Reckless Creed (11 page)

THE PLATTE RIVER VALLEY
SOUTH-CENTRAL NEBRASKA

N
ebraska didn't have the snow that Chicago had gotten. Brown grass, tinted with the beginning sprigs of green, surrounded the lake. The sky was a brilliant blue turning to deep purple at the horizon as the sun began its descent behind the trees. As the SUV pulled closer, O'Dell couldn't help but think that the surface of the lake looked like it was covered in snow.

The birds were crammed so tight and so close that not a sliver of water could be seen. Some of them even lay on top of one another.

There was no one else around. No traffic. No buildings or homes for miles. Not even any other birds in the trees. The only sound was the breeze whispering through the tall grasses.

“I thought it was best that we wait for the results before we start handling the birds,” Rief told her. She pointed out the few tire tracks. “We even made the news media walk from the main road and limited how close they could get. Not that difficult since, as you can see, there's not easy access.”

“Still, I'm impressed you were able to limit them.”

“National news agencies picked up the local feed. So far they've been satisfied with running with that.”

They parked on a field road and walked the rest of the way. With the sun low on the horizon the breeze started to turn cold. O'Dell was glad she had put on her coat. Mud sucked at the soles of her boots. In the distance she could hear a train whistle. There was a hint of musk in the air, but not at all what she expected. The cool weather had kept the birds from decomposing quickly.

“I'm not sure what I hoped to see or find,” she told the biologist.

“Maybe you just needed to see it.”

On closer inspection the birds looked as if they had lain down to rest in the water and simply died. There didn't appear to be any trauma. No deformities. No molted feathers. No injuries or blood. They looked quite peaceful.

They were headed back to the vehicle when Rief put her arm out in front of O'Dell to stop her.

“Just stand still.”

O'Dell didn't understand until she saw the coyote coming out of the trees. He was approaching the lake, slowly. He seemed to be focused on the dead birds and paid little attention to the women.

O'Dell glanced at the biologist only to find her looking in the opposite direction. From the other stand of trees three more coyotes were making their way to the lake. When she looked back she saw that two more were following the first one she had seen.

“What do we do?”

She kept her voice low and soft. In her own head she could barely hear it over the drumming of her heartbeat. She knew from working with Ryder Creed that dogs could actually smell human fear. Something about hormones and chemistry. None of it
mattered right now because she imagined that a coyote's sense was probably even more heightened. Her fingers automatically slipped inside her jacket only to find that she hadn't put on her shoulder harness and weapon after the flight.

“Just keep still,” Rief instructed with a steady and calm voice.

O'Dell was feeling anything but steady and calm. And “keeping still”? That was easier said than done. O'Dell couldn't help noticing that they were caught between the lake and the coyotes. And their vehicle was about a hundred feet away. About the same distance as the nearest coyote. It would be a sprint that she imagined might end badly.

The biggest one turned to look at them. The others didn't seem to care. All of them were more interested in the dead birds. O'Dell realized that made sense. It was less work for them to snatch and grab food that was already dead than to challenge the humans. Still, she tried to access her memory bank for any information about coyotes attacking people.

“Were they here last night, too?”

“No. They don't like fresh meat,” Rief said. “They'll leave dead stuff until it starts to decompose a bit. Easier to digest.”

“They have a lakeful. So we're okay?”

Just as O'Dell asked, another coyote looked over at them.

“Depends,” Rief said.

She waited for the biologist to continue.

“Usually a lone coyote won't attack, but a pack can be more aggressive.”

It was not what O'Dell wanted to hear.

Soon the sun would be sinking behind the tree line along with O'Dell's stomach. She hoped coyotes couldn't smell fear, because she was certain she was starting to reek of it.

FLORIDA PANHANDLE

C
reed sat on the boat dock with a blanket wrapped around him. He didn't remember which crew member had given it to him. Grace sat next to him. It had taken almost two hours for anyone to arrive. Too much time for Creed to sit and wait and think.

His initial reaction was to get Wylie down.

He had started to climb the riverbank. He'd climb the tree if he had to just to get the sheriff to stop hanging by his neck. But he stopped himself, knees buried in the mud. Halfway up the bank he realized he might destroy crime scene evidence. And he wanted to believe that a crime had been committed. He did not want to believe that Wylie had done this to himself.

So Creed had stayed there, staring up at the body. His eyes couldn't look away.

“You didn't do this to yourself, did you, Wylie?”

The rope had been thrown up over the branch. One end looped around the sheriff's neck. The other was attached to the boat. Creed could see the skid mark in the clay bank. The boat had been on the bank. All it would have taken was a shove to make it slide
down into the water and make the rope act like a pulley. The weight of the trolling motor and the downward slide looked like it was enough to yank Wylie's body up and keep him there. If his neck wasn't broken by the impact, he might have struggled. Creed didn't want to think about how long it could have taken.

