Consumed by Wrath: An FBI/Romance Thriller (An FBI/Romance Thriller ~ Book 8) (57 page)

Immediately, Maxwell Steppapaw was up and out of his chair. His quick motions had them all reaching for their sidearms.

“I didn't kill him! I guess all that you see is some Indian, and I have to be the savage that did this, right?” he said, addressing it towards Elizabeth, as if she had personally offended him.

While she was willing to play nice, and she had, this was crossing a line,

“Hey now! I have nothing against Natives. In fact, if you were sleeping a few minutes ago, you missed Director Whitefox telling you that I’m with them. That’s ‘WITH’ as in the biblical sense of the word. Well, what the bible would say if it had porn section.”

Callen choked on the laughter that struggled to break free. Why was he surprised? He really thought that she was going to tear the man apart, instead, she opted to go easy on him.

It was a testament to the love she felt for his people. Well, them at least.

“We just want to hear your side of the story,” she continued. “So, have a seat and take a deep breath. We’re not here to accuse you of anything. We just need to follow everything up and get all the information.”

It seemed to mollify him and the chief.

“One morning, I woke up and found Duke Williams, and his swine, rooting around in my herb patch. The entire place was destroyed. I lost quite a bit of money over his idiocy.”

Yeah, well money
was a good motivator in murder, but she wasn’t going to say that out loud, especially since the man was already on edge.

“I confronted him and kicked one of his pigs. He punched me and a fight started. He left licking his wounds
, and then twenty minutes later the sheriff came and arrested me.”

“For fighting?” Tyrell asked.

“No, for abusing an animal. I’ll go on record and say that I love animals. It’s people who I hate! I was livid, but I didn't kill him. I won’t be weeping over him being gone.”

Callen made notes.
“He actually came onto the Rez and took you away?” That was a big violation of Steppapaw’s ethnic rights, since the reservation had its own law enforcement agency. It looked like Tony missed that part of the orientation too.

Again, Tyrell apologized. “It’s why the charges were dropped, right?”

The chief nodded. “He broke the law himself, and we opted to let it go. The wrongs canceled each other out.”

Elizabeth pushed on.
“And that’s the last time you saw him?”

He nodded. “
Yes. Now, if you don’t mind, I would like to go, and since this is irrelevant to my life now. I have some things to tend to, and I don’t have time for this outsider bullshit, even if it’s served up by our brothers.”

The man nodded at the chief and walked out the door
, slamming it behind him.

“You’ll have to excuse him,” stated Runningwolf. “We don’t exactly have excellent relations with people in the surrounding communities,” he said.

Tyrell spoke up, “I would like that to change, Chief. I’m new at this, and I believe that I could learn a lot from you, and we could carry on a good relationship. Your land is part of our town, so we’re neighbors.”

The man
smiled easily. “I appreciate your offer, Sheriff.”

Elizabeth hated to bust up the love fest, but she didn't want them putting the cart in front of the horse. She still had to qu
estion the man in front of her, and for all they knew, he was a homicidal maniac.

“You also had an altercation with one of the men
who have gone missing, Chief Runningwolf.”

The man focused on her. “Who?”

She promptly pulled up the photo of Herman Peterson. The man in front of them instantly recognized him. It was clearly on his face.

“I am sorry that this man is missing, but surely you don’t think I could have something to do with this,” he began.

“Again, we’re covering our bases,” stated Whitefox.

“Care to tell us what happened?” Elizabeth asked.

“Certainly, Director. I was at the burial grounds, honoring my ancestors in a yearly memorial when I saw him. He was walking through the markers and taking pictures. At first, I ignored him, but as he started moving things, I had to intercede. I asked him to stop when he told me that he was just trying to get a better picture, and that certain colors worked better in this light, I called for assistance.”

“
Then what?” Elizabeth asked.

“
He was removed from the land and threatened with trespassing. We deserve respect, especially when it comes to those that have come before us.”

She didn't disagree
in the least, and understood where he was coming from.

“That was the last a
nd only time I saw him.”

Elizabeth leaned back in her chair. “Well, he’s missing.”

“Again, that’s a shame, but I didn't harm him. I simply asked him to be removed. That is all. I was clearly within my rights”

“You mentioned earlier that Jason Walters was no longer part of your tribe, why?”

The man looked uncomfortable. “I don’t like to discuss private business,” he said.

Elizabeth didn't really care what he liked, as long as he sung like a canary. “He’s part of our suspect list in the murder of Jefferson Harris.”

He sighed. “He assaulted someone.”

Oh, that had their attention.

Ethan urged him to continue, “Who?”

“His parents both passed away
, and he was living with a woman here on the Rez. They got drunk, had a brawl, and he was arrested. After, he was angry that we took the outsider woman’s side, and he walked away from his roots, so to speak.”

Fascinating.

The man had a temper and assaulted someone. This lined up with what Barbara Harris said. He definitely had moved to the head of the list.

