My debut novel Welcome to Cemetery arrives in just over a month! As I’ve had BestGhost floating around as a kind of sample to my writing, I figured it was time to showcase a little of the novel itself! If you didn’t see the cover reveal, check it out here, otherwise, please scroll down and get your first taste of Detective Williams and Ed Reyes before the book launched March 4th!
Book Info
Author: C.J. Daley
Artist: Miblart
Publisher: BestGhost Books
Release Date: March 4th, 2024
Formats: ebook, paperback, hardcover
Genre: Crime thriller, mystery, horror
ARC link
Goodreads
Preorder link
NetGalley link
Book Blurb
Stephen King has Castle Rock. Josh Malerman has Goblin. E. Reyes has Devil’s Hill. Now C. J. Daley welcomes you to Cemetery.
A strange town with a strange name, Cemetery, NY is filled with crime and secrets.
When a car accident one fateful night leads to a search for two missing bodies, detectives Abby Williams – an almost-thirty year old with something to prove – and Ed Reyes – a jaded, senior officer with a career as long as his partner is old – set out to solve the latest mystery.
Before long, a string of missing persons becomes a collection of bloodless bodies that has even the police pathologist stumped.
As the bloodshed continues, it becomes clear that the gruesome killings plaguing the town of Cemetery may not be the handiwork of some shadowy figure but of something even more sinister.
As detectives Williams and Reyes start to question the world around them, can they learn to put their differences aside? Or will the investigation of a lifetime be the end of their lives?
In this fast-paced small town crime thriller, nothing is as it seems.
“Beneath a web of lies and secrets, exists a small town plagued by masked figures and a growing body count. Daley shoves the reader headfirst into a nightmarish investigation where the deeper you dig, the more you realize some stories should stay buried. Welcome to Cemetery.”
—Nick Roberts, best-selling author of MEAN SPIRITED and THE EXORCIST’S HOUSE
“Welcome to Cemetery is like a stroll down X-Files lane intersected by King’s The Outsider. Cemetery is a town horror readers will be welcomed to with mangled arms and gaping chests, and one you’ll be lucky to get out of with your head. A bloody, eerie debut sure to keep you up late into the night.” – LordTBR
Excerpt
Be forewarned: cursing, smoking, possible violence…
Welcome to Cemetery
I
The town of Cemetery, New York sat damn-near invisibly among the other villages of the Hudson River Valley. It’s not that it was hard to find, or out of the way. Nor was it that hidden—practically only an hour outside New York City. Rather, it was just typically forgotten. Most of the townsfolk thought that the name was funny or silly originally, but with the passing of time, they started to think that it was part of the reason it was overlooked—as if people couldn’t get past the fact that the name was of an entire town and not a place. “What was the name of that town again?” visitors might ask each other while passing through. “I don’t remember, I think I only saw a sign for the cemetery.”
The town itself had a single long road that ran the entire length of it called Route 17. This was from the time long forgotten when a route or highway could be labeled for a single two-lane road. The townsfolk just referred to it as Main Street. However, any single turn off the main street was practically, and immediately, back road. A neighbor might be several turns away, but only a short drive or walk away.
Not overpopulated, streets were filled with trees. American beech, sugar maples, yellow birch, and great swaths of pine trees stretched way high into the sky. Cemetery wasn’t known for any single trade, but more often than not, truck advertisements and tee shirts in supermarket lines boasting employment with Cemetery Town & Lumber could be seen. Some might say the town and the surrounding area were beautiful; it just didn’t stand out above the rest.
Demographically, Cemetery was of an average size, in an average area, with average workers, townsfolk, and children; an average climate; and even an average unemployment rate. The only thing about Cemetery that wasn’t average, was the number of crimes that went unsolved and unpunished.
