Chapter 6
Six
The smell of death surrounded Kane as he removed his leather gloves and replaced them.
Using his phone, he recorded the scene, including the rock face, and then approached the body.
Gusts of wind blew dust into his eyes and lifted the edges of his jacket, making the fastenings of his harness jingle.
Recent rockslides had littered this area of the ravine, making the ground difficult to walk on.
Kane stepped carefully, his boots constantly slipping on small pebbles covering ragged broken pieces of granite.
He put on a face mask as he approached the body.
Wedged between boulders, Jan’s body had one arm twisted unnaturally.
The other was thrown out to one side palm up.
Her face was untouched, but dry blood and debris obscured most of her hair and splattered the rocks all around her.
Blue lips stretched around an open mouth.
Her expression was empty and her eyes stared sightless into the sky.
One of her legs was bent under her, the other straight out.
He walked around the body taking photographs from every angle.
He had been around dead bodies for a long time, but it never reduced the shock of seeing a young person dead.
He turned as Wolfe dropped a body bag on the ground and opened it.
“The blood spatter and the width of the pool around her is larger than I would have expected.”
“Unfortunately, that indicates that she was alive for a few minutes before she died.” Wolfe bent and lifted one of her hands.
“Her body hasn’t gone into rigor yet, which means she must have fallen on her way to Raven’s house.
If we estimate the walk there would have taken approximately forty minutes, she would have died around seven.
She has green stains on the palms of her hands.
I’ve seen this many times. It indicates she grasped at tree branches on the way down to stop her fall.
” He checked her pockets. “A set of keys, a small wallet, but no phone. I figure she had it in her hand. She liked to take photos of scenery.” He dropped the items into an evidence bag and pushed them into his pocket.
Standing back to allow Wolfe room to straighten her limbs, Kane took in the condition of her clothes.
“She has no rips or tears in her jacket. It will be interesting to see if she has any defensive wounds. From the disturbance in the ground on the trail, I’m assuming someone pushed her over the edge.
Although we hunted around for evidence of someone else being there, we found no footprints or anything else.
When people fight among pine trees, we usually find a few hairs caught on branches, but in this case, there was nothing.
” He bent to assist Wolfe with lifting the body into the bag.
“When we get the body onto the litter, I figure we need to take the time to look for her phone. Maybe get Raven to haul her up? We can hike out of here if the weather gets ballistic.”
“Yeah.” Wolfe looked at the sky and relayed the plan to Raven. “Let’s go.” He grasped one end of the body bag and they made their way over the uneven ground to the litter swinging on the end of the rope.
With the body stowed safely under a net, along with Wolfe’s forensics kit, Kane waved his arm and Raven hoisted the litter into the chopper and then it moved some distance away.
“Don’t take too long. I’m fighting a wind tunnel up here.” Carter snorted. “I don’t figure Jenna or Norrell would be too happy with me if I centrifuged your brains.”
Having been on a spinning rope on a chopper, Kane raised one eyebrow at Wolfe. “Sounds like every ride at the fairground. Count me in.”
“Get the phone, Dave. Jenna can hear you.” Carter chuckled. “Don’t worry, Jenna, I’ll take care of them.”
Climbing over jagged rocks, Kane tried to anticipate the trajectory of the phone if it was dropped from the point where Jan fell.
He had tracked the trajectory of bullets many times and added the wind gusts to his mental calculations.
The phone would likely have fallen almost straight down, whereas the body would have moved in an arc.
He led the way closer to the edge of the ravine and they spread out and searched.
“I see a reflection over there.” Wolfe jumped down from a boulder and headed to the location.
He held up a phone. “Got it. The glass is only cracked.” He pressed the button on the side and the phone lit up.
“It requires facial recognition. I believe that will work as her face is untouched. I’ll open it the moment we get back to the morgue.
” He slid it into a bag and added it to his pocket. “Let’s get out of here.”
