A rural sheriff’s deputy bringing bones to the lab was one thing, and it happened all the time. A police detective calling Sara on a Saturday and insisting that she drive a hundred miles to view bones in situ was another. Nolan Hess was adamant, and he was in a hurry.
Sara scanned the rolling hills. Away from sprinkler systems and lawn crews, the ground was brown and thirsty. Oaks and cedars dotted the landscape, along with the occasional herd of cattle. The cows took shelter wherever they could, under trees and near fence posts, waiting listlessly for the temperature to dip.
Sara turned onto Highway 12 and soon spotted a sign pointing to the west entrance of White Falls Park. She took the turn, trading smooth asphalt for a pitted road that was several decades past needing attention. After a few jaw-rattling potholes, she reached the west gate. A rusted swag of chain blocked the way.
No gatehouse. No attendant. Cursing, she shoved her Explorer into park and got out to look around. She walked over to the chain, examined it a moment, then unhooked it from the metal pole. After driving through, she got out and reattached the barrier, not that it provided much of a deterrent.
She proceeded through a parched valley flanked by steadily rising cliffs. The terrain here was rugged. Hard. She was glad she had her hiking boots with her. She still needed to change clothes, but she hadn’t wanted to take the time to pull over.
Another sign appeared, offering a choice between WHITE FALLS LOOP or PARK HEADQUARTERS. Sara opted for headquarters, taking a road that made a gentle ascent to the top of a plateau. She came to another sign—yet another decision point, but this time she had help in the form of a red-and-blue flicker on some distant cliffs. Pointing her car toward the emergency lights, she followed the road through some scrub and brush and turned into a gravel lot where vehicles were parked haphazardly. A dusty white pickup, several old hatchbacks, a green Suburban with the logo for Allen County Parks District on the door. Sara pulled into a spot beside a police cruiser where a uniformed officer sat talking on his radio. He didn’t spare her a glance as she got out.
Sara zeroed in on a woman with blond dreadlocks seated on a railroad tie near the trailhead. The woman swiped tears from her cheeks as she talked to a shirtless man crouched beside her. He wore cargo shorts and climbing shoes and had a brown pouch attached to his belt.
“Park’s closed, ma’am.”
Sara turned to see a man in an olive-green park ranger uniform striding over.
“Hi,” she said. “I got a call from Detective Hess with Springville PD.”
He stopped and looked her over, frowning. “Who are you?”
“Dr. Sara Lockhart from the Delphi Center Crime Lab.” She reached into the car and grabbed her wallet, flipping it open to show him her official ID, because her little black wrap dress wasn’t helping her credibility. “Are you by chance Tom?”
“Tom left,” he said, resting his hands on his hips.
“Okay. And where is Detective Hess?”
“At HQ.” He looked her over again, glaring hard at her shoes. “Stay here.”
With that, he trudged up the hill toward a small brown building.
Sara looked at the sky as the last flicker of sun disappeared behind the cliffs. The canyons around her shifted from warm yellows to cool grays. The cool was an illusion, though, and the day’s heat radiated up through the thin soles of Sara’s patent-leather heels.
She surveyed the scene, taking note of the emergency workers. A man dressed in hiking gear and a red T-shirt handed the dreadlocks woman a bottle of water. He eyed Sara across the parking lot, looking not exactly hostile but skeptical.
Sara walked to the trailhead, where a map behind plexiglass told her she was at the top of Rattlesnake Gorge. Beside the map was a litany of prohibitions: overnight camping, campfires, alcoholic beverages. The list went on.
A coil of blue climbing rope sat on the ground nearby, and she stepped over for a closer look. Heeding the numerous warning signs, she stayed a safe distance from the cliff’s edge.
Boots crunched on gravel behind her—the man in the red shirt.
“Who set up this rappel?” she asked.
“I did.” He offered her a handshake. “Bryce Gaines. I’m with ACSAR.”
“ACSAR?”
