1
Deputy Tessa Black roared down the narrow dead-end street in her county-issued SUV, lights flashing and sirens blaring. A report of a possible explosion in the small town of North Sound was a true emergency. The volunteer fire company was also on the way, but in rural areas, deputies were usually the first responders to almost every call.
What could have exploded in a residential neighborhood? Was someone cooking meth?
The weather in May was gorgeous in the Pacific Northwest. Barely five thousand residents lived on Widow’s Island year round, but the busy season had begun. Tourists already crowded the island. With the influx came a corresponding increase in accidents and 911 calls. Maybe a propane tank from a barbecue grill had exploded.
In the passenger seat, Logan Wilde, the local park ranger, scanned mailboxes as they passed. He wore boots, tan cargos, and a Washington State Forest Ranger T-shirt. He was tall and fit, his rigid posture and closely shorn black hair testifying to his military background. Tessa had known Logan her whole life. He was her best friend’s brother. Now, their relationship had grown into a romantic one. He’d been with her when the call had come in. There were only three deputies on Widow’s Island. With one on vacation and another off duty, Logan had volunteered to be her backup.
He pointed to a dilapidated bungalow with a FOR SALE sign staked in the middle of an overgrown front yard. “There it is. The last house on this side. It’s not on fire, and it still looks intact.”
“Let’s see what’s up,” Tessa said.
Across the street from the bungalow, a woman of about fifty watched from behind the screen door of a ranch-style house. A little boy of about three stood at her side, holding her hand. Tessa parked her SUV at the curb. When she and Logan stepped out, the woman lifted the child onto her hip and hurried out to meet them in the street. She wore boots, jeans, and a sweatshirt with the Rolling Stones tongue logo on the chest.
“Are you Gladys White?” Tessa asked.
“I am. I called you.” Gladys gestured to the bungalow. “Johnnie and I were having our lunch when we heard a loud sound, like an explosion, and then someone screamed.”
“I was scared.” Johnnie blinked innocent blue eyes at Tessa.
Gladys shuddered and hugged him closer. “That place has been empty for years. Someone bought it a couple years ago. He was fixing it up to sell but ran out of money. We had a drug addict camping there last summer. Who knows what could be going on with all the tourists running around the island? Whoever’s there is up to no good.” She shoved a few strands of short gray hair behind one ear. “Things go on in that house all the time.”
Though an hour’s ride by ferry from the mainland of Washington State, Widow’s Island had its share of homelessness, and there seemed to be no place on earth remote enough to escape drug addiction and the crime that went along with it. Last year, the sheriff’s department had busted two meth labs.
“Yes, ma’am,” agreed Tessa. “Please take Johnnie inside, and lock your doors. I’ll let you know what we find.”
Gladys turned and rushed back into her house.
Tessa drew her service weapon. Logan did the same. Tessa squinted against the afternoon sun high overhead. The temperature was a comfortable sixty-five degrees, but beads of sweat dripped down her back and pooled under her body armor.
“Hold on.” Tessa opened the cargo hold of her SUV and pulled out a Kevlar vest. “Here.”
Logan put it on. As a deputy, she wore a vest every day as part of her uniform. Logan’s job did not usually necessitate such measures. Since he’d helped Tessa with several cases lately, she now carried a spare vest in her vehicle.
Logan squatted in the grass. “These footprints look fresh.” Rain the night before had left the soil damp and soggy in low-lying areas. The boot prints led from the sidewalk toward the front porch.
They approached the house. The flaky bricks in the walkway crumbled under their feet. They stopped short of the porch. The front door stood open. About ten feet beyond the entrance, a black, moldy spot on the ceiling indicated a water leak. Beneath it, Tessa could see a hole where the floor had collapsed into the basement.
Logan pointed. “That looks recent. Very recent.”
The frayed edges of the broken subfloor were fresh rather than weathered.
“Gladys probably heard someone go through the floor,” she said.
The wind shifted, and the faint but distinct odor of decomposition hit Tessa’s nostrils.
Logan sniffed. “Smell that?”
“Something could have crawled into the basement and died.” Tessa glanced at a narrow window set low in the foundation. The odor was too foul to be fresh death. “Whatever it is, it didn’t die today.” And therefore was likely unrelated to today’s disturbance.
But the hairs on the back of Tessa’s neck quivered.
Was someone in the house with that smell—someone who was armed? If a shooter was inside, she didn’t want them to have advance notice of their movements.
She leaned close to Logan’s ear and whispered, “Let’s go around back.”
They crept through damp knee-high weeds and grass in the side yard until they reached the rear of the house. Vines slithered up the foundation, and paint peeled from clapboards like bark on a birch trunk. Tessa peered around the corner. The property backed up to woods. She turned to scan the building. A narrow covered porch extended across the back of the structure.
Tessa walked closer. Something scraped, like wood shifting. Tessa and Logan both startled.
Shoulder to shoulder, they approached the bungalow. Unlike the front porch, which had looked rotted, the back porch and steps had clearly been replaced more recently.
“The steps look newer.” She tested the bottom step with her weight. It felt solid. She went up the stairs one by one until she reached the top. Logan followed. They split up and flanked the back door. Tessa peered through the glass panes in the top half of the door. Cracks, dirt, and cobwebs obscured the view. “I can’t see anything.”
She tried the doorknob. Unlocked, it turned in her hand. Hinges squeaked as she pushed it open.
The kitchen floor was covered in empty beer cans and fast-food containers. In the center, someone had set up a card table. A couple of folding chairs were tucked under it. A few empty bottles of cheap liquor sat in a row along one wall, and cigarettes had been ground out on the tile floor. Had someone—maybe kids—been using the vacant house to party?
She could see through a doorway into what seemed to be a family room. More trash was strewed throughout. She cleared the slice of the room that was visible, then peered around the doorframe to see more. Doorways were choke points in a search. She moved through it quickly, stepping to the left corner and clearing the rest of the room. Logan followed, stepping right.
She checked a closet—empty—and they went through a doorway one at a time into an adjoining living room. Again, they worked as a team. Tessa swept left while Logan went right.
“Clear.” Tessa swept her weapon from corner to corner.
A quarter of the room had been cleaned up. Tessa spotted a sleeping bag but no occupant. The living room was open to the foyer—and the giant hole.
“It looks like someone has been squatting here,” she said in a low voice. “Maybe he or she went through the floor.”