Relic Read online

  My stomach grumbles. Unbelievable. Five minutes ago I was ready to puke my guts up and now I’m hungry? I probably shouldn’t eat before we drive down the mountain, considering how sick I got on the way up, but I can’t help wondering if Weller might offer us something. My stomach growls again in anticipation.

  I sigh and peer back into the house. Where the hell is Jack? He’s been gone way too long for a survey of the property.

  Something happened to him.

  Stop it, brain. This is the problem with being a cop’s daughter: you’re always seeing the dangers in every situation. I’m sure Jack’s fine, just picking his way slowly through the trees and underbrush.

  It’s too quiet. You should be able to hear him.

  “Jack?” I cry out, despite my attempt to reason away his absence. “Where are you?”

  The jay inside the house flutters, an angry, violent movement that makes me jump. But no response from Jack.

  I’m reminded of the mine, how one minute Jack was right behind me and the next he was gone.

  You should go look for him.

  I tiptoe down the porch which extends to the back of the house, and peek my head around. Just for an instant, I think I see something in the trees. A black shadow, darting behind a massive Douglas fir.

  It can’t be. It can’t have followed us. I back away, my eyes still fixed on the tree where I saw the shadow. I have to tell Jack. Warn him.

  “Hey!” Jack says from behind me.

  I scream, flattening myself against the cabin wall.

  Jack laughs. “Didn’t mean to scare you.”

  “Not funny,” I pant.

  “Aw.” Jack purses his lips and puts his hands on my hips, pulling them to him. “I’m sorry. Didn’t you hear me coming?”

  I shiver at his touch. “No, I . . . There was . . . I mean, I thought I saw . . .”

  His thumb finds the exposed skin between my shorts and my tank top, and grazes it lightly. I let out a slow breath, the shadow forgotten. “I just got creeped out here by myself.”

  “Sorry.” Jack leans in and kisses me, and despite the fact that seconds ago I was freaking myself out during Jack’s absence, I’m suddenly wound up, supercharged, and I want to yank off Jack’s shirt and run my lips up and down his taut abs.

  He pulls away and grabs my hand. “Come on. There’s a door open off the deck.”

  I shake off the unexpected hormone fog that has settled over my brain and follow Jack around the side of the cabin to where a large deck connects to the living room through a set of French doors, one of which is open.

  Jack steps inside. “Deputy Weller?”

  I tiptoe behind Jack and notice a line of white powder across the threshold. I step over it gingerly. “What’s that?”

  Jack crouches down to examine the powder, touches it with his fingertips, then licks them. “Salt,” he says, spitting it out. “Why the hell did he pour salt across the doorway?”

  “No idea.”

  He stands up and shrugs. “Come on.”

  I linger behind Jack, examining the bookshelves. The books are shoved in haphazardly, bursting from the shelves, and it kind of reminds me of my own book collection in my room. “Shasta County, 1900–1945,” I read, head tilted to the side to get a good view of the spines. Some are old, leather tomes with fading lettering, others are new, with shiny book jackets in eye-catching primary colors. “California Railroads of the Twentieth Century. Copper Mines and the Wintu Tribes. Shasta Dam and the New Deal.”

  Jack laughs. “This guy’s a bigger history nerd than you are. I’m going to check the kitchen.”

  “’Kay.” But I’m not really listening. Something else has caught my eye. A narrow offshoot of the living room extends down the side of the house. It’s empty except for a circular area rug at the end of the room, and in the middle of the rug, sitting alone by itself, is a book.

  It’s not as if Weller’s book collection is particularly neat and tidy. The shelves are crammed, volumes stuck vertically, horizontally, stacked upon one another. I’m surprised there aren’t more books strewn around the cabin.

  That’s what’s strange about it.

  I walk over to the book and pick it up. Maybe Weller left it there for us to find? Maybe it’s an answer to all the weirdness that’s been happening to us? I turn the small volume over and find bright yellow lettering against its dark glossy cover: Flora and Fauna of Shasta County.

  Not exactly the clue that solves the mystery, Sherlock.