“Allen County Search and Rescue. I heard you say you’re from the Delphi Center. So you’re here about the body, I’m guessing?”
Interesting word choice. Sara nodded at the couple across the parking lot.
“Are those the hikers who found it?”
“Climbers, actually. But yeah.” He combed his shaggy brown hair from his eyes. “They were down there in Rattlesnake. Boyfriend was in the lead. He was halfway up the wall when she spotted the body. She tried to climb out, but then she got panicked and froze up on a ledge. Boyfriend called for help.” Bryce nodded at the rappelling station. “We went down after her, got her in a harness, and hoisted her out of there.”
“You and . . . ?”
“Guy from my team. By the time we got her up, the police were here, the rangers, everyone wanting a statement. Word travels fast.” He shook his head. “We had a hiker go missing a while back. Guess they’re thinking it might be her.”
“And did you see the remains when you were down in the gorge?” She didn’t want to use the word body at this point. It would only fuel rumors.
“I didn’t stop to explore. Just got her tied in and out of there. I was worried she might have another panic attack, and that’s a long drop.”
Sara looked at the woman again. “Is she injured?”
“Nah, just freaked out. Evans—that ranger you met—he won’t let them leave yet. Think he plans to slap them with a fine for illegal climbing.”
Bryce’s phone buzzed, and he pulled it from his pocket. “Sorry, I have to take this.”
“Sure.”
He stepped away, and Sara looked at the climbers. The man had a Mayan sun god tattooed on his arm. No longer looking so distraught, he and his girlfriend were busy with their cell phones. Posting about their adventures? Ordering a pizza? Who knew. She’d let Hess worry about that. Right now, she had work to do.
She retrieved the duffel she kept in the back of her Explorer and ducked into the bathroom near the trailhead. After changing into her blue Delphi Center coveralls and hiking boots, she returned to her SUV and made some selections from her evidence kit: gloves, tweezers, several glass specimen jars. She didn’t have a headlamp, so her mini-Maglite would have to suffice. She loaded everything into a black zipper pack and clipped it around her waist, then grabbed her digital camera and looped the strap around her neck.
Sara walked to the cliff’s edge and crouched to examine the rappel setup, ignoring the drop-off just inches away. The anchor consisted of two bolts, which would distribute the load, both drilled directly into the rock face.
Bryce ended his phone call and walked over.
“These are expansion bolts?” she asked.
“That’s right.”
“Mind if I borrow your harness?”
“Depends,” he said. “You know what you’re doing?”
“Yes.”
“You realize there’s a trail that goes down there, right? Moderate grade.”
“I saw the map. Two-point-six miles.” She nodded at the rope. “This is faster.”
He picked up the harness and handed it to her. “You want a helmet?”
“Any chance you have one with a headlamp?”
“Absolutely.”
He trekked off to a green hatchback, and Sara shifted her attention to the hardware, checking for fissures in the metal.
“It’s bombproof,” Bryce said, returning with the helmet. “Nothing’s going anywhere.”
Sara stepped into the harness and buckled it around her waist. Bryce checked the fit and nodded.
“Hey!”
Ranger Evans was back now, his face reddening as he charged across the parking lot. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“Going down
there.” She snugged the helmet on her head.
“That scene’s off-limits. Authorized personnel only.”
“I’m a board-certified crime-scene investigator.” She tightened her chin strap. “Did you tell the detective I’m here?”
“Yeah, but—”
“If you’ve got a problem, take it up with him.”
“But you’re not authorized—”
“Springville PD summoned me to this location. It’s their jurisdiction. I need to examine this scene before nightfall, and we’re burning daylight.” Sara stepped around Evans and clipped the belay device into her harness. She double-checked the system and made sure her carabiners were locked.
The ranger stalked away, and Bryce shook his head. “Guy’s a prick,” he muttered. Then he looked Sara over. “Everything locked?”
“Yes.”
“Okay, it’s a hundred-forty-foot wall. Slight overhang at the top. Ledge about two-thirds down, case you need to stop.”
