“What?” Her mother’s voice was soft. Not demanding.
“It sounds stupid.”
“Nothing’s stupid.”
Bianca blew out a long breath of air. “Well, this is. I mean . . . I told you about being chased through the woods.”
“Umm.”
“Well, it was more than just the boys, you know, chasing the girls. I think there was something else.”
Her mother tensed. “Like what?”
“I—I’m not really sure.” Bianca lifted a shoulder. Felt dumb. “Maybe a wild animal—some kind of creature chasing me.”
“What kind of creature?”
Bianca felt her mother’s gaze boring into her. “I don’t know. Something big and smelly. A huge thing. I mean, this is crazy, I know. But . . . I think it was a monster, you know.”
“No, I don’t know.” Her mother stared hard at her.
How could she explain when it seemed weird, stupid, even made-up? “A beast, I guess.” Saying it out loud made her cringe inside.
“What kind of beast?”
“Just big and kind of animal. Horrible. Not human.” She shuddered remembering the immensity of the thing, how it had reeked, its glowing eye. God, it did seem surreal now. “I just had the feeling that, whatever it was, it was . . . like pure evil.”
“Evil?”
“Yeah, like really, really bad. I had the feeling it wanted to kill me!”
“This was before you saw the dead girl?”
“God—yes! I told you it chased me! Right down to the creek!” Bianca remembered the creature’s loud footsteps, its hulking size, and she felt that mind-numbing fear all over again. “I already told you. Can we just stop now?”
“We will . . . yes. But first. Just answer this,” her mother said calmly while Bianca was on the brink of hysteria. “This ‘monster,’ could it have been someone dressed up in a costume, you know, one of the boys playing a joke on—”
“A joke? Are you serious? This thing was like a mountain, so big, so scary . . . oh, crap, you don’t believe me.”
“No, no. I’m just trying to figure out what it is.”
“I told you what!” Bianca wrapped her arms around herself. Her mother didn’t believe her.
“Then try again. Calmly.”
“Okay. It was huge.”
“We’ve established that.”
“And hairy and smelled like . . . wet dog, only a hundred times worse, like if Sturgis took a bath in a lake filled with raw sewage, that bad. And it had an eye that kind of glowed gold. Like topaz or something. You know, like the stone in that necklace Michelle wears sometimes. It was like that.”
“One eye?”
“I only saw one.” It sounded weird. All of it sounded weird, not just the eye. Bianca knew that.
“Could it have been a cougar? A mountain lion was spotted not far from here.”
“No! Mom! This thing was huge. Massive. Like way taller than me and it . . . I mean, I couldn’t tell, but it was on two legs. Or rearing up. I don’t know. It was dark. It all happened so fast, but it scared me. It scared the hell out of me.” Oh, God, she was saying this all wrong.
“But could it have been human? Just bear with me and think about it. Someone dressed up to really scare you?”
“No! Yes? I don’t know! But it would have had to have been a giant. A hairy, stinky giant!” She let out her breath and tried to calm a bit. “It was . . . awful. And then . . . and then it chased me down to the creek where . . . where she was.” The more Bianca thought about it, the crazier it sounded. Tears welled in her eyes. “Can we just go home?”
“You can. After you go to the hospital. I’ll be a little longer. I have things I have to deal with here.”
“But—”
“I know.” Struggling with her massive girth, Mom turned in her seat and hugged Bianca. “I’ll be home as soon as I can. Promise.”
Bianca nodded as she stared out the windshield to the eerie gloom. Knots of kids, now with parents or cops beside them, were huddled in the play of light from flashlights and headlights, everyone telling his or her side of the story. She spied Austin Reece, blond head held at a lofty angle, looking down his nose at a short woman cop. Maddie was standing next to Teej, leaning on him. She was probably drunk. Not good.
But then nothing was. Groups of other kids, some with their parents, formed a wide, uneven circle as they talked to the cops. Rod Devlin was dealing with the same deputy with whom Bianca had first spoken, Kayan Rule. The party mood had dissipated, and most of her friends looked grim or scared or both.