  I turn back toward the bookcase to return the errant tome, when I notice there’s an alcove tucked into the back of the living room, complete with a desk, a leather executive chair, and a Tiffany lamp.

  And sitting with his back to me, a large pair of noise-canceling headphones perched on his head, is Deputy Weller.

  That’s why he didn’t hear the doorbell.

  I sigh with relief. Nothing sinister here. But as I reach out to tap Deputy Weller on the shoulder, my fingertips tingle—my cop’s-daughter spidey sense screaming out for me to stop.

  But I can’t. I need to see his face.

  “Annie, wait!” Jack cries, returned from the kitchen.

  Too late. I spin Weller around.

  The body doesn’t move. The cord of the headphones is wrapped around his neck, twisted behind the chair as the killer used it to strangle Weller to death. At least, I think it’s Weller. It’s hard to tell—his eyes have been completely removed, leaving bloody, black holes in his head. Gore oozes down his cheeks and chin, which hangs limp at the jaw, unnaturally wide as if someone had pried his mouth open and broken the joints in the process. As I stare at the blood-covered teeth and lips hanging halfway down to his chest, I suddenly understand what I’m seeing: his tongue, like his eyes, has been removed.

  It seems like an eternity that I stand there, transfixed by the mangled remains of Deputy Weller, before something steps into my line of vision, blocking the view. And then Jack’s arms are around me, dragging me from the house.

  TWENTY

  I SIT OUTSIDE ON A WOODEN BENCH NEXT TO JACK. I’M NOT sure how I got here. My mind feels as if it’s been wiped clean from the moment I discovered Weller’s body until now. My cardigan is on, but I can’t stop shivering. I wrap my arms around my waist, partly because I’m cold and partly in some vain attempt to protect myself from the horror we witnessed inside.

  I feel something hard tucked inside my cardigan. I glance down and find the book I picked up inside Weller’s cabin. I must have brought it outside with me, but I literally can’t remember.

  What I do remember is Weller’s mutilated, contorted face, carved into my memory in such crystal clear detail that it makes me convulse.

  I close my eyes, wishing the image away, and try to focus on something else. Anything else. I should talk to Jack, tell him about the book. Maybe he can put it back inside. But before I can utter a word, a Sheriff’s Office SUV pulls into the driveway, screeching to a halt before Weller’s cabin and drowning out any attempt at speech. The driver jumps from the car amidst a typhoon of dust, partially obscuring him from our view, but as the dirt begins to dissipate, my stomach drops.

  “Annie?” my dad says. “What the hell are you doing here?”

  Of all the gin joints in all the world, my dad had to be the first officer responding to Jack’s 911 call.

  How in the hell are we going to explain our presence at a murder scene? My dad’s going to want to know all of the details, and it won’t be long before the entire story comes out. I can already imagine his rage when he realizes I’ve lied to him. He’ll blame Jack for getting me into this situation in the first place, probably try to forbid me from seeing him for the rest of the summer.

  So yeah, at this moment my brain should have morphed into overdrive trying to come up with a decent story to explain away our presence at a crime scene, while my dad’s eyes, narrow and suspicious behind his lightly tinted aviators, dart back and forth between Jack and me. But all I can do is sit there, hugging
the book to my side, while my mind goes blank.

  Luckily, Jack’s brain is still in working order. “I had an appointment to meet with Deputy Weller,” he says, slipping his hand into mine.

  My dad doesn’t look at him. “Why?”

  “I was hiking around the lake this weekend while Annie was in Sacramento,” Jack lies without missing a beat. “I must have dropped my ID. Weller found it and called me.”

  Nicely played.

  “Awfully convenient that you just happened to be here to discover the body, Cruz.”

  I can’t believe my dad is insinuating that Jack had something to do with this. I know he doesn’t care for my boyfriend, but that’s going a bit far. I don’t like the skanky girlfriend he doesn’t think I know about, but I don’t go around accusing her of murder.

  I jump to my feet. “We were together, Dad, every second since we arrived.” Except when Jack snooped around in back. “So if you’re going to arrest Jack for Deputy Weller’s murder, you’d better arrest me too.”

