Bitter Truth: Hat Creek Thriller, #0

By Elizabeth Rain

A Set of Bones too Small.

A Cunning Killer Hiding in Plain Sight.

A Young FBI Agent with a Secret she must Keep.

 

When two sets of bones are unearthed in an abandoned field, Elle Adams and her young canine partner, Mia, will do anything to bring the two young victims home where they belong…

Someone cut their lives short, and Elle is determined to track them down and bring them to justice;

…and save the next victim from the same grisly fate.

But a killer is watching their every move, and soon the hunter will become the hunted when a madman comes searching for his own form of twisted justice…

It's too late to protect the dead.

 Instead, he'll make sure Elle becomes the next victim to know the BITTER TRUTH…

• Language: English
• Publisher: Elizabeth Rain
• Release date: Feb 28, 2023
• ISBN: 9798223811565

Book preview

CHAPTER ONE

Elle stared down at the litter of bones on display atop the freshly tilled earth. The carpals and metacarpals clung to the thin arm bones, residual sinew keeping them miraculously intact. They thrust up and out of the dirt, as if trying to claw their way free.

It had been a long time since that had been a possibility. The odd grasping reach wasn’t all that pulled her gaze. Enough years working with the dead, deciphering their secrets, had given her more knowledge and experience than was always welcome. It was the size of the bones that consumed her attention. This was no adult, or not likely, based on the length of the long bones and shape of the pelvis, twisted eerily in the wrong direction, nearly severed from the bony protrusion of the spine that remained.

These were the remains of an adolescent, somebody’s child. Did that somebody miss her, still hope she was alive somewhere?

An educated guess, the victim had been young and female.

Her mouth tight, Elle followed the rolled clumps of dirt to where an old Massey Ferguson tractor sat a few feet away. The victim, or what was left of her, had been buried shallow. The heavy steel blade, rolling only twenty-four inches of earth on each turn, had returned the bones topside. Likely it was responsible, at least in part, for the wide scattering of the remains. Animal predation might have accounted in part as well. They’d have a field day trying to piece it all together.

At her side, Mia gave a thin whine, bright dark eyes looking up at her imploringly. Soon, Mia. Patience was something in short supply for the three-year-old chocolate lab she’d picked up from a shelter when she was barely eight weeks old. She’d been in training for over a year, and she was showing serious promise as a bone dog with close to a thousand hours under her collar. She’d had extensive work in locating everything from blood and fresh tissue to bones that were over twenty-five years old. Additionally, she’d been exposed to remains located in trees, on the ground, buried, and most recently, submerged in ponds and even rivers. Weather, too, played a part, and even the time of day. She’d passed every test with flying colors. She had a nose born for the business of finding the dead. Now if she’d only learn to control her impulsiveness, to separate work from play and take the former more seriously, she’d be nearly unstoppable. But to Mia, life was a game of hide and seek. She was a rookie pup, and like most young cops, she hadn’t learned to temper her desire to perform with caution and respect for the dangers of the job.

They were partners foremost. Elle gave her a fond glance. Elle admitted that their relationship went beyond the job. Mia was something more. She was the friend allowed to get close that Elle didn’t hold herself aloof from, that she let inside where the nightmares lay in wait.

Of necessity, the two were separate. Today was a workday.

Mia, heel, she commanded and moved carefully through the tallish grass that hadn’t yet been tilled towards the tall cop and civilian standing some yards distant at its edge. Based on the faded dungarees and thick flannel he wore, it was likely the farmer who’d made the grisly discovery.

Both looked up as she approached, the older man raking nervous fingers through a thatch of thinning brown hair, his eyes wide and shocked. The officer was Nate Pruitt. He looked on with inscrutable blue eyes, his mouth thin. A tall man, he topped the stooped older man at his side by several inches, with broad shoulders and a self-assurance that could only have come from several years on the job. He inclined his head. Afternoon, Elle. We have to stop meeting like this.

Elle winced at his attempt at levity, unsmiling. It’s true. Certainly no way to woo a girl, is it? She turned to the farmer, her expression gentling. I know you’ve probably been asked to explain what happened a half dozen times already, but could you fill me in on what you know just one more time? Mia and I, she indicated her eager partner, sitting obediently at her side, a wriggle in her butt that said it was taking a lot of effort to mind her master at the moment. We need to have as much information as you can provide to help us get a bigger picture of what might have happened here. And then we’ll conduct a more thorough search of the surrounding area. The farmer gave a wan smile, bending at the waist and hesitating, and raising a brow for permission.

Elle nodded patiently. Sure, she loves a good rub. She hasn’t learned how to be a hardened cop yet.

His chuckle was a dry rasp of breath as he bent, reaching out to scrub work-roughened hands down over her head and along her sides. What a little beauty you are. Reminds me of my Betsy. My yellow lab died this past spring and I miss her fierce. We had fourteen years together.

A long life, Elle acknowledged.

The farmer straightened with a sigh, his gaze moving to the tumbled earth beyond. I can’t believe this is happening. He sighed, his cheeks pale in a ruddy complexion. I was putting in a winter till, turning the field under so it could lay fallow over the colder months, and so I could work it again in the spring. I just closed on the place a little over a month ago, you see.

Elle nodded thoughtfully. Have you walked through this field much since you bought it, then?

He shrugged. "Some, but I’m getting up in years. Used to go everywhere in the evenings with my Betsy when we were both younger. Now, with the missus gone, my kids all grown and moved away, I don’t get out as much. But I’ve been around