The Soul Summoner (The Soul Summoner Saga Book 1) (23 page)

"Want some coffee?" I asked, smiling like I was oblivious to the insult that had just occurred.

He shook his head. "Thanks. I've got some in my truck." He produced a large paper book from his jacket. "I talked to some buddies of mine last night and asked them where the most heavily tracked parts of the game land are. I figured those should be the last places we should check. I also picked up this book of hunting maps last night."

Warren nodded. "That's good." He pointed to the book. "May I?"

Nathan handed it to him. "Have you been there before?" 

Warren shook his head. "No, but I'm no stranger to the woods."

I raised my hand. "I have a question. What are we going to do if we actually find something today? We can't exactly say we were out hiking in the rain and happened upon it." I looked at Nathan. "Not with you being so close to the case."

Warren flipped through the book. "I figured that out last night," he said. "I can call it in after you guys leave. I will say I was on my way home from visiting my girlfriend and was scouting the woods for escape and evasion drills in the spring."

Nathan crossed his arms over his chest. "Your girlfriend or your sister?"

I pointed at Nathan. "Don't start." 

Warren was smiling down at the book. 

I pushed away from the counter and stretched my arms up over my head. "Come on boys. I didn't get up before the sun to stand around chatting in my kitchen. If we hang out here much longer, I'm going back to bed." 

It was a four hour drive to Raleigh. It rained the entire way. Thankfully, when we pulled into a parking area at Butner-Falls, the storm had minimized to a drizzle. The parking lot was almost empty. Nathan pulled his blue four-door truck up beside us, and we got out of the car. When we stopped in Winston-Salem, Warren let me drive the Challenger the rest of the distance. I didn't think I would ever be satisfied with my car again.

Warren spread out the map on the hood of Nathan's truck. "I went over this on the way here. I think we should hit these areas first." He was pointing to three red circles he had drawn on the map. "Coupled with the list you provided, these areas are the most secluded. There are few trails for hikers to come stumbling through, and they are heavily wooded with lots of ground covering."

I adjusted the ball cap I had stolen out of the back seat of Nathan's truck. "If there aren't any trails, how are we going to find our way through the woods and back again?" 

Warren and Nathan looked at each other and smiled for the first time ever at each other. "I think we'll be OK," Nathan said.

Warren made some notes on the map, and we started off into the woods. 

I shook my head. "This feels like the set up to a really bad, B-rated horror movie. 'A sniper, a detective, and a publicist go into the woods…'"

Nathan laughed behind me. "Or a really bad joke." 

I peeked back over my shoulder at him. "Speaking of really bad jokes, how's your girlfriend?"

He stuck his middle finger up in the air and I laughed.

"Who do we think is buried out here anyway?" Warren asked over his shoulder.

"My sister," Nathan answered.

Warren turned around so suddenly that I slammed into his chest. "Oh shit. Seriously?" he asked.

Nathan nodded. "She's been missing for almost twelve years."

"Man, I'm sorry. I had no idea." Warren shook his head and turned away again. "I was wondering why you are working on a case in Raleigh when you live in Asheville."

"He's been working on it his whole career," I said.

"Haven't had any good information until I met Sloan," Nathan said. "We didn't even know they were all dead."

"But you still don't know that they are all connected, right?" Warren asked.

"No, but it seems that they are," Nathan said.

"Follow your gut, man. If I've learned anything being whatever it is that I am, it's to follow your gut," Warren said.

After a half an hour of walking seemingly nowhere, I asked, "How big is that circle?" All I could see were trees in every direction.

"About a hundred and fifty acres," Warren answered over his shoulder.

"Um, I'm no expert, but I'm pretty sure that's a little bigger than a football field," I said.

"It's about a hundred football fields," Nathan said.

My mind flashed back to grueling laps around the football field during high school cheerleading practice. Back then, the terrain was flat and there were cute football players to discuss with Adrianne. Butner-Falls was cold and wet and without a level concrete path. The eye candy was definitely sufficient, but even the view of Warren from behind wasn't able to distract me from the dread of trekking through a hundred mountainous football fields in the rain. I wondered how much sweet-talking it would take to get one of my companions to give me a piggy-back ride.

