Waking the Dead Part 1

WAKING THE DEAD.

by Kim Bahnsen.

For Carly, who already felt like a member of the family even before it became official. We love you!

Acknowledgments.

One of the most intriguing parts of writing a novel is the research that goes into it, and many people contributed to this book. First off, thanks are owed to Alan Mayer, for describing the cave you found on the face of Castle Rock. It turned out to be perfect for my villain's needs.

For all things bone related, much is owed to Alison Galloway, Ph.D., D-ABFA F-AAFS, and Laura C. Ful giniti, Ph.D., D-ABFA. Your information was as fascinating as it was appreciated!

Thanks to Bud Jillett for the details on the care and feeding of dermestid beetles. Your book was a big help, too!

A big thank you is owed to Wally Campbell, Laboratory Manager of the GBI-DOFS Coastal Regional Crime Lab in Savannah and Tammy Jergovich, Trace Evidence Section Manager, GBI, Division of Forensic Sciences, Decatur, Georgia, for your help regarding collection and a.n.a.lysis of trace evidence, comparison and reference samples, and infinite other nagging problems I sent your way. As usual, all mistakes are mine and mine alone.

A very special note of thanks goes to Kelcie and Guy Santiago for hauling me around to the Oregon caves and through the forest, and answering my endless questions. I had a blast! The area around McKenzie Bridge, Oregon, is one of the loveliest I've seen and is unlikely to house the sort of criminal activity found in this story. The beauty of writing fiction is the ability to change anything that doesn't fit into the plot. Hence some site names, directions, and distances between points, among other things, have been altered to suit the needs of the story.

Prologue.

The way through the forest was familiar, so the lack of a moon didn't bother him. With the aid of the flashlight he made his way surely, avoiding fallen logs and low-hanging branches from memory. The large bag he carried on his back added nearly another twenty pounds, but that didn't slow him either. His strength was as sure as his sense of direction.

He carried a shotgun in his free hand and a machete hung from his belt. Not because he expected trouble, but because he'd lived in and around the Oregon wilderness long enough to be prepared for it. There were elk, bears, and cougars in the forest. Any number of poisonous snakes. And sometimes there was danger of a two-legged variety. It didn't pay to leave anything to chance.

His Sweetie would say once he had an idea he implemented it with the precision of a storm trooper. But for a long time now, it'd been Sweetie with the ideas and he who carried them out. That was all right with him.

The path he took wasn't an easy one as there was no trail to where he was going. Just across his backyard and into the forest that fringed it. Walking miles through brambles, salal, and thickets of blackberry bushes. Over outcroppings of lichen-slicked rocks and down through a creek that changed from a trickle in the summer to a rushing torrent when the mountain snows melted in the spring. Then the real test would begin at the base of Castle Rock. He'd have to stow the flashlight and shotgun. Switch on the camper's light he wore over his Oregon Ducks cap. And climb eight hundred feet to his hidey-hole.

He always fasted for a couple weeks before he made this trek. The first time he'd found the chamber in the small cave on the face of Castle Rock had been over ten years ago. He'd bulked up since then. Each time he belly crawled through it there were a few bad moments when he'd get stuck and have to work himself loose. He wanted to make d.a.m.n sure he was able to do so.

But when he got close enough to see the lights, he slowed. Taking shelter behind the trunk of a large fir, he reached for the night vision binoculars he wore on a strap around his neck and held them up for closer observation. What he saw sent a jolt through him. Looked like he wasn't going to be making the climb tonight after all.

The place was flooded with cops.

There were spotlights illuminating the edge of Castle Rock like a rooftop at Christmastime. Plenty more at the base, shining upward. Dotting its face. His initial thought that the locals had busted a meth lab was quickly banished when he saw that some of the lights came from climbers hanging like spiders in front of his hidey-hole.

Well, f.u.c.k.

Sweetie might be the brainy one, but he was smart enough to figure out that his secret hiding place was no longer a secret.

As if to underscore that thought, one figure on a line leaned forward to the cave's mouth to grasp at something coming out of it. Something long and black. Something not so different from what he carried on his back right this moment.