“That’s all,” the chief said.

Callen leaned forward. “You said in your call, that you were glad we were coming because you needed to see us. What about?”

The man stood and went to the table across the room. On it was a large board and an object wrapped in black bag. “One of our people was out fishing and this was found alongside the river bed
yesterday.”

When he pulled the plastic from the object, they all stared at it in horror.

“It’s a femur,” stated Blackhawk. He could identify it, because he had six more back at the morgue, and unlike those, it was missing its mate.

“We assumed
that it was, and since no one is missing from our community, we thought that you would like to have it.”

Have it?
Did the man just blow it off like he found a bunch of seashells at the beach? She was speechless.

Elizabeth needed to see if there was more where that came from. In fact, she was officially ready to dredge the entire damn river at this point.
If the chief thought that handing her a bone, like a lollipop, was going to get her to go away, he had another thing coming.

“Can you show us where you found that?” she asked, pointing at the bone. “If there are more, we may be able recover them.”

“I can and will show you, Director. I firmly believe that you need to put these pieces together and let the spirits be free to head home.”

Yeah, in the back of her mind, she prayed there wasn’t going to be a hell of a lot of pieces.
In fact, she was hoping this was the only remains that they were going to find.

Then, she thought back to what was
still missing from the bodies that they had recovered. There had to be tons of bones yet to be located.

If
the killer was using the river on the Rez, this was going to be a long and messy job of recovery.

“Ethan, can you mobilize everyone we have? We’re going to have to do this the hard way and pitch in to get it done.”

Something about his pregnant wife playing in corpses struck an ugly cord with him, and brought back nasty memories. From the look on Callen’s face, he two was going there in his mind.

“Sure thing, baby.”

“Okay Chief,” she said, standing. “You lead the way.”

The man nodded and headed out of the room with the woman following.

Callen leaned over to whisper in her ear as they headed into the unknown, “This is going to be a bad one.”

She nodded. “
I think we got off easy. Think of the person that once owned that leg.”

~ Chapter Sixteen ~

      Two Hours Later

Standing around the water, Ethan Blackhawk was taking no chances. He called in the entire team to do the search
, and Tyrell had alerted the divers. They would be there shortly.

They were going in, expecting the worst case and hoping for the best.

As he glanced over at his wife, she was scanning the area and giving the tech team some instructions on how to handle the dangerous situation.

“See that big black area over there,” she said, pointing to a swirling mess beside the land. When they all n
odded, she continued. “That water is the blackest for a reason. It’s a sink hole. It’s going to be wicked deep and pull you under. Stay away from it.”

There was grumblings from the techs, to let them just do their job.

Elizabeth gave them all a look. “
I’m only giving you the wealth of my knowledge. I grew up in this river, and you don’t want to die here.”

The team went about working and digging through the brush for more parts of the victim. The entire time,
Elizabeth kept her eyes on them, warily. As a kid, she had spent many a hot day, swimming in these waters, and knew how dangerous they were. It unnerved her that they didn't seem to be taking her serious. If anything, they appeared to be fascinated with the color of the water.

There were old Native tales on why it was that dark.
Some said it was because of the souls it had claimed, and others spoke of the evil that lurked in its depths. In truth, the only reason that it was that black color was because of the fallen trees and all the debris that was rotting in its depths. The locals may have wanted to believe that it was the hand of death in there, but it wasn’t.

Then again,
Charlie LaRue had pulled many a drowning victim out of their waters when she was a child. Considering the circumstances, there may be something to that theory.

Growing up, her
daddy didn't want her swimming there, but it never stopped her.

Why?

Because kids thought they were invincible.

Now
, she saw how stupid it had been, and that same ignorance was present on the faces of a tech team who believed this was just some hick warning.

Her gut, like the river, was stirred up.

As she watched from the perimeter of the river, one eye was on the team and the other on the man who had brought them there. He was sitting on a rock and looked distressed. Walking over to him, she interrupted his thinking.

“Chief,
are you okay?”

The man shook his head. “So many people have negative ideas about our tribe as it is. This is going to make us look bad.
You and I both know we’re going to be blamed for dumping remains here.”

“
We’ll know the truth and that’s what matters. I’ll find who did and the facts will come out,” she answered. “I will get the victims justice and prove that your tribe is innocent, if that’s the truth.”

He stared into her eyes. “You have a very old soul.”

She laughed. “Today, I have a very old body too.”

Chief Runningwolf touched her on the forehead. “No, you joke about it, but your soul has seen much and is wise beyond its years.”

Maybe death did that to you, or maybe it was people who you surrounded yourself with, that had that effect. One way or the other, the man was probably right.

“I need a drink,” he said.

“I have water in our car.”

That made him laugh. “I meant more of an alcoholic one. I think I may leave you to this
mess and head to the local establishment.”

Elizabeth was about to send him on his way, when s
uddenly, there was a shout and then screaming.