I was really beginning to doubt myself and my theory about the murders when Warren finally stopped in a clearing with a view of the lake and shook his head. "There's nothing here," he said. "It's not this section."

I almost burst into tears.

"How do you know?" Nathan asked.

Warren turned and took my hand as he led me past Nathan. "The same way Sloan knew those girls were dead." 

"You just know?" Nathan asked with an arrogant tone.

"I just know," Warren repeated.

"Sloan, why can't you do this?" Nathan asked.

I shrugged my shoulders. "I don't know. Why can't you do it?"

He smirked. "Funny," he said. "You know, not too long ago I was a real detective who did real police work. Now I'm wandering around the woods in the rain looking for dead bodies with two psychics."

"Ick," I said. "Don't use that word."

"I hate it." Warren laughed and looked down at me. "It always makes me want to break out singing, 'That's What Friends are For' by Dionne Warwick."

"That singer with the Psychic Friends Network?" Nathan asked. 

"Ha! Yes," I answered. I smiled up at Warren. "And, I think you should sing."

"I second that," Nathan agreed.

Warren was shaking his head. "Singing it in my head is bad enough."

We stopped for a sandwich when we got back to the parking lot, and then we drove to the second spot that Warren had circled. I didn't like the sight of it from the road. The incline was steep, and it went on for further than my legs were willing to go. We parked in a grassy spot near a guardrail, and I got out and looked up. Straight up.

"I think I'm going to sit this one out, boys. I'll just wait in the car with the heater and the radio on," I said.

Warren slung his backpack over his shoulders. He raised an eyebrow. "We're out here looking for the body of two dead girls who we believe were murdered by a serial killer in this vicinity, and you want to stay in the car alone?"

"I could wait with her," Nathan suggested with a sneaky grin.

Warren smiled and cut his eyes over at Nathan. "Then they might have to look for three bodies." 

I groaned and re-tied my shoelaces. "Who would bury bodies on this cliff? That's just stupid."

Warren looked at the map. "If the bodies are here, they will be on the other side of this hill. We could hike in from the access road on the other side, it's not as steep, but it is about eight times as far, and we would have to cross a river. The hill is our fastest route."

I looked down at my drenched clothes. "I don't think the river is a deterrent at this point. And stop calling that thing a hill." I pointed at the incline. "That's a mountain."

Warren shoved the map into his back pocket and offered me his hand. "Come on. It's not as bad as it looks," he said. "We'll be there before you know it."

I put my hand in his, and the three of us walked down into a creek before starting up the mountain on the other side. Some parts were so steep that we had to pull ourselves upward using tree roots that poked out of the ground. Halfway to the top, the sky opened up and the rain poured down once again. 

"This is every single bit as bad as it looks, Warren," I whined as he helped me up onto a boulder near the top.

Nathan hoisted himself up after me. "I would like to take this opportunity to remind you, Sloan: this was
your
brilliant idea." 

Warren put his backpack down and pulled out the map. I plopped down next to the pack and pulled out a water bottle. I offered it to Nathan. He took it, then stepped closer to look over Warren's shoulder. My wet hair was matted to my face, and my teeth were chattering. Cold rain drizzled down the bridge of my nose like a freshwater spring.

The other side of the mountain leveled off after a small decline from where we were. I could see the lake in the distance. 

"It was a brilliant idea," Warren finally said. He was straining his eyes out over the view. "This is it."

I jumped up, causing water to squish out of my new boots in every direction. "What did you just say?"

Nathan stepped forward. "Where?"

Warren held his hand out. "That direction," he said, reaching for his pack. "Come on."

I had initially hoped that knowing we were on the right track would renew my strength, but the screaming pain in my legs proved otherwise. The only thing that improved was the rain finally let up again. Still, I didn't want to take another step. "OK, I'm done." I was dragging my heavy feet through the fallen leaves and the mud. "Who wants to carry me?"

"We're almost there," Warren insisted.

I tossed my head back over my shoulder. "Nathan, you wanna carry me?" 

