Jeffery Deaver - The Bodies Left Behind

Referring to the conversation with Graham Boyd, Brynn’s husband.

“Hard to say.”

They’d come miles through the underbrush, adjusting their course occasionally after consulting the GPS, Google Earth and the paper map as they made their way north.

“So that was why you turned it on, her phone?”

“Right.” Though just after the conversation he’d removed the battery so the police couldn’t trace it. “I’ve been waiting for that. Wanted to hold out for as long as we could. Now we put him at ease. He’ll go to sleep and won’t worry until three or four when he wakes up in an empty bed. By then they’ll both be dead and buried.”

“He believed you?”

“Pretty sure.”

As they walked on, Hart was wondering about her husband, somebody married to a woman like Brynn…what would he be like? Low voice, seemed smart, well-spoken, wasn’t drunk. He wondered if the man’s words had contained clues that might help him find and kill her more efficiently.

Not really.

Still, he kept replaying the conversation. It fascinated him.

Two different last names. Didn’t surprise him that Brynn had kept her maiden name.

Graham…The man she slept with, the man she shared a life with. Unusual name. Where did it come from? Was he conservative, liberal? Religious? What did he do for a living? Hart was interested in the relief that had filled his voice. Something seemed a bit off about it. Hart didn’t know what to make of that. Yeah, relieved…but another emotion too.

He wished he’d gotten a better look at her in the Feldmans’ driveway. Pretty enough, he recalled. Brownish hair, pulled back. A nice figure. Hadn’t let herself go. Picturing her eyes. Brows furrowed as she registered his presence when he rose from the bushes.

Hart had killed six people. Three had looked at him as he did it. Seeing their eyes meant nothing to him. He didn’t prefer that they look away. He didn’t look away either. The only one who hadn’t cried was the one woman he’d killed, a drug dealer.

Yo, you gonna do this?

He hadn’t answered.

You and me, we work something out?

She’d stolen money, or hadn’t, skimmed the drugs, or hadn’t. Wasn’t Hart’s issue. He’d made an agreement with the man who wanted her dead. And so he, a craftsman, made her dead, staring into her face as he did so to make sure she wasn’t going to leap aside or pull a hidden weapon.

Brynn had looked him in the eye too as she fired.

A craftswoman.

“Hart?”

Lewis’s voice shook him out of his reflection. He tensed, looking around. “Yeah?”

“You’re a Milwaukee boy, I’m one too. How come we never worked together before?”

“Don’t know.”

“You work in the city much?”

“Not much, no. Safer that way.”

“Where you live?”

“South of town.”

“Toward Kenosha?”

“Not that far.”

“Lotta building going on in those parts.”

Lewis stopped suddenly. “Look up there, a post or something. A sign.”

“Where?”

“See it? On the right.”

They moved forward carefully, Hart putting aside his thoughts about Brynn with some reluctance, and stopped at the sign.

In the summer of 1673, Louis Joliet, a 27-year-old philosopher, and Fr. Jacques Marquette, a 35-year-old Jesuit priest, crossed Wisconsin on their way to the Mississippi River. Although the trail you are standing on is named for him, Joliet never hiked this 458 mile route. He and Marquette made their voyage mostly by waterway. The Joliet Trail was created by fur traders and people just like you, outdoor-lovers, some years later.

Hart consulted the GPS on his BlackBerry and the paper map.

“Which way’d those girls get?”

“Has to be to the right. That’s the ranger station, few miles away.”

Lewis looked up and down the trail, which, little traveled this time of year, was overgrown and tangled with branches and dotted with stubborn saplings rising through the sludge of leaves.

“What’s wrong?”

“You ask me, this ain’t no trail at all. It’s just less forest.”

Hart smiled at that. Which made Lewis smile too.

HERE THEY WERE, two women moving relentlessly forward on a tourists’ trail. One with an inlaid rosewood cane, one with a matching spear. Bolos and knives in their pockets and grim faces both.

The trail reminded Brynn of the last time she’d been horseback riding-one spring several years ago. She’d loved cantering along the bridle path in some woods near Humboldt. Years ago, before she’d become a deputy, she’d been an amateur competitive jumper and loved the sport. In fact, it was at a competition that she’d seen an exhibition by some mounted police from Milwaukee. The eighteen-year-old had spent time talking to an officer, which had ignited a fascination, ironically, not in the art of dressage riding but in police work.

Which, a few years later, provided the same thrill she’d experienced hurtling over jumps atop a half ton of animal.

Now, she realized how much she missed riding and wondered if she’d ever have the chance to get back into the saddle.

As they continued along the trail they’d see poignant evidence that the park was usually a far more innocent place than tonight, signs dispensing bits of history and information. The most troubling dangers had to do with fires, steep drop-offs and ecological risks.

EMERALD ASH BORER WARNING Firewood purchased from Clausen may be infested with Emerald Ash Borer. If you have purchased any Henderson brand firewood, please burn any such wood immediately to avoid endangering our hardwood trees with the Emerald Ash Borer!

One tree-a massive oak-earned a sign all its own. Maybe the biggest or oldest (tourists loved their superlatives). Brynn, though, thought of it simply as a source of cover. Around here the trail wound through patches of bare fields, exposing them to pursuers. To move off the trail, into the lowland brush, though, would slow them down way too much.

The flying squirrels were plentiful and bats flitted by silently, owls noisier. Several times they’d hear a beat of wing and a final squeak from a predator’s successful strike.

Michelle kept up pretty well but Brynn was growing concerned about her. Her ankle wasn’t bad-from the job and from Joey’s many mishaps, she knew about serious injuries; when to dole out sympathy and when to call medics. Rather, it was the young woman’s resignation. She was lagging behind. Once, she paused and looked up a steep incline, grimaced.

“Let’s go,” Brynn urged.

“I need to rest.”

“Let’s cover a little more ground.” She smiled. “Let’s earn a break.”

“I’m tired now. I’m so tired. My blood sugar, I told you.” Then she gasped and jerked back as a small animal scampered past. “What was that?”

A vole or mouse, Brynn told her. “Harmless.”

“It could crawl up your pants.”

Not yours, Brynn thought, considering Michelle’s tight jeans.

The younger woman’s good mood from earlier had faded. She was like a child who’d missed her afternoon nap. Patiently Brynn said, “Come on, Michelle. The more we walk, the closer to getting back home. And we can’t stop here.” They were in a clearing, very visible in the moonlight.

Her lips tight, almost in a pout, she complied and they climbed the steep hill. At the top Brynn suddenly smelled rosemary and wanted to cry, thinking back to the Easter lamb she’d struggled to roast for her family just weeks ago.

They slipped through a copse of wiry trees, eerie, something out of Lord of the Rings.

Her face was now throbbing with every step. She touched her cheek and inhaled as the ache flowed through her head and neck. The swelling was worse. She wondered if the wound would get infected. Would there be terrible scarring? The thought of plastic surgery came to mind, and she actually smiled, thinking, You vain girl. Maybe you should concentrate on staying alive before you worry about making yourself presentable for the multiplex on Saturday night.