Set the Dark on Fire Read online

  With no conversation to distract her, Shay concentrated on not throwing up. Being jounced around inside the cab of the pickup didn’t help. She reached into her pocket, took out a cracker, and started chewing. It tasted like sawdust. Shuddering, she choked down the pasty mouthful and popped the tab on her Coke. The instant the sickly sweet, overcarbonated soft drink hit the back of her throat, she remembered something bad.

  Something very, very bad.

  Last night, after drinking wine with dinner and beer at the bar, her crazy girlfriends had ordered a round of mixed drinks. Rum and Cokes.

  A hot wave of nausea washed over her, causing beads of sweat to break out on her forehead. When they went over a bump, syrupy brown liquid sloshed over the rim of the can, dripping from her hand and soaking into her jeans. Setting the Coke aside, she removed her sweatshirt and rolled down the passenger window.

  The sheriff finally gave her his full attention. She must have looked a little green, because he asked, “Are you going to be sick?”

  “I don’t think so,” she said, hoping it was true. Really, she had a stomach like a steel trap. What went down did not come up. Usually.

  Her tummy lurched, threatening to make her a liar.

  She put her face out the window and gulped cool, early-morning air.

  With a muttered curse, he pulled over.

  Luke’s initial impression of Shay was that she was beautiful. His second, from the way she fidgeted in the passenger seat and acted sort of spacey, was that she was on drugs.

  Now he figured she just had a killer hangover.

  Her disheveled appearance and unsteady gait didn’t inspire much professional confidence, but it did spark his prurient interest. With her messed-up hair and smoky eyes, she looked like she’d been up all night giving some lucky guy the ride of his life.

  He rubbed a hand over his face, wishing the Department of Fish and Game had recommended some one older, more reliable, and more experienced.

  Getting out of the truck, he rummaged around in the cab for a fresh bottle of water and some paper towels. She was standing with her back to him a few feet from the dirt road, bent forward, her hands resting on her knees.

  Not interested in watching her decorate the bushes, he leaned his forearms against the hood on the driver’s side and stared out at their surroundings. There was nothing but barrel cactus, rock-strewn dirt, and sagebrush as far as the eye could see.

  It could be worse, he supposed. He could be back on the beat, waiting for a drunken vagrant to vomit on the Strip.

  He’d seen too many used-up party girls in Vegas to find humor in Shay’s predicament, but he’d over-indulged a time or two when he was her age, so he could sympathize. She was probably barely out of college, and hadn’t learned her limit.

  Although Luke didn’t consider the situation amusing, he had to admit it was pretty ironic. He’d come to Tenaja Falls to avoid trouble, but here he was, neck-deep in it, on his way to a crime scene with a woman who couldn’t walk a straight line.

  When he glanced over at her again, she was crouched down farther, elbows planted on her slim thighs, head in her hands. The position wasn’t deliberately provocative, and there was no doubt in his mind that she was truly ill, but this time it didn’t deter him from looking.

  Her hair was an improbable shade of blond, dark ash mixed with platinum, twisted in an untidy knot atop her head. Even in disarray, it looked thick and shiny and soft to the touch. Some obsessive-compulsive part of him wanted to take it down and comb his fingers through the tangles. He stifled the urge by imagining it would smell like cigarettes.

  Her clothes were just as wild as her hair. Faded jeans, snug in all the right places. A thin white tank top that did nothing to disguise her subtle curves or the lacy black bra she wore underneath. One strap hung off her shoulder, an invitation to touch.

  His fingertips itched to slide it back into place.

  She had a tattoo on the nape of her neck, a tiny cat’s paw with four little scratches. Wondering if she liked to be kissed there, he let his gaze trail down to her lower back. Between the waistband of her low-rise jeans and the hem of her tank top, a creamy expanse of skin was visible, lovingly detailed by curling ribbons of ink.

  He’d bet his badge she liked to be kissed there, too.

