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Just glimpses of him up ahead, always too far away.
I’m stumbling through underbrush, tripping over fallen branches, flailing and just barely catching myself before forging on.
This time, it’s different.
If I don’t catch him, I never will.
It’s like I’m electrified, something unnatural pushing me on, forcing me after him, because there’s somethinghere, some answer, some secret I have to know.
And even if there isn’t—
He’s hurt. Bleeding from the mouth, limping, obviously dazed and confused.
If I don’t do something, he could die out here.
But I’m worried I’ve lost him.
I can’t hear anything but my own crashing footsteps and raging heartbeat.
No more of those glimpses, no snapping twigs up ahead, no sign of him at all, but I keep moving.
And I nearly smack right into him as I break through a gap in the trees into a clearing thick with stacks of orange and brown leaves.
He sways in front of me.
Only for a second while I stop in my tracks, staring.
Then he collapses like a falling tree, wheezing as his lanky frame falls down in a pale tangle of limbs at my feet.
At first I don’t see it, not when I’m on my knees, searching for a pulse.
But once I see he’s still alive, the churned-up patch of dirt next to him catches my eye.
There, the bones protrude from the ground, sharp off-white fingers of human ribs stabbing up at the sky.
17
ONE GOOD TURN (GRANT)
When you’ve been a cop as long as I have, you learn to trust one thing.
If something smells bad, it’s probably rotten.
Right now, this whole situation stinks to high heaven.
The clearing in the woods on the west side of town, just on the far edge of the tiny central shopping district, is a riot of color.
The violent yellow-orange of October leaves.
The retina-burning contrast of red and blue patrol lights flashing, clashing with the red and orange of the whirling ambulance flashers.
The black-and-white patrol cars.
The vibrant green of the last few pine needles slowly turning dull for winter.
Then there’s the blaring red of that man’s blood, so coppery crimson it’s loud.
It spills down his chin, turning muddy brown as the splatters left behind soak into the disturbed earth.
