Chapter 1

Cal Lewis was on duty for ten minutes before a car raced into the sheriff's parking lot like a bat out of hell. It came to a sudden stop just before the concrete yellow blocks that said, Sheriff Personnel Only. He had just sat at his desk with a steamy cup of black coffee when the vehicle rushed in.

"Looks like a young blonde," Alan, his deputy, observed. He watched her alight from the car. "Man, she's a beauty," Alan stated.

"Back to filling out that accident report," Cal growled. He liked good looking women as any red blooded American man, but he hadn't had his first Cup of coffee yet and he was miserable until he did.

The door opened and she walked in. She was wearing a tight pair of black pants, calf high black boots, and a soft white blouse. Her hair looked like an organized mess. Like she had brushed it carefully then shook her head to mess it up. She wore no makeup but the dark brows gave her sky blue eyes more emphasis on her comely face. If there was a flaw, she had a small hawk like nose.

"Are you Sheriff Calvin Lewis?" she asked.

"What can I do for you, lady?"

"It's what I can do for you, sheriff. I'm your tracker."

Cal almost spit out the coffee in his mouth. "My what?"

"Your tracker. You know. I track people who are reported missing or dead," she somehow reached into her back pants pockets and produced an official ID from the Washington State Police. "I hear you have three homicides of young girls here in the Leavenworth area. I've been sent to help you as you requested."

"You are a bona fide tracker?" Lewis asked.

"I'm the best there is. I was taught by my father since I was nine. Now I'm starving. Take me to breakfast and lets get acquainted."

"I seldom eat breakfast," Cal retorted.

"Well I do. I'm hungry. Lets go," she demanded.

"Do you have a name?" Cal asked.

"It was right on this ID," she smirked, returning to her back pocket. "I am Paula Dennis but my friends call me PD. That should be easy to remember."

There was still a chill outside but this day promised to be a hot one. The sun was rising over the high mountains with its millions of trees lining each side of the highway leading into and out of Leavenworth. It was a tourist town where everything was set like Munich, Germany. They served all kinds of ethnic foods, had Bavarian music playing all over from eight a.m. until ten at night, and every shop from candy to clothing had a Bavarian theme to it.

Cal drove south of Leavenworth with PD in the passenger seat. The back seat was for people taken into custody only. On occasion Cal saw a stray mutt and put him into the back to take him to his home or to the shelter if he didn't know who it belonged to.

"Tell me about those girls," PD broke the ice. Cal figured her to be an open person. She could be brash at times. Strong minded and didn't take any bullshit from anyone.

"Three college girls from Central Washington University. One was alone taking pictures of wild life. We found her camera plus her purse. A hiker found her body a few days later. She had been half eaten by animals. We did not get any DNA from her body. We didn't know if she was raped or sexually violated or not because that part of her was eaten. We found a lot of animal hairs and a few human ones. A few of them were pubic so my guess is, and it is only a guess, that she had been forcibly raped."

"Sounds like it," she said, as he pulled into a diner called Sally's.

"Are you sure you want to hear the rest?" he asked, holding the door open for her to enter first. It was crowded but she managed to commandeer a booth.

"I'm not a girl scout that scares easy," PD said, after getting settled. She ignored all the stares of the men glaring at her. "I've been in this business four years and I've seen some pretty awful things that one human being can do to another. Have you ever seen a grizzly do its thing on a person?"

"I've seen what one of those bears can do to a deer or an elk, it's enough for me."

"If you can, aim for the eyes if one charges you. You'll drop him right away because the bullet will go through the softness of the eyeball right into the brain."

"I don't want to get into that kind of a situation," Cal said.

"Hi Cal," a smiling middle aged waitress came to their table holding up a big coffee pot. "You got a new gal pal?"

"No! She's a pal that just happens to be a gal. PD meet Loretta, Loretta this is PD. She's a cop too."

"Hi," both said simultaneously to the other.

"Cal here is a confirmed bachelor. He can have any single chick in the county but he thinks he's Wyatt Earp and isn't interested in settling down," Loretta said. "I include myself in this group of love starved women."

"I'm a confirmed bachelorette," PD smiled. "Ain't met the man who can tie me down. I like being single myself. But if the right guy comes along I'll give him a second look."

"Coffee?" Loretta asked.

"Please!" Cal pushed his cup forward.

"No coffee for me," PD stated. "I'll have a coke with my breakfast."

She noticed Cal grimace.

"You better make an exception and eat this morning. I'm anxious to get to those two murder sites," PD suggested.

They placed their orders from a chalk board showing the specials. PD added an extra over easy egg to the plate. "Don't tell me about the other two until we get back in the car."

"Fine by me," Cal agreed.

"Any family?"

"I've got a brother who is stationed in Korea up by the DMZ. He's a master sergeant now and should be a sergeant major soon. He's married to the military but also has a Korean bride and one boy."

"Is that it?"

"I don't know who my parents are. They dumped my and Cliff off at an orphanage door step and took off. I don't know the circumstances why. We may have been bad kids, or we were a burden to them, he could have lost his job, she might have become pregnant. Hell, I don't know. I've been wondering about this almost all my life."

"That's an awful thing to do to a kid," PD sympathized with him.

"Maybe the orphanage was the best thing for us at the time. Neither Cliff or me were ever adopted so we were together for the duration. He's three years older than me so he upped and joined the army. He's making it a career, I didn't but gave me some skills being an MP and helped me on the way to becoming a cop."

The food came and both dug in. Cal was hungrier than he thought as both finished their plates in five minutes. He noticed that PD ate as fast as he did. She wasn't at all a dainty eater. She shoveled it in just as quickly as Cal did. She asked for and received a refill on her coke.

"I'm the baby of the family, twenty-four. My father was a tracker for the State Police and assisted on a lot of cases. Murders of young women up here are common as you know."

"Tell me about it," he said, thinking of the two girls he had not yet mentioned.

"I helped my father track a bear when I was nine. My brothers and sister were never interested but I was. He taught me everything and when I finished college two years ago he brought me on board with him. He tells me I'm the best he's ever seen but what father isn't proud of daddy's little girl following in his footsteps.

"I love police work and the specialty that's been given me. I have found several lost children in the woods, some teens lost too. But my favorite was a cantankerous moose and her calf the wreaked havoc on campers up near the Idaho border. She left a trail of broken limbs and branches which made it easy to find. We shot her and her calf with tranquilizers and airlifted them north out of harms way."