Kane activated his com. “Carter, swing back this way and pick us up.”
“Copy.” The chopper came closer but hovered twenty yards or so away.
As they made their way across the landscape to the chopper, the wind dropped and everything went suddenly quiet, apart from the whoop, whoop, whoop of the chopper blades.
The sun vanished and darkness descended across the ravine in a straight line.
It reminded Kane of an eclipse, and he looked as a line of purple-blue clouds rolled toward them.
He hurried to clip his harness to the rope and then attached his clips to Wolfe so Raven could raise them into the chopper together.
The long rope had only just started to climb when Carter took them higher.
Above them the chopper turned and swung erratically as Carter fought to keep it under control.
The gusts of wind blew them closer to the edge of the ravine, and the rocks were getting closer by the second.
Above, thunder growled and lightning crackled seconds before hail pelted them like buckshot.
They swung and twisted on the end of the rope like flies caught in a spider’s web.
Above them, Carter continued to climb higher and higher until only the tops of the trees were under their feet.
They swung back and forth in ever widening arcs, making it impossible for the winch to get them higher.
Lightning crackled through his earpiece and he couldn’t make out what Carter was saying to him.
The chopper swung over the tops of the trees and headed toward Bear Peak.
The direction confused Kane as the town was in the opposite direction.
The next moment a lookout came into view and he made out the Beast in the parking lot.
He pointed toward it and smiled at Wolfe.
He raised his voice to be heard above the noise. “He’s dropping us at the parking lot.”
Hail pinged off the top of his helmet and bit deep into his cheeks.
In front of him, a trickle of blood ran down Wolfe’s face and hail piled up around the neck of his jacket.
A bolt of lightning came close and hit a tree, sending a puff of smoke into the air.
The tree ignited. Flames danced for a few minutes before the torrential rain extinguished them.
“That was way too close.” Wolfe’s eyes narrowed and he pressed his com. “Hey, y’all up there, didn’t you know water and electricity don’t mix.”
“Hang on, old man.” Carter’s voice crackled through the earpiece. “Two minutes.”
“Old man, huh?” Wolfe grunted. “I could run circles around y’all.”
As lightning flashed and they spun in a spiral toward the ground, Kane grinned at him. “I’m sure you could.”
Moments later, they dropped into the parking lot.
Kane quickly released them from the rope and waved Carter away.
The chopper rose high in the air and headed back to town, the rope trailing behind it as Raven slowly wound it into the chopper.
They dashed across the parking lot as hail pelted their backs.
Kane didn’t bother to remove his harness but threw himself into the back seat of the Beast with Wolfe close behind.
In the driver’s seat Jenna’s pale face and wide eyes told him everything he needed to know.
Watching them come close to being toast had terrified her.
He squeezed her shoulder and smiled. “That ride back was crazy good.”
“Well, I hope Carter gets the bird back safely.” Jenna stared into the distance before turning her gaze back to him. “How bad was it?”
“Massive head trauma.” Wolfe wiped a hand down his face. “Dave looked at the trajectory. She didn’t slip and fall straight down. She was well away from the bottom of the cliff face. Add the scuffle marks on the trail and I’d say someone pushed her.”
Horrified, Jenna stared at him. “I had my suspicions.” Thunder rolled overhead. “We’ll talk about it later.” She looked at Kane. “Why don’t you remove the harness and dry yourself? I figure you should drive. It will be faster.” She narrowed her gaze at Wolfe. “You have a cut on your cheek.”
“Do you want me to fix it?” Jo frowned. “How did you get cut?”
“Now don’t y’all go worrying about me.” Wolfe shook his head.
“We need to get off this mountain.” He looked at Jenna.
“You drive. I’ve seen you behind the wheel of your Mustang.
You’re more than capable of driving this truck in a storm.
It’s practically indestructible. Just point and drive before all the roads wash out. ”
Tossing Wolfe a towel, Kane grinned at her. “You heard the man.”