Wolfwraith (20 page)

Shadow felt hot coffee splash over onto his fingers. “What? How?”

“He pulled some hair from his attacker. It was still between his fingers.”

Yes! Shadow’s hopes soared. “Have they learned anything from it yet?” They might already have identified the killer.

“If they have, I haven’t heard. ’Course, I’ve been stuck out here most of the night, so who knows?”

So, Shadow thought, it
was
a human being. His hunches about the earlier killings had been way off. Still...

Trying to ignore the bloody subject of the conversation, he casually sipped his coffee—at least he hoped it looked that way. Then he asked, “You think I might have a look at the crime scene?”

Watkins stiffened as though he might realize he’d said too much. “Nah. You know the drill. Nobody the detectives haven’t approved.”

“But it was my friends, my neighbors, and it happened in my park. I should be in on this.”

“Look, Shadow, was it?”

“Yeah.”

“Look, Shadow, I’d like to help you—since they were your friends and all—but I can’t. You’ll have to go through channels.”

“Okay,” Shadow replied. “Thanks anyway.” He tried to think of an excuse to sneak around the back of Jenny’s place, but nothing came to him.

He went back to his cottage, locked up, which he normally didn’t bother with, and then drove to the ranger station. The office was nearly as busy as the day before, even though it was six a.m. Now the tourists had all been shipped out and the crowd consisted of rangers, police officers from various agencies, state officials, and reporters, who had been allowed to drive into the park because of the unusual situation. Shadow noticed Commissioner Barnett’s sedan parked among the other vehicles. He pulled over into the grass at the edge of the gravel road, as near to the station as he could get, making sure he didn’t get his wheels in the swamp.

He made his way through the group of men and women on the porch and walked into the crowded outer office. Betty hadn’t arrived yet, since her shift usually started at eight. Mark Wilson sat at her desk, talking on the phone. He nodded at Shadow and waved him toward Alex’s office.

The door hung open and Alex, who was also talking on the phone, gestured for him to come in. Shadow took two steps in and stopped. He normally would have sat down until Alex was ready for him, but Barnett was already there, sitting in the corner, where he would be behind Shadow once again if he sat.

Surprisingly, the commissioner nodded and smiled. “Good morning, Ranger Fetcher,” he said, mispronouncing the name.

“Er, good morning, sir.” What an asshole!

“I understand you’re right in the middle of things as usual.”

“Yes, sir. I sort of wish I wasn’t though.”

“I can imagine. They were friends of yours, I hear.”

“Yes, sir.”

Barnett said no more, although he continued to scrutinize Shadow. Disconcerted, Shadow assumed the military ‘Parade Rest’ stance, with hand and claw tucked behind his back, eyes straight ahead until Alex finished his phone conversation.

“Glad you’re here, Shadow,” Alex said, finally. “The police are setting up a command center at the E.E.C. since there are bunks and a kitchen there. They’ve established a joint task force—local, state and federal. I want you to take them down there—the ones who are already here—and stand by for anything they might need. You’re probably most familiar with that area, since you live there, so fill them in on any details you think they might overlook. See Detective Ericsson, okay?”

“Yes, sir,” Shadow answered, with a quick glance at Barnett. He’d have liked to ask Alex about progress in the case, but now was not the time.

“Good,” Alex said. “The park is closed indefinitely; they’ve interviewed everyone known to be in the park the night before last, except for two men from campsite ten. By the way, uh, several campers confirmed you were away, at False Cape, at about the time the, uh, murders occurred.”

“Yes sir.” Several? He’d thought only the girls could give him an alibi. It was a little embarrassing that the other campers in the meadow might have heard what was going on.

“That will be all, Ranger,” Alex said.

“Thank you, sir.” Shadow pivoted and stepped from the office.

He glanced around at the people in the outer room, but didn’t see Ericsson, so he stepped onto on the porch and looked. Still no Ericsson, but he must be around. He walked to the end of the gravel walk and saw the state police detective farther down the road, talking to someone behind an SUV.

