Chapter 8

Brady jogged to catch up with Heather. “Wait. You can’t.”

“Why not. I do this for a living. You need me.”

“Yeah, sure. But—” He rubbed the back of his neck. Her jaw was set. She would not be swayed. “Okay. Follow me to my place. We’ll load up the horses and head out past Eight Mile Road. Search, Rescue, and Recover has set up a base camp along the river.”

“Fine.” She leapt into her Mini-Copper and turned over the engine.

Brady shook his head as he climbed into his truck. “This is a big mistake!”

He led the way out of Colorado Springs to Highway 115 south to his land. He backed the truck up to the trailer and jumped out to connect the hitch. Ignoring where she parked or what she did once she got out of her car, he pulled the trailer closer to the barn.

He whistled for two reasons— To call his dog and alert the horses they were needed.

Hudson came loping out of the house and ran directly to Heather. Brady cringed, imagining Hudson knocking her down. He darted his eyes toward her to find Hudson circling her legs and Heather laughing.

“Traitor!” Brady muttered and dashed into the barn. He tossed two saddle blankets over his shoulders, lifted two saddles and walked to the corral door. “Dick! Li’l Dove!”

Heads down, they still grazed in the pasture. He whistled a pattern meant only for the horses.

Their heads rose simultaneously. Li’l Dove leapt forward. Dick responded with the mare, trotting behind her straight to Brady.

“You named your horse Dick?” Heather stepped up behind him.

He started. He’d practically forgotten she was there, even though he was preparing to saddle two horses. It was his custom to do this alone for so long, it felt odd to have another person waiting to ride with him. Especially Heather. It was like having the ghost from Christmas past standing in his barn. Mentally he shook off the déjà vu.

How often had he wished— He glanced over his shoulder at her. A shrug and a sharp inhale seemed like an appropriate response. The horses halted inches from Brady’s feet. He reached up and took Li’l Dove’s harness. “Hold her will ya?”

Heather complied. He pulled his horse into the barn by his reins and looped the leather through an iron ring to keep him out of the way. Maybe he should explain. “He’s a gelding. I thought it appropriate to give him back what he missed the most, with the name.”

Heather giggled. “You’re something else.”

A stone slammed into his gut. She didn’t say anything about the mare’s name. He didn’t think twice about calling her Heather’s pet name. Until now. Brady frowned. So much for the guise that he’d put the past behind him.

Brady saddled the mare, leaned back, measured Heather’s legs by sight, and adjusted the stirrups. “There, that ought to be right.”

“Thank you.” She said but her brow questioned his ability to measure so accurately. She put her foot in the stirrup and swung up into the saddle. Her pants stretched tight across her round bottom, and Brady’s jaw went lax. Mentally he shook his head. Mercy.

“Perfect fit.” She broke his spell, pressing her legs out wide to demonstrate the leathers were exactly the right length.

“Uh, yeah. Good.” He had his horse saddled in no time. “Let’s load them into the trailer and go to the base camp.”

“Sure.” She slid off her horse as if she’d done this every day of her life.

“You know horses?” Brady glanced over his shoulder as he guided the two toward the trailer.

“As a matter of fact, I do,” was all she said.

Brady glanced one more time, but she didn’t look like she was willing to share. He shrugged and stepped back from the horses as they plodded into the trailer side-by-side.”

Brady closed the trailer gate while Heather climbed into the truck. They rode in silence. A first response fire truck, two sheriff’s SUVs, and several volunteers’ cars were parked in the scenic turn out. Brady pulled in and parked perpendicular so he could off-load the horses without blocking others who might be pulling in. Heather waited as Brady backed the horses out, then handed her the mare’s reins. She leapt into the saddle and was ready to go. Brady nodded and took the lead. They walked the horses up to the canvas-covered picnic table to get instructions. John Brockman spotted Brady and came out from under the cover.

“Glad you’re here, Master Chief.” His mouth twitched at the ends as though he was suppressing his amusement that Heather was with Brady. “Here’s what we know—

“A man in his early twenties, wearing an orange with blue trim Broncos t-shirt and cargo shorts, washed over the side of the raft when it hit a big whitewater chute. His life jacket popped out of the water, but he wasn’t seen. We assume he washed down river with the current.

“Just walk the bank and if you find him, here’s the number to text.” Brockman handed Brady a business card. “This probably isn’t going to be pretty, ma’am.” Brockman glared at Heather.

“I’m a Medical Examiner, Mr. Brockman. I can handle it.”

He jerked a nod. “Glad to have your help, ma’am.”

They turned their horses and headed down the bank to the river’s edge. “Let’s go up here a ways, there’s a bridge. You go on that side and I’ll stay over here. No telling which side he may wash up on.”

Heather nodded.

