my bearings, and in slow motion, a great blue heron with a wingspan the length of a grown man glides over me, casting a brief shadow. Slowly, I sit up, dazed, and my hands go to my scalp. When I pull my fingers away they are bloody.
Dizzily, I stagger to my feet. I cannot pass out here, I tell myself. No one will know where to find me. Blood pools in my mouth from where I’ve bitten my tongue and I spit, trying to get rid of the coppery taste. I wipe my hands on my pants and gingerly touch the back of my head again. There’s a small bump but no open wound that I can feel. I look at my hands and see the source of the blood. The thin, delicate skin of my palms is shredded and embedded with small pebbles.
The forest feels like it is closing in all around me and I want to run, to get as far away from here as possible. But maybe I was mistaken. Maybe what I thought I saw was a trick of light, a play of shadows. I force myself back toward the ridge and try to summon the cool, clinical stance that I was known for when I was an emergency room nurse. I peer down, and staring up at me is the naked body of a woman floating just beneath the surface of the water. Though I can’t see any discernable injuries on her, I’m sure there is no way she happened to end up here by accident. I take in a pair of blue lips parted in surprise, an upturned nose, blank eyes wide-open; tendrils of blond hair tangled tightly into a snarl of half-submerged brambles keeps her from drifting away.
Pinpricks of light dance in front of my eyes and for a moment I’m blinded with shock, fear, dread. Then I do something I have never done, not even once at the sight of a dead body. I bend over and vomit. Great, violent heaves that leave my stomach hollow and my legs shaky. I wipe my mouth with the back of my hand. I know her. Knew her. The dead woman is Gwen Locke and at one time we were friends.
Gwen Locke. Nurses, the both of us. Friends at one time. Good friends. Once again my stomach clenches and I retch, but this time nothing comes up. Stitch’s trance has been broken and he paces in agitation, his powerful jaws opening and closing with what I’m sure are sharp yips and barks. I fumble with my FlipBelt, a tubular band with a series of pockets where I keep all the items that I have to carry with me when I’m on the river. Safely ensconced in a waterproof case is the cell phone that I promised my cop friend Jake I would carry with me at all times. Never mind that it would do me little or no good in emergency situations, like this one. Nine-one-one via text message hasn’t reached my silent little world yet so I dial the three numbers and hope for the best. I wait three seconds and begin to speak. “My name is Amelia Winn,” I say, I’m sure my voice is high and shrill and nasally. “I found a body. Please send help. I’m on Five Mines River, two miles north of Old Mine Road. I’m deaf and can’t hear you.”
Phone clutched between my fingers, I repeat the same message over and over before disconnecting. I found a body. Please send help. I’m on Five Mines River, two miles north of Old Mine Road. I’m deaf and can’t hear you.
Frantically, I turn around and around, my heart thrumming, the air squeezed from my chest. I try to swallow up each inch of the landscape with my eyes. The sway of switchgrass along the bank, each shiver of a tree branch, each shadowy crag and crevice in the bluffs could be concealing someone. Each whisper of a breeze across my neck, the killer’s touch. Nothing. No one there. The sun is slipping in and out from behind the clouds and every shift in light seems ominous. Finally, dizzy and exhausted, I sink to the ground and lean my back against the curly white bark of a paper birch. Though I’m afraid, I’m not fearful of someone noiselessly sneaking up on me. Stitch, snuggled up against me, his bearded chin resting on my lap, will alert me of any new presence. I just don’t know what I’m going to do if someone steps into the clearing to confront me. Do I run? Do I stay and fight? Would Stitch stay by my side to protect me? I don’t know.
Just when I think I have my breathing under control, the chills start in. Gwen lies only a few yards away from me. I pull the pepper spray that Jake gave me from another FlipBelt pocket.
Jake Schroeder is a Mathias police detective and best friend of my brother, Andrew, from when we were growing up. I’ve had a bit of a crush on Jake since I was eight. He thinks of me as a pesky little sister who still needs looking out for since my brother moved to Denver and my dad, fed up with Iowa winters, retired to Arizona.
Jake was the first one I saw when I opened my eyes in the hospital after a hit-and-run driver struck Stacey Barnes. Stacey was killed on impact and I suffered a broken leg, a severe head injury and the complete annihilation of the tiny bones and neural pathways of my inner ears. I was sure that the driver was the bastard who abused Stacey, but it wasn’t. So with no leads the case remains unsolved.
Two years later, I’m almost divorced, unemployed, profoundly deaf, probably an alcoholic and still a little pissed. Okay, an alcoholic. No probably. I still find it hard to admit. The only people in Mathias who haven’t given up on me are my stepdaughter, Nora, because she’s seven and I’m the only mother she remembers and Jake, who’s no stranger to heartache himself. Jake’s the one who hauled my drunk ass out of bed, got me to my first AA meeting, and made me take an American Sign Language (ASL) class at the local college with him. Even before my accident he was already proficient in ASL. Two counties over, a policeman shot and mistakenly killed a deaf teenager when he didn’t hear the command to stop. Local law enforcement, hoping to avoid future tragedies, arranged for training and Jake learned the basics. To top it all off he showed up at my house one day with a Czech dog trainer named Vilem Sarka and Stitch—a reluctant service dog.
Stitch came to me with his own baggage. A thick, zipper-like scar extends vertically from the bottom of his belly to just below his throat. Hence his name. “Some sick fuck. Over one hundred stitches,” Vilem wrote on a pad of paper when I asked what had happened.
I stroke Stitch’s head and wait for help, knowing that it could arrive in a matter of minutes or not for up to an hour. There are only three ways to get to our remote location: by boat, by four-wheeler or by foot. I focus my attention on Stitch’s ears; if they start to twitch I know he hears something. My bet is help will come via the river and a Department of Natural Resources officer with a boat. Up until now I have never been afraid around the dead and now I’m terrified.
I can’t believe Gwen is dead and I can’t help but think of my own accident, which I’m not convinced was an accident, after all. What if Gwen’s murder and my attempted murder are connected? Crazy, I know. But Gwen and I both treated patients who were abused by very bad, very dangerous people. Is it such a stretch to think they would come after the nurses who were trying to gather the forensic evidence to put them in jail for a very long time?
Stitch raises his head and looks at me with worry. I must have whimpered or spoken out loud. I do that sometimes without even knowing it. “It’s okay,” I tell him. My throat is sore and I figure I must have been shouting while I was talking to the 9-1-1 dispatcher. What if the person on the other end of the line couldn’t understand me? What if they don’t know where to send help and no one is coming?
I’m just about ready to call 9-1-1 again when Stitch scrambles to his feet and faces north and up the river. “Two if by sea,” I say, holding on to Stitch’s collar so he won’t run off.
Sure enough, a heavyset man of about sixty, steering a small boat with the Iowa DNR logo emblazoned across its side motors toward us. Stitch looks up at me for reassurance, and I gently pat his back. The boat slows and the DNR officer says something, but he’s too far away and I can’t read his lips.
“I can’t hear you,” I say, and the officer’s mouth widens in a way that tells me he’s shouting.
“No, I’m deaf,” I say, cupping my ear. “I can’t hear you. Come closer.” He looks at me suspiciously, hand on his
