The only sounds were their huffing breaths and the crunching of snow under their boots. Spencer was carrying a flashlight and turned it on every once in a while to help them see. The moon was out tonight, bright and silver-white in the distance and nearly full. No snow was falling. The clouds had recessed away to slumber, which meant it was bitterly cold. At the house, the thermometer outside read twenty-one degrees. It had undeniably been much colder than that this winter, but coming out of a warm house, a warmer bed made it feel like negative ten.
“This way,” Spencer whispered after about two miles.
He led them into the woods, and Tristan could clearly see the tracks they must’ve made yesterday when they’d come through here hauling his body on a stretcher, which Spencer told him they did. They’d taken four-wheelers, one pulling the small wagon, and stopped where he’d left them to search on his own without the horse. Luckily, his friend and Gyles had some experience tracking, or else he probably would’ve lain there all night until hypothermia had kicked in and killed him. It was strange because he felt fine now. Maybe it was just survival mechanisms his brain was using because he didn’t have time to sit around feeling sorry for himself.
Tristan wasn’t sorry, either. He was downright pissed off. This asshole had better clear out of their county because Tristan’s new goal in life was to find and kill him.
After walking about a mile through the woods, the path easy to follow from being trampled down by so many people who’d been on the search and rescue mission, they came to the spot above the river where he’d been clubbed. That same, nearly uprooted tree was still there. He spotted blood on the white snow at the base of the tree, probably his, where he must’ve slumped.
“This way,” Spencer told them. “I came from down there towards this spot. I thought maybe you’d fallen in the river, so I’d gone down to search, but not from here. It’s too steep.”
Following Spencer, they shuffled down another path, one not so well-worn, each sliding here and there in the deep snow. When they came to the bottom of the steep hill, they found a grassy, muddy bank where they could all three stand. The snow blanketed the ground, but where the water lapped at the sides of the bank, the grass and mud showed through. The terrain was not easy to navigate.
“There,” Spencer said and turned on his flashlight. “She’s over there.”
Tristan took the flashlight and said, “Stay here with Kai.”
He didn’t wait for an answer but climbed through the thickets, accidentally stepping off a few times into the water. His boots were supposed to be waterproof, but Tristan could feel icy water trickling down his left ankle because he’d gone in too deep. Nothing was going to stop that.
Inching closer, he squatted when he came to the body of the woman floating face down. He’d been right on his first assumption last night when he thought he’d seen a woman. It was a woman, and she was caught up in the branches and limbs of a fallen tree and marshy grass-like weeds.
Tristan grunted as he dragged her body closer to the edge and rolled her over. He had to see if she’d been murdered or if she was just a night crawler that had fallen in and drowned. They’d seen that before; night crawlers that had done themselves in by accidental means like injuries, drowning, even burned alive.
Squatting in the muddy bankside, he shined the flashlight’s beam at her face and discovered bluish veins standing out against her white skin. She was bloated from the water. One of her eyes was open and a pale grayish color. He wasn’t a forensic analyst, but he knew there were certain things that just being in the water did to a dead body. Tristan wasn’t sure if what he was seeing was from being murdered or from the time she’d spent in the water.
Studying her face and appearance, he was pretty sure she hadn’t been infected, nor was he concerned about contracting it from her if she’d been ill. She didn’t have bloodshot eyes. There were no signs of malnutrition or the general, raggedy appearance of a crawler. She was wearing a long skirt, boots in good condition, a sweater, scarf, and hat. Her clothing did not appear tattered or dirty other than from being in the river.
Tristan slipped again and got his foot wetter. Then he tugged at her scarf until he could remove it from her neck enough to see. His hands were getting soaked even through his leather gloves, but he didn’t care. He had to know. The second he had her neck revealed and displayed under the gray haze of his flashlight, Tristan knew the same man had killed this woman. The dark bruising marks around her neck were clearly, distinguishable handprints. She looked to be in her thirties and had been pretty. Now she was not. She was a dead woman, murdered, and left in this icy grave like some unwanted trash.
He let her go, unable to hold onto her longer or fish her out all the way by himself. If she was still here in the morning, they’d pull her body from the water and bury her properly. He did not know her, doubted the others did, either, but she didn’t deserve this funeral. Maybe they’d take a few trips around the area and see if she’d been with a group of people who were probably looking for her. She could be anyone. Or no one. A person just passing through or a person from the area. Whoever she was, she didn’t deserve this. No woman did.
As he traversed the slick bank back to his friends, he slipped again and ended up with his