The bridge was solid concrete and iron. Heather urged her namesake to cross it and continued down the river on the opposite side from Brady. He glanced up from the water to watch Heather ride.

She sat tall in her saddle, her legs tightened, squeezing into the sides of the mare, signaling her to move up and down along the bank to avoid large debris. The mare responded to Heather with familiarity. It was as if she had ridden this horse all this time and knew the distinctions he had taught her. Heather looked good on L’il Dove. Brady liked having her along even though it was a morbid hunt.

Long shadows darkened the sides of the river as they rode. The horses plodded through the large rocks and driftwood debris along the riverbank. If the river hadn’t swept the man out of his orange t-shirt, he shouldn’t be hard to find. Brady scanned the river bottom as well as the bank where the water was deep, clear, and not frothed over with rapids. Even though he knew he was further ahead— And dead.

The monster picked up a scent of death— human death— on the breeze that whipped back into his face. So Brady reasoned the guy couldn’t be under the water. Still, he looked hard into the clear stream for the orange shirt, or bare skin, just to be thorough.

“I think I see him,” Heather shouted over the river’s flow. She pointed to Brady’s side at a large rabbit bush that hung over the rushing water a few yards ahead. Brady lifted his eyes to hers, then turned to follow her line of sight. He wouldn’t have seen it because of the overhanging bank, but the monster smelled it. Orange and dark soil-covered tan skin wadded in a tangle, caught by the spiky, dense bush that jutted out into the river.

“Yep.” Brady rocked his pelvis forward and turned his heels into the horse to hurry him over to the spot. He dismounted, letting Dick’s reins drag on the ground. Brady leapt into the water and leaned over the waterlogged body. The river flowed around Brady’s boots.

Heather zig-zagged Li’l Dove at the bank on her side, antsy to get across and examine the body. “It’s him.” Brady stood. He pointed downriver. “Go a quarter mile further, there’s another footbridge, you two can cross there.”

Heather jerked a nod and lunged her horse into a run up the bank and along the grassy edge of the embankment.

Brady squatted down next to the body. “Poor guy. This wasn’t how you imagined your day ending, was it? Well, mine hasn’t exactly been the way I expected either.” He lifted his phone and texted the number on the card.

“Body found.” He thumbed his GPS app and texted the coordinates. Taking a deep sorrowful breath, he stepped deeper into the water, and placed two fingers below the guy’s ear for good measure. Nothing.

Brady nodded. The beast already knew the man was very dead.

A distant siren sounded, as Heather on Li’l Dove clopped closer to where Brady still stood in the water. He didn’t want the man’s body to accidentally dislodge from the bush and trek on down the river. Heather slid from the saddle and rushed to Brady. Li’l Dove immediately lowered her head and munched on wild grass along with the gelding. “Did you—”

“Check for a pulse? Of course.”

“May I?” She pushed past him and tested for a carotid pulse anyway. “Time of death...” She stood back and lifted her phone. “Well, I’ll call it as now, but he obviously died an hour or so ago, we’ll know better when I can examine the body.”

“You?” Brady grimaced. “What makes you think you’re going to examine the body?”

“I’m here. Why not?”

“This isn’t your ... jurisdiction. And besides, shouldn’t you be back at the hospital relieving your sister? It’ll be dark soon.”

Heather opened her mouth, looked around, then slammed her lips together. The ambulance pulled close as they could to the embankment and medical personnel spilled from their boxy vehicle.

“You found him!” a female EMT hollered. Two men ran to the back of the ambulance and pulled out the gurney. One guy laid out a black body bag on the bed while the other joined the driver next to the body. Brady stepped deeper into running water and helped lift the corpse from the entangled bush and lay him out on the prepared vinyl mattress.

They checked his vitals despite the obvious, then zipped the bag over his face and strapped him down before lifting it and crawling up the steep side. Soon he was in the ambulance and the EMTs were talking the Heather. She signed a piece of paper on a clipboard and handed it back to the driver. They drove away unceremoniously with no emergency lights or sirens.

Heather walked over to Li’l Dove and swung back into her saddle. “You ready?”

Brady stared at her Jeans stretched across her shapely backside. “You’re really going to stay and do the autopsy?”

She smiled. “No. Those guys told me Fremont County’s Medical Examiner was standing by.”

He tilted his head. “Okay. So, you going back to the hospital?”

“Yeah. I suppose I should.”

“Okay.” Brady mounted his horse and they rode back to the trailer, loaded the horses, and drove back to his place. The silence was unnerving. As was the exhilarating aroma wafting from Heather. She obviously loved her work and finding this body amplified her thrill from the discovery.

Brady clinched his jaw. Why did every emotion she felt excite the beast?

Once he pulled into his drive, he parked the truck next to his barn. “You don’t have to help with the horses. I’m sure your sister is wondering where you are?”

“No. Actually, I texted her several times. She knows I helped with the body search.”