Chapter 1 #2
Just the opposite. The last time Jordan had seen his half sister in town, she had been picked up by her friend and temporary roommate, Sasha.
Sasha claimed she had dropped Jenny off at the park to meet Eric Cally, the boyfriend who’d dumped her upon finding out Jenny was pregnant, around seven o’clock in the evening.
The problem was that Jenny wasn’t at the park, and Eric claimed he and Jenny never arranged to meet in the first place.
The police assumed Jenny had a new boyfriend, one she didn’t want tell anyone about, but Jordan wasn’t convinced.
Especially since nobody had seen his sister since that night.
It was difficult to admit that Jordan hadn’t known Jenny was missing until a few days later, when the manager from the Dollar Store had called him to ask about her being a no-show. That was when he sounded the alarm.
Had Jenny gone to Denver with a new boyfriend as the police thought? Peters insisted there were more resources for young pregnant women in need of assistance in the bigger city.
But Jordan felt sure his half sister wouldn’t have left without telling him.
Especially since he’d offered her a place to stay on the ranch.
An offer she’d bluntly refused, preferring to stay in town with her friend Sasha.
Still, he’d hoped she’d come around. Especially as her pregnancy progressed.
He hated knowing he’d failed Jenny and wished again he knew where she’d been these past eight months.
Shaking off the troublesome thoughts, Jordan carried the jacket back to Autumn in time to hear her say, “The shooter got away. But yes, we need the crime scene techs here ASAP. We’re just outside the city limits, not far from the Clarke Cattle Ranch.
Roughly two miles off East County Line Road.
” Another pause. “Okay, I’ll wait here.”
Jordan frowned, still trying to figure out how she knew a crime had been committed. He thrust his jacket at Autumn. “Here, you should wear this.”
“Thank you.” It was a testament to how cold she must have been that she didn’t argue as she slid her arms into the lambskin coat.
The jacket was huge on her slender frame, reaching down to her knees.
She had to roll the cuffs up to free her hands.
She returned his phone, eyeing him curiously. “Is your pickup truck drivable?”
“Yeah, why?”
“There’s no reason for you to stick around.” She gestured to Bear, who now sat by her side. “We’ll stay here until the officers arrive.”
“I’m not leaving until I understand what’s going on.” He crossed his arms over his chest, staring down at her. Autumn was tall for a woman, but his six-foot-three-inch frame still towered over her by a full six inches. “What’s up with your dog? What did he find?”
She hesitated, then bent over to stroke the bloodhound’s fur. “You don’t know what Bear is trained for?”
“He’s a bloodhound, right?” He frowned at the dog’s seemingly sad face. “They track people.”
“He’s a bloodhound, yes.” She glanced up at him. “Bear is excellent at tracking perps, but he’s also been cross-trained to find cadavers.”
Icy fingers of dread danced down his spine. “You think there’s a dead person buried beneath the rocks?”
“I’m afraid so.” Autumn looked almost apologetic. “You can see why it’s best if you head back to your ranch. I can swing by in the morning to return your coat.”
“I don’t care about the coat.” He stared past her at the area where Bear had alerted. “A dead body.”
Before he could say anything more, the sound of police sirens split the air. In the distance, he could see faint red-and-blue lights indicating the Canyon Creek police were responding to Autumn’s call.
Now he understood why she’d wanted the crime scene techs to get there as soon as possible. And for him to stay back from the area.
He glanced back at the rocky burial site.
Clearly gravel and other debris had been used to cover up the body.
It occurred to him that the ground must have been frozen solid, making it impossible to dig a grave with a shovel.
With the recent uncharacteristic warm weather, most of the snow had melted.
Winters could be long, cold and hard in Colorado. So how long had the body been there? Eight months? The exact time frame his half sister had been missing?
The last time Jenny had been seen was in late August, and back then, the ground wouldn’t have been frozen. He firmly believed someone else had been buried beneath the rocks. Not his sister.
Yet he couldn’t move, couldn’t so much as take one step to put distance between himself and the mound of rocks.
“Please, Jordan. You really need to head home,” Autumn repeated. “There’s nothing more for you to do here.”
“I’m not leaving.” The words were flat and hard. “Not until I know who is buried there.”
“There’s no reason to suspect…” Her voice trailed off as the sirens grew louder. Seconds later, two squad cars were parked behind his truck.
And four officers jogged toward them.
In deference to the crime scene, Jordan stayed back, giving the officers and Autumn room to work. She was explaining about following an intruder who broke into her home, something he hadn’t realized had preceded the chasing event, when her K-9 Bear had gotten distracted by the pile of rocks.
“Did you ask the crime scene techs to respond?” Autumn asked.
“Yeah, they’re on the way.” The younger officer could have been a rookie by the way he stared apprehensively at the mound of rocks. “I don’t smell anything unusual.”
