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  “On your desk,” she cut in before dismissing him so she could answer the ringing phone.

  Nodding to himself, he closed the door behind him, flipped the switch on his coffee maker, and settled himself behind his desk as the first chugs and hisses escaped the aging machine. Before long, the inviting scent of fresh coffee perfumed the air, 115

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  making the autopsy report for Lori Watson only slightly more tolerable.

  Tossing the photo’s aside, he stood and crossed his office. As he poured a cup of the steaming brew, he glanced out the window and surveyed the street before him. Despite the grisly photos on the desk behind him, the cozy familiarity of his town offered comfort. Maggie’d changed the daily special’s sign in her front window. Meatloaf and mashed potatoes.

  He’d have to stop in for supper.

  Doc Templeton’s receptionist/assistant had set out a fake fire hydrant in front of his place. An amazingly lifelike plastic terrier grinned at passersby as he lifted his leg in tribute. Ginny had her front door propped open with a garbage can full of discount scoop shovels. He couldn’t blame her. It was too damned nice outside today not to savor every last ounce of fresh air, work or no work.

  Turning his gaze in the other direction, he scanned the tidy faces of the library and the town hall. No changes there. Heaving a sigh, he took a quick sip and scalded the roof of his mouth as he turned back to his desk. Cursing, he forced the swallow, and sucked in a sharp breath to cool his mouth. It didn’t help much. Unable to face the photo’s, he flipped them upside down on the edge of his desk and reached for the report as he returned to his seat.

  The technical jargon floated on the surface.

  Words and phrases popped at him from the page.

  Obstruction of venous drainage. Occlusion of the internal jugular vein. Cerebral edema and cerebral ischemia. Cyanotic. And the classic sign of strangulation—petechiae—little blood marks on the face and in the eyes from burst blood capillaries.

  Ligature marks, as well as fibers taken from the victim’s skin, indicate the stockings found around the victim’s throat were indeed the murder weapon.

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  The hyoid bone was broken, pointing to manual choking rather than execution via hanging. Jarvis tagged time of death somewhere between midnight and one a.m. given the corpse’s temperature at time of discovery, and the woods as the place of death given lividity. Lori’s death would have been immediately following her shift at Maggie’s.

  The ME hadn’t been able to recover any prints or viable DNA from the body, or from the crime scene evidence. The only prints on the rosary were those of the victim. The killer had used paint to form the gruesome letters on her back, not blood as they’d initially assumed. That made sense, given the rain.

  Blood would have washed away. He must have been more off balance than he’d realized to have missed that. The condoms scattered about the crime scene were your garden-variety condoms, available in dozens of pharmacies or retail stores across the state, as were the magazines. None bore any trace of bodily fluids. Red was following up, even now, on the videos. With any luck, they might get a hit when they ran serial numbers. All in all, the sum of the report left Cam with more questions than answers.

  Who would kill Lori? Why? And why leave her like that? Why strip her of her dignity in such a base, cruel fashion?

  Tucking the photos and the reports back into the manila file, he dropped the packet into a tray on the corner of his desk and leaned back in his chair, considered the stack of work that had accumulated since the last time he’d been in his office less than two full days ago. Hell, anymore a day off was more work than if he spent a double shift in uniform.

  It took him just over two hours to review the rest of the papers in the stack Emma had handed him. He signed off on requests for concealed weapons permits, approved purchases for a new K9

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  unit, and then read reports for the latest rash of vandalism. Still no lead there either. It only took a few minutes to fill out a report for the call he’d taken at JJ’s. He’d long since given up the absurd notion that formality equaled distance.

  His mind circled back to the incident outside her shed. Rocking back in his chair, he closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger. Hell, who was he trying to fool? His mind had never left her place, never left her. Those scars had been vicious. It didn’t take a genius to figure out where the fear in her eyes came from. Someone had done some serious damage. And not just to her body. From the look in her eyes earlier, she had much deeper wounds that were still bleeding.

