Saving Amber - Zoe Dawson Page 0,14
was deeper up here but had been packed down by a lot of feet. The whirling blades of the helicopter slowed, the engines making a whining noise as the blades stopped spinning and the engines shut down.
She followed Tristan, who moved steadily through the snow. They followed a trail to the site. A tent cover had been set over the spot where Tristan had found Connelly’s body. Garza and Mendez stood away from the site as Tristan lifted the tent flaps and exposed the scene. Amber walked closer. There was displaced snow on either side of his resting place, discolored with Connelly’s blood. She pulled a small camera out of her pocket and started to snap some pictures.
“There’s not a whole lot of blood,” she murmured.
“Most likely due to the cold. Doc said it would be difficult to determine the time of death. It was twenty below and that kind of cold would constrict his veins and he would bleed very little,” Mendez said.
“Which way was his head positioned?”
“Horizontal to the mountain.”
“Parallel?” she asked, looking over her shoulder at Tristan. Something wasn’t sitting right with her, and when she had that feeling, she rarely ignored it. “He was on his back?”
“Yes.”
She stood and stared at the spot.
“Looks like the kid got caught in the path of sniper fire from one of his fellow classmates,” Garza said.
“Unlikely,” Amber said.
“How’s that?”
“No exit wound, Deputy.” She looked at him and he still had the placid calmness around him that grated on her nerves. “Sergeant, sniper rifles use a full metal jacket, correct?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“The bullet at that velocity would most likely penetrate and exit the body, correct?”
“Yes, ma’am.
“Look at you,” Garza said, his brows lifted. “You know your sniper rounds.”
“I was in the Navy, JAG Corps. Learned a lot from my trials.” Dread filtered through her. This was looking even less like friendly fire to her and more like something…else.
“JAG, huh? A lawyer, too. You’re a versatile woman. Hopefully, the autopsy will shed some light.”
The wind came whipping up and her breath blew hot, steaming the air. She rubbed at her forehead and Tristan stepped up to her. “Do you have a headache?”
She looked at him blankly.
“Amber, do you have a headache?”
The sound of her name in his deep voice sent a spiral of reaction all the way to the pit of her stomach and it released a slew of butterflies. With the cap on his head, it hit her how really handsome he was. His eyes so darn blue and…full of concern. He might act like a tough guy, but there was a soft center in there.
“No. I was just thinking.”
He looked up at the sky and took her arm. “There’s another storm coming. We need to go. Getting caught on this mountain in a blizzard is not a good idea. The temperature is already starting to fall.”
She nodded and waited while they secured the scene.
Tristan rolled down the flaps of the tent and staked them into the ground. “That’s about all we can do. Time to go.”
The whole trip back she was quiet, her brain going a mile a minute. After they landed and Tristan dropped Garza and Mendez back to the PD, it was late afternoon.
“I’m starving,” she said.
“We can grab a bite at the chow hall.”
She nodded.
Inside the busy and crowded chow hall, after they got their food, Tristan said, “Something is bothering you.”
“There are a couple things that aren’t adding up for me.”
“Okay, what are they?”
“If snipers only use full metal jackets—”
“That bullet should have gone right through Connelly with about the same size hole as it went in,” Tristan said grimly.
“But no exit wound.”
“I said as much to Jacobs and that’s why he wanted NCIS involved instead of leaving it up to the PD and sheriff’s department.”
“Exactly.”
His response only confirmed her worry that Connelly wasn’t killed by someone in the sniper classes.
“The other thing is he was shot in the back. Was there any evidence that he rolled?”
“I didn’t see any, but it snowed pretty heavily during the day and into the night.”
“So, it’s possible?”
“Yes, it is.”
“Where was he for forty-eight hours and how did he end up on that mountain if he intended to go AWOL?”
“Again, I don’t have an answer. It’s been bothering me, too.”
“I know. It’s something we’ll have to figure out.”
“We’ll wait for the autopsy.”
“I’d like to interview the men in your class.”
He bristled. “Why? We just established that it wasn’t my class that killed him.”
“I have to interview them, and I should also