The Shaman Part 1

The Shaman.

by Kimberly Zant.

Chapter One.

There was no word in the English language strong enough, in Special Agent, Charlotte Boyer's, mind to adequately describe the carnage. She thought she'd prepared herself. She supposed, if it had been even a little more typical of the murders she'd studied at Quantico, she would've been braced for it. There was nothing 'typical' or even to be expected about this and her stomach heaved. She turned away from the scene, taking several deep breaths, fighting for her dignity.

Concentrating, at first, on a pretense of professionalism, she searched the ground with her gaze, as if looking for clues. Finally, to her relief, her training kicked in and her mind, in truth, slowly focused on the search for clues.

The soil was too rocky to yield up anything as conclusive, or useful, as footprints. There were drag marks, however, much of the way. The victim, sixteen-year-old Chast.i.ty Owl, appeared to have been sneaking back into her bedroom window, or maybe out of it, when she was attacked. She'd been dragged for several hundred yards into the desert and finished off almost within sight of her own home.

No one had heard her scream, even though the field they'd found her in bordered a fairly sizable neighborhood.

"Looks like a puma," one of the men muttered. Turning, Charlie saw that it was the reservation police chief, George Brown, who'd spoken.

"Like the other two?" she asked.

He glanced at her. "It looks the same as the other two attacks." He studied her a long moment, his eyes narrowing. "I'm curious to know why they would've sent a field investigator out to look at an animal attack."

Charlie merely stared at him, trying to decide how much, or how little, to say. It was a Federal Reservation, but the reservation police had jurisdiction. She'd been invited, not very graciously, as a consultant because her boss had asked if she could drive out and have look.

She'd been sent because of the anonymous phone call the bureau had received. The caller had disguised his voice, had refused to leave a name, but he'd insisted the attacks weren't animal attacks at all, but murder.

Maybe it had just been someone from the reservation that was afraid his daughter might be next on the menu?

She frowned. "Weren't the other two attacks on the Utah side of the reservation?"

Brown gave her a look. "Don't give me that 'across state lines' c.r.a.p. That only applies if there's a crime. No human did this."

Charlie thought quickly. "What's the typical range of a puma? I mean, they're territorial, aren't they? Would one hunt this far?"

"Not typically. If they drove him off, though, he'd mark new territory."

Charlie nodded and, without offering up any explanation for her presence, returned her attention to examining the scene.

The girl was unidentifiable. If not for the fact that there had been a clear drag path from the girl's home to the sight where they found the body-if not for the fact that it was a small community and anyone who went missing was immediately noticed- Her face was gone, nothing more than a b.l.o.o.d.y mess of ragged flesh. She'd been ripped open from neck to groin, her entrails spilled out all over the ground. Swallowing the bile that rose in her throat, Charlie examined the girl's body, mentally tallying parts. As far as she could see, nothing was missing.

Wild animals attacked when hungry, or when threatened. It was a rare animal that merely attacked for sport. It was possible, of course, that something had spooked the animal off before it had had a chance to feed, or that it had eaten. The body was so damaged it was impossible to be certain if anything was missing until there'd been an autopsy-but it looked as if the animal had done nothing more than ripped her to shreds.

There was no reason that she could see that the animal might have felt threatened by the girl, unless it had been sniffing around the garbage and she'd happened up on it.

It had gone for her throat. Again, only a medical examination would tell for certain, but she suspected n.o.body had heard the girl scream because the animal had ripped her vocal chords first thing.

Again, that seemed fairly typical of an animal. Most predators went for the quick kill, but the drag marks seemed to indicate that the girl had struggled at least part of the way. She'd lost her shoes, one in the yard of her home, the other on the road below.

The one thing about the scene that really unnerved her though-which absolutely no one had commented on-was the fact that the girl looked almost as if she'd been posed.

When she'd arrived, the girl had been lying in the 'submissive' posture of a rape victim, her arms lying, palm up, on either side of her head, her knees bent and her thighs spread.

The sound of an arriving vehicle drew her attention and Charlie turned to look.

A small crowd had gathered at the edge of the road below them, held in check by two police officers. The vehicle just pulling up was an ambulance from the clinic/ hospital/ medical examiner's office.

To her surprise, a blond man dressed in a lab coat got out of the pa.s.senger's door. At this distance, he looked more like an intern than a doctor-it seemed doubtful he was more than thirty-His build suggested as much, for he was tall and slender. The man with him was a local, and pretty much a direct opposite-dark, short, either stout or chunky muscular.

It was he who went to the back, opened the doors and pulled the gurney out. Lifting it, he locked the folding structure upright and began dragging it up the hill. The blond man trailed behind him, making no attempt to help the driver with the unwieldy thing.