Now it wasn’t that the police force was too small, too negligent, too unproven. It was simply that they were inundated with a mysterious, arguably devilish level of disappearances and deaths, and insufficient evidence to solve them. Even with the most experienced wracking their brains for a solution, a lead, or a single shred of evidence, nothing was found, and nothing was solved. Over the years, many of the retirees from the police department became true crime enthusiasts, taking to continued researching and speculation over crimes long unsolved in their newly found free time. One group that had gotten a semi-substantial following, started calling themselves Closed Case Resurgence. The team worked hard to keep alive the hope on cases long put aside.
Regardless of the way the townsfolk felt about the town, their way of life was often marred with shock and loss, as if a long shadow was cast over the town a long time ago.
Enough time spent somewhere begins to feel like home…
Ch 1
Cemetery Township
I
Short on detective work for the day, and having already made a pitstop for in-home questioning for a case she was buttoning up, Detective Abigail Williams cruised around aimlessly in a squad car. Since she was a child, it was never more than Abby, and since entering the force, it was Williams only. She was convinced her coworkers had no idea what her first name was. That had become her preference, not because she didn’t want to feel seen by them, but simply because she always felt embarrassed correcting people about her first name.
As one of the two detectives in the department, she did have something less conspicuous she could drive around, but today she wanted to drive the Dodge Challenger for the hell of it. It had been a gift from the mayor to the department after it had come to light how many outdated Crown Vics were still in circulation.
Coming around a bend, she passed a sign that said “The Nowack-Prendergast Parade.” It was a yearly parade funded by what she always assumed were two big league town members. The parade was a good time though, and since making detective, she was finally off detail and able to go. Small victories.
Getting back toward the center of town, she approached the red light and idled next to a recently refurbished McDonald’s. It always amazed her how some of the town’s elderly frequented the fast food restaurant daily, as if it were some local small business deli. Mr. Cody, an elderly man with crows feet eyes and a mop of shaggy white hair and who Williams wouldn’t have been able to pick out of a crowd if he didn’t happen to be her neighbor, ambled out of his parked car, headed for the door. As he looked both ways and went to cross the parking lot, cane in hand, he saw her staring and waved.
Fuck, she thought, just what I need, to look like I’m checking out the old people. He’s probably going to wave at me every time I leave or enter my house now, too.
The light turned green, giving her a reprieve from her internal chastisement. She drove off, turning right. She passed a gas station, an old pizza place, an empty building, and another pizza place—or a card place—or was it the florist now? She couldn’t keep track anymore. She remembered as a young kid it was one of the coolest places to get Pokémon cards. It had this larger-than-life sign that read “WHAT’S HOT,” the outside giving away nothing of the treasures locked inside.
Three miles down the road she passed what was easily her least favorite location in Cemetery, a ramshackle collection of two two-story buildings called the James Motel. Motel was the word they used, but it’s not what any normal, decent person would picture when thinking of a motel. However, somehow the owner had legally gotten the rights to the property, collecting the rent in what can only be called a ghostly fashion, as nobody had ever seen them.
With only negative thoughts attached to the place now, Detective Williams saw the stages of her life through the property. As a child, she was continuously cautioned that “if anyone from that place ever approaches you, for anything at all, you tell mommy and daddy immediately.” As a teen, it was the easiest place in the entire town (and neighboring ones) to score weed. It was also the cheapest place to knock on a door and play “Hey Mister” for some underage beer. Then, as a young adult and rookie on the CPD, it was the place she’d frequented the most for petty theft, domestic disputes, and assaults.
The reminder of her childhood smarted more than she expected. As a child, her father had, unbeknownst to her mother, allowed her to be used during a police sting operation. She had been young, far too young to understand what had happened, but the trauma had gotten to her in other ways. The morbid fascination of which more than likely was the driving force that led her to police work. When she had arrived on the force, she had been beside herself to read through the report and find that the perp had specifically been after her. Before his death, her father had sworn that was the precipice that plummeted her parents toward divorce. And if the perp was after her, did that mean that she had caused her parents to split? Although she had been much older when he told her, it didn’t make it feel any less hard to hear.
Another five minutes down the road and she arrived at her intended destination. This gas station was out of the way, further from the station than the one she already passed, but she always liked this one the most. Eight years on the force and it still bothered her that the station didn’t have its own supply of gas, at least for convenience’s sake, and emergency situations, not that she’d speak up about it.