  His pulse quickened at the thought, but he shoved it aside. His mind had no business going that direction. She was way too young for him, and not everything about her appearance was seductive. Her well-worn hiking boots were sensible and the hooded sweatshirt she’d been wearing earlier covered her from neck to midthigh.

  Maybe he should give her the benefit of the doubt.

  Abruptly, she straightened. “Is that water?”

  He jerked his gaze from the back of her jeans a split second too late. “Yeah,” he said gruffly, stepping forward to hand her the bottle.

  “Thanks.” Tilting it to her lips, she downed a couple of ounces, her pale throat working as she swallowed. She looked like she wanted more, but she didn’t push her luck. Neither did she take the paper towels he offered. “False alarm,” she said, managing a weak smile. “I think I’m okay now.”

  Luke wasn’t convinced, but he didn’t have time to find another wildlife expert. “Are you sure?” he asked anyway. “I can try to get someone else.”

  “No. This is my territory. My responsibility.”

  Evaluating her sincerity, and her level of sobriety, he looked into her eyes. They were mildly bloodshot, her pupils tiny amidst a sea of dark blue. She was calm and lucid and quite lovely in the early-morning light.

  Managing a careless shrug, he climbed back into the truck, waiting for her signal before he started the engine.

  “Is it bad?” she asked after they’d been on the road a few more minutes.

  “Yes.” He’d seen worse but she probably hadn’t.

  “Are you going to tell me anything about it before we get there?”

  “I would prefer that you draw your own conclusions.”

  “Is the victim …” her lips trembled “… a child?”

  “No,” he answered, voice grim. “A woman.”

  “Who?”

  “She hasn’t been positively identified,” he hedged, keeping his attention on the road. Switching to a safer topic, he said, “I don’t have much experience with wildlife. Why don’t you give me a rundown on mountain lion behavior?” He cast a speculative glance her direction. “If you’re up to it.”

  “Lions are notoriously shy. Usually they avoid humans at all costs.”

  “What about a mother protecting cubs?”

  “It’s a possibility,” she admitted. “Bears will, but they tend to be more aggressive. They also like people food, which leads them into populated areas. A transient lion might skirt past suburban neighborhoods and go after livestock, even a family pet. Lions prefer deer, but if they get hungry enough, they will eat almost any prey that becomes available.”

  “Including humans?”

  She hesitated. “Yes. In the cases I’ve studied, I believe hunger was the motivation for the attack.” Her eyes met his. “Again, this is an extremely rare situation. Only five or six fatal incidents have occurred in California over the past two hundred years.” Her tone was defensive. “Dog attacks are far more frequent.”

  Luke was sure what he’d seen couldn’t have been done by a dog, but he didn’t say that. He was also pleasantly surprised that she seemed to know her stuff, but he didn’t comment on that, either. “Are there bears around here?”

  “No. A black bear could wander this far, in theory, but I’ve never seen bear sign, and I’ve hiked every inch of this wilderness.”

  He fell into silence as they rounded the next bend, hoping he hadn’t imagined the flinty determination in her eyes when she spoke of her responsibility to the land. She’d need it, along with nerves of steel and a cast-iron stomach, when she saw what lay ahead.

  2

  He brought her to the Graveyard.

  It was a flat s
tretch of land, grassy and desolate, broken up by a single oak tree and a congregation of large, slate-colored rocks. They looked more like the humped backs of whales than headstones, and as far as Shay knew, no one had ever been buried here. Rumor had it the place was haunted by the spirits of dead Indians, and that it had been an execution site where horse thieves were hung. Teenagers called it the Graveyard because they’d been gathering here to tell ghost stories, and to mourn their losses, for decades.

  Whenever a local kid got killed doing something stupid like drunk driving (which happened with alarming frequency around these parts) his friends got together at the Graveyard to have a party in his honor. Some came to grieve, some to drink, some to socialize. It was a popular hangout even when no one had died. High school boys flocked to the location, hoping a spooky setting and a bonfire would encourage their girlfriends to get cozy.