“Okay, I need to talk to some of the others,” her mother said. “Find out if anyone else got a look at the body.”
Bianca’s stomach turned over as she thought of the corpse still lying in the creek. She swallowed hard and didn’t let her mind wander too far to what had happened to the girl.
Her mother urged, “Let’s go.”
“Fine.” Reluctantly, Bianca climbed out of the Jeep and saw that Santana was out of his truck in an instant, as if he’d gotten the high sign from Mom, or more likely been watching like a hawk. He acted as if he was going to do something stupid like try to help her, so she shouted, “I’m okay!” before he touched her, then hobbled her way over to Santana’s pickup, wincing with each step. Still, she made it and was able to climb into the passenger seat and roll down the window unaided.
“Really, how ya doin’?” Santana asked as he stood next to the cab.
“How do ya think?” she tossed back, not bothering to hide her sarcasm. “Just super.”
He lifted one dark eyebrow and she felt immediate remorse. “I just want to get out of here. To go home,” she muttered.
“Okay. I’ll be right back. Just want to get a couple of things straight with your mom.”
“Perfect.” She waited in the passenger seat of her stepfather’s battered pickup and listened to the sounds of the night.
Over the drone of insects and a frog croaking somewhere she heard the voices of kids being interviewed, the rumble of engines and crunch of tires as more parents or guardians arrived. Bianca also caught pieces of the conversation between Santana and her mother as they stood in front of the pickup’s grill. Regan was filling him in and giving instructions. “Bianca . . . body . . . unconfirmed but working on it . . . a girl reported missing. . . some kind of one-eyed monster . . . I know . . . crazy . . . shock probably . . . check it out at the hospital with the ankle. Yeah, it’ll be a while. Take her home . . . I know. I’ll call him.”
Dad, she thought from the tone of her mother’s voice. The only other “him” they could be talking about, she thought, was her brother, Jeremy, but her mom didn’t talk about him the same way. Surprisingly, she wished Jeremy were here. As much as he’d bugged her while they were growing up, now she missed him.
Bianca closed her eyes, felt the heat of the summer night against her skin, and wondered what the hell she’d seen in the woods. A wild animal? A kid dressed up like a monster—but who? And how? And why? Or something else? The skin on the back of her arms prickled as she considered the options. Possibly something otherworldly. Lately she’d been reading a lot of books with paranormal themes, about ghosts and ESP, and vampires. She’d even gone through a zombie phase and the truth was, she did believe in an alternate universe, one few could see. But she probably shouldn’t mention ghosts or wraiths because it would only freak out her seeing-is-believing mother.
Again, the image of the dead girl came to mind, and she tried like crazy to think of anything else.
But it was no use. As the old driver’s-side door opened with a creak and Santana climbed behind the steering wheel, her mind wandered back to that moment when she’d touched what she’d thought was a stick but had turned out to be a bone with rotting flesh still attached.
Acid climbed up her throat. “Wait!” she yelled and she shoved open the door and heaved, vomiting over the gravel and part of the truck’s door frame. Her stomach turned inside out, bile rising, the s
tench burning through her nostrils as she hurled again. When it was over, she spat, wished she could wash her mouth of the sour taste that lingered, then yanked the door shut and leaned against the back of the seat. Tears were hot in her eyes.
“You done?” Santana asked and reached into the glove box to pull out a box of Kleenex.
She didn’t know. “Yeah.” She plucked several tissues from the box and cleaned herself. “Let’s just go.” Though her eyes were closed, she couldn’t shake the image. Deeply embedded in her brain was the mental photograph of the dead girl’s mangled face, pale floating hair, and deep, empty eye sockets.
CHAPTER 4
Blackwater arrived at the scene.
“Bad news travels fast,” Pescoli said under her breath as she watched the acting sheriff’s Tahoe roar along the access road, headlights cutting through the darkness, dust rising in a plume behind the rear wheels. She just didn’t like the guy. Laid-back wasn’t in his vocabulary, and he was very big on agendas, meetings, and finding ways to “pump up” enthusiasm in everyone on the force. Pescoli didn’t need it. He also seemed to preen for the cameras, but Alvarez had told her she was overreacting, that Blackwater was just trying to use the press to the department’s advantage to solve cases.