  “It’s over now. He’s dead,” she’d said. That was little comfort to him. Then again, it was probably just as well. It was a very real possibility the man’s life would have been forfeit should Cam have ever met him face to face. He’d have taken great satisfaction in ripping the man’s throat out with his bare teeth, badge be damned.

  Cam’s narrow-eyed gaze swerved to the computer screen on the left side of his desk, and he chewed the inside of his cheek as he fought curiosity.

  It would be an invasion of her privacy. Under any other circumstances this wouldn’t be something he’d ever even consider. Even now, it didn’t sit well.

  Digging into someone else’s secrets was taboo for him. And yet…

  He rubbed at his chin, dug at the knot at the base of his neck. He drained the cooling coffee in his cup and drummed his fingers on his desk blotter.

  Pushing to his feet, Cam paced to the window and back again. And all the while his eyes never strayed 118

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  too far from the blank computer screen. Cam all but gnawed a hunk of his lip off while his conscience lost the battle with the merciless need to know all there was to know about JJ Frost.

  With a snarl of self-disgust, he plopped down behind his desk and reached for the mouse. His conscience made one last stab at him, and his fingers hesitated. But that long, jagged scar across her back flashed through his mind again, and conscience was hamstrung without another whimper.

  He began with a basic search and came up with more than he’d expected. She’d graduated at the top of her class, with honors, from a highly distinguished academy of the arts. Miss Jillian Josephine Frost, AKA JJ Frost, age 26, born and raised in Minneapolis, was a critically acclaimed artist the art world watched with baited breath.

  She’d had several very successful showings, both here in the United States, as well as abroad.

  Then, with no warning or explanation it seemed, she’d fallen from the face of the earth…at least from the face of the art world.

  Cam called up some old clippings, as well as pictures of her and a few other select artists at a fashionable gala event a couple years back featuring celebrated works. The woman smiling back at him took his breath away. She was different…and still the same. The proud tilt of her head, the glint of steel in her eyes was the same. The self-assured, unguarded happiness glimmering in her eyes in these pictures was missing in the woman he knew.

  What had happened?

  Without giving it a second thought, he dug deeper. A phone call to the proper authorities in Minneapolis lasted less time than it took to pour another cup of coffee. Having secured the sergeant’s assurance she would fax their files on JJ to him at the earliest convenience, he returned to his 119

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  computer. He typed in more keywords and waited.

  A brisk rap on the door—followed by the click and hum of the outer offices as the door opened—

  interrupted his concentration just as the next article popped onto his screen in startling, bold print.

  ‘ Brutal homicide leaves promising young artist fighting for life.’

  Biting off a particularly nasty expletive, he glanced toward the door, fully prepared to rip into the intruder. The angry growl died on his lips.

  Emma’s pale face was chalky, her eyes round as sa
ucers.

  “Sheriff…”

  Oh, hell…

  Coffee curdled in his stomach, and he held his breath. Emma only called him sheriff when there was serious trouble. Trouble in all caps. Trouble beginning with a Holy shit and ending with an Oh, fuck. “Just got a 911. A couple kids over at Angel’s beach,” she paused to draw a shaky breath, forced a swallow. “They found another body.” 120

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  Chapter 9

  Cam parked his truck alongside Austin’s Tahoe and took a moment to brace himself. He couldn’t shake that sick sense of foreboding swimming in the pit of his stomach. In a jurisdiction this size, odds were pretty damned good Cam was gonna know the victim, whomever it was. He’d been so startled, so appalled at the news of another dead body he hadn’t stopped to ask Emma if Austin had a positive ID on the vic. He should have. At least he would’ve had the drive over—short as it was—to prepare.

  Prepared or not, he still felt as though this was his fault…somehow. Common sense argued no one would have expected this—a second murder—so fast on the heels of the first. Which begged the question…what was going on here?

  Well, hell, at least this time he wasn’t dead on his feet, wearing a coat of sheetrock dust and sweat.

