring him to the site. Better radio him and tell him to call off all the other searches.”
He clicked off the radio and turned to Dana. “Hope you don’t mind, but we need to keep the scene uncontaminated.”
“I’m not so sure I want to see it, anyway,” Dana replied, nausea clutching at her.
****
Cole hoped he wouldn’t embarrass himself by being sick. He’d seen some terrible things in Afghanistan and Iraq, but the sight of Shannon’s body was enough to turn anyone’s stomach. After the helicopter dropped him, he called Nita Sanchez, keeping his back to what was left of Shannon Fowler until the county van arrived.
“I’m going to have to transport her before I can tell you anything,” she said, her voice taut with rage. “I’ll need to clean her up to look for trace evidence and I can’t do it here. If I ever get my hands on that bastard, I’ll gut him like a wild animal.”
Shannon was completely nude, lying in a position similar to Leanne’s. But probably assuming dogs would be used to hunt for her, the killer had smeared her entire body with honey. It was getting on toward summer, and the Texas heat made her a ripe target for ants and other insects. At first, Cole thought her skin had a black substance all over it, until he saw the black moving and realized what it was.
“I think a lot of people will be standing in that line,” he told the coroner. “Jesus. I can’t believe this.”
“I can’t even tell what other damage was done to her until I get rid of the bugs,” Nita told him.
The Crime Scene Unit photographed the scene from every angle. Then Shannon’s body was loaded in Nita’s big Ford Expedition, and she bumped along the field to the dirt road.
Cole turned to Tina. “Thanks for all your help. Send me the bill, and I’ll beat up the commission to get it paid.”
“I wish it could have had a different ending.” She shook her head. “I can’t believe another human being did something like that.”
“Whoever he is, he isn’t human.” Cole tightened his lips. “When I get my hands on this animal, he’ll wish he was never born.”
“Just don’t get yourself in trouble, Cole,” she warned. “It isn’t worth it.”
“Yeah, I know. All right, tell your people t
hanks for me. CSU will go to work here now and see if they can get anything at all. I’m heading back to the office to handle things from there.”
“Will do.”
They shook hands, and she trudged off to round up her crew.
Mickey and Andi had stretched crime scene tape around the drop area and the CSU techs were in the process of combing every inch for any stray bits of evidence. Anything at all that could be useful.
“This is probably a waste of time,” Cole told them. “He was meticulous about not leaving any trace with Leanne so I don’t expect to find anything here. But it’s got to be done.”
“No problem,” Mickey said. “I’ll do whatever it takes to get this maniac.”
“Me, too,” Andi echoed.
“All right, then. Check in with me when you’re done.”
The helicopter was long gone, so Gaylen had someone pick Cole up and bring him back to his SUV. He climbed into it weary to his soul. He hoped someone had given Dana a ride back to her car, and she’d gone home as he suggested. He was glad she hadn’t seen the scene close up.
Cole knew the media would be nipping at his heels for information. The deputies were still keeping them out of the area, but he’d have to tell them sooner rather than later. The Fowlers were at home with their pastor and friends form the church, but Cole had no such insulation.
Shit. Once the details got out, they’d have reporters converging from all over the country. What a freakin’ mess.
And Grace had radioed him that people were gathering at the office again. Word of the body’s discovery had spread like wildfire, and the good citizens of Salado County were after his hide.
Double shit.
Well, at least people’s attention had been turned away from Dana’s project. Now, instead of being after her hide, they were after his.
He’d already decided to call the FBI office in San Antonio first thing when he got back. This had all the makings of a serial killer, and he needed to look for help beyond the Texas Rangers.