dog took it, we need to swab its mouth for trace.”
She looked right him. He may be drunk and an ass at times, but sometimes, he thinks of the oddest things that can actually help a case.
“As a Consultant or Detective?” Donovan asks, looking right at her.
She opens the case between the seats and hands him his shield and gun, a Navy SIG P226, still in its holster, “I could never turn them in, and I fought hard to get you back on the force. But the Chief wouldn’t have it, but we need you, so I am making a lateral decision. Can you follow orders this time?”
“Can you leave politics out of it?”
There is a long pause, and she bites her upper lip. “I will try.”
“Me, too, Captain MacBride.”
For the first time, she feels that he truly means it, and she actually heard the respect in his voice. “Where do you want to start?”
“I need to see the scene.”
“Thought you would say that,” MacBride says, driving up near the Reporters as a Deputy moves one of the two barricades aside.
She drives through and parks near O’Malley’s SUV and a few other white patrol cars with a blue strip running down each side and jackson hole county printed on the rear fenders.
Donovan looks around and steps out of the sedan, but she hands him a stick of gum first. He comes around and steps up to the tape at the same time Duke returns with three Deputies.
“Good to have you back, Nephew,” Duke says, raising the tape up for them to pass, and gives MacBride a look—it’s about time.
“Where’s the first girl, Unc?” Donovan asks, greeting his Uncle with a hug. He walks them back to the first girl, where the CSU is about to pick up the body and put her on a gurney. Donovan puts his left hand out for them to wait and stoops for a better look, moving some leaves and twigs with a pen he took from MacBride’s inside coat pocket. “All are the same?”
“Except for their ages and stages of decomposition, the color of their dresses, and this one with her hand, yes,” Roberts explains.
“What colors?”
“White like hers or black,” Roberts replies.
“I have seen this outfit and pearls before,” Donovan comments under his breath, but before anyone can respond, O’Malley and Stein return.
“About damn time, T,” O’Malley says, looking at the group and then at MacBride.
Donovan looks up. “Still only fourteen, O’Malley?”
“Yeah, I have them looking an additional five miles in all directions.”
Roberts and another Tech pick the body up and transfer it to a body bag and then onto a gurney.
“Wait,” O’Malley says, watching as a small white card falls. He quickly picks it up, turns it over, and shows it to Stein.
She looks at MacBride, and O’Malley hands it to Donovan.
Donovan puts his hand out toward Roberts. “Gloves?”
Roberts hands him one from her pocket. He slips it on and flips the card over, “It’s one of my Dad’s old business cards. Bag it, run it, and make sure you are careful with the others. They may also have something hidden,” Donovan states, looking at Roberts.
Roberts nods, places it in an evidence bag, and fills it out, then closes the body bag around the young girl.
Donovan looks over the ground. “Okay, and the oldest one?”
“Over this way, by the creek,” O’Malley says, heading off.
Donovan and MacBride follow Stein and O’Malley back deep into the woods to a point near a creek bed. MacBride vomits seeing the body’s decomposition. Most of the woman’s face has been gnawed at, her eyes and nose are missing, and there is a lot of dry blood. A few maggots are working their way around and under what skin remains on her face and through the eye sockets. MacBride vomits again, and Donovan shoves her a bit to her right, holding on to her so she does not vomit near the body and contaminate the scene.
“We have called Forensic Anthropologists from the University for help,” Stein says.
“Good, leave the ones that are at least three weeks old or older so they can judge the full decomp,” Donovan explains, stooping down for a better look, “Did you find any witnesses?”
“A fisherman found the dog with the hand and a Ranger, who was through this area about three hours earlier,” O’Malley reports.
“We still have the dog?” Donovan says, looking up at him.
Stein looks puzzled. “Why?”
“There may be some trace in the dog’s mouth from the hand,” MacBride explains like a first-year student who knows the answer and blurts it out. She wipes her mouth with a white handkerchief O’Malley gave her. Donovan smiles and continues looking around.
“Where’s the Ranger?” Donovan asks.
“After we took his statement, he needed to finish his rounds through the forest,” O’Malley answers.
“I’ll want to talk with him,” Donovan says, stooping over the woman. O’Malley nods. Donovan walks back into the woods, back toward the base camp, with MacBride following, “Sushi, anyone?”
“Keep it up! Keep it up,” MacBride yells, slapping Donovan on his back and then Stein vomits. O’Malley holds her by her waistband and wrist, moving some distance from the body.
“Document, document, document!” Donovan yells back.
O’Malley holds Stein as she continues vomiting. “Good to have you back, T.”
back on the job
donovan and macbride arrive at the station, walk down a small corridor and up to the four-and-a-half-foot-tall check-in desk with a small swinging door off to one side and a long wooden bench on their right.
Maria Ramirez, a young girl looking right out of high school and just shy of five feet nothing, with black hair, sits at the check-in desk, with four other Deputies around her. She runs around the desk and hugs Donovan. The others clap to celebrate his return.
“Okay, okay. Back to work. It’s not like he is the prodigal son or something,” MacBride says.
“You’re back?” Maria asks, stepping back some.
“For this case, I think,” Donovan says, looking back at MacBride.
MacBride points, keeping him moving, and they continue through the bullpen. A few of the Deputies welcome him back with pats on his shoulders and handshakes. He notices O’Malley’s desk. It is the messiest one in the place, with two used coffee cups and what looks like eggs, maybe his breakfast in a box, except for a small area in the top right-hand corner with a single picture frame of Roberta, his wife of twelve years. She is a young Hispanic woman in her forties, with dark hair. There are also two wallet-size pictures. One is of an eight-year-old boy, brown-haired, in a blue-and-white Little League uniform and kneeling with a bat. The other is of a young girl, about seven, in a white ballet leotard and with blond hair.
Donovan looks across, seeing his old desk, which is now Stein’s new one. The desk is immaculate, still not lived in since she just started as a Detective a couple months ago. He looks around for an empty desk.
“This way, Mister,” MacBride says, walking past him and into the empty office next to hers along the back wall.
“I’m moving up in the world,” Donovan says, entering the room.
“Like you said, we’ll see,” MacBride says, watching him sit down behind the desk.
“This could