Well, maybe.
But she still didn’t trust him.
He parked his SUV near a couple of cruisers, crossed under the crime-scene tape, and strode up to Pescoli. Just under six feet, with a compact, athletic body, short black hair, and intense hawkish eyes, he appeared as if he were still an active member of the Marine Corps, though he was dressed down for him in pressed jeans and an open-throated polo shirt, his usually clean-shaven jaw showing night stubble.
“What’ve we got?” he asked.
“Dead female. Possibly a girl reported missing since sometime last week, Friday, I think,” Pescoli said and gave him the rundown. As she spoke, he didn’t interrupt, but his eyes scanned the area. She figured he didn’t miss much.
“You interviewed everyone?”
“Almost done,” Pescoli said. She was still sweating, even in the coolest wee hours of the morning. “A couple of deputies are wrapping things up. Then we’re sending the kids home with their parents.”
“Any caught with alcohol?”
“Not in their hands. A couple of coolers, though,” Pescoli said.
“Drugs?”
“None found,” Pescoli said. “I checked with the deputies, who searched the cars. But I smelled marijuana.”
“Probably ditched in the undergrowth.” His eyes scanned the scrub brush and thickets surrounding the parking area, his head shaking slightly. “They all need to be cited.”
“You think that will help?” Pescoli asked.
“It’s against the law.” His lips were flat. “I’m the sheriff.”
“Zero tolerance.”
“You got it. And don’t let any of them drive.” He pointed a finger at her for emphasis. “If they don’t have an adult, I mean a sober adult, to drive them, then we haul them back to the station. At least while we deal with the bigger situation.”
Pescoli’s gut tightened. She knew he was right, but she’d been down that route before, on both sides of the law. Not only had she arrested kids, but her own son had done some time in juvie.
“Maybe if they’re scared enough, they’ll talk,” he said. “What do we know about the victim?”
“Seems like the girl’s been dead a few days. Body bloating, decaying.”
“Not a part of this.” He motioned a finger to include the vehicles and kids still cluttering the area.
“Whatever happened to her occurred before these kids met up tonight.”
“But they might know something.” Blackwater’s brow furrowed as he eyed the crowd. “The girl went to the local high school, right?”
“Yes.”
“Same with most of these kids,” he guessed.
Pescoli couldn’t argue and decided to come clean. “My daughter was here, too. She called it in to nine-one-one on another kid’s phone. She was injured so I sent her to the hospital.”
In the blue and red flashes of light, she saw the muscles in the back of his neck tighten. “Cite her,” he said. “I can’t play favorites.”
“I wasn’t asking you to.”
“Good.”
At that moment, a fresh set of headlights pierced the night as the first television van arrived.
Pescoli inwardly groaned. The press. Already.
“I’ll speak to them,” he said, as the lumbering white vehicle parked on the far side of the police barrier.
I bet you will.
“Make sure we get statements from everyone up here.” He glanced pointedly at Pescoli. “Including anyone who’s already left. I want a list of every person who was here.”
Pescoli ground her back teeth together.
Without another word, he crossed the lot, rounding the rear bumper of a BMW as the passenger door of the van opened, and a reporter Pescoli recognized from the local news stepped out. Petite. Blonde. In a dress and jacket in the middle of the night, like she’d been sitting by the phone waiting for the call.
“He treats us like newbies,” she said as Rhonda Clemmons, a road deputy who had been one of the first on the scene, approached.
“Who? Blackwater?” Clemmons waved away the comment as if it were a bothersome fly. “Just his style.”
“Bullshit. And the TV crew. Oh, yeah, that’s just what we need.”
“At least he’ll deal with them,” Clemmons said. “That way we don’t have to.”
“Tonight.”
“One day at a time. And maybe they’ll help us.”
