window to the cracked rubber of the windshield wipers where the water formed two small pools. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Gordon shift in his seat, heard him pick up the set of keys from the seat between them. He opened his door, got out, and made a dash for the house. She waited a few moments, until he had unlocked the front door of the house, and then followed him. By the time she reached the porch, it was raining heavily, huge hail-sized drops pelting the broad leaves of the oak tree next to the door and causing the loose gravel of the drive to skitter about with noisy click-clacks.
Inside, the house had retained the morning heat despite the cold rain outside. It seemed stuffy, uncomfortable, and Marina went around the house opening all of the windows to let in the cool water-freshened air. Gordon put his keys on the kitchen counter then moved to the front doorway, where he stood looking out through the screen. The thick monsoon clouds formed a wet ceiling above the forest, blocking out even a partial view of the Rim. 'Damn,' he said.
Marina finished opening the windows in the back of the house and returned to the living room. 'What?' she said.
Gordon tried to smile for her sake. 'I said 'At least it's cool.'' She stood next to him and put her arm around his waist, snuggling into the crook under his arm. She looked with him out the screen door toward the forest. Her eyes brimmed with tears, but she did not allow him to see them. The tears flowed freely down her cheeks. 'Yes,' she said softly. 'At least it's cool.'
Jim Weldon slept for ten hours straight--a record for him--and for the first time in almost a month his sleep remained undisturbed by nightmares. He was exhausted; his body and brain were just too damned tired to allow him to dream, and he lay on the bed unmoving from four in the morning until two in the afternoon.
He had never had a day like this before.
The morning had dawned clear and hot like any other, and he'd gotten to the office by eight. He'd expected a few minor complaints, maybe some drunks or speeders, then an afternoon of paper shuffling and serious rest. But Tim Larson had called less than an hour later with news of the vandalized Episcopal church, and by noon the investigation had spread to include the mysterious disappearance of the Selway family and the series of goat mutilations, which apparently stretched all the way from the Green River Ranch south of town to Bill Heard's place up on the Rim. The bodies of Loren Wilbanks and Clay Henry, or what was left of their bodies (connected somehow with the goat mutilations?), had been discovered by a neighboring rancher late in the afternoon, and by the time they had dusted for prints, taken the pictures, examined the house and carted off the bodies six hours later, the other five churches in Randall had been vandalized. Although the desecration of these churches had to have taken place between six and ten p.m.'
none of the nearby residents had seen or heard a thing, and they'd had to spend another four hours sifting through the piles of broken glass and combing every inch of each church, trying to gather what clues they could. Judson Weiss and Pete King were working night shift, and when Jim's brain finally became too tired to function properly, he left everything in their hands and went home to get some much needed sleep.
He'd been up for almost twenty-four hours.
Jim had prayed before falling asleep that somehow, miraculously, Judson and Pete would solve everything in his absence and that the two murders, the disappearances, the vandalism, and the livestock mutilations would all be neatly tied up into one package and written into a typed, double-spaced report that would be placed on his desk for him to read and sign.
No such luck.
A call to the station upon waking revealed that no progress had been made in any of the cases. There were still no leads and nothing to go on.
He hung up the phone, feeling a headache coming on. A bad one. He massaged his temples with his fingers, feeling the rhythmic pounding of blood beneath the thin layer of skin. He just wasn't cut out for this shit. This was for the big-city cops and the motion-picture sheriffs, not him. Already he felt way out of his league, and he wondered vaguely if he shouldn't call for some help on this.
But who would he call?
He pulled on a robe and lumbered into the bathroom, his bare feet sticking to the green tile floor as he walked. He pulled back the shower curtain and turned on the water in the shower, adjusting the two faucets by feel. Why the hell had he been born in Randall instead of one of the hundreds of other small towns scattered throughout Northern Arizona? Why wasn't he sheriff in Sedona or Heber? He climbed into the shower, wincing as the water hit his skin. This was going to make national news for sure--if not television then at least the wire services. People were going to be watching him closely. He'd better not fuck it up.
A note on the refrigerator said that Justin andSuzonne were at the movies with Ralph Pittman and his mother. A second note, held up by a TweetyBird magnet, told him that Annette was at the grocery store. Jim left his own note in reply and grabbed a donut before taking off. He said in the note that he'd be back for dinner, but he knew that was probably just wishful thinking. In all likelihood he'd be coming home late. He had a feeling there were going to be a lot of missed meals over the next couple of weeks.
The child was waiting in his office when he arrived.
The sight threw him for a second, but he did not let the surprise register on his face. He threw his hat on the rack next to his desk, as always, and sat down. CarlChmura was sitting next to the boy on the low vinyl couch against the far wall, and he stood up when Jim entered the room. 'Howdy, Sheriff.'
'What's up, Carl?'
The deputy walked across the carpeted floor toward the sheriff and nodded his head toward the boy. 'This kid here came in around noon today, maybe a little earlier. Said he had something important to tell you. He wouldn't talk to anyone else. I told him you probably wouldn't be coming in for a while, but he wanted to wait. Said it was real important.'
Jim looked at the boy. He was small and pale and couldn't have been more than eleven or twelve. He looked as though he had not been out of the house all summer. He was wearing an ill-fitting shirt that looked like it had probably been his father's or grandfather's and a pair of ripped Levi's faded almost white. His hair was thin and greasy and too long, and it curled around his shoulders in matted tangles. He was clenching and unclenching his hands nervously.
But it was the boy's face that captured his attention.
His face was filled with fear.
Jim stood up and smiled kindly at the boy, not wishing to frighten or intimidate him. 'What's your name, son?'
'Don Wilson.' The boy's voice was timid and uncertain.
Jim motioned Carl to the door with his eyes. 'Thanks a lot, Carl.
I'll call you if I need you.' The deputy nodded, understanding, and closed the door behind him as he left.
Jim sat on the corner edge of the desk facing the boy. He put on his all-purpose concerned-father expression and bent forward, placing his hands on his knees. 'So, Don,' he said. 'What did you want to talk to me about?' The boy's frightened face looked first toward the door then toward the window--in human approximation of a cornered rabbit checking out its options for escape. He looked immediately sorry that he'd come, and Jim thought for a second he was going to bolt. The sheriff smiled understandingly. 'It's okay, Don,' he said. 'You can talk to me.'
'I know where the Selways are!' the boy blurted out. 'I know how to find their bodies!'
Jim's smile of patient understanding froze on his face. He stared at the pale scared youth before him, his mouth suddenly dry, his hands holding on to his knees with a vice like grip. Adrenaline flushed into his system.
Their bodies.
Jim snapped his head toward the door, his sheriff's instinct taking over. 'Carl!' he called. 'Carl!'
The deputy rushed in instantly. His head did a one-eighty as he quickly scanned the room. His eyes stopped on Jim, baffled, but Jim had already turned back toward the boy. 'Why the hell didn't you say something about this earlier? Why didn't you tell DeputyChmura ?'
The boy was still cowering, and under the sheriff's verbal onslaught he appeared to almost visibly shrink, but he held his ground. 'I can only tell you,' he said. His voice was scared, shaky.
'Where are they?' Jim demanded.
The boy looked from the sheriff to the deputy and shook his head.
'All right!' Jim yelled. 'Carl, get out of here for a minute!' The deputy retreated, confused, and closed the door
