“Do you think I’ve lost my forensic touch?” she asked.
“Hardly.” Opening the binder, he clicked his pen, signaling they were done. “Everyone knows you’re a prodigy.” He peered at the form, muttering, “Cameryn Mahoney, Angel of Death. You’ve got quite a reputation around town.” After scribbling a few lines, he held out the binder. “Okay, you’re up.”
But she refused to extend her hand. Crossing her arms, she hugged her sides. Her father’s exasperation was etched in every line on his face. “Take it,” he commanded.
“If you’re going to shut me out, you can at least tell me why.”
“For Pete’s sake, you don’t need to see a severed head.” Jabbing the folder toward her, he said, “The face holds the soul, Cammie. Just-do the inventory.”
“What’s the real reason?”
Her father sighed. Slowly, the folder dropped to his side. Another truck crept by, its engine clattering like an old sewing machine, but this time they ignored the rubberneckers. “For one thing,” he finally said, “I promised your grandmother.”
This didn’t surprise her. Her mammaw was convinced that cutting into the dead was the devil’s business. Her father, though, had always been on her side. “Why did you make that promise?”
“Because the last case we worked on put you in danger. For now, at least, she wants you to stop.” He grinned, trying to soften her up. “You know how she can be when her Irish dander’s up. Just humor her, all right? Humor me.”
Inside, Cameryn groaned. This again.
“But this job,” she argued, “is the reason I’m being courted by a top forensic school. Besides, this case is not a homicide-it’s a car wreck. Please, both of you, quit worrying about me. You said ‘for one thing.’ So, what’s the other thing?”
He took a step closer, his eyes full of appeal. “You’re struggling. There’ve been so many changes in your life that I want to keep anything that can hurt you as far away as I can. You can tell me anything, Cammie, and I’ll help. No matter what it is. Or who.”
At that moment, she became aware of a bird cawing overhead and the whisper of wind through the pines and the way her father’s feet had planted in the snow like pylons. For some reason she registered these things-the mountain sounds and Patrick’s stolid legs, the blinding whiteness of the snow, the coldness of the air in her lungs, mingled with the pungent smell of truck exhaust. It was then that she understood: this was not a conversation about something, this was about someone. Her father had been talking about Hannah, the mother Cameryn had never known, the woman who had unexpectedly been resurrected in their lives only weeks before.
“You’re worried about Hannah,” she answered. “That’s what this is all about.”
Patrick’s silence told her all she needed to know.
“Dad, she’s- I just want to spend time with her. You said you’d let me figure things out on my own, and that’s what I’m doing. She’s my mom.”
“Genetically. A womb doesn’t make a mother. And since we’re opening this box, how long is Hannah going to stay in Silverton? Doesn’t she have a life in New York? She was supposed to come and go, but she’s still here.”
“I-I don’t know.” It was the truth. Her mother had returned, but she was elusive, as vague about her plans as she was her thoughts. “Hannah told me she’s just taking it a day at a time. She doesn’t tell me a lot. She… paints.”
“She paints.” Patrick scoffed. “Hannah doesn’t talk, she paints. Do you have any idea how crazy that sounds?”
“Don’t say that!”
The words echoed against the granite mountainside. That, that, that, rang through the air and her father stared, as though if he tried hard enough, he might somehow burn Hannah from his daughter’s mind. When she could no longer return his gaze, she watched the victim’s math book as it lay there on the road, splattered with blood, its pages turning gently in the winter wind.
“Be careful,” Patrick told her, his voice low. Placing a finger beneath her chin, he raised her face until she was forced to look into his eyes, which had become once again warm, fatherly. “I loved her once, too. But there are reasons you need to be cautious. Has she told you the story of how Jayne died?”
Shaking her head, she mouthed the word no. Of course she had asked. Countless times she’d tried to fathom details from the depths of her mysterious mother, but whenever she’d pressed, Hannah had turned away. In this delicate chase of daughter courting mother, Cameryn felt as though she’d lose if she pushed too hard.
“Before you give up your heart, find out what happened that day. I think it’s important.”
“Why can’t you tell me?”
“A long time ago, Hannah promised to stay away and I promised to stay quiet. Secrets were put in place to protect you. But you tell her for me that if she breaks the deal, I will, too. You’re slipping away from me, Cammie. She’s giving me no choice.”
“Dad.” She stopped there, because the words she wanted to say were jammed in her throat. Eyes brimming with tears, she asked, “Why does it have to be this hard?”
“Oh, baby. Sweetheart, I’m sorry.” Pulling a blowing strand of hair away from her face, he hooked it gently behind her ear. With the edge of his thumb he wiped a tear that rolled down the side of her cheek. “Cammie, it’s just… when I saw that dead kid, I kept thinking about you and me and how time runs out. I- This is not the time or the place.”
Before he could finish, lights flashed from the top of a white Durango, Silverton’s four-wheel-drive police car. The blue and red dazzled like bottled rockets.
“Well,” he sighed, “here they come.” Patrick’s brows knit together and he closed his eyes. When he opened them he’d become, once again, Silverton’s coroner. “We’ve got a job to do. No matter what, we have to do it.”
Blood had pooled against the side of Patrick’s boot; his heel cleaved a print of red as he stepped toward the approaching car.
“Dad,” she’d cried. “Wait! ”
At that moment car doors slammed as Sheriff Jacobs, along with Deputy Justin Crowley, made his way toward the crumpled car.
“Sorry we’re late. We had a snafu at the office,” Jacobs declared as he approached the mangled car. He balled his hands on his hips as he surveyed the scene. “My God, Pat, what a mess.”
“Oh, man, look at that,” Justin said as he caught sight of the corpse. “Where’s the head?”
“Haven’t found it yet,” Patrick replied. “I checked out the wallet-the kid’s name is Benjamin Baker, resident of Durango. Cammie’s done the first sweep of photos. She’s going to stay back and do inventory while we search.”
Sheriff Jacobs made a sound in the back of his throat. His features were sharp. His gray, thinning hair was hidden beneath a sheriff’s hat that had actual earflaps. Small in stature, Jacobs was the kind of man whose motions were quick, impatient. Ever since Cameryn’s father had hired her, the sheriff had radiated disapproval whenever Cameryn was on the scene. This time, though, he barely seemed to notice her. His already small eyes seemed to disappear as he squinted. “Guess we can skip calling the EMTs. Don’t need an emergency team to check for a heartbeat if he don’t got a head.”
“That’s what I thought,” her father said. “I already declared time of death at five minutes before we received the first call. That makes it oh-six-hundred hours.”
Sheriff Jacobs scribbled the number on his own notepad.
Rubbing his hands together, Justin blew on his fingers, his eyes surveying the scene until they rested on Cameryn’s, lingering.
Are you okay? Justin mouthed. Cameryn nodded in reply. Justin’s dark hair, too long for regulation, hung into his eyes; there was a slight shadow of stubble across his chin. Although he’d come from New York only five months earlier, Justin had already embraced Silverton’s casual style. His brown leather bomber jacket had been broken in along with his jeans; the only thing that marked him as police was the badge he wore on a cord around his neck.