“Enough time to get gas, get back to the station, swap cars, and start my off days a little early,” she said, smiling as she pulled up to the gas pump.
She filled the car and headed toward the station, eager to start her time off.
II
Two hours later, Williams was drenched in sweat, out of breath, and finishing up one final set at the gym. The idea of relaxing had felt strange to her, like it had been engrained in her that not having work to complete was her fault. She still had three full days after this, right? Might as well get a good workout in. Work herself into exhaustion now, then finally settle in for her days off. At least that was the plan.
Williams set her feet, leaning forward to begin her final set of deadlifts. She was just about spent, which was entirely the point. She would head home, grab a shower, order in something to eat, and probably crash on the couch.
She worked hard, harder still to gain respect in the precinct, but three days off in a row still felt like an undeserved luxury. It grated on her to have the time off.
Too bad the relaxation wouldn’t last.
III
Once outside the town itself, the roads of Cemetery are winding and long, practically circling in on themselves. Unlike its neighboring town of Warwick, there’s no farmland, just trees. The town itself doesn’t have a particular forest, but no one told the town that.
Detective Williams received the call thirty minutes ago, getting dressed immediately. Although she had finally settled in, the erasure of her personal time had somehow still felt right. As she pulled up, the oscillating blue and red of the police lights cut through the dead of night, filling her windshield.
Williams got out and walked over to her partner, Senior Detective Reyes. Subconsciously, as if trained, she had begun waiting for him to speak first. A trait that was two parts embarrassment and anxiety, and one part respect.
“What are we looking at here? It’s two o’clock in the morning for Christ’s sake.” Reyes, an expert at his craft, spoke while taking a drag of his cigarette.
“Uh, a car crash?” Williams asked, uncertain. She strained her neck to look over at the scene. “Jesus, I know the Cemetery force isn’t huge, but they called both detectives in for an accident?”
“Ain’t no body in the car, kid.” Senior Detective Reyes, as his title suggested, had been with the force for over twenty years. Regardless of his seniority, he’d only recently taken to calling her kid. A fact that Williams continually pointed out to no avail.
“Cut that out, I’m almost thirty, Reyes. I-I think I’ve earned it—” Williams cut herself off, Reyes’ previous statement finally settling in. “There isn’t a body? Like, the person was ejected through the windshield or something…and they called us in for that? Did they check further down the road for it?”
“I just got here, kid, same as you. My guess would be that they already did, the Chief doesn’t like us called in for nothing.” Reyes took a final drag and rubbed the cherry out of his cigarette with his index finger and thumb. His voice still had the distinct trill on several words with the letter “r,” gathered from being first or second generation Mexican, but otherwise had taken on an almost distinct New York accent. His shirt, stretched across his chest and stomach, had seen better days. Or at the very least, better days when Reyes was of a smaller size. As his years with the force passed, his cynicism, and belt size, grew.
Williams noticed his need for a cigarette had grown recently. He’d even taken to long bouts without shaving, as if he couldn’t be bothered. The caramel skin tone of his cheeks was being overtaken by a black beard speckled in grey and white. Williams had thus far let it lie, unsure of how to broach the subject. She knew he was jaded—hell, the entire department could tell—she just wasn’t sure they’d passed a point where she could ask.
Williams on the other hand was still young enough—and new enough to the force—that she aimed to keep in shape, working out whenever possible. After years of her parents forcing her to play soccer as a child, she ended up loving the sport, continuing all throughout high school and even some of college. As height had never been gifted to her, she used her more squat, muscular build to her advantage, often using her back to block out the competitor as they both went for the soccer ball, ponytail swinging. Now she kept her hair more shortly cut, a bob. However, she still clung to her desire to keep the competition away from the ball, turning it to ambition instead, as the world is less forgiving than a soccer pitch. Her ambition, and honed skills, always fought for the surface, her uncertainty entering the force the only thing holding her back.