“Yeah, yeah.” But Pescoli couldn’t really argue. The press had come to the department’s aid in finding suspects in the past. Didn’t mean some of the members, including that worm Manny Douglas of the Mountain Reporter, didn’t bug the crap out of her. It wasn’t so much what Manny wrote, but how he handled himself, as if he were somehow more virtuous than the cops in the department, as if the Pinewood County Sheriff’s Department might be dirty.
Scumbag. But so far, he hadn’t appeared. As Clemmons headed to her vehicle, Pescoli dug into her pocket for her cell phone to call Santana and saw that he’d left a text: At the ER. Waiting. Not seen yet. Bianca in some pain, but holding up.
She wrote back: Ok. Still at the scene. Keep me posted. Home ASAP.
She didn’t mention that Bianca would be cited. After all, she had to leave some of the fun stuff for later, right? Once the whole family was back home and the trauma of the hospital was behind her, then Pescoli could lower the hammer. Oh, joy.
She clicked off and caught sight of Alvarez climbing out of her Subaru.
“Sorry I’m late,” Alvarez said. “Out of town.”
“I thought you were on vacation.”
Alvarez had been spending time with her biological son, Gabe, a teenager who lived with his adoptive parents.
“Got back a few hours ago,” she said. “The trip got cut short.”
“Why?”
“Addie,” she replied, mentioning Gabe’s adoptive mother. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Okay.”
Alvarez’s dark hair was slicked back into a ponytail. Like Pescoli, she hadn’t bothered with makeup, but somehow looked fresher, ready to go. “Let’s see what we’ve got.”
“The victim is up that trail.”
They headed out, Pescoli struggling to keep up with Alvarez, who was walking briskly, the beam of her flashlight bobbing along the trail ahead.
“Bianca was here?” she said. “Part of the party?”
“Yeah,” Pescoli admitted, still wondering about that. “She found the body, called it in, so the road deputies in the area got here before the kids had a chance to scatter.” There was a lot more to it than that, of course, but she’d fill in Alvarez later.
“Good.”
Selena Alvarez had been Pescoli’s partner for years, and they got along. It
had been a little rocky at first, as their backgrounds, educations, and viewpoints on life, as well as how they handled their jobs, were at odds, but they’d sorted most of that crap out. Alvarez came from a large family in Oregon somewhere, had gone to school, excelled, and worked by the book, a scientist who valued evidence far more than any gut instinct. Pescoli, on the other hand, was known to fly by the seat of her pants and relied on her own perceptions.
Even so, Pescoli had grudgingly come to respect the younger woman’s skills.
Straightforward, usually calm, Alvarez was relentless when it came to collecting evidence, checking and rechecking facts, and working a case by the book. Hers was never a forty- or even sixty-hour work week. Alvarez was a student of all things in life and she could think outside the box. She was also far more adept at today’s technology, was an Internet/social media whiz, and kept abreast of the most recent theories in psychology. However, she never wanted to bend the rules, which, in Pescoli’s mind, were meant to be pushed to the breaking point if need be. And, she found, “need be” turned out to be pretty often.
While Alvarez was calm under pressure, a cool head, Pescoli’s emotions often got the better of her.
“What’ve we got?” Alvarez asked as they walked along the dusty trail that wound along the creek.
Breathing hard, Pescoli filled her in on as much as she knew, which was, at that point, mostly what she’d learned from Bianca.
By the time they reached the spot where the victim lay in the shallows of the creek, Pescoli was sweating. Lights had been set up so they could view the scene, and insects were hovering above the stream, where a girl’s body was tangled in roots and stones. She was rapidly decomposing, her face disfigured and, in Pescoli’s estimation, unrecognizable. Techs were already combing the area around the creek while the EMTs, after confirming what was obvious, that she was deceased, were waiting for someone from the coroner’s office to arrive.
Pescoli’s stomach turned at the sight. Still, she crouched near the creek bed, shined the beam of her flashlight over the body.
The girl looked under twenty. Maybe around Bianca’s age and the age of most of the kids who were up here tonight. Had her death been an accident? Had she tripped and fallen here? Sustained head trauma? Had she been all alone in the forest or with someone? Had that someone killed her? Or harmed her and left her here to die? Could she have come out here to be alone in nature to take her own young life? If so, why?