The Nymph's Curse: The Collection (32 page)

Dane spun around to face his brother. “We’ll leave in a second, but first I came up here to let you know that we found Angela’s body. She was found along the deserted logging road to the north.”

“No … ” Zeb seemed to weaken and he stepped back. “You’ve got to be wrong. She’s got to be fine. I just saw her … a couple of weeks ago.” His face paled.

“I have a few questions for you. I’m going to need to take you back to the crime lab for you to identify the body.”

Zeb ran his finger around his mouth, clearing away a piece of stringy brown chew that had escaped. “You know her as well as I do. You identify her.”

Was Zeb being shifty because he was upset about Angela’s death, or was he trying to avoid seeing her — avoiding some level of guilt?

“Is there a reason you don’t want to come see her?”

“Look — I didn’t have anything to do with her death.” Zeb’s eyes darkened and his cheeks seemed to take on a faint green hue. His lip pulled tight over the lump of chew in his mouth. “You know as well as I do that I loved that damned woman — for the good and the bad. I just wanted her to quit drinking. She said she was going to get cleaned up. Then she was coming back. I thought she meant she was going to some rehab clinic.”

“She didn’t make it to rehab.”

“Son of a bitch.” Zeb ran his hand along the brim of his cowboy hat. “What did she get herself into?”

“That’s what I need to talk to you about. Do you know of any reason that someone would want her dead?” He pushed open the little pad of paper that he still held in his hand. The edges were rippled from the sweat of his palm.

He grabbed a pen from his pocket and clicked it open.

Zeb stared down at his pad of paper and pen with a look of annoyance, like Dane was out-of-line for telling him about her death, then hitting him up for suspects. But whether he liked it or not, it was part of Dane’s job. Zeb was either going to comply now or Dane would be forced to bring him in for questioning.

He readied himself for the crap that would undoubtedly spill from his brother as he played his normal, manipulative power-play.

“I don’t know. She’d been out a lot with her girlfriends. She’d been going to the bars.”

“Any one in particular?”

“She’d been going down to a bar called Del’s.”

“How often was she going down there? About every night? Once a week?”

Aura stuffed her phone back in her purse and shoved her arms over her chest as she inspected Zeb. She looked every part as a cop. If only she could keep her emotions in check, she’d make one hell of a deputy.

Zeb looked up at the sky and let out a cloud as he exhaled. He brought his chin down. “I don’t know. Probably about every night. You know the work at the ranch, Dane. I don’t have time to babysit Angela.”

His words rang false. When Dane had been married to Angela, a fair amount of his time had been spent following her around, trying to get her to come back home. The last time had been when he’d found her in the arms of Zeb. From that day on, the problem of Angela had fallen into his brother’s lap.

“Well, you’re done babysitting her.” He turned to the car and then looked back over his shoulder at the wolf standing at the front of his den. “And don’t worry about identifying her … I’ll take care of it. I’d hate to make you go out of your way for your
wife
.”

The black and white sheriff’s car pulled up next to Aura in the Montana State Crime Lab parking lot. It had been a long ride from Somers to Missoula, but it had given her plenty of time to think — and to form a plan. She would glean whatever information she could from the crime lab then she’d go after Natalie — on her own if she had to. She’d wasted too much time already.

Dane tapped on her window. She looked up as he opened the door.

For a moment she was back lying on the ground, him on top of her in the Diamond’s pasture, and the frosty tendrils of grass rubbing against her lust-warmed face. He was looking at her with a sparkle of want in his eyes. His body was hard against her as she slowly raised her hips, seducing, needing, wanting him to be against her. Like the men she’d seduced in her past, she had seen the sexually starved way his body disobeyed his mind as he’d driven hard against her. There was emotion within him, somewhere deep, somewhere hidden, somewhere that she may never have the chance to experience again.

Stop. I can’t think of him like this. I have to focus on Natalie. She needs me. I can’t have … love.

“You know you didn’t have to come down here, Aura. I called in a favor to get in before the results are finalized — they may not have anything of use to find Natalie.”