He continued to watch as he pondered his options. He'd been busy with preparations for the last couple days and hadn't left his place. And Sweetie was on that trip with the kids, so there hadn't been any warning of the discovery, the news of which must be sweeping the area. Their dump site might have been found, but there was no way anything in it led back to them. They'd made sure of that.

He watched for a while longer, wishing he dared get closer. CSI was his favorite show. It was the worst kind of luck that he didn't dare hang around and watch the cops work. Not that the locals would be much to see. h.e.l.l, most of the deputies were d.i.c.kheads. With a force like that, Sheriff Andrews was going to be chasing her tail from now until doomsday.

Grinning, he lowered the binoculars and faded back into the forest. Nope, he had absolutely nothing to worry about.

Nothing except finding a new hiding place for the bag of bones he was carrying on his back.

Chapter 1.

Seven stainless steel gurneys were lined up in the morgue, each occupied by a partially a.s.sembled skeleton and a large garbage bag. The bones gleamed under the florescent lights. At the base of the last gurney was a heap of stray bones that had been found lying separately. Caitlin Fleming's first thought was that they looked forlorn. Deprived of their dignity, until they could be rejoined to form the remnant of the person they'd once belonged to.

Her second thought was that without the skulls, the chances of identifying those persons decreased dramatically.

"What do you think?" Sheriff Marin Andrews demanded. Her booted feet sounded heavily as she walked from one gurney to the next. "The bones were pretty much loose in the bags, but the medical examiner made an attempt to rea.s.semble them. We brought out the bones scattered on the bottom of the cave floor in a separate body bag. Recovery operation was a b.i.t.c.h, I'm telling you. The cave branches off from the original vein, gets wider and higher. Then it drops off to a steep chamber about seven feet down. These were probably dumped from above into that chamber." She must have caught Cait's wince, because she added, "We had an anthropologist from the university supervise the removal process."

Cait nodded. She was rarely brought onto a case in time to help process the crime scene. But that didn't stop her from questioning what might have been destroyed or overlooked in the recovery. "I'll want to see the cave."

Andrews's expression first revealed shock, then amus.e.m.e.nt. "Fortunately for you, that won't be necessary. It's on the face of Castle Rock and not easily accessible. Either you climb down from the top, or you scale upwards nearly eight hundred feet. There are trails, of course, but they could be tricky for an inexperienced climber. We don't need an injury on our hands before we even get started."

"I'm not inexperienced." Cait knew exactly what the sheriff saw when she looked at her. It was, after all, the appearance she'd cultivated for well over a decade. But her days on the runways of New York, Milan, and Paris were long behind her. She was as comfortable these days in a room exactly like this one as she was hiking in the Blue Ridge Mountains.

The other woman shrugged. She was probably about fifteen years Cait's senior. Her looks were nondescript. A st.u.r.dy build filling out a beige uniform. Close-cropped light brown hair and hazel eyes. But Cait knew better than anyone that appearances could be deceiving. Marin Andrews had a reputation for being an excellent, if ambitious cop. And that ambition, along with her father's millions, were rumored to be priming her for a chase to the governor's mansion.

Cait's help in solving this case would provide a stepping-stone to that end.

"Figured you'd want to see the area, anyway. That forest fire in the eastern Cascades has depleted the personnel at the forestry stations, but we've hired Zach Sharper to stay available during the course of the investigation. He's the outdoors guide who found the bodies. Said he was preparing for a client who wanted to spelunk some out-of-the-way caves, so Zach explored a few off the beaten path. Thought he'd discovered a new one when he stumbled on this." Andrews waved a hand at the skeletons. "He runs an outfitting company. Raft ing, kayaking, mountain climbing, hiking, that sort of thing." The a.s.sessing look in her eyes said better than words that she didn't believe Cait's a.s.sertion of her outdoor experience. "He's also on the search and rescue team when campers and hikers go missing. He's got some rough edges, but he's supposed to be the best in the state."