He, in fact, stopped to chat with a man that was leaning against one of the police cars.

A jolt went through Charlie as she focused on the man that had stopped him. He was wearing nothing beyond a pair of ragged, cut off jeans and he had the body of a male stripper, leanly muscular, each muscle lovingly defined, from his washboard stomach to his well shaped legs. His arms were folded across his chest, displaying, whether intentional or not, very nice pecs, and bulging arm muscles.

He was American Indian, she was certain, although his dark skin gleamed more golden than red in the bright sunlight.

Silvery highlights shown in the black hair that hung down well past his shoulders. For a moment, Charlie thought it was streaks of gray, but as he turned and almost seemed to look directly at her, she saw that he was probably no older than the doctor, for the 'streaks' disappeared as he moved his head.

With an effort, she dragged her gaze from the Native American to the white man beside him, wondering if either man could actually tell from this distance what had captured her gaze.

After several moments, she turned away, unwilling to make it too obvious that she was disconcerted that she'd been caught staring. The EMT came to an abrupt stop when he was level with her. She heard him suck in his breath. "Jesus Christ almighty," he muttered.

Charlie felt swell of sympathy. "Did you know her?"

The man glanced sharply at her. Charlie saw then that he was wearing a name tag on his uniform that said 'Bear'. "How the h.e.l.l would I recognize her if I did?" he said roughly.

Charlie blushed, feeling more than a little foolish. In the world of investigation, the question was almost as pat as 'how do you do' in society, and in this case, at least, almost as inane. "Sorry. That was thoughtless. I'm special agent, Charlotte Boyer."

He nodded, but brushed past her as he saw the chief's impatient glare and lined the gurney up next to the body. Pressing the lever that collapsed it, he stared down at the body for several moments. "We need a body bag. No way am I going to let those people down there watch me scoop her up onto the gurney."

Chief Brown nodded and the EMT stalked past her once more.

As she turned to watch him, she discovered that the coroner had finally decided to grace them with his presence. He favored her with a once over that was blatantly s.e.xist and a slow smile that might have charmed her under other circ.u.mstances. Up close, she saw that he was nice looking in the manner of meticulously groomed rather than raw nature, although he was far from ugly, or even plain. He stuck his hand out. "I'm Doctor Robert Morris. Most people around here just call me Dr. Bob."

Charlotte held out her hand and shook his firmly, then tugged her hand from his grip. "Special Agent Charlotte Boyer. Most people just call me Agent Boyer."

His brows rose. His smile widened to a grin. "Well, Ms. FBI, what brings you out to our neck of the woods?"

Charlotte supposed it was meant to be charming, but the comment annoyed her. Moreover, she had no intention of announcing her agenda. She forced a polite smile.

"You want to have a look before we take her?" Chief Brown called out.

The doctor looked annoyed, but he nodded and brushed past her.

Hearing the door of the ambulance slam, Charlie glanced back down the hill. She was far more interested in the man she'd seen the doctor talking to, however, than the EMT, whom she saw was struggling up the incline once more, this time carrying a black body bag.

As she glanced casually around for him, she discovered that he was still where she'd first noticed him, leaning against the police car.

He was staring straight at her, making no effort at all to appear casual about his interest.

Charlotte looked away, determined to ignore the wave of testosterone that smacked into her like a sledge hammer, making her stomach go weightless and jolting her pulse into high gear. She'd put her initial reaction to the man down to nerves. She didn't have that luxury this time and it annoyed her almost as much as it unnerved her. When the EMT came even with her, she fell into step beside him. "Who is that man leaning on the police car ... the one that was talking to the doctor when he arrived?"

Irritation flooded her when the EMT looked behind him. He might just as well have bellowed her interest to everyone present.

"Greywolf? He's the shaman."

Chapter Two.

"What's he doing here, you think?"

The EMT gave her a narrow-eyed, a.s.sessing look. "Rubber necking like everyone else?"

Charlie's lips tightened in annoyance. She could see no reason for his hostility. It was obvious most of the people below weren't 'rubber necking'. This was someone most of them probably knew. They were, quite rightly, anxious and distressed about the killing, probably wondering if one of them, or one of their loved ones, would be next.

She had gotten the sense, however, that Greywolf was there for a purpose that went beyond community concern. His expression was impa.s.sive, but, without quite knowing why, she sensed that he had missed very little of what was transpiring at the scene on the hill, and that he was waiting--for something.

She didn't try to keep pace with the EMT. It was obvious he didn't feel particularly talkative. Either his hostility was a direct result of his own distress over the killing, or he resented her presence as much as everyone else ... or maybe he just didn't like nosy white people.