  “I’m not arresting anyone,” my dad snaps, his anger igniting more quickly than usual. “But I’m going to want a full—”

  The rest of his words are drowned out by a small armada of patrol cars that roar down the driveway to Weller’s cabin. Deputies swarm out of them, and Ned, my dad’s second in command, rushes to his side.

  “How did you get here so fast, Sheriff?” Ned asks, breathless as if he’d run up the mountain instead of driven.

  “I was in the area.”

  “Have you examined the body?”

  My dad shakes his head. “Not yet.”

  Ned gives a single nod, then turns and dashes into the house.

  My dad points his forefinger and pinky at Jack and me. “Stay here. I’m not done with you.”

  My dad starts barking orders to his deputies, who scurry around like ants from a drowned anthill. A few seconds later, Ned trots through the French doors onto the deck. His face is pale and he’s broken into a sweat. “Sheriff,” he pants, “you have to come. . . . I’ve never seen anything like it.”

  Ned is afraid, rattled by what he’s seen in the house. I don’t blame him.

  My dad’s inside the cabin for all of five minutes before he returns. Despite his years of experience with everything from murder to suicide to bodies half-eaten by wildlife, I can tell he’s shaken.

  “Somebody call Flynn,” he shouts to one of his deputies, then he turns to us. “Tell me exactly what happened when you got here.”

  “We rang the bell,” I begin, closing my eyes to remember the exact chain of events. “Twice.”

  “No one answered,” Jack cuts in. “But since all the lights were on, we walked around to the back, thinking maybe he was outside or something. The door was open, so we went in.”

  “I found Deputy Weller sitting at his desk. He had headphones on, and I figured he just couldn’t hear us, so I . . .” I swallow, remembering how I laid my hand on his shoulder, recalling how stiff his muscles were. Then the body slowly turned, and I saw the jaw, the skin, the empty sockets.

  I don’t realize I’m crying until Jack slips his arm around my waist. The shock has worn off, the adrenaline high vanished.

  “Annie found the body,” Jack says softly.

  “I see.” My dad lets out a heavy sigh, filled with regret and sadness and words not spoken. And I know that he, like Jack, is wishing he could have spared me the sight that would forever be burned into my brain. “Did you touch anything?”

  “No,” Jack says. “As soon as we saw that he was dead, we got out of the house, called nine-one-one, and waited here until you arrived.”

  “Good.” My dad turns back to the house and shakes his head. “Never seen anything like this,” he says under his breath.

  “Sir,” Jack says, “do you think I could take Annie home? She’s had a shock.”

  My dad nods absently. “Don’t know when I’ll be home, Annie Bananie. Get some sleep.”

  I lean my head against the passenger-side window as Jack slowly navigates the winding road down the mountain. My stomach is still sour, but his care with the tight turns has staved off my carsickness for now. I take a deep breath and press my forehead against the cool glass, and for the first time in an hour, I allow my body to relax. My muscles are sore, aching as if I’ve been power lifting at the gym, and it takes a few moments for them to unclench. Finally, my arms fall limp at my sides and something tumbles onto the bench seat beside me.

  A small book with a glossy yellow title.

  “Oh no.”

  “What’s wrong?” Jack asks, easing off the accelerator.

  I pick up the book and stare at the cover. Flora and Fauna of Shasta County. I’d completely forgotten about it.

  “Annie,” Jack says slowly. “Please tell me you brought that book with you from home.”

  “No such luck.”

  I know better than to take evidence from a crime scene, especially from a murder as grotesque as this one, but in the chaos of my dad’s appearance, I’d forgotten that I’d had it squirreled away in my cardigan.

  “Do you know how much trouble we’re going to be in if your dad finds out about this?”

  “I’ll be in,” I correct him.

  Jack snorts. “Yeah, right. Like Sheriff Kramer isn’t going to believe that I somehow coerced his darling daughter into tampering with a criminal investigation. You heard him back there. He wants to tear me limb from limb. He blames me for bringing you to Weller’s. Hell, he probably blames me for the murder.”

  “You’re overreacting.”

  Jack glances at me sidelong. “Am I?”