“I don’t, either, but bloodhounds can identify up to two hundred million different olfactory scents. They’re also known to stay on a specific scent, tracking it for miles.” Autumn bent to stroke her dog’s fur. “Bear here is better than most. Trust me, he alerted here for a reason.”
The officers glanced at each other and shrugged. Then they stepped back as a white panel van drove up to the scene.
Jordan tensed. This was it. The moment of truth. He had to admit the likelihood of Jenny being found here was a million to one.
Yet finding any dead body was cause for concern. Especially buried in so obvious a manner to keep the dead person from behind found.
If not for the intruder breaking into Autumn’s home and leading them on a merry chase to this remote parcel of land, they wouldn’t be standing there now.
Jordan found himself glancing up at the starry sky, as if seeking answers.
His father had turned into a believer after he’d been diagnosed with brain cancer.
His father’s sins of getting his mistress pregnant, resulting in Jenny’s birth, hadn’t seemed to matter.
His dad had claimed God had forgiven his sins and had asked Jordan to do the same.
Jordan had tried, for his father’s sake. He’d attempted to welcome Jenny into the family, but she hadn’t been receptive. Things had remained awkward between them.
Still, he had offered for her to live with him at the ranch, to raise her baby there in a stable environment.
But Jenny had claimed she didn’t want to be stuck on the ranch so far outside of town. That she liked working at the Dollar Store and sharing the small apartment with Sasha. And then she’d gone missing, which had made him wonder if she really had picked up and moved to Denver with some new guy.
“Set up the spotlights here and here,” someone said. “We’ll need to dig cautiously at first so we don’t destroy any key evidence.”
Jordan’s gut clenched at the image of a shovel blade penetrating a dead body. He wanted to step forward, to offer to help dig, but something held him back.
Autumn stayed to the side as well, watching as the crime scene techs removed the top layer of rocks by hand. The minutes seemed to drag on forever, but it was only ten minutes or so when he heard someone say, “I have something here.”
He craned his neck but couldn’t see what they’d found. He wasn’t sure if that was a good or a bad thing.
“Let me see.” Autumn edged forward. “Yeah, okay, that provides the confirmation we need that someone is buried here. We’ll proceed with caution.
Oh, and we need to get one of the detectives here.
” She frowned, glancing at Jordan before turning back to the officers on scene. “I’m not sure who’s on call tonight.”
“I called Detective Peters on our way out,” the younger officer said. “He didn’t sound happy about being woken up, but agreed to meet us here.”
Peters was a grouchy dude, Jordan thought sourly. The guy wasn’t the best example of what he knew were high-quality police officers working in Canyon Creek. Then again, Jordan was slightly biased because of the detective’s lackluster attitude toward his missing sister.
“Any ID on the victim?” Jordan asked.
“Not yet.” Was it his imagination, or was Autumn looking at him with apprehension? “Stay back, Jordan.”
Oddly, her comment made him want to move closer. He suddenly had a really bad feeling about this. “Who is it?”
“Looks like our victim is a young woman,” a voice said.
“Don’t,” Autumn said sharply, but it was too late.
Jordan pushed forward in time to see a pair of black-and-white-checkered sneakers. His knees went weak and it took every ounce of his strength to remain upright.
Jenny had a pair of black-and-white-checkered sneakers. He tried to remind himself that other young women likely wore them, too. They were a common enough brand and popular with the teenage crowd.
But seeing the sneakers poking out from the rocks had struck deep.
Then Autumn was there, her hand on his arm. “Jordan, do you have picture of Jenny? Can you remember what your sister was wearing when she was last seen?”
“She was just beginning to show. A pink long-sleeved maternity top, dark blue maternity jeans and black-and-white-checkered sneakers.” He pulled out his phone, scrolled through the photos and then handed it to her.
He steeled himself for the harsh truth as Autumn gazed down at his phone for a long moment.
“That’s Jenny buried there, isn’t it? My half sister has been dead all this time. ”
“I’m sorry to say that yes, the victim we’ve uncovered matches the woman in this photo, and the clothing she’s wearing fits your description.
” Autumn somberly handed his phone back.
She paused, as if thinking about something.
“But I must tell you, I don’t know how long she’s been buried here. She doesn’t appear pregnant.”
He stared in horror. “What do you mean?”
“We won’t know for sure until the autopsy is done, but it does not look to me as if Jenny was pregnant when she was killed.
” Autumn’s gaze was full of sympathy. “I’m so sorry, Jordan.
I know this is a terrible shock. I wish I could tell you more but we need to wait for the medical examiner to get here. ”
Not pregnant when she was killed? That didn’t make any sense. If she was wearing the same clothes as the last time she’d been seen… Jordan stared over to where the crime scene techs were continuing their work of uncovering Jenny’s body.
How long had his sister been buried there? And worse, what in the world happened to her baby?