“So the options are what, accidental self-ejection, or foul play? Therefore, they need to call in the entire force?” Williams quipped, still searching for her footing.
“Astute detecting, kid, really tip-top,” Reyes retorted.
Embarrassed, Williams stared at the ground, pushing a sheet of hair behind her ear to hide the reddening of her cheeks.
“What do you think then? You have to give me something to go on. You might have just arrived, but I know you’re thinking something,” Williams said, her lips downturned in frustration.
Williams’ comfort, or lack thereof, was not lost on Reyes as he held his hand up to stop an approaching officer. He placed a calming hand on her shoulder.
“I think Chief gets a call in the middle of the night and is told there’s a flipped-over car right outside of Cemetery and it’s missing a body. My take on the situation is I don’t know, he don’t either, and therefore, it’s a big deal until we do, kid.” Reyes shrugged, releasing her and pulled out his pack of cigarettes, gesticulating with them as he talked. “You know what you’re doing. The officers see it too, or at least they will if you let them. Now why don’t you go over to the car and look instead of badgering me for the answers, okay?”
The police walkie attached to Williams’ hip chirped, pulling away her attention. The call wasn’t for her, but she listened to the back and forth anyway, wondering if it pertained to the accident. It didn’t. Dispatch was calling for a response to a disappearance at the Old Mayor’s Mansion. A local haunt for kids that wanted to test their mettle in what was coined the town’s biggest paranormal hotspot. To Williams, even when she was a teen who could have been susceptible to the pressures of others, she still thought the place was all bullshit. She turned the walkie down, giving her attention back to the task at hand.
Williams walked toward the accident, calling, “Hey, Brennan and Shotz, what have you got so far?” She wanted to listen to Reyes, knew he was right, and figured asking the officers’ their opinions were the fastest option. Now, if only she could stay out of her own way.
Brennan and Shotz, two of the department’s uniform officers, had been on and off their walkies and phones since she stepped out of the car. Finally free, she aimed to question them too. Brennan was tall, while Shotz was not, with a head of salt-and-pepper hair that didn’t quite match his eyebrows yet; and Shotz had a hooked nose that could make a ‘90’s witch jealous. Even at the unholy hour both were in full Cemetery Police Department uniforms.
“Answers have been hard to come by given the hour, but we just got back confirmation that the car is registered to a Cynthia Wickam. We tried to contact her or her husband but haven’t heard anything back just yet. We requested to have someone go over to their residence, but it looks like it might have to be us whenever we get finished here,” the taller of the two said.
“Do we have any reason to believe that she wasn’t the driver?” Williams asked.
“That’s still unknown, but we’re looking for anything at this point,” Brennan replied.
“And what do we have coming in the way of clean-up?” Williams continued, kicking chunks of glass off the road with the heel of her boot.
“Officers Dans and Riggs have some flares and a couple of squad cars blocking the way into Cemetery, as well as a couple of road flares, and Officers Prescott and Owens posted a little up the road toward Cemetery. Figured we better wait until everyone arrived before blocking that side. Gonna keep them closed at least until the scene is cleared.” The shorter officer removed his police cap and ran his hands through his hair. “Whole thing is pretty freaking weird if you ask me…I mean, where’s the body?”
“I’m simply looking for something to go on here,” Williams replied, her tone more clipped than intended. Practice made perfect.
“I’m just saying, Detective, this is unusual even for us,” Shotz replied, replacing his police cap. “We don’t have much else for you yet though; everything was left exactly how it was when we arrived. We figured we better wait for it to be photographed. Then we heard you and Reyes got the call, too.”
“I’ll hold my judgments for some actual facts for starters…thanks though, to you both. You better get back to it,” Williams said, stepping away from them with a nod. She had wanted to play it cool; to show them she had things handled, but maybe Shotz was right. Was it a little too weird?
No. She was being ridiculous.
