Chapter Thirty-One
Declan
“Sheriff?”
Looking up from my desk, I found Corbin Blackwater, one of my deputies, standing in the doorway.
“What is it, Deputy?” I leaned back in my chair, curious as to what he needed.
“Just got a call from Grayson Powell. They found a body in one of the back pastures.”
That got my attention, and I sat forward. “What kind of body?”
“The human kind.”
“Shit.”
Standing from my desk, I grabbed my keys and walked around to the door. “Foul play?”
“They believe so, yes.”
“Ok, let’s go take a look.”
The Powell Ranch was only eight miles outside of town. The trouble was, the ranch included over fifteen thousand acres of land.
Pulling onto the ranch road, Grayson Powell waited for us. Deputy Blackwater and I stepped out of my vehicle and walked over. The sun was shining brightly, but it was fucking cold.
That was December in Nebraska.
It was nothing compared to what January and February could be though.
“Hello, Sheriff.” Grayson held his hand out to me.
“Grayson.” Shaking his hand, I got right to it. “I hear you found a body.”
“I actually haven’t seen it yet. Hudson and Em were out riding fences when they found her. Em stayed with the body, and Hudson came back to get me and call you.”
“You sure it’s female?”
Grayson sighed. “Yea. Hudson said her face was unrecognizable, but no doubt it’s a woman. She wasn’t wearing clothes. Emerson stayed with her to make sure nothing else got to her. They wanted to cover her with a blanket but knew they had to wait.”
“I appreciate that. Can we drive out there?”
“Not in your vehicle.”
I turned, and Hudson was walking over, leading two big ass horses over to where I stood with his brother.
“I am not getting on a fucking horse.”
Grayson grinned. “You never rode your brother’s bike? That’s just a steel horse.”
“Yea, but that steel horse doesn’t have a mind of its own that gets spooked by fucking rattlesnakes.”
“Oh come on, Sheriff, the rattlers are all brumating this time of year.”
“No fucking way.”
Grayson threw his head back and laughed. Looking at my deputy he asked, “What about you?”
“I don’t mind riding, but what about the sheriff?”
Just then, I heard a small V-twin motor as one of Grayson’s hands drove over a Gator.
“Deputy, if you’d like to ride, I can drive the Gator with the sheriff,” Hudson offered.
“Don’t have to ask me twice.”
Grabbing the reins, Deputy Corbin Blackwater swung onto the horse with practiced ease, the leather creaking softly beneath his hands as he settled into the saddle. Almost as if he were born to it.
Shaking my head, I climbed into the Gator with Hudson, while Grayson swung up on his horse. Hudson led the way, since he was the only one of the four of us that knew exactly where we were going.
“How the fuck do you stay outside all goddamned day in the winter? It’s fucking cold out here.”
Hudson laughed at my rant. “Be thankful I grabbed the one with actual doors. Horses don’t have fucking doors and windows.”
It took forty-five minutes to get to where they found the body. I was half frozen when I stepped out. Emerson Powell stood guard over the woman as I approached.
“Any idea how long she’s been out here?”
Emerson looked at me, I could see the anguish in his eyes at finding the woman.
“I was out here two days ago, and she wasn’t. So I would say less than forty-eight hours.”
“Fuck.” Squatting down next to the body, I looked her over. She was young, maybe mid-twenties. Beneath the blood in her hair, it looked as though it was brown. “Any tracks?”
“None that are distinguishable. Because the cows roam this pasture, they have trampled everything. Including her,” Hudson explained.
“So, either the perp knew the cows would cover his tracks, or he just got lucky.”
“How do you know there’s a perp? Looks like she got trampled.”
I looked up at Emerson Powell. I knew he was young, probably close to the same age as the victim, but I didn’t think he was stupid.
“Is there another reason a woman would be traipsing through your fields in the middle of December buck ass naked?”
“No,” he responded, his eyes on the ground.
“She was running from someone,” I said, looking around the field. It was flat as far as the eye could see. My guess was she had escaped from somewhere, run for as long as she could and collapsed. Then been trampled by the cows. I only prayed the elements had killed her before the cows did.
The autopsy would give me cause of death, but I was guessing there wouldn’t be much evidence. Even if I did find the bastard that caused her to be out here, it was unlikely he actually killed her. The most I could get someone on was involuntary manslaughter. Maybe kidnapping and false imprisonment if I was lucky.
It was situations like this where the law failed victims. And in times like this, I didn’t let guilt plague me. If I found who was responsible for this woman’s death, I would let the Silver Shadows dole out the justice the law couldn’t.
Standing up, I looked at my cell phone.
Great. No service.
“We need to call everyone in. Get the M.E. out here to take her in.” Turning to Grayson, I asked, “Can you call the station, and tell Martha to send everyone out here, including Wallace? I need a couple of people to wait for the M.E. and my deputies and bring them out here. I’m gonna stay out here and look around to see if there is anything at all that will give me information on what I’m dealing with.”