"I can handle rough edges." Cait walked around the gurneys to peer more closely at the nearly identical junctures where the skulls had been separated from each skeleton. She looked around then, spotted a magnifying loupe on a set of metal shelves in the corner, and retrieved it before continuing her examination.

"The guy from the university said it looked like a knife or saw was used to decapitate them."

Cait moved to another gurney to peer at the vertebra. "I'd say a saw. With luck I may be able to narrow the type down for you." Straightening, she scanned the remains lined up on the stainless steel tables. "You've got four men and three women, but I suspect the medical examiner told you that."

"He did. He also tried, and failed, to find a cause of death for any of them. But this thing is way out of his league and he knows it. He's a pathologist, not a forensic anthropologist. When I saw what we had here, I immediately thought of Raiker Forensics. Adam Raiker a.s.sures me you're the best in this field."

Cait used the loupe to take a close look at the femur of the second skeleton. The guy had suffered a fracture to it at some point in his life. It had knit cleanly, suggesting certain medical attention. "I am," she responded absently. She looked up then to arrow a look at Andrews. "My a.s.sistant will be arriving at dawn tomorrow with our equipment. Will this facility remain available to us?"

"It will. The building is less than a year old and state of the art." The look of satisfaction stamping the sheriff's face told Cait better than words that the other woman had been a driving force behind the new morgue. "Anything you need, talk to the Lane County medical examiner. His name is Steve Michaels. You'll have to meet him tomorrow." Cait followed the direction of the woman's gaze to the clock on the wall. Eight P.M. And she'd left home at six in the morning in order to catch her flight from Dulles. Weariness was edging in, warring with hunger.

"I've arranged two rooms for you and your a.s.sistant at the Landview Suites here in Eugene. You've rented a vehicle?"

"Picked it up at the airport." The compact SUV looked perfect for the ground she'd be covering in the course of this investigation. "I'd like all the maps you can provide for the area. Roads, forests, surrounding towns . . ." A thought struck her then and she looked at the other woman. "And thanks for arranging for the weapon permit so quickly." Raiker refused to let any of his consultants work without one.

Andrews lifted a shoulder. "Your boss made it clear that condition wasn't up for discussion. I doubt you'll need it. These bones may have been in that cave for decades. Even if foul play is determined, the unknown subject is probably long gone by now. The threat should be minimal."

"Maybe. Maybe not. It certainly doesn't take decades for a corpse to be reduced to a skeleton. In some climates it'd be a week if the body were left out in the elements. In Oregon it'd take several weeks or months, depending on where the body's dumped, the season, the temperature, insect and animal access. Maybe you're right and these bones have been there for that long. But not necessarily."

When she saw the satisfied gleam in the sheriff's eye, Cait knew she'd read the woman correctly. Whatever the outcome of this case, Andrews was going to use it to vault her political career. And solving a current crime spree would make for a lot better press than some old murders that had happened long ago.

But the woman only said, "I've got a copy of the case file for you in the car. You'll be reporting directly to me, but in the field you may be working with my lead detective, Mitch Barnes. You can meet him tomorrow, too."

Cait's attention had already returned to the skeletons. There was a lot of preparatory work to be done on them, but it would have to wait until tomorrow when Kristy arrived. Although she'd be supervising the lab work, these days Cait was an investigator first, a forensic anthropologist second. And she was anxious to get a look at the secondary scene.

"I'll want to get my a.s.sistant started first thing tomorrow morning. Have Barnes meet me here at nine and tell Sharper to stand by. We'll head up to . . ."

"Castle Rock," the other woman supplied.

". . . and he can show me how he happened to discover the remains of seven people." She shot a glance at the sheriff as they headed to the door. "How did Sharper react to the find? Is he pretty shaken up?"

Andrews gave a bark of laughter, real amus.e.m.e.nt showing in her expression. "Nothing shakes up Sharper, unless it's people wasting his time. He'll be steady enough, don't worry. But he won't win any congeniality contests."

Cait shrugged. "I don't need congenial. I'll be satisfied with competent."

Andrews led the way out of the morgue, the echo of her booted footsteps ringing hollowly. "I may need to remind you of those words after you meet him."