Brennan was an officer who came on the force around the same time as Reyes. When he wasn’t doing something involving his hands, he was known for spinning an old class ring on his pointer finger. Whether it was because he was proud to be educated, or just some kind of tick, Williams was unsure. Shotz, on the other hand, was new blood. She remembered the day he joined. There’s nothing weird about an accident, she thought. Perhaps the two of them were partnered to balance each other.
Regardless, they were both waiting on her.
The car appeared to have come around the bend in the road at substantial speed. It had clearly rolled and spun on its hood until finally stopping in a ditch. Williams found herself playing it out in her head; the driver losing control, possibly drunk, an overcorrection, a curse and shout, then the inevitable crunch. Or a dirty look at a local bar, words exchanged, someone followed the driver into the parking lot, and it leads to this? Or, a case of road rage—the driver’s, or someone else’s—leading to an untimely end.
Or some kind of kidnapping.
The windshield of the Chrysler 200 was cracked and missing chunks of glass, all of which had kindly placed themselves at dangerous angles all over the road and hill of the ditch, like so much vehicular flotsam. Williams carefully stepped her way through and squatted down, taking a closer look. The upside-down view gave her a weird feeling, as if she were the one that was topsy-turvy, suspended, but she pushed through. The driver side airbag had deployed, now deflated. There were obvious rips and tears through it from the glass. But where is the body?
There were a few things that stuck out as odd to her, though.
“Reyes, come look at this!” she called up to her partner.
Lighting up again, Reyes panned his flashlight over to her and the car. “I can see great from up here out of the glass. What is it?”
“Well, it’s weird. The glass missing from the windshield couldn’t have fit a body through it, not even a small one, not even at high velocity. But the driver-side window is entirely gone. There’re various blood spray patterns inside the car, as well as some blood wiped on the door, but nothing substantial. It’s all just passive drops, nothing’s splattered in it. And whoever heard of a car accident where the person involved is rocketed through the driver-side window? I don’t know that I believe that’s even possible, honestly.”
Detective Williams stood again, shaking her head and running her hands up and down her thighs. She shone her flashlight back and forth over the driver-side of the car, thinking hard. “This is interesting too; if the driver had survived the crash and was conscious enough to pull themselves out, the glass from the window would have been blown outward, most of it outside the car. And if it had blown out during the flip there wouldn’t be so much of it here. I mean, I can’t be positive with the windshield glass here too, but it looks like this window was broken inward. Toward the driver. Are we sure there’s been no arrivals to the local hospitals? Maybe a witness saw it happen and tried to rescue them on their own?”
“Without calling it in?” Reyes said. “I mean people are stupid, but everyone knows you’re not supposed to move someone when they’re hurt. They still teach kids that, right? They got to.”
“I don’t know, but that hardly matters. The passenger side airbag didn’t deploy, so most likely they were alone. Unless it malfunctioned. We need to get on this. If someone saw and tried to help, or if there was a passenger, the victim could already be at a local hospital. Let’s try Middletown or Newburgh even—no idea how bad the person was banged up, but Saint Luke’s is good.”
“Alright, this is good stuff. Let’s give it a shot, but I doubt we wouldn’t have heard if they had,” Reyes replied.
Detective Williams climbed precariously back up the ditch. “Yeah, I feel the same way. We would have heard by now. Still worth a shot though. I know it might sound stupid, but I typically have some inkling, some feeling toward the cause or a path to take, but this?” Williams gestured back and forth between the glass, the flipped car, and the flood of activity around them. “But this is stumping me. What in the hell would even make someone flee? Or if it was a witness or passenger helping, who doesn’t call to notify the appropriate authorities?”
“Panic,” was the only word Senior Detective Reyes offered in reply, exhaling cigarette smoke.
“Excuse me?”
“Panic. The dude probably panicked. How often do you flip a car? Dude probably got out of it mildly hurt and panicked. Panic makes people do strange shit.” Reyes’ shoulders raised, not looking nearly as concerned as he should have been.
“And why are you so certain it’s a man all of a sudden?” Williams shot back.
“Listen, I’ve been doing this a long time. Nine times out of every ten, if something real stupid’s been done, it’s a man’s done it. Better yet, most likely a young one too.” He shrugged again, smiling around his cigarette butt. “I don’t make the rules, kid.”