“How much do you want me to tell Martha?”
“Tell her everything. She runs the station. She’ll know what my people need to bring with them.”
“We’ll take the horses back and leave you the Gator. Cell service out here sucks, so there are walkies in the Gator. They’re set to channel four. Let me know if you need anything. We’ll bring everyone out as they arrive.”
“The coroner will need to bring the van out here, unless you have something to transport her in?”
“When Wallace gets here, I’ll ask her what we can use. It won’t be easy to get her van out here, but we’ll figure something out.” Grayson shook my hand, and he and his brothers mounted their horses and rode back to the house.
It would be at least an hour to an hour and a half before my deputies and Wallace made it out here.
“What are you thinking?”
“I’m thinking that someone scared this woman so badly she was willing to take her chances with the weather in the middle of fucking December, naked.” I heard the anger in my voice, and I knew Blackwater heard it too.
“What do you want me to do?”
I looked around again. There was nothing out here. No trees to hide an old hunting cabin, no mounds hiding a hidden door to an underground root cellar or bomb shelter. There was no telling which direction she came from or how far she ran before ending up here.
“Grab a walkie, turn to channel ten. Start walking west. No more than an hour. See if there is any sign of her.”
“Why west? You have a theory?”
“No,” I said, my eyes traveling over the land, hoping to spot something I knew I wouldn’t find. “The sun sets in the west. If I was running from someone and there was nowhere to hide, I would run toward the darkness. When the others get here, I’ll send them in the opposite directions. Check in with me every fifteen minutes, whether you find anything or not.”
“You afraid I’ll get lost, boss?” I heard the sarcasm in his voice. Corbin Blackwater had been born and raised in Diamond Creek, Nebraska. His ancestors had been here longer than anyone. He knew the terrain, and he knew how to track. He was a valuable member of my team. I knew he wouldn’t get lost. But there was something about this situation that had my hackles up. I just didn’t know what it was.
“Get the fuck out of here.”
Laughing, Deputy Blackwater walked off in the direction I sent him, leaving me alone to study the body. There wasn’t much I could ascertain without being able to move her around, but it didn’t deter me.
Two hours later, Blackwater was back, and my deputies had finally arrived, along with the M.E., Dr. Elizabeth Wallace.
“Afternoon, Sheriff.”
“Afternoon, Beth.”
“What have we got?”
“Female, appears to be mid-twenties. Looks like COD could be stampede.”
Dr. Wallace looked at me, raising a brow in question.
“I know what you’re thinking, but until we know cause of death, I can’t rule this a homicide. Maybe not even then. If the cows trampled her to death, it technically isn’t a homicide.”
“Fuck your technicalities, Sheriff.”
“My hands are tied, Beth.”
Beth Wallace got in my face then. She was five foot eight with red hair and green eyes. She wasn’t Irish though.
No, she was worse.
She was a Scot.
“That is a fucking homicide. I don’t care how she died,” she shouted, her arm stretched out in the direction of the dead girl on the ground.
“Take it easy, Beth. We will find out what happened to her.”
“And get her fucking justice.”
“And get her fucking justice,” I agreed.
Over the next several hours, we painstakingly collected what scant evidence we could find, our fingers brushing against damp earth and dried grass. Despite hours of searching in every direction, my deputies returned empty-handed, their faces etched with exhaustion.
By the time I got back to the station, I was hungry and tired, and all I wanted was to go find my woman and wrap myself up in her.
“Declan.” The mayor stepped into my office and closed the door.
“Hey, Allie.”
“How bad is it?” I stared at her, waiting for an answer to the question I didn’t need to ask. “Martha told me when she called to postpone lunch.”
I released a heavy breath and ran my hand through my hair.
“Technically, her death is likely from a stampede. But the fact that she was naked and outside in the middle of December is concerning.”
“Do you think it was one of the Powells?”
“No. If it had been one of them, they would have just buried her. They have thousands of acres to choose from.”
Allie nodded her agreement. “So, what’s the next step?”
“Identifying who she is. Pray she isn’t local. Then, we find the fucker she was running from and who is responsible for her being out in the cold, naked.” I shrugged, falling into my chair. “We need to keep this quiet. At least until we know more.”
“I agree. Go home, get some rest. You’ve had a shitty couple of weeks.”
“That’s the fucking truth.”
Standing from her seat, Allie smiled and asked, “How are things with Maureen?”
With my own cocky grin, I replied without looking at her, “They’re good.”
“I like her for you, Dec. I’m happy for you. Don’t fuck it up.” She laughed as she walked out of my office.
I had no plans to fuck it up, but things didn’t always go the way I wanted them to.