  More than just memories had been laid to rest here.

  Shay didn’t believe any of the old stories, but she had to admit she’d been caught up in the ambience once or twice. Before she left for college, she’d given her virginity to Jesse Ryan beneath the hanging tree on a hot summer night.

  She closed her tired eyes, picturing Jesse’s face in her mind, wishing he’d been a little less handsome and a lot more sincere. Together they’d burned fast and bright, an old flame that rekindled from time to time, especially when she was feeling weak or self-destructive.

  If there was anything positive about the morning so far, Shay thought, it was that she hadn’t woken up in bed with Jesse.

  She opened her eyes to see a lone officer at the side of the road. He was standing guard next to his police cruiser, his barrel chest all puffed up with importance. Shay had known Garrett Snell since they were kids. He was a bully and a blowhard and she didn’t envy Luke Meza for having him as his only deputy.

  Luke parked beside Garrett’s cruiser, got out of the vehicle, and started off toward the Graveyard. She had to hurry to keep up with his long-legged stride, an experience she was not accustomed to. When he stopped suddenly, she almost crashed into his back.

  “Just look,” Luke said, holding up one hand. “Don’t touch anything. Watch where you step. And don’t talk until you’re finished.”

  Feeling peevish, she stared back at him in silence.

  “Do you understand?”

  “Of course. I’m hungover, not stupid.”

  A ghost of a smile touched his lips. Then it was gone, as if she’d imagined it, and he took her by the elbow, walking her toward the circle of stones like a suitor leading a debutante. When she saw what was beyond the rock border, she was thankful for his support.

  At first glance, the woman on the ground resembled a sleeping child curled up on one side. She was slim and small of stature, barely five feet tall, but the lines on her face and curves of her body showed her true age.

  Shay recognized her, and like most of Tenaja’s residents, she knew the woman hadn’t been a child for quite some time. They weren’t friends, and they never would have been, but that didn’t make her any easier to look at.

  Her long dark hair was matted with blood, partially obscuring the fatal wound on the nape of her neck. Mountain lions often attacked from behind, severing the spine, and she hadn’t been spared this indignity. Deep scratches covered her hands, her shoulders, her exposed arms, her face. She’d fought. Her clothing hung in blood-soaked tatters from her petite frame. Flies and ants swarmed around her, lighting in and out of her open mouth.

  Shay grimaced, covering her eyes with one hand and turning away from the gruesome sight. Her cheek met the hard wall of Luke’s chest, and even in her tumultuous state she noticed how rigid he held himself.

  To Shay’s surprise, her response to the corpse was more emotional than physical. Her headache was still there, like a dull roar, and she was sicker than ever, but what she was most aware of wasn’t her own discomfort or Luke’s chest or even the woman lying dead before her. For a fleeting moment, the present receded, and she was sixteen again, standing in the barn behind the house, catching her first glimpse of death.

  Gasping, she banished the image, relegating it to the dark, faraway corner of her mind where it belonged. Then she was staring up at Luke Meza, not the rafters in the barn, and he was gripping her upper arms as if he thought she might faint.

  She risked another glance at the victim. This time, her brain worked to compartmentalize the elements of her reaction. Fear and horror went into one box, empathy into another, allowing her to analyze the subject with clinical detachment.

  This was not a woman. It was a kill. Lion sign. Nothing more, nothing less.

  “Okay now?” he asked, sensing a change in her demeanor.

  “Yes.”

  When he released her, she gave the remains a closer study, measuring the size of the tooth marks with her eyes, noting the distance between the scratch lines. A part of her was proud of her composure, another ashamed of her inability to feel.

  Remembering his instructions, she took a step back and considered her surroundings. There was no question that a lion, and a large one, probably a male, was responsible for this attack. But what had he been doing here, of all places?

  The Graveyard looked the same as always. Low-lying rocks, the perfect height for lounging, were evenly spaced around the smoldering embers of last night’s bonfire. Crushed aluminum cans and cigarette butts littered the soft dirt. In the close, quiet distance, grass-covered hills swayed with the gentle morning breeze.

