17

Just getting to the High Line was a hell of a chore.

Barstow to Los Angeles International Airport was a two-hour drive—an hour and a half with Windermere behind the wheel, the rental Hyundai’s little engine screaming in protest the whole way. From LAX, the agents caught a flight to Spokane, landing at Spokane International just in time to learn their connection to Kalispell, Montana, was canceled.

“Weather,” the gate agent told them. “Got a heck of a snowstorm running through there right now.”

“A snowstorm.” Windermere thought of Barstow, the desert, Los Angeles. Thought of Miami, where she’d first joined the Bureau. Warm weather. No snow. No need for winter clothing. “Shoot, Stevens, and I forgot to pack my mittens.”

Stevens gave her a smile, then glanced over his shoulder at the long line of passengers rebooking to later flights, no word yet when the airport in Kalispell would reopen.

“So, what now?” Windermere asked him. “I don’t relish the thought of waiting in this airport all day. But I’m betting the highways are closed, too.”

They were headed for a town called Butcher’s Creek, two hundred and fifty miles northeast of Spokane, near the Canadian border. Stevens checked his phone.

“Highway might be closed,” he said, “but the railroad isn’t.”

—

Truman said it was a rancher who found the latest victim,” Stevens told Windermere, reading from his notes as they pulled out of Spokane on Amtrak’s North Coast Limited. “Some guy named Benson had a wolf lurking around his property, called the warden to come take a look at it. Warden showed up, figured out pretty quick why that wolf wasn’t leaving.”

Windermere made a face. “Oh no.”

“Afraid so,” Stevens said. “The body was in rough shape when they found her; no purse or ID, either. But she’s a female and probably Native. Lincoln County Sheriff’s Department is treating the case as suspicious until they can pin down a cause of death.”

“Strangulation,” Windermere said. “That’s how Truman’s Jane Doe died, right?”

“That’s right. Boundary County coroner found her larynx crushed.”

Windermere shivered. Outside, the train kicked up a gale of snow and ice as it wound through the mountains, obscuring what little could be seen through the windows. It looked cold out there, ice-age cold—and as darkness fell, it looked desolate.

“Pretty crummy place to be a serial killer, if there really is one out here,” she said, staring out the window. “This doesn’t look like a neighborhood where nature needs the help.”

—

It was long past midnight when the North Coast Limited stopped at the little flag station in Butcher’s Creek. Stevens and Windermere were the only two passengers to disembark, and as Stevens climbed down to the platform and the bracing, bitter cold, he shivered and hoped someone from the sheriff’s department had remembered they were coming. This was frostbite weather, die-of-exposure stuff, even to a native Minnesotan, and Stevens, who’d spent the last couple of days sweltering in the desert, was shocked at how quickly the mountain air chilled him.

“Come on,” he told Windermere, shouldering his overnight bag as the train pulled away behind them. “Let’s see if we can’t find some shelter.”

Windermere rubbed her hands together. “Right behind you, partner.”

There was a vehicle idling at the other end of the platform, an SUV, and Stevens could see the light bar and sheriff’s department markings as he walked closer. The driver’s door opened as they approached, and a woman stepped out in a heavy, fur-lined parka. “You must be the feds.”

“Sure are,” Stevens replied. “Are you the welcoming party?”

“Kerry Finley, Lincoln County sheriff’s deputy.” Finley looked like she was a few years younger than Windermere. A trim build and a ready smile. She held out her hand. “Glad you all could make it.”