“I’m going to have to sit down with you and have you give me a list of the shifters you’re aware of,” I said.
“I can do that.” She suddenly lifted her flashlight and pointed it ten feet in front of us. “There he is.”
We both stopped in front of the partially skeletonized remains of a man still dressed in his uniform. He appeared to have been dead at least four to five months which would track with the timeline of Sheriff Willis’ disappearance. The coroner would have to confirm it, but I’d seen enough bodies in my time with the LAPD to ballpark his demise.
There was almost no scent of decomposition remaining on or around the remains, at least none that I could detect. He looked mummified with dry patches of skin stretched over his skull like leather which had dried out in the sun. At least he was no longer oozing like a fresh corpse would have been. I’d always hated those kind of crime scenes.
I had to wonder at Sally’s ability to pick up on the scent of a shifter or vampire. Even though I was a unicorn, my sense of smell was no match for either hers or Vincent’s. And after her crack about all the observing eyes from the trees the night I’d first transformed, I wondered how many other supernatural creatures in town knew what I was. It was weird to even think about.
I squatted in front of the sheriff, snapping on a pair of gloves before reaching into the holster he still wore and removing his gun. I stood up and placed the gun in a plastic evidence bag Sally held open for me as one of the radios in the pack crackled to life. She sealed the evidence bag as I grabbed the radio.
“Sheriff Harmon…come back.”
“Sheriff, Dr. Willoughby is here,” Dave said. “I’ll send her back.”
“Sure, Dave. Thanks,” I replied, clicking off, stuffing the radio back into the pack, and pulling out a roll of yellow crime scene tape, and a stack of plastic evidence markers.
I handed the items to Sally without any instruction, interested to see how she’d process the crime scene. I’d only seen her do one before at the Buck Walters’ murder, but each scene was handled differently based on the location, the environment, possible onlookers, and other things. I was impressed when she taped off the area and then pulled out a camera, photographing the scene from all angles before she started placing evidence markers. Afterward, she photographed each piece of evidence and its’ marker individually. I turned my attention back to the former sheriff as I remained squatting.
I noticed no telltale evidence of what had killed him. No obvious knife wounds or blood on his clothes, no obvious bullet holes, no claw marks. Even though Sally said she smelled werewolf, I thought it very weird that Floyd or his pack would have killed the sheriff without leaving any visible trace of claw or bite marks. If they had murdered the sheriff without leaving marks it seemed stranger still that they would have hidden him deep in a mine, especially wearing his uniform. There were no drag marks either.
The sheriff’s killer made no attempt to hide his victim’s identity, though, it was plausible the murderer figured Willis wouldn’t ever be found. All of this assumed he was murdered, though, I couldn’t imagine what other reason he’d have for going into an old played out uranium mine just to die. Questions filled my mind. Why hadn’t the murderer taken his victim’s gun or badge? That seemed beyond odd to me.
I stood up and turned as I heard the sound of shuffling feet. When I saw the beams from two flashlights, I knew the medical examiner had arrived with an assistant, and a carry basket to transport the body over the lumpy and uneven ground.
“We’re back here, Doc,” Sally called out.
“We see you,” Doctor Tammy Willoughby said, walking into the beams from our flashlights, holding her own. She was followed by Stuart, her lab assistant whom I’d met at the scene of Buck Walters’ murder. They stopped in front of us, and I reached out my hand, shaking hers.
“Howdy, Sheriff…Sally,” she said.
“Hey, Doc,” Sally said, shaking the doctor’s hand.
I watched her snap on gloves as she frowned at Sheriff Willis’ body. She clucked her tongue. “That’s a damned shame,” she said. “I always had a feeling he didn’t just up and run away voluntarily.” She walked over and stood over the skeleton, looking down at him.
“How long do you think he’s been here?” Sally asked.
“He disappeared around Halloween, right?” Doc Willoughby asked.
Sally nodded. “Yes, October twenty-ninth.”
“That looks about right based on the mummification I see here,” she said. She glanced around the mine, shining her flashlight on the walls before looking at me. “It’s cold and dry in here and it would have been even colder from October until now. I’m certain that’s what accounts for the mummification we’re observing in the sheriff’s corpse.”
I nodded. “Is there any way to tell how he was killed just by looking at him, Doc?” I asked.
“Let me take a look.” She squatted and looked closely at him, reaching out a gloved hand to tenderly lift his chin and examine both sides of his neck, then taking each of his hands, gently turning them over and looking closely, before glancing up at me. “I don’t think I’ll be able to tell you what killed him until I get him on my table back in town. If you’re finished here, shall we move him?”
“Sure. Let me give you a hand, Doc.”
“We’ll do it, Sheriff,” Stuart