“Detective Ericsson,” Shadow said as he approached.

“Ah, Ranger Fletcher. Good morning,” the detective replied.

“Yes, good morning, Ranger,” Lorene Walker said, stepping out from behind the truck.

Shadow was genuinely glad to see her. He’d come to like her a lot and, in his present mood of optimism, he hoped she could help clear his name quickly. At least she wouldn’t be biased against him, as Ericsson’s attitude implied he might be.

“Hi, Lorene,” he said, before he realized she had addressed him as “Ranger.” Her face showed she didn’t appreciate his informality in front of the state police detective. “Er, Agent Walker.” Too late.

“That’s okay, Shadow.” She turned to Ericsson. “Ranger Fletcher has been showing me about the park. Concerning the earlier deaths.”

“Uh-huh.” The detective grunted. “In any case, let’s get down to that environmental center and get things rolling, huh? We have some more forensics people coming soon and daylight’s already upon us.”

“If you’ll get your people together,” Shadow said, “I’ll lead the way down the interior road.”

“We’ll be ready in a minute,” Ericsson replied, turning away.

Shadow began to leave, also, but Lorene stopped him.

“Do you mind if I ride with you?” she asked.

“Of course not. But, uh, what about your car?”

“I’ll get a ride back later.” She grinned. “Why? Are you worried someone will steal it? With all these cops around?”

“No, of course not. Come on then.”

“I’ll get my things and meet you there. Where are you parked?”

Shadow told her and, in a matter of minutes, he and Lorene were leading a parade of cars, trucks and SUV’s through the park.

“I need to ask you something. It’s important,” she said almost immediately.

“Go ahead.”

“We’ve formed a joint task force, you know that?”

He nodded. “Alex said so.”

“We’ve already decided to interview you again in depth today, but I wanted to talk to you first.” She put a hand on his shoulder. “By the way, I’m sorry you lost your friends.”

“Thanks, but I’ve told you everything I know. Why not find some other people to interview?”

“You’re the only thread we have running through these cases, other than the animal-mutilation thing or whatever you’d call it, and I wanted to ask about something before we talk to you again.”

“What’s that?”

“I went to Richmond yesterday evening and I talked to your ex-wife. I’ve seen transcripts of your divorce and custody hearings.”

“Oh, shit.”

“Yeah.” She dropped her hand from his shoulder. “Your wife says she caught you molesting or about to molest your daughter.”

Shadow took a deep breath. “I know. It’s not an easy thing to live down, even though I didn’t do it.”

“She wouldn’t let me talk to your daughter but the record shows your daughter agreed you’d touched her inappropriately.”

“Look, I was tickling her. It was all in good fun, just teasing, and all I ever touched was under her arms, tickling her. I swear. My wife came in and said Ashley was too old for horseplay and we stopped. I never heard another word about it until the custody hearing, when my wife had an entirely new version of what had happened. Somehow she got Ashley to believe I was doing something wrong.”

“I believe you.” Lorene said. “I don’t think you have a disingenuous bone in your body.”

Shadow frowned and gave her a sharp look. “What does that mean? Is that some lawyer word?”

Lorene appeared startled. “No! It means you’re truthful—as straightforward as they come. It would surprise the hell out of me if you had done something like that or if you had anything to do with these murders.”

“Oh. Sorry I flew off the handle. I just didn’t know what that word meant but it shouldn’t matter. You should be able to clear me easily.”

She cocked her head and raised her eyebrows. “And how are we supposed to do that, Hawkeye?”

“I’ll give a DNA sample. It won’t match what you’ve got.”

“What do you know about any DNA evidence?” Lorene’s voice had taken on a suspicious note.

“I heard the forensics guys found some hairs gripped in Jonesy’s hand. Since he was in a struggle for his life, it would follow that he ripped them from the killer.”

