Hair tie: I found this hair tie in the mud near the north fence. It was still wet when I picked it up. Luciana always wears bright orange hair ties. This must belong to her, but where is she?
* * *
Driver’s license: Belonging to Paloma Cortes. I found this near the fishing cabin by the river.
Jenna turned to Kane. “Bring up the map.” She waited until the hand-drawn map flashed onto the screen. “See here, he marked where he picked up the items. There are other places on there as well. The old well, a burn pit, and a cabin he included with a disused root cellar.” She stood and walked around the table and used her pen to point at the map. “See here, he mentions this as an area where I assume he heard something that concerned him and he’s labeled this area with the caption ‘don’t dig.’ We need to look into all of these and see if anything about them is mentioned in the journals. The map alone is useless. I know it’s going to take time but there is one entry that caught my attention as we were copying the books. Lawson mentions that he was afraid to hand them into the sheriff because he suspected the sheriff was involved with the missing women. I believe this is an account of everything he saw over a period of time, maybe not enough to identify the perpetrator but enough for him to become suspicious. I don’t believe anyone goes to this much trouble if there isn’t something really disturbing within these pages.”
“It sounds to me like he saw something he shouldn’t have.” Rowley leaned back in his chair frowning. “I feel sorry for the guy. If he believed the sheriff was involved or had connections to the perpetrator, it’s no wonder he made his will and left a letter for Rhett to read to get down to the truth.”
“I wonder why he didn’t tell the lawyer.” Rio tapped his pen on the table. “He trusted him with the letter and the will. If he really believed his life was in danger, surely that would be someone he could tell?”
“Obviously not.” Kane went back to the laptop and displayed an aerial image of Lawson’s Ridge. “We know they were heading toward the river when they took shelter in the cabin for whatever reason. I have a theory. We know they sent Rhett to his grandparents. Maybe it was getting a little too hot around the ranch, and rather than pack up their bags and leave, Lawson decided to make as if he had to go and check the fences and his wife went along for the ride. Where they were heading is the only bridge across the river for some miles. On the Lawson’s Ridge side, there’s a locked gate, likely installed to prevent cattle from wandering across the bridge. I figure he planned to escape on horseback with his wife. He’d have known there was a storm brewing and likely planned to use that as a cover. Everyone back at the ranch would assume they took shelter in the old cabin.”
“So how did they get trapped inside?” Raven leaned back in his chair, making it creak under his weight.
Jenna looked from one to the other. “I figure someone followed them and took them by surprise. They could have drawn down on them and ordered them inside the cabin and locked it. Setting fire to it would have been easy enough. It’s miles from the ranch and a bad storm was on the way. No one in their right mind would ride out in one.”
“Hmm, intriguing.” Rio rubbed his hands together. “This case has good bones. Do we have any information on the hands still working at the ranch from back then? I recall Rhett saying that some of the hands had been there since his father was in charge. I’ll need to make a list.” He turned his attention to Jenna. “If someone is still on the ranch murdering women, a list of those people might be crucial to discovering the recent killer. I’ll get on that right away.”
“I noticed other things on that map.” Rowley looked Kane. “Can you get it up again?” He pointed. “Look at the key at the bottom. It says ‘hair clumps found here’ and ‘footprints in mud.’ I figure the journals are a terrified man’s attempt to document a crime he didn’t fully understand.”
Nodding, Jenna checked her watch and collected her things from the table. “I agree. We’ll leave this investigation in your capable hands and go and attend the autopsy. We won’t be coming back to the office today, we’ll be hunting down clues and doing interviews with Rhett’s employees out at the ranch. You know the drill. Keep us in the loop by uploading everything you find onto the server, and call if you get a breakthrough. I agree with Rio. It’s more than likely there’s a link between the cold case and the current one. So watch your backs, everyone.”