  He secured his sidearm and leaned across the seat, digging in his glove box for a pair of latex gloves. He should have put his uniform on this morning, not that it really mattered. His was the kind of job that didn’t recognize the meaning of the terms day off or vacation time.

  He followed the narrow trail through the woods toward a secluded little lakeside cove, Sutter Hollow’s version of lover’s lane. If he hadn’t been aware of what awaited him at the end of the trail, this could have been nothing more than an ill-timed trip down memory lane. Moving with the natural grace of a lithe predator, he made not a sound as he drew closer to the beach. His heavy boots left no 121

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  trace of his passing. His movements bent not a single leaf.

  Ducking beneath the fluttering yellow ribbon of crime scene tape tied between two saplings across the trail, Cam broke into the clearing and paused.

  He dragged in a deep gulp of air through flared nostrils, careful not to let his gaze fall to the body just yet. He needed to assess the scene objectively…before the victim’s identity could impinge on his clarity of purpose.

  Distinctive earthy scents, lush and verdant, mingled and swirled through the air. Lake water.

  Damp sand. Then the wind shifted, and a wave of stale liquor washed over him. His gut clenched. No.

  No, he told himself adamantly, it couldn’t be him. He was mistaken. Shaking off that impossible thought, he dragged in more scent. Sifting. Isolating.

  And that familiar scent hit him again.

  Denial gripped him by the throat.

  Although he hadn’t had the advantage of a night of rain to aid in washing away his trail, the killer had left no trace of himself behind. Again. Nothing, but for the scents of liquor and old blood…and the dead body, of course.

  He took the scene in with a wide sweep of his keen eyes, deliberately avoiding the corpse.

  Desperately ignoring the unexpected lump in his throat. A plethora of glittering glass—broken shards and intact bottles with a wide assortment of liquor labels—littered the sand in a fifteen-foot radius of the body. Each and every one appeared empty beneath his quick glance.

  It looked like the beach had been the sight of a wild, booze-soaked party.

  Not a likely scenario. Local partygoers would never leave the beach in this user- un friendly condition. Everyone in the county old enough to have a hormone in their body knew this beach—and this 122

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  sand in particular—was far better put to use in more recreational ways. No, whoever the killer was, he couldn’t have had any sentimental attachment to this location, defiling it the way he had. Wide arcs of rusty splatters tinted the pale sand. Blood-stained, shattered glass peppered the ground. A massive, uneven hunk of stone near the center of the clearing—also drenched with dried blood—half concealed the discarded corpse, like a pagan sacrificial altar, used and abandoned.

  Cam’s gaze slid to the kneeling deputy, trepidation slithering through his veins. Austin’s silver-streaked head bent to examine the area surrounding the body. With cautious, latex-covered hands—apparently oblivious that he’d gained an audience—Austin used the tip of a slim golden pen to lift the victim’s wrist a few inches from the ground. His brow puckered as he angled his head this way and that, scrutinizing the victim’s frozen, bloody fist.

  Cam’s gaze edged from the suspended wrist upward, over the thickly muscled, tattooed forearm to the bulky shoulder. His eyes widened as he identified the familiar tat, and the ratty plaid shirt.

  Stunned, he sucked in a sharp, horrified breath and staggered forward a few steps. The exposed and mangled, gaping chest cavity left Cam clutching at the nearest tree for support. The victims other broad, long-fingered hand lay open on the ground, palm up, gently cradling a silent heart.

  The bastard had left him sprawled on the beach like a half-carved Thanksgiving turkey.

  It took every ounce of Cam’s self-control not to howl in bewildered disbelief.

  A violent gash yawned beneath the victim’s chin, ear to ear, in a macabre smile. The victim’s features locked in eternal pain and shock. Garish red paint scrawled the word GLUTTONY across the 123

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  man’s forehead.

  He knew that face as well as he knew his own.

  He saw similar features in the mirror every morning as he shaved. He’d never forget the first time he’d seen this man’s face. Cam’s mother had set up their first contact, urging Cam to listen carefully…and to believe in the impossible. Yes, Cam knew this face.

