High in Trial - By Donna Ball Page 0,38

because that would probably be the only warm-up either of us would have that day, assuming we even made it in time for our first run. As we reached the part of the field where other dogs had crossed, however, Cisco slowed down, taking his time to distinguish between older and more recent scent trails. I pulled out my phone and dialed Miles.

“You’re late,” he answered.

“Sorry.” I was still breathing hard from the run. “A slight delay.”

“Are you okay? You sound winded.”

“I am. The dog got away again.”

“Then you won’t mind if I eat your bear claw.”

“Miles,” I said, “you don’t have to stay. You should go back to your meeting. My schedule is all screwed up anyway and there’s no point in you coming out to the fairgrounds again today. You should go do your thing and I’ll see you tonight.”

“Are you trying to get rid of me?”

“Kind of. I feel bad about making you drive back this morning.”

We’d reached the far end of the field and Cisco, twenty feet ahead, plowed into the brush. Shielding my face against flapping branches with my arm, I gamely followed him.

“You didn’t make me do anything. But that does remind me. What’s the story with the random creep playing games?”

“Hold on,” I said.

“No chance. I’m not going anywhere until…”

I took the phone away from my ear and concentrated on keeping my balance as I struggled after Cisco through the piney woods and undergrowth. I thought I heard a scuffling in the distance and a movement in the undergrowth. I called out, just in case, “Marcie?” There was no reply, so I tried instead, “Flame! Here, girl!”

I heard a muffled voice from the phone in my hand and I spoke into it. “Seriously, Miles. Hold on. I think I’ve got her.”

He said something, but it was drowned out by the sound of Cisco’s sharp bark. The leash had gone slack in my hand.

“Weird,” I murmured. Cisco had been trained to sit and bark when he found his search object, but the search object was generally static—an injured victim or an inanimate object. A runaway border collie wasn’t the kind of target he would give the “find” signal for, unless… unless the dog was injured and unable to move. “Oh, no,” I said and started to run.

“Where are you?” Miles demanded. “I’m coming that way.”

My breath hissed and gasped into the receiver as I clambered over fallen saplings and broken rocks to where Cisco, half-disguised by the shadow of foliage, sat and barked again. I managed, “Wait, it’s okay.” And then I sucked in my breath, stumbling to a stop.

“Oh God,” I whispered.

“Raine? Raine, are you okay?”

I couldn’t answer. Cisco was sitting, as he’d been trained to do, looking anxious and alert beside Flame. Flame was lying down, head between her paws, staring fixedly at something half-concealed in the undergrowth. That something was a woman’s leg.

I moved slowly forward, one step and two, and then sank to my knees when they would no longer support me. For the longest time all I could do was stare at the Golden Retriever Club of America sweatshirt, streaked with blood and loamy earth, matted with crushed leaves. Gently, I reached forward and pushed a clump of tangled hair away from a face that was so swollen and disfigured it was barely recognizable. I felt for a pulse with shaking fingers but knew already it was pointless.

“Miles,” I said hoarsely, “hang up and call 9-1-1. It’s Marcie. I think… I think she’s dead.”

~*~

TWELVE

Five hours before the shooting

Buck stopped by the office at change of shift, as was his habit. Even on his rare Saturdays off—of which this was not one—he liked to get a report from the night shift and check for bulletins or updates that might have come in on the computer overnight. This time of year things were pretty quiet around the county; the kids were still in school and the tourists hadn’t started getting lost in the woods or running their cars off a cliff, and if anything major had happened while he was away someone would have called. Still, he liked to check.

“Four DUIs, two domestics, one B and E,” reported Ham Broker, his night Charge Officer.

“Turns out it was the complainant’s son, trying to sneak back into the house after curfew. Syd Evans ran his car into a tree over on Blue Moon Trail, but he’s okay. The man’s blind as a bat after dark. We’re going to have to do something before