Colorado Wildfire

Even if Swain County wasn’t a hotbed of criminal activity, she knew the standard procedures and would adhere to them as much as possible. She pulled her pistol from the holster and went to the driver’s side. The window was down. Fully expecting to find the driver sleeping or drunk, she angled around until she could see inside.

“Sir, are you...?” The words froze in her mouth.

He’d been shot in the chest. The front of his plaid flannel shirt was drenched in blood from his neck to his gut. Oh God, what do I do next? What’s the procedure? She should check for a pulse, assess his condition. But she didn’t need to touch his pale jowls to know the flesh would be cold. His sightless eyes stared directly at her.

“He’s dead,” Ty said.

“Yes.” She could barely speak. Her throat was dry.

“We need to be careful. The killer might still be nearby.”

Gathering her courage, she backed away from the sedan and scanned the area, peering through the smoke at the rocks, shrubs and trees. No one else was in sight, but these hills were full of hiding places. A murderer wouldn’t put up a billboard to announce his presence.

But would he run away? Was he waiting for them? Harsh little flashes of tension and fear made it impossible for her to concentrate. Oh, Wade, I miss you. He would have known what to do. He was a born leader; giving orders came easily to him. Somehow, she had to pull herself together.

She cleared her throat. “We have to find the hikers.”

“Do you think they did this?”

“I don’t know.”

But she didn’t think those three men with backpacks were in this area by coincidence. Either they were friends of the deceased who were on the run or they were killers.

Ty gently touched her shoulder. “Are you all right?”

“This is my first murder case.”

“I’m here to help.”

She’d seen dead bodies before, usually people who passed away from old age or due to an accident. And she’d arrested plenty of bad guys who had hurt someone else. The local violence had always stopped far short of murder.

“I can do this,” she said.

“Hell yes.”

She slapped her Glock back into the holster. “I want this investigation to be done right.” She took out a pair of baby blue latex gloves and slipped them on.

“Do you always have gloves in your pocket?”

“Not my pocket. My utility belt.” She passed a pair to him. “I keep them in here.”

“Isn’t that the place where you should be packing a second magazine for your Glock?”

“Here’s the thing, Ty. I’ve never fired all thirteen rounds from this gun. I’ll carry one mag of extra bullets, but the second one is overkill. But I’ve found the gloves come in handy. I am a mom, after all.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Last time I used my latex gloves was at Jenny’s kindergarten class when we were making a collage of forest animals.”

He nodded slowly. “What’s our next move?”

That was a good question. Swain County didn’t have the facilities to deal with a murder. They had a small clinic and a dentist who doubled as county coroner but no hospital for an autopsy. For forensics, she used a fingerprint kit that she usually carried in her SUV. She had no access to DNA data analysis or a mass spectrometer or any other fancy tools.

In usual circumstances, she’d step aside and happily turn this investigation over to the Colorado Bureau of Investigation or maybe the Grand Junction police. But today was different. Today, there was a wildfire that just might reach this car and obliterate the scene of the crime.

She took her cell phone from her pocket. “First, I’m going to take photos of the crime scene and dust for prints. Then you and me are going to load this body into the back of my SUV and cart him to the nearest hospital.”

“Why move him?”

Pointing toward the flames, she said, “So the body won’t be incinerated along with the rest of the evidence.”

With her phone camera, she took a picture of the windshield and the front end of the car, which was crumpled against the trunk of the cottonwood. The damage wasn’t severe, causing her to think the car hadn’t been going very fast at the time of impact. Pleased with herself for drawing that conclusion, she made a complete circle around the sedan, taking pictures of the whole car. No skid marks in the gravel behind the car. The driver hadn’t applied the brakes.

A theory began to form in her mind. The man behind the steering wheel was already dead when the car hit the tree. Her conclusion fit the evidence. Wade would have been proud of her. He’d always said that she was a natural-born cop, not surprising since her father was a captain in the Portland PD.

She returned to the front window and made observations, sticking her head inside. The dead man was covered in blood, but the rest of the front seat was fairly clean. She looked over her shoulder at Ty. “I don’t think this sedan is our primary crime scene.”

“What do you mean?”

“I think he was killed somewhere else and then put in the front seat, which is why there’s no spatter. And he didn’t crash this car. It was pushed off the road into the tree.”

“How do you know that?”

After outlining her prior conclusions, she stepped away from the window so he could see the final bit of evidence for himself. “No keys in the ignition.”

He peered inside, taking care not to get blood on his white shirt with the pearly snaps, and then he cursed. “I recognize this guy.”

Had she heard him right? “You know him?”

“He’s a cop.” Ty pulled his head out of the car and stood up straight. “A state patrolman. I think his name is Morrissey. Wade introduced us.”

Her husband had been well acquainted with all the law-enforcement guys who worked in and around Swain County. Like her own deputies, they hadn’t been as friendly with Sam. “We’d better do everything right. The staties can be as annoying as you FBI guys. Lieutenant Natchez is a real pill.”

“Agreed. I’ve met Natchez.” Ty whipped out his cell phone. “Do you want me to contact him?”

“I guess that’s the right thing to do.”

If the situation had been reversed, and someone had found Deputy Caleb Schmidt’s body, she’d want to be among the first who were informed. She wasn’t looking forward to seeing Natchez. Somehow, he’d get everything turned around and make this murder her fault.

While Ty placed the call, she continued photographing the inside of the vehicle, starting with the front driver’s side and working her way around. No blood at all in the backseat. When she opened the passenger-side door, she saw a handgun. An attractive piece, it was a Colt revolver with an inlaid copper-colored design on the grip.

The weapon belonged to her husband.

* * *

WADE CALLOWAY EXERTED every bit of his willpower to keep himself from charging down the hill, grabbing his wife and planting a big, hard kiss on her soft, pink lips. The urge almost overwhelmed him. He couldn’t stand to watch her anymore. Ducking down behind a tall boulder at the edge of the forest, he squeezed his eyelids shut, fighting his desperate need to be with Samantha, his angel.

Now wasn’t the time or the place.