  And he hated it.

  It was the face of Ed Whitlock, town drunkard…

  The face of Cam’s own biological father.

  A crackle and a snap from somewhere behind him swung his head about, but he couldn’t make his feet move, couldn’t release the tree, though his fingers were fast going numb, the bite of bark against his palm all but unnoticeable. Only by sheer determination did he manage to keep the instinctive snarl of warning locked deep in his chest.

  “Oh, Cam,” Jarvis muttered, stumbling over a gnarled hunk of tree root that didn’t seem to understand it belonged beneath the ground rather than above it. For being so athletic, the good doctor could be unnaturally clumsy sometimes. “I didn’t realize they’d called you already. Judy will be along shortly. She’s gathering some things from her car.” Tugging his medical coat free of a clinging branch, the doctor drew closer, hesitated. His alarmed gaze swept over Cam’s face. His brow creased. “Cam…are you all right? You look like…well, you…you don’t look so good.” That was the understatement of the century.

  Blood pounded in his ears, though his head felt vastly bereft of the warm oxygenated fluid. His stomach was oddly hollow, though nausea rolled. His knees had gone to jelly.

  Once he’d pushed beyond the shock, past the raw grief he couldn’t fathom, his mind locked onto and whirled around one inescapable fact. Ed was a Werewolf… had been a Werewolf. Although they 124

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  were not immortal, they were notoriously fast healers. There were few ways to kill one of his kind beyond the natural aging process. A severe trauma, say a slit throat for example—since the example was glaring him right in the eye—would temporarily incapacitate a Werewolf…provided he didn’t bleed out, a risky gamble that. If the trauma, however, were followed quickly enough by another lethal strike—say something like having his heart removed from his chest—death was a given.

  Jarvis wondered closer to Cam, mumbling beneath his breath, “Why slit the throat, and then cut out the heart—isn’t that overkill?” Cam bit his tongue, though the thought circled in his head like a swarm of angry bees, Not if the victim is a Werewolf. It wasn’t overkill…it was necessary.

&n
bsp; A sudden dawning crashed through him like a runaway freight train. The killer stalking Sutter Hollow knew the legacy…but was not one of his kind. Cam couldn’t scent him. If a human did this…knew how to kill one of his kind…then the killer had the potential to expose his pack. Cam’s own secrets weren’t safe anymore, in more ways than one. But why had the killer targeted these specific people? Ed and Lori were nothing to each other.

  What was the common thread here?

  “Cam?” The concern—both professional and personal—in Jarvis’s voice drew Cam back from the brink of panic.

  “Yeah, yeah,” Cam hedged. “I’m okay.” He could panic later. Right now he had a job to do. “C’mon.” Jarvis shot him a look rife with disbelief, but followed him into the clearing anyway. At the sound of their approach, Austin glanced up, and pushed to his feet. “Hey, Cam…not much of a day off, huh?” Ignoring Austin’s off the cuff remark, Cam 125

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  visually searched the rest of the empty beach. “Who found…the body?”

  “Noah Simpson and Tess Palmer. I took their statements and sent them on home with stern orders not to discuss the scene with anyone. Tess was in rough shape. I figured the best place for her to be was with her mama.”

  Cam stepped aside as Judy shuffled by with a large duffle bag slung over her shoulder. He would’ve liked the chance to speak to Noah and Tess himself, but what was done was done. He’d just have to track them down later.

  Jarvis snapped on a pair of gloves and stepped up to Ed’s body to begin the preliminary exam.

  Unable to watch, Cam turned away under the pretense of helping Judy remove crime scene equipment from the bag. Once Jarvis began with the body, Austin was in the way so he stepped aside as well. He crossed to the edge of the clearing to stand beside Cam.

  Dangling a broken, brown bottle between his thumb and forefinger, its ragged edges liberally coated with dried blood and little pieces of torn flesh, Austin announced, “Near as I can tell, this seems to be the murder weapon.”