“Holy shit, who told you?”

“It doesn’t matter. You can clear me.”

“Shadow, I’m beginning to see why the Commissioner didn’t want you messing around with this case. You’ve got things so mixed up, it’s not funny.”

“You mean they didn’t find hairs?”

“Damn.” She pounded her fist on her knee. “Shadow do you promise all to hell and back you won’t tell anyone what I tell you now?”

“I promise.”

“Okay, yes, they found hairs, They can’t use them for DNA evidence, though.” She laughed dryly. “But they do clear you—in a way.”

“How’s that?”

She stared at him for a moment, as though deciding what to say. “The hair wasn’t human.”

Chapter Fourteen

Was it a bear?

Shadow quickly turned toward her. “Not human? But I thought...”

“Look out,” Lorene cried, and he whipped his face forward and pulled the truck back onto the gravel.

“Christ.” He sucked in a breath to steady himself. “An animal? What was it?” Suddenly, he had an odd thought. Whatever it was had struggled with Jonesy. There was only one animal in the area big enough for that. “Was it a bear?” There were no bears known to be in the park, but it was all he could think of.

“No, it wasn’t a bear. Listen, Shadow, I probably shouldn’t tell you anything, but...”

“But what?”

“Knowing you, you’ll keep digging around. I’ll tell you what kind of hair it was if you’ll promise to stay the hell away from this investigation.”

Shadow considered for a moment. “I’m not promising crap, Lorene. I can see I’m rapidly becoming a suspect and I don’t like it. It’s all because I’m the guy who found two of the bodies. Didn’t Ericsson check and find out I wasn’t here when Jonesy and Jenny were killed?”

“Yes, he did.” Lorene sighed. “The two young women say you were there and checked up on them, but the four campers from nearby said you yelled and caused some kind of commotion by the girl’s tent, though they were too far away to hear what was said. But it would only take a couple of minutes to drive from the meadow back to where the murders happened and the timing’s not exact as to when they died.”

“What about the group at the E.E.C.? There were nearly a dozen people there. Any of them could easily have walked to Jenny’s cottage.”

“Jenny had just left there and they were writing reports on their evening outing. Everyone was accounted for, until well past midnight.”

“But everything pointing to me is circumstantial,” Shadow said. “Don’t you have anything about someone else?” Then it dawned on him. “You do have something else! If some man-killing creature were responsible, you’d have men with rifles combing the park. You’re still looking for a man.”

Lorene sighed. “Damn, Shadow, would you stay out of this? You might be digging your own grave.”

“I haven’t done anything except ask a few questions.”

“Yeah.” She grinned. “All the wrong ones, apparently. Okay, since we talked about it earlier, I’m going to tell you what kind of hair it was.”

“We already talked about it?” He cut the truck’s wheels left, passing Jenny’s cottage. The E.E.C. building was only a couple of hundred yards farther on.

“Yeah. The hair came from a wolf.”

“Not a dog? They’re sure?”

“They can tell.”

Shadow’s head was spinning as he pulled up outside the E.E.C. “So the evidence points toward a wolf that rips out the throat of a person after he or she’s already dead. But there’s no cause of death in the first place?”

“Yeah.” Lorene put her hand on the door handle. “There’s one more finding on the wolf hair, though. It came from a dead animal. Makes a hell of a lot of sense, doesn’t it?” She opened the passenger door and got out. Shadow could see Ericsson walking up from the following vehicle as Lorene stooped down and looked at him. “But we do have some leads, Shadow. There’s more to it than you know. Leave it be and let us handle it.” Then she was gone.

After she’d left, Shadow parked the truck and began helping the law officers settle into their new headquarters but Detective Ericsson soon took over and ushered him away.

Shadow had little to do, so he wandered back up toward Jenny’s place and watched a team of investigators sifting the sand. Others carried items out of the cottage—evidence, surely. Had the killer been in her house?