Her first stop had been an office supply store. The next was a fast food drive-through for a grilled chicken salad with definite wilting around the edges. Cait had eaten in between setting up her work area in the motel room. The crime scene photos were tacked to the white display boards sitting on top of the desk. A collection of labels, index cards, markers, and Post-it notes sat neatly at the base.

Now she sat on the bed leaning against the headboard, the contents of the fat accordion file folder scattered across her lap and on the mattress. The photographs from the cave chamber had been taken with a low-light lens, but they were still darker than she'd like. While she was able to easily make out the bags' proximity to one another, it was more difficult to read the plastic numbered evidence markers that had been set in front of each to tell which one was which.

There was a preliminary report from the ME, Steve Michaels, and it appeared to be solid work. Measurements of each set of bones were included, as was a thorough examination for evidence of trauma. None of the skeletons showed recent signs of injury. Perhaps the missing skulls would. Or maybe the deaths were the result of poison. Cait narrowed her eyes, considering. She found herself hoping for the victims' sakes that the decapitation had been enacted posthumously.

Had the skulls been removed to impede identification of the victims? To prevent investigators from detecting the method of death? Or were they kept by the perp as trophies?

Taking a look at her watch, Cait began gathering up the materials and replacing them in the file. But it occurred to her that if she could answer those questions, she'd be a long way toward profiling the UNSUB they were searching for.

Kristy Jensen was a full foot shorter than Cait at four-eleven, a wispy ethereal creature with an otherworldly air. Slap a pair of wings on her, and with her elfin features and blonde wavy hair, she'd looked like a fairy in a kid's story-book.

Once she opened her mouth, however, that notion would be dispelled forever.

"There is no f.u.c.king good way to get to this f.u.c.k dump of a town, you know that, don't you?" Kristy sipped at her Star-bucks coffee and aimed a gimlet stare over the rim from cornflower blue eyes. "Charter plane, my a.s.s. Eight f.u.c.king hours it took me from Dulles. I could have walked faster. I could have parachuted half way here, hitched a ride on a mother-f.u.c.king migrating duck and still gotten here before that d.a.m.n plane."

"So the plane ride was good?" Cait laughed as her diminutive friend gave her the finger as they entered the morgue. "And you owe me four bucks. I'm giving you a pa.s.s on the 'd.a.m.n,' and the one-finger salute because at least that's silent."

"We aren't even on the clock yet," Kristy complained. But she was already digging in her purse to pull out the money. "I think we should change the rules so it only counts during work time."

"Tough love." Cait s.n.a.t.c.hed the five from the woman's hand and dug in her purse until she found a one for change. "You wanted help cleaning up your language. Can't change the rules midcourse."

"Why not? Nothing else has changed, except for my disposable income. I'm still swearing like a one-legged sailor."

They showed their temporary ID to the clerk at the front desk and headed down the long hallway to the room where Andrews had brought Cait the evening before.

"Discipline," she chided. But there was no heat to the word. She could care less whether or not Kristy swore like a seasoned dock worker, as long as she did her job to Cait's exact specifications. And since Kristy was the best tech she'd ever been a.s.signed, Cait was satisfied. "Anyway you'll cheer up quick enough once you see what we have to work with." She paused in front of the door at the end of the hall before opening it with a dramatic flourish.

"Sweeeeet," Kristy breathed, when she got a glimpse of the remains on the gurneys. "What do we have, ma.s.s burial? Ma.s.s murder," she corrected as she got closer and noted the lack of human skulls attached.

"I suppose we have to allow for the possibility that someone stumbled upon that cave long before the guide did," mused Cait. The thought had occurred belatedly, once she'd gone to bed, her mind still filled with the contents of the files. "Someone with a sense of the macabre who took the skulls as souvenirs."

Kristy was practically salivating as she walked between each gurney. "So I'll double-check them, right? Make sure the right parts are with the proper skeleton?"