At the same time he reminded himself that sometimes things weren't what they seemed. There were so many easier ways to kill yourself. Like Tony Briggs's way of jumping nineteen stories. Or putting a .22 to your temple like Creed's father had done.

Creed didn't want to think about that right now either. He'd spent the last eleven years of his life trying to forget. Sometimes it was too much work to stop it. Too painful to juggle the memories, to decide which ones to release and which to lock away. Brodie's disappearance. His dad's suicide. They leaked into each other.

In his head he could still hear the play-by-play of a football game. It was on the car radio. It was the reason his dad hadn't gone with Brodie to the bathroom at the rest stop. Because his dad couldn't miss a goddamn second of the game. And it was the reason Creed couldn't go with her either, because he was supposed to keep the dog quiet so his dad could listen to the game.

Creed always wondered if it was some sort of odd poetic justice that when he found his dad a football game was playing on the television. His dad was slumped over on the sofa as though he'd fallen asleep watching.

Grace nuzzled him and only now did he realize he was breathing hard, taking gulps of air. He needed to slow down, steady himself before he started to hyperventilate.

He wrapped his arm around the dog and pulled her close to
his side, tucking her under the blanket with him. The rain had stopped, but both of them were soaking wet.

The rescue unit finally had a boat in the water. They had to wait on the CSU team. It was getting dark and two of the men were hooking up spotlights. One of the technicians stopped beside him and handed him a thermal cup.

“Hot coffee,” he told Creed.

“Thanks.”

Then the man put down a stainless steel bowl with water for Grace. She looked to Creed first.

“Go ahead,” he told her, and she lapped at it.

“I appreciate that,” he told the tech.

“Deputy Mason said to tell you, you're free to go. Oh, and your ride's here,” he said, pointing a thumb over his shoulder.

“My ride?”

“You look like hell,” someone said from behind him.

Creed turned to find Jason and his friend Colfax. Colfax served in Afghanistan with Jason. He'd lost an eye, and that side of his face was scarred so badly it looked like half his face was melting.

“I have my Jeep. You didn't have to come all this way.”

“Hey, I only do what Hannah tells me to do.”

Jason kneeled beside Grace and she greeted him with tail wags and face licks. He took a plastic bag from his jacket pocket and held out a handful of kibble. He looked out over the water while the dog took bites and crunched.

“You think he did it?” Jason asked.

“I didn't know him well enough to say.”

“Yeah, well, I thought I knew Tony pretty well and I still didn't see it coming.”

He pointed to Colfax and told Creed, “One of us will drive your Jeep back. You and Grace can sit back, relax. Enjoy the ride. Have something to eat. We brought food for you, too.”

When Creed didn't answer, Jason added, “Please don't make me have to call Hannah.”

Creed smiled at that, and suddenly he was too exhausted to argue.

THE PLATTE RIVER VALLEY
SOUTH-CENTRAL NEBRASKA

T
he largest coyote was the first to approach the lake.

O'Dell swore her legs were starting to ache from trying to stand so still. But now she was captivated with watching the coyotes.

Two stayed back as if acting as guards, occasionally looking over at Rief and O'Dell. The others drew closer to the lake, but even they didn't go to the edge. They appeared content to let their leader check it out first.

He had to crouch on his front legs to reach over the shallow ledge. Slowly he stretched until his teeth could grab a bird, and even then, he took it gently by the wing, tugging and pulling it, separating it from the others. He did this as he backed up, dragging the bird up onto the shore.

The others watched patiently. They waited while their leader sniffed the bird's dead body. He left it. Went back to the lake and began again the same process, bringing another one to the shore. This time he nudged it several times with his snout. He left this one, too, and walked to another spot on the lake. He brought up two
more birds. By now the others had come over and started to inspect the ones he had rejected. None of them attempted to take a bite.

Then suddenly their leader turned and headed back into the woods. One by one the others followed. All of them left without dinner.

“They could smell that the birds were sick,” Rief said. She didn't seem surprised.

On the drive back O'Dell was thinking about Ryder Creed's dogs. The coyotes reminded her that the last time they had spoken, Creed was training his scent dogs to detect different health issues in humans. His team had already trained several dogs especially for private owners with epilepsy and diabetes to help detect seizures before they happened and insulin levels before they dipped. She also remembered that she owed Hannah a phone call.

“If you need a place to stay tonight, my guest room's available.” Rief offered. “I do have to warn you, I have a black Lab and a cat.”

O'Dell would have been surprised by the offer except that she had worked several cases in Nebraska and the surrounding states. Oftentimes she'd been met by generosity beyond what she'd ever expect. In western Nebraska an Indian woman, a retired coroner named Lucy Coy, had opened her home to O'Dell during an investigation. The two women had remained friends, consulting each other on various cases. But ordinarily O'Dell wasn't comfortable staying in someone else's home. She liked—no, she needed—her own space to recharge or to stay up all night if she wanted.