His words pulled her from her fantasy. “Hello to you too, Dane. It’s nice to see you. Yes, my trip was fine.” Her words took on the finely sharpened edge of a well-honed knife.

He looked at her and frowned. “Yeah, sorry …
Hi.”

“Hi.” She smiled, lips tight. “There was no way you were going to keep me from coming down here. If there is something on that phone I need to know about it. I need to know who she called besides me.”

“I get it, Aura. I get what you are trying to do — saving your sister and all. But this isn’t just about her. This isn’t just about those women. There is something more going on and we need to get to the bottom of it.”

Aura grabbed her purse from the seat beside her. “That’s exactly what I’m trying to do.”
And while I’m at it, I’m going to find my sister.

“I don’t know what happens down in Arizona, or what your judgments are about law enforcement in Montana — but even here we don’t believe in vigilante justice. You can’t go out on your own to find your sister. You are welcome to work with me, but I can’t have you contaminating any more crime scenes or messing up my investigation.”

“I won’t mess up your investigation.” That was the last thing she’d want — to put Natalie’s life even further into danger.

“It’s not just about the investigation — you can’t go running around hunting down the people who did this. If you get hurt — ”

“You’d have more paperwork to do … I know.” Aura stepped out of her pickup and slammed the door.

“Stop, Aura. You know that’s not what I meant.” Dane’s hand moved instinctively to his waist, where his utility belt normally rested. Instead he was wearing what she assumed to be his every day wear — crisply ironed blue jeans and a collared maroon, silver, and white University of Montana polo shirt.

If she hadn’t been so damned irritated with him, he would have looked … She glanced back at him. No, he
was
strikingly handsome.

“I don’t care what you meant,” she lied. Her heels pounded on the ground as she made her way to the front door of the unassuming brown county building. “Let’s go.”

The putrid odor of death twisted around the refrigerated crime lab, assaulting her nostrils and clinging to her like an unwelcome spirit. She wanted to run. To get out of this place and away from the defiling stink that permeated her clothing and hair.

Aura clutched her purse tight. This was for Natalie and to find out exactly what was on that purple phone that flaunted its god-awful cheeriness. She needed to find out for herself exactly what she was going to be dealing with.

Dane touched the door that read
Authorized Personnel Only
, which led to the main lab, then stopped. He turned back and looked at her. “You can’t come in here. You’ll have to wait in the lobby.”

It had been a long night envisioning Angela’s little black horse tattoo — and the way it matched her own. Every time she’d thought she was close to sleep, she’d close her eyes only to fall into whirling dreams of whipping snow and zigzagging snowshoe hares — all leading to the dead face of Natalie.

She wouldn’t leave without the answers she needed — that her sister was still alive — and that those cruel visions had only been figments of an overactive and stressed imagination.

“I’m coming into the lab with you.”

“Dr. Redbird won’t allow it. She’s — ”

“I’m
coming with you
. Tell her I’m a trainee or something. I don’t care.” She stepped next to him.

He opened his mouth to retort, but for a second she let him stare at her. Nothing he could say would stop her.

She pushed the cold metal door. It swung open lightly as if it was used to having regular newcomers to the halls of the morgue.

“Fine. Stay quiet.” Dane stepped in front of her and led the way down the sterile glaring-white hallway.

On their left was a stairwell. Next to it on the wall was a framed placard which listed the departments within the crime lab and the floors where they could be found. She read down from the top:

Floor three: Photography Section, Evidence Storage Section, Identification Section.

Floor two: Firearms Section, Instrument Section.

Floor one: Chemistry Section, General Examination Section, Main Offices.

The elevator dinged on the other side of the hall and she sped up, catching up to Dane who was three steps ahead.

They walked past a door that read
Toxicology Lab
. Inside was machine after machine, each standing as stoic reminders of the hundreds of cases that the lab had on their hands. The pit in the bottom of her stomach grew. There were so many stories out there that ended here at this office-like center of death and possible answers.

Their footsteps echoed off the tiles as they made their way to the end of the hall and the door that read
Autopsy Suite
— like it was some kind of hotel for the dead. Chills ran down her spine.

