Page 11 of Unnatural Death

“What if they won’t?”

“I have ways of being persuasive,” Lucy says. “The big problem’s going to be when we’re flying back to your office. Then it will be open season for anybody hoping to film something sensational. Once we lift off from Buckingham Run, we won’t be able to disguise what’s strapped to the skids.”

“I wish there was a way to make it less obvious,” I reply.

“There’s not. Other than the bodies riding inside the cabin with the rest of us.”

“Even if you didn’t mind, I wouldn’t permit it.”

“Niner-Zulu is seven out at one thousand.” Lucy checks in again with the Washington National tower as we overfly trees blazing orange, red and yellow.

CHAPTER 5

NINER-ZULU, STAND BY,” the tower tells Lucy over the radio.

“Standing by,” she answers.

“Seriously?” I look at her annoyed profile as she scans her displays and out the windshield.

“In addition to the earlier flight cancellations screwing up things royally?” she says to me. “There’s a temporary restriction north of D.C. because of the vice president’s visit to Baltimore later this morning.”

“Even so it would seem that you would have special status. You’re the Secret Service. I’m surprised they make you wait even a second,” I reply. “Air traffic controllers must know you’re on official business.”

“Unless we’re in a pursuit or doing an intercept, I abide by the same rules as everybody else up here,” she says. “Well, almost.”

“Niner-Zulu, state request.” The tower gets back to her.

“Would like to turn on a two-thirty heading …,” Lucy answers.

My smart ring alerts me that I have more messages from Marino. As Lucy talks over the radio, I review the latest images he’s sending. Unable to resist show-and-tell, he’s making sure I’m aware of dangers to be avoided once we reach the scene. Pictures of a huge hollow tree with a honey beehive, the massive spiderweb could be from a Tarzan movie.

A few minutes ago, Marino almost stepped on a bull snake, he makes sure I’m aware. They’re not poisonous but look enough like a rattler that he shot first and questioned later. In a selfie, he holds up the deceased reptile and it’s over seven feet long and as thick as my arm,dear help me God. Marino smiles stiffly, staring wide-eyed at his camera phone. He looks befuddled and startled.

Other photographs are of bloody jackets, pants, sweatshirts, undergarments that have been shredded by something sharp, the victims’ clothing cut off them. By all appearances they were outside the tent when attacked.

“Huck and Brittany Manson would have been alerted by their trail cameras, and were dressed and ready with weapons loaded,” Lucy says. “They must have wondered what the hell was going on when the intruder was headed toward them. But the thermal imagers weren’t picking up whatever it was, as I’ve explained. Just this occasional flash of yellowish- orange light as you hear heavy footsteps and see dead leaves kicked up.”

“I’m assuming that you and the victims were hearing and seeing the same thing simultaneously,” I reply. “Since you’d hacked into their trail cameras.”

“That’s right. The intruder triggered the cameras’ motion sensors at threeA.M.”

She and the Mansons were alerted simultaneously, as were other key people, including Sierra Patron, her investigative partner at the Secret Service. Everyone calls her Tron. Both of them are cyber experts and on permanent loan to the CIA.

“Huck and Brittany prepared themselves as best they could while they heard the something getting closer, we can only assume,” Lucy says. “But there’s no place to run, as you’ll see once we get there. The only way in and out for them was the same footpath the intruder was on. They were trapped.”

“Did they try to call for help?” I ask.

“No, and they knew anybody showing up in those conditions would have been impossible.”

“Except you did.”

“Your typical aircraft couldn’t get in to land. This thing could, but I was too late.”

She begins a gradual detour around a ranch to avoid startling the horses and cattle. Ahead is the Manassas National Battlefield Park, the site of the Civil War’s first major clash between the North and South. I can make out the wooden palings, cannons and monuments of Bull Run. People are jogging and hiking the trails, some out with their dogs.

“The victims could hear the intruder getting closer. Then what?” I ask Lucy.

“Their only hope was to ambush whoever it was,” she says. “I would expect they did what they could to get ready, and it’s looking like the confrontation happened in the woods near the footpath’s entrance. I’ve not seen anything for myself yet, been too busy Ubering everyone to the scene. Tron’s there as we speak with a metal detector.”

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