  “It’s not like I took it on purpose. It was an accident, and my dad’s not going to blame anyone, especially not you.”

  “If you say so.” He’s clearly not buying it. I feel the car slow, as Jack gently turns off the main road. “How about we get something to eat, huh? I’m starving.”

  “Me too.” After what I saw at Weller’s cabin, you’d think my innards would want nothing to do with food, but as Jack ushers me through the door at the roadside diner and I’m hit with the pungent aroma of sizzling meat products, my stomach growls.

  We order quickly from the waiter, and the second he brings my Diet Coke I suck it so quickly through the straw I give myself an ice cream headache. But the coolness and caffeine have a restorative affect, and it isn’t long before I’m feeling more myself again.

  “Okay.” He reaches his hand out to me. “Let me see it.”

  “What?”

  He arches his eyebrow. “The book.”

  “Oh.” I have no idea why he wants to delve into the Flora and Fauna of Shasta County at this very moment, but whatever. I place it in Jack’s hand, but as I do so, the cover slips off, its glossy coating stuck to my fingers, and the book underneath slides onto the Formica tabletop.

  I stare at it, shocked. Instead of plain cloth with an embossed title, the book cover is made of leather, worn and faded from years of use. The pages are thick, and I notice for the first time that the book bulges slightly as if included in its depths is more material than intended for the structural integrity of the spine.

  “What is it?” My fingertips are tingling.

  “A scrapbook.” Jack spins it toward him. “Where did you find it?”

  “On the floor.” I picture the book, poised in the middle of the carpet, no other volumes near it. It sat squared to the wall, parallel to Weller’s desk. In fact, I might not have discovered the body if I hadn’t gone to investigate the errant book. You couldn’t see him from the living room, tucked away in that alcove, unless you walked all the way down to the end. “Funny that it should be right there, by Weller’s body.”

  As if someone wanted you to find it.

  It certainly wasn’t Weller. He had no reason to leave it on the floor before he died. If he’d wanted us to see it, he’d have had it on his desk. Could the killer have left it there for someone to find? Could this be the key to Weller’s murder?

&n
bsp; Jack runs his fingers over the textured leather and across the wrinkled spine. His eyes are bright—the strangeness of the book has captured his imagination.

  “Why do you think it was camouflaged behind another book’s cover?” I ask.

  He looks up at me, dark eyes fixed and serious. “There’s only one way to find out.”

  TWENTY-ONE

  I LEAN AGAINST JACK’S ARM, SNUGGLED TIGHTLY BESIDE HIM in the booth, and hold my breath as he gingerly opens the scrapbook. I’m not sure what I’m expecting: a note from the killer, an accusation by the victim, some other minor Sherlock Holmesian clue that will instantly make sense of the whole situation. Those things would have made sense. Instead, a teaspoon’s worth of salt pours out onto the table.

  “What the hell?” I say.

  “Dude certainly had a thing for salt. In the book, across his doorway. Any idea what that’s about?”

  I shake my head and, using the sleeve of my cardigan, brush the white crystals off the table. “Weird.”

  We turn back to the book. There’s no note written in the front, no name or warning or commentary about who owns it or what significance it holds. There are designated locations for those things, such as the “This book belongs to _______” stamp centered and bolded on the first page, but Deputy Weller, or whomever the book belonged to, has left the blank . . . blank.

  Jack carefully lifts the page, treating the scrapbook like a priceless historical manuscript that might disintegrate in the slightest breeze. Its pages are wrinkled and puckered, stained a yellowish-brown hue from either sun or water damage. But as Jack flips it over, I can see the reason for both: there’s a newspaper article glued to the other side.

  “‘Bull Valley Mine to Close,’” I read aloud. “‘Stubborn residents refuse to leave Banner.’”

  Jack points to a handwritten annotation near the top of the page. “‘Sacramento Bee, 1925.’” He turns to the next page. Again, another newspaper story about closing the mine and residents of the once-bustling area who insist on remaining in their dying town. This time, a name had been circled in the article. “‘Malcolm Hockler,’” I read slowly. “Any idea who he is?”