She moved closer to observe as the man unfolded the body bag and laid it out beside the victim. Dr. Morris was looking the girl's body over with clinical detachment ... in fact, he not only seemed strangely unmoved, but morbidly curious at the same time.

She had to wonder if her imagination was working overtime.

"...clearly an animal attack. See these marks here?" He looked up at Chief Brown. "Clearly claw marks ... from a good sized puma, I'd say."

"That's what I thought," the chief said grimly, sending her a glance that was part triumphant and part irritation.

"You don't think there's anything strange about the positioning of the body?"

Dr. Morris looked up at her questioningly.

"They've moved the body. When we first arrived on the scene, her legs were up, her feet flat on the ground."

He looked down at the body again. They'd straightened her legs, but they were still splayed wide as they had been. He shrugged. "Both sides of her hands are lacerated. Looks like she was trying to fight it off."

"She was dragged here by her throat. I don't think she was in any condition to fight by the time she got here."

The chief gave her a look. "How do you know she was dragged by the throat?"

"The amount of blood leading here, compared to much less at the scene itself. It looks like the initial attack severed her jugular. She'd bled out by the time they got to this point. Plus, n.o.body heard her scream. Didn't you say the girl's parents only discovered her missing this morning? If she was attacked right outside her home and she'd been able to scream, don't you think they would've heard her?"

The doctor shrugged her comments off and began scooping the entrails back into the girl's body cavity. After a moment, his a.s.sistant helped. When they'd finished, they lifted her body carefully and placed it in the body bag.

"I'll know more when I've had the chance to examine her in the lab," he said dismissively as he removed his surgical gloves and shoved them into the pocket of his lab coat.

Charlie gaped at him in disbelief. She wasn't an expert in forensics herself, and she couldn't claim to have had a lot of field experience, but this was so far off procedure it was just plain bizarre.

"I'll send my results over to you tomorrow, chief," Dr. Morris said, helping the EMT lift the gurney and holding one end as they started down the hill.

Charlie fell into step beside him. "When will you be performing the autopsy?"

He glanced at her. He was frowning, but she thought that might be because they were having trouble keeping the gurney upright on the uneven ground. "I've got patients waiting. Later this evening."

"May I attend?"

His brows rose. "If you think you can handle it, little lady."

Charlie gave him a look. "If I can handle seeing her strewn out all over this hillside, I think I can handle the autopsy," she said dryly.

He grinned at her, showing no animosity at her sarcasm. "All right then. It's a date. I'll see you around seven."

Charlie stopped abruptly, watching as they continued down the hillside and finally reached the road. The people waiting crowded close, asking questions, demanding answers. Dr. Morris fielded most of them good-naturedly, but elusively. Finally, he held up his hands for silence. "I'll have to have a look at her at the morgue before I can answer anything conclusively. Right now all I can say is that we're fairly certain it was another animal attack."

Charlie frowned, stepping aside as the chief and his men made their way down the hillside and pushed past her.

It was a small police force for a small community. They were well trained for all that, and would know procedure and techniques for studying a crime scene.

She supposed it was just easier to accept an animal attack than the possibility of a crazed killer. Maybe that was why they'd ignored the possibility. Maybe that was why they'd trampled all over the crime scene without giving it more than a cursory examination. Maybe that was why the doctor hadn't seen fit to look for possible evidence before he'd loaded the body.

It seemed plausible, and yet she couldn't help but wonder if there was something else going on here.

Shaking it off finally, she followed the police. She'd left her car at the station and ridden to the site with the police chief. She glanced at her watch. It was only five. She had two hours before the autopsy. She decided to ride back with the chief, get her car and return to the site to see if she could find anything they'd missed, or that hadn't been trampled.

It was almost six by the time she turned onto the road leading to the crime scene once more, and nearing dusk. She saw the thin pillar of smoke almost at once and an angry suspicion settled in her mind. Flooring it, she brought her car to a screeching halt at the bottom of the hill, leaping out almost before it had stopped rocking and drawing her weapon.

Fury filled her when she saw her suspicions had been well founded. Someone had set a fire right in the middle of the crime scene ... and that someone was still there, squatting beside the fire, throwing something into it.

She made no attempt to be quiet as she rushed up the hill. There was no point when she'd made such an arrival. To her amazement, however, the man didn't make any attempt to escape. It was almost as if he was deaf to everything going on around him.

She stopped when she was little more than three feet away from him. "Hold it right there! Let me see your hands!"

He stiffened, but he didn't move.

"Now!" she ground out.

Slowly, he lifted his hands.

She looked him over. "Spread your knees. Wider!"