  Saying nothing, she examined the ground near the body. Her brow furrowed in concentration as she walked in a wide circle around the site, searching for any other evidence of the lion’s presence.

  “Well?” Luke asked when she returned to his side.

  “It was a lion.”

  “But?”

  “He wasn’t here.”

  Although her words didn’t make any sense, he acted like they did. “How do you know?”

  “First of all, this is the last place a lion would bring a kill. Signs of humans are everywhere. Lions have an excellent sense of smell, and avoid fire.”

  He nodded. “What else?”

  “Lions attack by stealth or ambush. If he followed her here, or was lying in wait—where’s the blood?”

  He didn’t have to look to know there was no pool beneath the body. “Maybe he drank it.”

  “Sure, but some spilled onto her clothes. Why not on the ground as well?” Following that train of thought, she continued, “Even if he attacked her somewhere else, and dragged her from there, he would have chosen a more secluded place. That grass is high enough.” She lifted her chin toward the adjacent hills. “It would provide better cover.”

  “So you’re saying it’s possible that he dragged her here, just not typical lion behavior.”

  “Right.”

  He played devil’s advocate. “Attacking humans isn’t typical, either.”

  “Yes, but there’s another problem with your scenario.”

  “What’s that?”

  “No drag marks.”

  Looking out at the horizon, he swore softly. “Do you know who she is? The man who reported the body gave a name, but I’d like a confirmation.”

  “Didn’t Garrett tell you?”

  “No.”

  She sighed, wondering if the deputy was too lily-livered to take a good look, didn’t want to admit his connection to the victim, or was just refusing to be helpful on principle. Garrett wasn’t qualified to run for sheriff, so maybe he resented Luke Meza. “It’s Yesenia Montes.”

  “Garrett knows her?”

  “Every man in town knows her. Except you, I guess.”

  “She gets around?”

  “And then some.”

  His dark gaze narrowed on Garrett for a moment, then came back to her. “Have you seen her with anyone in particular lately?”

  She felt the color drain from her face. “You don’t think—”

  “The body was moved somehow,” he interrupted, “
and I don’t suppose a lion floated her over here on a cloud. There’s a term we use for circumstances like these.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Foul play.”

  Feeling weak-kneed, she lowered herself to sit on a nearby rock. Her stomach churned with renewed nausea. “I saw her at the bar last night,” she whispered.

  “With who?”

  “Jesse Ryan,” she said, putting her head in her hands.

  Shay spent another hour searching for lion signs, scouring every inch of terrain. During that task, which required both patience and concentration, she couldn’t find a single track, nor could she come up with a plausible explanation for the discrepancy.

  The county coroner took the body to the morgue for an autopsy, and until he made a ruling concerning the cause of death, Luke said he had to consider it a homicide. Accordingly, he spent a lot of time taking pictures with a digital camera, recording everything from the position of the body to shoe prints and tire markings.

  Then he started collecting evidence.

  As a deputy, a crime scene investigator, and a man, Garrett Snell was pretty much worthless, so Shay asked Luke if she could help. He countered by suggesting she let Garrett drive her home. Both offers were politely refused.

  With nothing left to do until she heard from her supervisor at the Department of Fish and Game, Shay curled up on the passenger seat of Luke’s government-issue pickup and fell asleep. She dozed on and off, plagued by strange dreams. An indeterminable time later, Luke laid a warm hand on her bare shoulder, startling her awake.

  She jumped at his touch, instantly alert. Her hands were curled up beneath her head, buried in the sweatshirt she’d been using as a pillow. As she straightened she cataloged her condition. Her headache had faded. She felt better.

  “Mike Shepherd wants you to call him back.”

  Groaning, she massaged her eyes. They refocused on Luke, who was standing at the driver’s side door, extending his cell phone toward her. Not ready to talk to her boss, she merely took the phone from him and rested it in her lap.