Eternal by V. Forrest (new reading TXT) 📗

Sean said his cousin Malachy had at least two we could borrow.”

“It’s been almost four hours. We need to process the scene and get the body out of there.” He wiped the sweat on his forehead with the back of his hand, but kept moving.

“You a city boy, Glen?” she asked, trying not to think about the body ahead on the path. They were almost there. No more than fifty yards from the hangman’s tree, Uncle Sean had told her. He’d left Petey Hill to guard the body.

“Suburbs of Baltimore.”

“Ah, the American dream. White picket fence. Dog in the backyard.”

“Hey,” he grumbled, double slapping mosquitoes. “I saw plenty of white picket fences back in your hometown. You didn’t have such a bad life yourself.”

“My father is an alcoholic.” It came out of her mouth before she had time to take it back. She didn’t normally share with coworkers.

“Mine, too. Was. He was killed on the job.”

She glanced over her shoulder at him, holding back a sycamore branch. On the job echoed in her head. In an instant, she had a connection with Glen’s father, a man she had never known. They were all connected…law enforcement agents of every kind, all over the world. A silent brotherhood. Sisterhood. Whatever. “A cop? You’re kidding.”

“Bureau. Firearms deal gone bad. Seventies. I was in middle school. A long time ago.”

Fia nodded. She probably should have said something like how sorry she was, or how much respect she had for agents who had given their lives for their country, but the words seemed unnecessary. Part of the connection they all shared.

She slowed her pace, not sure if it was because she felt bad for giving Glen a hard time about keeping up or because she knew the body wasn’t far. She caught a glimpse of pale blue on the green canvas of the forest. A uniform. “Officer Hill?” she called out. “Petey? It’s Fia Kahill. I’ve got Special Agent Duncan with me.”

“Ah, Jezus,” he swore, approaching them. “About time someone got here. I been alone with him for an hour.” I was scared here alone, Fee, and I’m man enough to admit it, he telepathed. What in Sweet Jezus Christ’s name is goin’ on here?

Not here, Petey. Not now. Not with the human present.

She consciously blocked out his thoughts, trying to concentrate on the crime scene. On her job.

She heard the flies before she saw the body. They were already beginning to lay their eggs. If the body wasn’t refrigerated within the next few hours, the white eggs would begin to appear around the edges of any open wounds or bruises. Within a week, maggots would begin to hatch. As she walked closer, the stench of burnt human flesh, with underlying hints of the first putrid stages of decomposition, grew stronger in her nostrils.

Sometimes enhanced senses weren’t all they were cracked up to be.

Petey met them on the path. He was a nice guy. Late thirties. Married to her Aunt Ruthie. He had a teenage daughter, Katy, who she heard through the grapevine was giving him a run for his money. Drinking. Violating curfew. The usual teenage bad behavior.

“It’s this way.”

“Pete,” she said softly. “You don’t have to show me—” Because I can smell him, she was going to say, but as he drew back the branches to reveal the headless, handless body, sour bile rose in her throat.

“Ah, hell,” Glen muttered, turning his head away to catch his breath.

This close, even a human could smell it.

“Is that—”

“It must be eighty-five out here. Ninety-five percent humidity. Decomposition starts immediately.” She tried to breathe through her mouth as she took a step back. The body lay in a small clearing, just off the path. When Pete let go of the hawthorn branch, her view of the body was blocked again.

She looked to her uncle’s officer. “Officer Hill, how about if you take a few steps back, give Special Agent Duncan and me some room?”

“You want me to cut back some of those thorny branches?” Pete needed no further invitation to move out of the direct vicinity of the body. “Chief said to leave ’em be. Possible evidence, but—”

“No. You did the right thing.”

In another two hours the sun would be setting. They’d have to move fast to process the scene or be forced to haul in generators for light. Two old ATVs wouldn’t be near enough then and she didn’t want to have to call the office for additional backup and equipment. She didn’t want anyone else from the Bureau here.

She swung her backpack off her shoulder and felt for the digital camera in the front zipper pocket. “Officer, why don’t you begin a perimeter check, make a circle around the body, then a bigger circle and so forth. You see anything that could be evidence—blood, a footprint, a piece of fiber, even a broken branch—you holler. I want it photographed and marked clearly.”

“Weirdest thing. No blood outside the clearing.”

“Look anyway.”

“Will do, Fee.”

Petey walked away and she looked to Glen, standing beside her. “You want to take the photos?” She raised her camera.

Generally, when two agents worked together and one took photos, it was the other agent who truly observed the crime scene. As odd as it sounded, the photographer could distance himself or herself from a grisly setting, concentrating on recording it. Without a camera in one’s hand, without the lens to soften the edges, a body in this state could be overwhelming.

“I’m no good at high-tech crap. It will take me an hour to upload them onto my laptop. You get the pictures.” He reached around her, brushing her arm with his fingertips as he pulled back the prickly branches of the hawthorn.

Fia stepped through the natural wall into the small clearing. The leaves and dry pine needles, now singed, were tamped down. It was most likely a place deer bedded at night, or in the heat of the day. Perhaps even gave birth.

Twenty-three-year-old Mahon Kahill was lying in the very center of the