Watcher in the Woods (Rockton #4)(71)

“I can see a cougar dragging off Val,” I say, “but Brady wasn’t a small guy. He’d outweigh the cat. Even if she managed to take one body and cache it, why come back for the second?”

Anders says nothing. He knows I don’t expect a response. I’m just thinking aloud. If he disagrees, he’ll speak up. He doesn’t.

“Any other predator would only take pieces,” I say. “Maybe they could eventually cart off the scavenged remains but . . .”

I don’t see signs of that. I find blood. I find trampled undergrowth. I find exactly what I’d expect to remain after we took the bodies.

“Someone cleared the scene,” I say.

“Petra?” he asks.

“Maybe. At this point, we have no shortage of council spies who could have gotten the order to move the bodies. Petra, Phil, Mathias . . .”

“Me.”

“I wasn’t—”

“Yeah, I know. But I need to address it, right?”

This is why Anders got into Rockton despite his violent past. He’s here to spy on Dalton and report back to the council. They’d told him that Dalton was violent himself—and corrupt—so Anders had been fine with the task . . . until he realized the council was full of shit. He still plays spy. He just gives them small indiscretions that can never be used against Dalton. We know that’s the best way to play it, even if I’m pretty sure by now the council realizes where Will Anders’s loyalties lie.

“I didn’t clear the scene,” he says. “They never ask me to do anything like that.”

“Someone has, and I doubt they did it as a favor. I came here to see if the bullet that killed Brady matched the one that killed Garcia. Now I can’t.”

“Petra’s your most likely suspect for clean up, too,” he says. “I can’t see Phil or Mathias dragging around dead bodies.”

“Hmm.”

“How many shots did Petra fire?” he asks.

“Just one. He was standing over here.”

I position myself in Brady’s place and then turn to see the trajectory of the bullet. It’s possible that it passed through Brady. I wasn’t paying enough attention to that—I only know that he died. Anders and I both search for the bullet. Then we go to where I saw Petra, and we hunt for the cartridge. We search for at least an hour. As the sun drops, we shine our flashlights on the ground, in hopes the beams will bounce off the metal cartridge.

“It’s not here,” Anders says. “Which really suggests it’s Petra.”

“Or that she grabbed it before she went.” I sigh and ease back on my haunches. I’m tired, though, and when I shift my weight, I topple onto my ass.

“A fine idea,” Anders says, plunking down beside me. He stretches out, arms braced behind him and says, “Does it even matter?”

“Does what matter?”

“Any of this. Petra shot a serial killer. Someone shot a guy threatening to expose Rockton. Do we actually care?”

I look over at him. “Do we care whether our resident comic-book artist is a highly trained assassin? Do we care whether someone may have murdered a law enforcement official who came to enforce a Federal warrant?”

Anders sighs. “Yeah, I know. I’m tired and cranky. Sometimes it just feels like we’re killing ourselves trying to solve crimes no one cares about. No one except us. Fighting the council. Fighting the people we’re trying to protect. Everyone watching, everyone judging, no one giving a shit how much we put into this, how much we risk for it.”

“Like being back in the army.”

He barks a laugh. “Actually, yes.”

“It’s like policing down south, too. The difference is that there, we hear only the criticisms. We have to trust that the silent majority appreciates what we do—the risks we take, the constraints we work under. Up here, I actually see that. I hear that. I feel appreciated. It just gets hard to remember that when I’m running on two hours sleep while watching other residents toddle off to bed at ten PM.”

“No shit, huh.” He stretches out on his back. “We could stay here. Pretend we’re searching all night. Super, super busy, doing super, super important police work.”

“Do you think Eric won’t notice?”

“He’s probably already on his way, making sure we haven’t been devoured by cave bears.”

“Those damned cave bears. They’re everywhere.”

He flashes a smile my way at the old joke, “Fortunately Eric will always protect us. He’ll be here any moment, and then you’ll have to sweet talk him into staying with us. Sleeping under the stars.” He squints up at the thick tree cover. “There are stars, right?”

“There will be, once it’s dark.”

“Perfect.” He rolls his head to the side to look at me. “And do not tell me that we can’t have the entire police force spend the night in the forest, how it’s irresponsible and shit like that.”

“I wasn’t going to say a thing.”

He sighs and pushes himself up, sitting again. “I suppose we should go.”

“Never said it.”

“Yeah, but I still hear it.” He starts to rise and then pauses. “Speak of the devil.”