Eighteen
As they drove to the morgue, Jenna buzzed down her window and inhaled a few deep breaths of fresh summer air. An autopsy wasn’t something she enjoyed, and although Kane never said anything, she noticed the way he stiffened his shoulders the moment they stepped inside the examination room. The smell was always the same: antiseptic mixed with the recognizable smell of human decay. It had its own sweet disgusting smell that clung to clothes and hair. As this victim had been partially buried, the smell would be worse, and Jenna covered her hair and dressed in full PPE before entering. Beside her, Kane had taken the same precautions. They took their usual positions: She stood underneath the air conditioner and Kane moved closer to the gurney containing the body. The sound of instruments clattering on stainless-steel trays seemed magnified in the quiet, almost reverent, atmosphere. Beside the gurney, Wolfe and his daughter Emily collected swabs from the corpse. Wolfe concentrated on the body, and Emily meticulously removed dirt from under the fingernails and toenails and from inside the victim’s ears. She took swabs from her mouth as well.
“It’s good to see y’all.” Wolfe glanced at the clock on the wall. “Right on time. No Raven today?”
Jenna shook her head. “Nope, we have him working on the Lawson case right now. It’s impossible for us to cover both of them at the same time, so I’ve split the team. We have Carter to assist and Kalo. I’m also expecting Beth and Styles to arrive sometime today.”
“That’s good.” Wolfe’s brow wrinkled into a frown. “The tape. The recording goes for a few seconds. It’s a woman screaming. It’s been taped over notes about livestock. Later I’ll listen to it all and let you know if there’s anything else significant.”
Swallowing hard, Jenna nodded. “Lawson must have heard something. I wonder why he didn’t go and help the woman. Most people would.”
“Not if he knew his wife and son would be next if he failed to take him down.” Kane shook his head. “Not with that gun he carried. I don’t believe he was a coward. He wasn’t a violent man. I noticed there wasn’t a gun safe in the house. I mentioned it to Rhett and he’s having one installed. No rifle racks, nothing. The man didn’t like or use weapons.”
Jenna nodded. “That makes sense.”
“Okay, we’ll start.” Wolfe tapped his earpiece to begin the recording. He gave the date and time. “The victim is adult female, mid-twenties to early thirties, brown eyes and hair, five-five, with olive skin. The condition of the body is consistent with a shallow burial.” He turned to Emily, who was examining a sample underneath a microscope. “What do you see?”
“Mostly organic debris.” Emily returned to his side.
“That would be expected, given she was found in a cattle grave. As a side note, when I exhumed the body, it was obvious that it had been placed in the ground deliberately. It was laid out and I didn’t get the impression it had been thrown in.”
Jenna moved her gaze over the body. The poor woman had been beaten to a pulp. She looked at Wolfe. “How did she survive?”
“It’s surprising how the will to live keeps people going even when they’re very seriously injured.” Wolfe turned back to the victim. “There’s evidence of gaffer tape stuck to her hair and fragments of adhesive across her mouth. I’m also seeing ligature marks on both wrists and ankles. The markings are consistent with rope.”
“Soil was packed deep under the fingernails.” Emily glanced up at Jenna. “That will be consistent with her clawing at something. She was probably trying to dig her way out.”
“I’m seeing multiple contusions to the face and scalp.” Wolfe indicted to a large round mark on her cheek. “Some of these blows are from gloved fists. The others are consistent with the use of a blunt force instrument, possibly a baseball bat. Can you see the elongated but rounded edges to the bruising? It’s repeated blows almost in a pattern, as if he intended leave his mark on this victim.” He let out a long sigh. “This wasn’t a single attack. From the bruising pattern, I would say this happened over one or two days.”
“I’m seeing bruising but I’m not seeing any defensive wounds.” Kane leaned closer. “Would you agree that all the bruising is consistent with having her arms tied behind her back?”
“I would.” Wolfe looked at him over the top of his face mask. “I’ll open her up and see what damage there is inside.”
Looking away, Jenna hummed to herself to try to block out the noise coming from the gurney as Wolfe cut into the body and broke open the rib cage. At no time did she ever consider the body on the examination table wasn’t once a vibrant living young woman. She admired Emily’s strength and the way she treated each body with the utmost respect. Everything about her reflected her father. She noted the compassion in the girl’s eyes when the examiners peeled back the skin to reveal the fractured ribs below. She stared almost trancelike as they continued with their examination.