“I’m good.”
She approached the edge and turned her back to the abyss. Holding the brake strands in her right hand, she leaned back until the rope was taut, positioning her body as though sitting in an invisible chair. Her heart thudded as she adjusted her grip.
First a long, deep breath to help her focus. And then she took the most unnatural of steps—backward off the cliff.
CHAPTER 3
Sara used the rope like a brake as she walked down the wall and reached the overhang Bryce had mentioned, a distinct curve as the rock sloped inward. Her stomach clenched as she dipped her foot down and felt nothing but air. It was a leap—part faith, part science, but always nerve-racking—as her leg dangled and she leaned into the void. She fed more rope through the belay device until her toes touched stone. The wall curved again, and she was able to press the soles of her boots flush against the rock.
Sara looked straight ahead, studying the striations in the limestone as she walked down, nice and easy. Weeds and saplings clung stubbornly to the rock face. She didn’t look down. Instead, she focused on the honeycomb texture and felt the residual heat coming off the rock. Sweat slid down her temples. She concentrated on her breathing and on keeping her fingers away from the sharp teeth of the belay device as the rope slid through. Sweat beaded at her temples, and not only from the heat.
Sara had been on a volunteer search-and-rescue team when she was in grad school. She hadn’t rappelled in years, but she remembered the basics, and the details were coming back to her—such as that tight, sickly feeling in her stomach as she gripped the brake strands, slowly feeding the rope through. She was more than one hundred feet up, and as a forensic anthropologist, she knew what that sort of fall could do to the human body.
The gorge was narrow here—only sixty feet across, give or take, so more than twice as deep as it was wide. After several long minutes, she reached the ledge where Bryce had rescued the stranded climber. It was a small outcropping, barely a ledge at all, and she noticed the faint shoe prints in the dirt there. She didn’t stop.
Down, down, down. Her pulse pounded. Her mouth felt dry and cottony. The space around her grew cooler and dimmer, and she peeked over her shoulder to survey the gorge’s shadowy floor.
A great gust whipped up. Startled, she lost her grip on the brake strand and dropped abruptly, then jerked to a halt. A black cloud whooshed around her, swooping, flapping, squeaking, and she hunched forward and squeezed her eyes shut.
Bats. She clenched her teeth as thousands of little winged mammals swirled around her. Seconds ticked by. Minutes. When the air was still again, she opened her eyes and gazed up at the black cloud curling against the lavender sky.
Deep breath.
Peering over her shoulder, she searched the base of the wall and spotted the dark maw of a cave. Her heart did a flip-flop.
Not much scared her. She wasn’t afraid of snakes or rats or creepy-crawly insects. She could handle musty bones and decomposing flesh. But tight spaces got to her. And she desperately hoped the remains she’d come for weren’t tucked back in that hole.
She continued down the wall, alert now for more surprises, such as a loose rock tumbling down on her head. At last, the wall sloped toward her, and her feet touched ground. Relief flowed through her, and her stomach muscles relaxed. She unhooked herself from the rope and unfastened the harness.
“Off rappel!” she called toward the top.
Bryce hollered down and gave the rope a tug.
Sara stepped away from the wall and did a slow three-sixty, taking in the setting. She paused to listen. No flap of bat wings. No hiss of a rattler. The gorge was silent, and for a moment, she simply stood there, surrounded by the hot summer breeze and the pungent smell of guano.
Two hours ago, I was at a wedding, she thought. Some days, her job was surreal.
Sara pulled out her flashlight and beamed it in all directions, trying to get a sense of where the climber might have been standing when she spotted the bones or the body, whatever had sent her into a panic.
Dropping into a crouch, she aimed the flashlight across the ground at an oblique angle. White rocks of all shapes and sizes made up the floor of the gorge, but the terrain was too uneven to expect much in the way of footprints. Sweeping her beam over to the wall, she spotted some initials scratched into rock: JM & CL. She shone her light on the wall nearby. Metal glinted. Someone had hammered pitons into the stone—a definite taboo in a park where climbing was prohibited.