"No he doesn't," Warren said.

"This time, he's right," Nathan agreed.

We walked for another half a mile to an area thick with twisted mountain laurel and kudzu. Warren stopped so suddenly that I slammed into his backpack once again.

I rubbed my head where it smacked into a piece of the pack's hard plastic. "You've got to start warning me before you do that," I griped. "Maybe get a set of brake lights."

"There's a body buried under there." He was pointing to a spot on the ground, just beyond a fallen tree covered with moss and mushrooms.   

My head snapped up. I looked around him for confirmation but didn't see anything suspicious in the mess of woodland brush. All I saw was a patch of decaying flowers and a mulberry bush.

Warren spun around to his left and started walking again.

"How can you tell?" I asked. "Can you describe it?"

He thought for a moment. "It kind of feels like the sucking force of a vacuum. Like the spot is swallowing up the life around it."

"That actually makes a lot of sense. I always know when a person is nearby because it seems like they are pulsing with energy and I can sense the vibrations," I said.

Nathan just looked puzzled.

I put my hand on his arm. "It's OK. You wouldn't get it."

Warren began walking a wide circle, leaving Nathan and me watching him like he might sprout a long nose and a tail at any moment. He was like a six-foot-two bloodhound scouring the ground with his eyes. 

About forty feet away from us, he finally looked in our direction. "There's another one this way." He took a few more steps to his left. "This one is easier to get to." He started toward a wild rhododendron. 

"Should we disturb it?" I asked when we got closer.

Warren looked up at me. "How am I going to convince anyone there is a body up here if I don't have something to show them?" he reminded me. "I'll just say I was scoping out areas for foxholes. I'll dig up some other places too."

He put his pack down and pulled out a large knife. I started to go with him, but Nathan blocked me with his arm. "Stay back. You and I should keep our distance. We aren't supposed to be here."

Warren ducked under the rhododendron and fought his way through more kudzu before he knelt down and began scraping at the ground with his blade. A few minutes passed and he finally stopped. "Bingo," he said.

I dug my nails into Nathan's arm.

Warren's hand came up, and resting on his fingers was a piece of bone that was hooked like the letter 'J'. It was about four or five inches long. He raised his eyebrows.

"Oh god," Nathan moaned. He folded his arms over top of his head and began to pace around.

"What is it?" I asked as Warren stood up still examining it.

Nathan paced the other direction and groaned. "It's a jawbone."

14.

EVEN THOUGH WE had been talking about it for two days, Nathan obviously wasn't prepared to actually find his sister's remains. If he hadn't been so worried about tainting the crime scene, I was sure that he would've been vomiting. It wasn't the first time he had seen human remains, but it was the first remains that carried the probability of being his baby sister.

Warren carefully walked back over and put the bone into a zip lock bag he had brought for such an occasion. He turned it over in his hand so I could see the teeth that were still attached to the half he was holding. I felt my stomach do a backflip. I turned and covered my mouth with the back of my hand.

He nodded toward Nathan who had wandered further away. "Go check on him," he mouthed.

Cautiously, I crossed the grass. "Nathan? You OK?"

He nodded, but didn't answer. His eyes were closed as he paced. 

"Why don't you sit down?" I suggested. "Have a drink of water."

He shook his head furiously and walked away rubbing his hands over his face. 

Warren caught up with us. The bone was tucked securely somewhere in his pack. "Let's get him out of here," he said quietly. He walked over and clapped Nathan on his back. "Hey man, we've got to get out of here before you and Sloan leave too much of your presence behind."

Nathan blew out a hard puff of air and nodded. His hands were visibly shaking. He shoved his arms through the arm holes of his pack and turned back in the direction of the cliff we had just scaled.

Warren let him lead the way back to the car. I was pretty sure it was to keep Nathan completely focused on where he was putting his feet instead of on what Warren was toting down with us. If that was his reason, it worked.  Nathan was almost back to normal when we reached the bottom, but he still went directly to his truck and climbed in the cab without saying a word. He sat there with his head on the steering wheel while I walked with Warren to the Challenger.