Heritage: Against the Grain

Chapter 3 - Predator

“This is Gillian Beaumont,” Colt explained when they reached him, and his gaze never wavered from her. She almost squirmed under the intense scrutiny and apparent anger.

None of this was her fault. Her shoulders squared, her chin rose, and she kept her expression carefully neutral. He noticed her change in stance and frowned.

“What the hell am I supposed to do with another rookie?” he demanded as if expecting an answer from them. The two officers who had escorted them disappeared in seconds, scurrying away like ants into the half-lit dark, and she wouldn’t have minded following them.

He abruptly turned away from them, staring at the crime scene. Tension turned his shoulders to granite, his weariness suggesting that he hadn’t slept in a while, but more weighed him down than mere fatigue.

“Keep an eye on her, Detective, and keep her the hell out of my crime scene. I don’t have time for this now,” he ordered without looking at either of them, and Colt unmistakably bristled.

“Why the hell do I have to babysit her?” she demanded, and he didn’t even bother to face her as they spoke as if Gillian wasn’t present.

“Should I send her to David instead?” he asked.

His voice lost its anger and arrogance, sounding infinitely tired. It was the fatigue of a man fighting because it was his nature, but he had long since lost the heart for it. The silence stretched, and he shrugged, sighing when Detective Colt didn’t even deign to answer him.

“A rookie is better than nothing,” he gritted between clenched teeth.

The atmosphere seemed laden with hidden meanings only they understood, and Gillian’s brows knitted. Something lay between them, a weight only death could cause.

Did someone close to them die? Possibly. If it happened, it shouldn’t have.

“Come,” Colt ordered, and Gillian followed without saying a word.

Worked to the bone and soul weary, the detectives needed no more burdens.

“Sit and pay attention,” Colt said and left her alone.

Unqualified to help, she chose to observe the interaction of this group instead of sulking as most would. It wasn’t hard to determine who worked with Detective Boss, who was in the medical examiner’s office, or which ones were the techs and miscellaneous officers called in to help.

Gillian used her sensitive hearing and sight to her advantage.

“This is definitely him; it is his signature. I remember reading about this in the papers,” one of the white-clad women from the ME’s office said to a colleague.

The hollow structure amplified their voices well.

“We studied his case files, but we thought him inactive.”

“Why was he never captured?” the first asked.

“Forensics was not as advanced back then, and he outwitted even the Feds.”

“This will cause a shitstorm if we don’t get a handle on it soon.”

Gillian understood their frustration and caution. Mistakes in cases like this ended careers, and the officers didn’t have much time to process the crime scene.

It took longer to piece together that the search teams only discovered two bodies, but expected three. No one paid attention to her, but she didn’t miss a thing.

Gillian waited until Colt turned away from her and no one else was looking to escape into the darkness. Not an easy task. The detective seemed to sense every time she thought of moving and glanced in her direction like a long-suffering parent with a naughty child.

Colt appeared to be in her mid-thirties, only a little older than Gillian, but the detective would never learn or guess that truth from her outward appearance or documents.

Gillian allowed the predator out just enough to pick out scent trails, ignoring the water and sewage seepage. Tracking a much fainter aroma that her brain turned into a brownish-red vapor as she moved deeper into the darkness.

Her night vision illuminated, and she almost didn’t notice the hand that was visible beneath a toppled pillar, but she quickly altered her course.

Colt swore when she glanced toward the barricade and discovered the rookie was missing. This cavernous garage saw better days, and deeper into the gloom, the structural integrity of the 1940s building left much to be desired.

Her legs had gone stiff from the cold, and she winced as she stood, making her way around the tape with irritated staccato strides.

She had no aptitude for babysitting, but deemed it better to have an extra pair of hands and eyes than none. They had too much work, and it kept coming, but this rookie had wandered off, wasting her precious time when instructed to stay put. It didn’t bode well for Beaumont’s future if she disobeyed simple instructions.

Worry replaced her irritation as she unstrapped her flashlight, passing the construction barriers into more unstable territory.

“Beaumont?!” Colt quietly called into the silence—afraid the echo might dislodge something, but not bothering to keep the impatience from her voice.

She reached for her phone to call for more officers. Gavin Boss won’t be happy, and this might be Beaumont’s last day with their unit. Unfortunately, she should not have allowed this to happen.

Bracing herself for the fallout before noticing the lack of reception, she frowned at the phone. She’d have to walk all the way back to use it, but as she pivoted on her heel, she heard a voice.

“Here, Detective Colt. Around the second pillar,” Beaumont said, sounding grim.

She changed direction without question.

The rookie sat on her heels, shining her flashlight at something Colt could not yet see. A familiar heaviness settled in Andrea’s stomach. The distinct smell of old blood, metallic and harsh, greeted her among the scents of damp earth, dust, and seeping sewage.

Closer to Beaumont, the fatty mix of urine and feces joined the mixture. She grimaced, but the odor of rot she associated with death clung to the back of her throat like a layer of wax.

“What are you doing back here? I told you to sit tight!” she said curtly, but grew silent when she saw what the rookie had discovered.

Until then, they had hoped this was a copycat killer or a weird coincidence. The child curled up in that small space, cradling his severed head in his arms like a baby, left no doubt.

“Are you alright?” she asked Gillian, who turned her flashlight away from the gruesome sight.

“Yes, ma'am.”

The young officer sounded infinitely sad, but at least she wasn’t barfing or passing out, which was a good sign. If Boss didn’t send her packing for this stunt, this one might have potential.

“We’ll talk about your disobedience later,” she said calmly, and Beaumont nodded, her face unreadable.

Had she ever looked that young?

“Stay here, don’t move; I’ll send the tech team over. There may be evidence stuck to your shoes.”

The sarcasm wasn’t lost on Gillian, but she had been careful to avoid the telltale traces on the ground, but could not explain that to a human. Her forehead wrinkled when the detective’s footsteps faded away. What was that hint of a scent she couldn’t place? Something odd and slightly “other” that she’d not yet encountered before that didn’t belong to the victim or the killer.

Was it perfume or cologne? No.

Having a werewolf around would have been nice. Her senses were exceptional, but nothing compared to a shifter. Those thoughts belonged to another life. She pushed them from her mind while allowing her senses to roam. She took in every detail and locked it in the vault of her memory.

She would never forget this poor, unfortunate child. He would remain as clear to her as he was now—without the comforting fuzziness human minds used to dull the horror.

Gillian saw so much that they would never notice at a glance, like the distinct shoe prints in the disturbed dust near the body. A few fibers on the ground suggested the murderer wrapped the child in a blanket when he brought him here.

A single strand of springy carpet fiber matted into the blood on his shoulder originated from the vehicle used to transport the boy, a car or van.

The jagged neck wound implied a large hunting knife. The killer severed the neck like an animal for s*******r, with no signs of a struggle. The pooled blood suggested that he died in this place and was not dead on arrival. Cable ties left distinct lines on his wrists and ankles.

The dark, defined bruises on his arms and legs seemed a day or so older. The sheer amount of discoloration and varying shades indicated that the killer had the child for longer than a day but no more than two.

When she and Detective Colt arrived, the ME had already placed the other victims in body bags. From what she heard, that was not true for the other two. He killed them within hours of abducting them, not toying with them first, and if that was true, then this was all about the boy.

The killer beat them viciously before stabbing each seven times in the heart. From what she gathered, he used the same knife on all three victims.

Rage drove him, but his attention to detail and meticulous staging didn’t fit with mindless fury; it suggested far more chilling control.