Page 28 of Little Girls Sleeping
She inched closer, and then even closer. When she was about a foot away, a startled juvenile deer popped his head up and then bounded away into the forest.
Lowering her weapon, Katie sighed. She was angry that she’d almost fired off a round at an innocent and harmless animal. Her battlefield-induced stress was worse than she had originally thought.
There was something strange, even a little unsettling, about the area she was now preparing to search. It wasn’t a feeling that was easily described, but there was an unforeseen force or energy that made her jumpy. Being alone wasn’t the issue. Katie had been in all types of situations and found that the solitary ones were usually quite comfortable for her.
She walked back to the Jeep and saw Cisco sitting in the driver’s seat, steaming up the window with his heavy panting and escalating apprehension about the situation.
She glanced at her watch: 11.47 a.m., early enough in the day to consider another area of search. She could still see Jenny’s ghostly face asking for help in last night’s dream; it was almost as if the little girl was shadowing her searches.
The investigation felt like a wild-goose chase, or wishful thinking on her part, but she still didn’t want to give up on it too soon. There just had to be something she could do for Chelsea. But she could only do what she could do. Maybe the little girl’s body would never be found.
As she stood at the car, she almost gave in and drove home. A gust of wind whooshed by her, scattering leaves and dust along the road. She waited for a few more minutes, fighting with her conscience, then she grabbed her pack, called to Cisco, and secured the vehicle before moving out.
She focused on the path to the right. It was wide enough for the Jeep, but the walk would settle her anxious energy and she loved to hear the whispering pines all around her. The wind continued to blow through the area and press against her face.
There were no trails off the path, and it appeared to be a dead end, narrowing a little before reaching a high ridge. It was a lookout, but it didn’t appear to have been used much, with overgrown trees and bushes camouflaging it.
Katie moved closer until she could see the vast area below: mostly treetops, but with sporadic areas of land peeking through. She surveyed ahead and could see rolling hills and valleys. It would be ridiculously impossible to find anything out here. Perhaps it was time to call it a day.
“Well, Cisco,” she said, moving carefully through the overgrown brush.
The dog was nowhere to be seen.
“Cisco!”
Nothing.
Her heart skipped a beat as she began to frantically search around for her dog. “Cisco!” she yelled again.
She heard two barks coming from inside a group of trees.
“Cisco?”
He began barking again and burst through the trees, trotting in large circles, tail wagging.
“What’s up?”
Katie approached the area from where the dog had appeared. The branches formed a tough natural barrier that couldn’t be penetrated. She ran her fingers up and down them, and a broken branch caught her hand. Leaning closer, she saw that there was a small rope that looked as if it marked some type of entrance.
Cisco joined her and whined at her side.
“How did you get in there?” she said, not expecting an answer.
With a little bit of muscle, she pulled a branch up and immediately saw what appeared to be a man-made tunnel. There was no way an animal could have made it—the branches were intricately woven together.
Dropping her backpack to the ground, she searched for her small flashlight. She flipped it on and crept into the tunnel with Cisco close behind. Everything appeared to be sturdy; it wouldn’t cave in, leaving her buried alive underneath the massive branches. It surprised her that the tunnel didn’t have the same pine aroma as the rest of the forest. It indicated that it had been here for some time and any new growth had been trimmed back.
She kept moving forward until she came to a sharp right turn. Hesitating for a moment to get her bearings, she carried on, going from dark to daylight as she emerged onto a narrow landing with a similar view to the one she had just experienced. Carved steps led downward. Anticipation mixed with an eerie intuition made Katie’s legs tremble. Taking the steps one at a time, she descended onto another landing. This one was quite large and stable, and she examined it closely. To the left, there was a small yellow flag affixed to a pole about a foot high.
She gasped, and stopped short.
Part of the landing had clearly been disturbed, the earth fresh as if it had been dug up and laid again. The outline of the area was the perfect shape and size for a grave.
Seventeen
Although military training and police work have made an indelible impact on my life—my own personal defining moments—they still haven’t prepared me for the evil that lurks within the mind of a serial killer.
Katie ran at full speed to her Jeep as a million scenarios ran through her mind—some terrible, some horrendously grisly. What she had found might be nothing, or it might be an actual buried body. Whether it was Chelsea would be determined at a later time, by the medical examiner.