"I want you to start a photograph log first," Cait corrected. "I need a notebook kept of images of each skeleton throughout each step of the process." It would be easier to correct mistakes that way, especially in the tricky process of rea.s.sembling the full remains of each, which was often a matter of trial and error. "The ME should be around somewhere. Get him to give you a copy of the measurements he's done." She'd left her copy in her case file back at the motel.

"But you'll want me to do my own."

Cait sent her a look of approval. "I doubt he had a caliper to do the measurements with. Then you can ensure each bone is with the right remains." And when Kristy was done, Cait would go over them carefully again, just to be certain. "We've got a.s.sorted bones on the last gurney that will have to be matched, as well. Then we'll see exactly what we've got here."

"What should I do in my spare time?" But her sarcasm was checked. Kristy was hooked by the enormity of their task, just as Cait was. Antic.i.p.ation was all but radiating off her.

"I heard voices." At the sound of the newcomer the women turned toward the door. The man approaching them was average height, with hair as dark as Cait's. He wore blue scrubs, shoe covers, and a slight smile that faded as he got closer. Then his face took on that slightly stunned expression that was all too familiar. He stared from Cait to Kristy and back again, with the look of a starving man surrounded by a steaming banquet. "Ah . . . Michaels." He held out his hand to each of them in turn, visibly wrestling to get the words out in proper order. "Steve. I am, that is."

He looked chagrined, but Cait spared him no slack. "Well, Michaels Steve, I'm Cait Fleming." She jerked a thumb at the other woman. "My a.s.sistant, Kristy Jensen. I've got your preliminary report. Appreciate it. Kristy will be working down here most of the time. I've been a.s.sured that whatever she needs, she can come to you."

While she spoke the man seemed to have regained his powers of speech. But twin flags of color rode high on his cheeks and his dark eyes still looked dazed. "Certainly." He dragged his gaze away from Cait and fixed it on Kristy. "Certainly," he repeated.

"Then I'll leave you to get started." She didn't know if Barnes would be here yet, but she wasn't anxious to spend any more time with the ME who looked like he'd just cast them in a low-budget p.o.r.n fantasy involving a threesome and a stainless steel coroner's station. She started out of the room, throwing a look at Kristy over her shoulder. "Keep me posted."

As she headed through the door she heard her a.s.sistant say sweetly, "So Michaels Steve, why don't we go out to the truck and you can help unload the mother-f.u.c.king equipment."

A smirk on her lips, Cait decided to let it slide. Nothing was more guaranteed to shatter a guy's X-rated fantasy than a pint-sized angelic blonde with a mouth like a sewage plant. She almost felt sorry for him. Would have if she weren't still annoyed at his all too common reaction. As it was, she figured he was going to get exactly what he deserved working with Kristy.

When she stepped out of the morgue doors she saw the Lane County sheriff patrol car pulling up to the curb a full fifteen minutes early. Her good humor restored, Cait rounded it to approach the driver's door. A stocky deputy got out, extended his hand. "Mitch Barnes, Ms. Fleming."

Belatedly, Cait realized she was still wearing the morgue temporary ID. She s.n.a.t.c.hed it off with one hand and she offered him the other. "Looking forward to working with you, Mitch."

The man came to her chin, had receding blond hair and brown eyes that were pure cop. And it'd been her ID that drew his attention rather than her face or figure. She liked him immediately for that fact alone.

"Sheriff says you want to head up toward McKenzie Bridge. Over to Castle Rock."

She nodded as she dropped her ID into her purse. "I'd like a look at the dump site. Get a feel for it."

"You got the pictures?"

Understanding what he was getting at, she nodded. "Still want to see it."

Shrugging, he leaned into his front seat only to withdraw a moment later with an armful of maps. "Andrews said you asked for these."

"I did, thanks." She took the stack from him. "If you want to lead the way up to the McKenzie Bridge area, I'll follow this time. That way you don't have to wait around while I go through the cave if you don't want to."

"Sounds good. It's about a forty-five minute drive. I'll call Sharper on the way and let him know we're coming by." A smirk flashed across the man's otherwise professional de meanor. "He'll be thrilled to take you to the cave."