James Patterson - Thriller - Stories to Keep You Up All Night

"It's where the ghosts are. Raccoon says he saw a ghost. Robes white as bleached sheets. Jake and Carmen thought maybe Raccoon would be there with the ghosts. That's why they went."

Kier had heard the rumors of ghosts and murder. Fantastical stories that grew under their own weight.

Mix seemed to be waiting for Matty to leave, but she didn't. So they walked up on the porch and Kier invited them both to sit. Kier was curious about Mix. He seemed to be hanging around a lot lately. Under the eave, Mix removed his straw hat, revealing cropped brown hair that matched a neat mustache. Mix had made a fine transition from law officer to owner of a local feed store and wildlife photographer, even if he had never quite fit socially with the stranger-shy locals. Like Kier's wife, Jessie, also an ex-FBI agent, Mix had gladly given up the big city for the backcountry.

"Some of my friends from the FBI called," Mix said. "I recommended that they ask for your help. You're the best forensic tracker around."

He caught Mix's real message. "The FBI isn't looking for Jake and Carmen. Or ghosts."

"You're right," Mix replied. "They want to talk to Raccoon. Just yesterday they spoke with me. The couple over in Lassen County a year ago, they never found the girl, and the boy was a cooked pile of meat. That boy's father was a state senator. Then we had a couple from Humboldt just disappear off the face of the earth. The press is starting to use the words serial killer"

"That's got nothing to do with Raccoon."

"Maybe. Maybe not. What can you tell me about him?"

"We call him Kawa We Ma. A gentle man inside a big body." He pictured Raccoon as he'd last seen him, wearing a leather flight jacket over deer hide. The man had been born Josiah Morgan, a part-Tilok orphan adopted by the tribe. The nickname came from the port-wine stain on his face that gave him the look of a raccoon's mask.

"The tracks the sheriff found, and some other things, were suspicious," Mix said. "Raccoon disappears for days."

"You disappear for days in the woods, too, with your photography."

"I come back out. Talk to people. Run a store."

"Raccoon talks to the forest," Kier said. "People don't understand him, so they fear him. You and I have no idea what it would be like to see a miracle in every blooming flower. Raccoon is a man distracted by miracles. He's incapable of hurting anyone."

"If he isn't doing anything, then why not track him for them?" Mix asked.

"Because I don't want to."

Matty faced him. "Raccoon told Carmen that above the caverns, in the cliffs, there's a cabin with a ghost. Right above Man Jumps."

Carmen was Raccoon's daughter, whom Kier knew the man worshipped. So he believed the information.

Mix produced a bag of shelled pistachios and offered some. Kier scooped a few, as did Matty. "A cabin would show up on aerial photos," Mix said.

Kier shook his head. "It wouldn't be visible in a cave or hollow. And since it is sacred, no one goes there. Not even rock climbers."

"Who would you say Raccoon really cares about?" Mix asked.

Kier smiled. "That's a perceptive question for an ex-bureaucrat who sounds like he's returning to his old ways. My grandfather used to say the difference between a good and an evil man is what he loves. I'm not sure what Raccoon loves, other than Carmen. But, like I said, Raccoon is not a killer."

There were more questions, but Kier found that in answering he was repeating himself in a manner he disliked. Finally he said to Mix, "I thought you gave the FBI a flunking grade. Said they didn't protect the country the way they should. 9/11. The anthrax killer, and all that."

"I've got my beefs with them, but when it comes to a psychopath, I figure everyone has to pitch in."

Kier nodded, as if he understood.

Kissing Jessie and his children goodbye, dispatching hugs all around, and receiving the benedictory "be careful," Kier left for the woods. Three hours later he studied the tracks of Jake and Carmen, which told him a story. From their separation and angle he was certain these two were friends, not a couple. But it was the third set of prints, following theirs, that consumed his attention. They were made by a heavy man in good physical shape. Given the weight, the tireless stride, the smooth of the sole and the way it rounded at the toe, they could have only come from a handmade hide boot. Only a few Tiloks wore them and none were this size, except perhaps for Raccoon and himself.

The wind molesting the trees made him uneasy. He wondered if the murmur was more of Grandfather's sense of the presence of another life.

He allowed his mind to manipulate the puzzle engulfing him. More unease crept through him. Around him rose the towering rock faces of Iron Mountain with its caverns and Man Jumps, a hole in the cliffside. A slow, 360-degree turn brought his senses to high alert. Something man-made, a patch of cloth on the ground, just visible through the trees, caught his attention.

He inhaled deeply and noticed a strange, meaty smell, something like pot roast.

Hair rose on his arms.

He waited, not moving, listening, looking. Then he silently slipped forward and repeated the exercise. Thirty minutes later, after steadily creeping forward, he concluded that no one alive waited for him ahead. The sense taught by his grandfather confounded him. It would not leave him. But he overruled the sensation and entered the camp.

The first thing he saw was the charred remains of Jake.

A groan escaped his lips. He tried to divorce from his thoughts the agony that must have been Jake's last experiences on earth. He searched for signs of Carmen, imagining the terror she'd be feeling. Anger rose in him, forming a familiar determination.

He studied the fire pit where Jake lay. Given the depth of the ash, the remnants had burned maybe five hours. Probably the killer had watched the campers for a while to savor what was coming. So Kier knew what to do.

Find the watching spot.

He backed away from the fire and soaked in the scene. Quickly, he discovered where the killer had waited. Near the stream. And a fishing rod, probably Jake's, still leaned against a tree. He stared at the prints in the earth. Discernible, but blurred. If he hadn't seen the same blurs elsewhere in the camp, he would have attributed it to the movements of impatience. If he didn't know better, he would have said there were two large men making similar tracks.

Raccoon was here.

But Kier knew he wasn't the killer.

He surveyed the surrounding ground.

Something small and white caught his gaze. He bent down to examine it. A tiny flake. No. A chip of something. Not really. Much more.

A piece from a pistachio nut.

One thought rushed through his mind. Jack Mix.

He reeled off the possibilities. Mix could have easily made a print that size. He possessed the requisite weight, but to make either he would have been forced to stretch his stride to emulate Raccoon.

What did this mean?

He returned to the camp and searched for a sign of struggle or a spot where Carmen might have been tied down, but found nothing. He discovered a blood spatter at the base of the cliff. Fifty feet up the rock wall he spotted a blood smear. He knew what both meant. Jake had tumbled down the cliffs. Then he'd been cooked, like the boy in Lassen County.

But why?

To mask something.

Grandfather's sense of another life dogged him. But his scientific training reminded him that superstitions achieved nothing. So he circled the camp, searching for an exit track. On the far side lay a tan sheet of paper. He bent down and saw that the sheet was a map. Beneath it laid a Polaroid photo of a woman in her mid-thirties.

It was Jessie.

His wife.

And in her engaging smile he saw the inherent goodness that would incite any killer to want to destroy her. Fear threatened to overwhelm him. The message resonated clear. The killer had known he'd be here and had seized his vulnerability.