Dane peered into the small bulletproof window of the door. He gave a curt nod to someone inside, then looked back at Aura. “Are you sure you wanna do this?”

She swallowed back the sour flavor in her mouth.

He opened the door and she followed him inside. At the far end of the room a small inconspicuous brunette woman hunched over, poking at a pale hand that sat lifeless on the cold-looking steel. Dane cleared his throat. She looked up from her work. Her face was covered by a plastic shield and mask, perfectly matching her blue paper gown and slippers that protected her from the foul contents that came with rotting flesh.

“Dr. Redbird, we’re sorry to interrupt your work. I just wanted to come by and see what you’ve found from the bodies. I know it’s only been a day since you got them, but is there any information you’ve gathered? Any evidence of what exactly we’ve got on our hands?”

“Hello, Deputy Burke.” The mousy woman sat down the little set of scissors and stepped back from the hand. “Long time no see. I’m glad you made the trip — I found some really interesting peculiarities that might be useful in your investigation.” She smiled warmly to Dane, then her gaze flashed to Aura and her smile disappeared. “Who’s your friend, Dane?”

Aura mentally cringed at the overly friendly way the woman said his name — like she was marking him as hers, and not to be touched.

“This is a friend of mine, Aura Montgarten. She’s from a department out of Arizona. Hope you don’t mind. She’s aiding in the investigation.” The lie flew from his lips with the practiced grace of a Las Vegas magician.

“Pleasure.” The doctor pulled at the edges of her gloves and pulled them off, inside out. “Well, we haven’t finished up with the toxicology reports or the DNA analysis, but as luck has it for you, we haven’t been too busy this week and I could get right to the post-mortem examination.”

Yes, it was a lucky day when there were fewer dead bodies.

“Find anything interesting?” Dane’s voice took on a softer edge.

The medical examiner removed her plastic face shield, revealing a young twenty-something woman — far from the mousy woman Aura had first judged the woman to be. “It’s my belief that we’re most likely dealing with a homicide, as your notes seemed to assume from the crime scene. However, there were a few peculiarities.” The woman nodded, making her full ponytail bounce to life.

A tingle of jealousy swept through Aura as she noticed the way the doctor seemed to focus on the small, almost imperceptible, cleft at the center of Dane’s chiseled jaw.

“On both victims we found traces of the tarp as well as some interesting non-human type hair.”

“Do you know what type of hair it was? Canine?”

A lump formed in Aura’s throat as she remembered the little square of tissue that rested in the pocket of yesterday’s jeans. The hair wouldn’t be canine — or truly equine either.

The woman walked to the far side of the room to a stainless steel lab table where a bag lay. Inside were a few strands of long, black hairs. She lifted up the bag to the light.

“It appears to be the coarse hair from a horse’s tail, but under the microscope the cuticle, or the scaly exterior of the hair, seems to be rougher than that of something of an equine source. It seems almost human-ish.” She squinted at the hair as if it would magically somehow make sense if she just stared a little while longer. “If I hadn’t gotten the whole strand along with the follicle, I would have thought it possible that it was a woman’s hair.”

Aura smiled but kept her mouth shut.

Dane pulled out his little notepad that he seemed to always have on hand. He jotted down a few notes as the woman twisted the bag in her fingers.

Aura peeked over and noticed he had written
Possibly brought in by horse?

The doctor twisted the bag in her fingers as if she was trying to make sense of the anomaly. “Also, Angela had wounds on her back which were at the initial stages of healing at the time of her death that look similar to the burn marks on her disarticulated hand.”

“What kind of wounds?”

The doctor glanced over at Dane. “They look like possible rope burns, but it’s hard to say.”

“What about the tarp?” Dane asked, not looking up from his paper.

“Well, from what I can tell the tarp is just the standard everyday blue tarp you can buy at any big box store. I don’t know how helpful it’s going to be in nailing down a perpetrator.” She sat the bag back down. “Did you have a chance to examine the bodies before they came in?”

Dane coughed lightly as if the question made him uncomfortable.