Sara stepped closer, scanning the rocks. Was this where they’d started their ascent? She looked around for more clues.
A flash of white caught her eye. She moved closer, switching on her headlamp. Fabric fluttered in the slight breeze. She made her way across the floor of the gorge, and with every step, her stomach tightened with dread.
A cranium protruded from the dirt.
As she reached the spot, Sara’s mind kicked into gear with a long list of tasks. At the top of that list was documentation.
Shoot your way in, shoot your way out. The CSI mantra had been drilled into her. After removing the lens cap, Sara lifted her camera and took the first of what would be dozens, maybe hundreds, of pictures tonight.
Snap. Snap. She inched closer, studying the scrap of fabric and the partially buried bones. Snap. Snap. Snap.
She lowered her camera and knelt in the dirt, and a familiar mix of pity and outrage washed over her.
Nolan Hess had been right. The remains were human.
But this was no missing hiker.
• • •
“Is it her?”
Nolan trekked down the steep slope, surprised he was still getting reception. “Don’t know,” he told the police chief over the phone.
“Did the anthropologist ever show?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, what’d he say?”
“She just got here. And I haven’t talked to her yet. She’s down in the gorge.”
Hank Miller cursed. Nolan scanned the trail for loose rocks, but it was hard to see in the dimness.
“I need something, Nolan. Sam Baird’s been ringing my phone off the hook since seven o’clock.”
“Mine, too.” Looking ahead, Nolan caught a flicker of light through the trees.
“And the mayor’s calling me. I want an update tonight.”
“You’ll know something soon as I do,” Nolan told him.
The flicker moved back and forth like a pendulum, and Nolan stopped to wait, turning on his flashlight so he wouldn’t spook her.
“Call me later,” Hank said. “I’ll be up.”
“Will do.”
Nolan slid his phone into the pocket of his jeans as Sara Lockhart hiked up the path. According to Evans, she’d shown up dressed for a cocktail party. Now she looked like a miner coming in from a long day. She wore a helmet with a lamp attached—either she’d switched it off, or it had run out of juice—and the knees of her coveralls were brown with dirt. Even with her sleeves rolled up to the elbows, she had to be suffo
cating in this heat.
She stopped in front of him. “Detective Hess?”
“Call me Nolan.” He offered his hand, and she gave it a firm shake.
“Sara Lockhart.”
She pulled off the helmet, and honey-colored hair spilled around her shoulders. In the stark glare of the flashlight, her eyes were an impossible shade of green. Nolan tried not to stare.
He cleared his throat. “Thanks for coming. So, what have we got down there?”
“Human remains.” She wiped her brow with her forearm. “Advanced decomposition.”
“A skeleton?”
“Not quite. There’s still some desiccated soft tissue.”
He waited for more, but she just looked at him.
“Male? Female?”
“I don’t know yet,” she said. “But based on the personal effects I could see, it’s probable we’re dealing with a female.”
Nolan sighed as he thought of Sam Baird and the raw pain he’d heard in the man’s voice message.
“Again, that’s unconfirmed,” she added.
Lightning flashed, and they both looked up. Thunder rumbled in the distance.
“I didn’t know it was supposed to rain tonight,” Sara said.
“It’s not, at least not according to the forecast.” Nolan looked around at the arid landscape in the rapidly falling darkness. Ten more minutes, and it would be black as tar. He looked at Sara. “Flash floods can be deadly out here, though. I don’t recommend we spend any more time in the gorge tonight.”
“I wasn’t planning on it.”
She stepped around him and continued up the path. Surprised, he trailed behind her. She wasn’t tall, but she had long strides, and her hiking boots had seen plenty of use.
“This is a delicate recovery.” She looked over her shoulder at him. “I’ll need people, equipment. I won’t be able to get everything on-site until tomorrow.”
Stone Cold Heart Page 2