“I really appreciate the offer, but I have a room reserved at the Embassy Suites in the Old Market.” She shrugged. “It's close to the airport and I have an early flight out. But thank you.”

“Sure, no problem.”

“What are their names?”

“Excuse me?”

“Your Lab and cat? I have a white Lab named Harvey and a black German shepherd named Jake.”

“Tommy is my big baby. Harry is my cat.”

“I would like to buy you dinner if you have time.”

“That sounds nice.” Then, gesturing to O'Dell's cell phone, she added, “We'll run into a dead space pretty soon. Not enough towers out here. Which to me is great. I can't tell you how many thousands of warblers we lose every year when more towers or wind turbines are added.”

“They run into them?”

“Most birds have very poor night vision. You probably have a few miles before we get into one-bar country.”

O'Dell took the advice and started checking her messages. She had a missed call from Agent Alonzo and one from Platt. It looked like Ben had sent her an e-mail with attachments. She had forgotten that she had asked for the autopsy report and photos of Tony Briggs.

She was about to go to her text messages when the first thump on the windshield startled her. She looked up in time to see something slide off the hood of the SUV.

“What was that?”

“I'm not sure,” Rief said as she let up on the accelerator.

Another thud and a smear of black and red.

This time the biologist slammed on the brakes just as the windshield, hood, and roof were being pummeled. Everywhere around them—on the two-lane highway, in the ditches and in the fields surrounding them—birds were falling from the sky.

It was raining birds.

Rief pulled the SUV to the shoulder. The biologist pulled out her own cell phone and immediately was talking to someone about highway barricades while O'Dell turned her cell phone on to video.

The sky had gone dark, but not from the impending sunset. Streams of black birds with red-tipped wings flew overhead, thick flocks blocking out the sunlight. And hundreds of them were falling from the sky.

Smears of blood and feathers streaked the windshield. O'Dell kept the phone steady as she panned across the highway to the ditches and to the fields. Everywhere there were dead birds. She zoomed in to record those on the ground. There appeared to be no movement—no injuries. Just dead birds, and they seemed to be dead as soon as they hit the surface, if not before.

“State Patrol is on the way,” Rief told her.

A pickup flew by on the highway. It was the first vehicle they'd seen since they'd left the lake. O'Dell noticed Rief wince as she started tapping in another phone number. To O'Dell she said, “We need to get this stretch of highway barricaded. If these birds are infected, we don't want pieces of them being transported to other places on the tires of vehicles.”

As the biologist explained the situation on the phone, O'Dell kept her video going but looked out over the long stretch of road. Dead birds littered the highway for as far as she could see.

She glanced at the timer on the video: five minutes and forty seconds. And birds were still falling.

Ten minutes later what was left of the flock overhead was gone. The last of the birds had fallen, but O'Dell and Rief stayed inside the vehicle.

The sun disappeared behind the tree line, leaving layers of pink and purple as it set. It was a pretty spring evening, except of course for the hundreds of dead black birds dotting the fields and highway.

“Do you know what they are?” O'Dell asked. Several of the birds were laying on the hood in front of them.

“Redwing blackbirds.”

“Migratory?”

“Yes.” The biologist looked distracted, watching for the State Patrol and keeping an eye on her cell phone and occasionally replying by tapping in a text message. “Birds falling out of the sky en masse isn't an unusual occurrence. There have been incidents when flocks have been startled and flushed out of their roost by loud noises. It sets them off and they fly too low, crashing into buildings or, as I said before, into cell towers or wind turbines. Sometimes electrical lines. Wind, fog, lightning—all of those factors have been known to cause incidents like this.”

O'Dell stared out the window and refrained from saying out loud what they were both thinking. None of those factors applied here. Not only was the weather beautiful, though the temperatures a bit crisp, but there were no buildings, no wind turbines, no cell towers or water towers anywhere in the distance. It was still light out, so even the birds' poor night vision didn't explain this.

“It looked as though they were dropping rather than flying down into our vehicle,” O'Dell said.

“Yes, I noticed that, too.” Rief was reading something on her cell phone. “A colleague is telling me that last year in Idaho he witnessed a flock of geese falling out of the sky.” She paused as she scrolled through the message. “About two thousand. They later
determined it was avian cholera. Not sure where the birds picked up the bacteria. But it spreads so quickly that infected birds can have no signs of illnesses and suddenly die in flight.”

O'Dell didn't bother to keep quiet her immediate reaction. “I wonder if there were any research labs in Idaho conducting studies on avian cholera.”

Before Rief could respond they both noticed the flashing blue and red lights in the distance. O'Dell started to breathe a sigh of relief until she noticed that coming from the opposite direction was another vehicle. And even from this far away she could make out the satellite dish on top of the news van.