Williams’ attention shifted as an ambulance pulled up. Two paramedics got out and pulled a stretcher out of the back. One of the paramedics, pulling latex gloves over his hands, looked left and right, a rather confused look on his face.
“You guys took your sweet time.” Williams smiled, shaking her head. “Ehh, doesn’t matter anyway, no one’s found a body…”
IV
Detective Williams stared down at the coffee Reyes had handed her. Cloudy, greyish brown with bits of white floating in it. Creamer. I fucking hate creamer. The oily excuse for a milk alternative always turned her stomach in circles. By now, she thought Reyes would have remembered that, but after the night out they had, she’d drink it black, or shovel the grounds directly into her mouth. Anything to stay awake at this point.
A crowd of people from town had amassed, answering the call for volunteers. All they had been notified of was that there was a missing person. The car and glass had been removed hours ago.
The crowd slowly headed toward a tarp-covered portable pavilion, the kind from Target or Dick’s Sporting Goods. It was a purchase that Williams had been sent to make when she was a uniform cop, some four or five years ago, and Chief still said it was the best purchase they ever made. To him, the thing exuded control. Or power. Or at the very least it commanded attention, which was all the Chief of Police wanted when he made appearances. Usually known for his pomp and circumstance, he had dressed down for the day: hiking boots and slacks, and a tucked-in flannel with a police windbreaker overtop. His hair, a usual staple for being perfectly placed, was no different today, the wind unable to defeat it. He raised his hands and smiled, gimlet eyes turning to the crowd.
“Ladies and gentlemen, some of you may already know me, but I am the Chief of Police for the Cemetery Police Department, Raymond Carter. I want to thank you all for showing up on such short notice. This is quite a turnout, and I’m yet again humbled by the great town of Cemetery.”
The crowd gave a subdued round of applause, while many in the crowd continued to shake their heads and stare at the Chief of Police. The Chief had been appointed by the mayor, but he was an unusual pick. The pool of applicants had featured several older, more qualified individuals, so the choice had surprised many of those invested in the selection. The rumor mill had spit out that there was possibly an outside source making the final call, but nothing was ever confirmed. The Chief, though, had proven himself to be calm and steady, offering something Cemetery often needed in spades.
Chief Carter gave them all a small smile and nodded his head in recognition. “You can clap, you certainly all deserve it. And look, I know many of you have questions. Questions I am not prepared to answer. Not yet at least. Please, let me put your minds at ease. At this point this is a missing person. We are looking for them. We aren’t currently looking into any suspected foul play, so please put all of that to rest. We just need your help to find them; to bring them home safely.” A few hands were still raised straight into the sky, like beacons, readying to undo the tentative calm the Chief had elicited. He did his best to cut them off, “That’s why it’s so important for us to stop wasting time here! Let’s be orderly, let’s be safe, and let’s do this together.”
Some of the older generation, those especially keen on law enforcement, applauded again. They were joined by those that found the Chief to be impressive as well. The Chief smiled but directed his attention back to the table he had been standing over. The surrounding woods had been broken into manageable quadrants, then even smaller sections so that groups could be assigned targeted search areas. Officers Dans and Owens started handing out high-vis vests to the volunteers. Each of them would also be provided with a flashlight. It was early morning, but there was rain in the forecast, and the police department didn’t want anyone to feel the need to bend down to get a look into any tight or dark places. They had enough on their hands without added injuries to worry about.
Williams and Reyes approached the Chief from behind the pavilion, still slurping their coffees. Both looked haggard, but the changes showed the most on Williams. She had dark circles under her eyes, the right side of her shirt was untucked, and she sported a coffee stain on her shirt that she was still self-conscious about.
Reyes replaced the cigarette in the corner of his mouth with a fresh one, barely putting one out before starting another. “Lovely morning we’re all having, wouldn’t you say, Chief?”
Chief Carter pinched the bridge of his nose and took a deep, calming breath. Looking down at a list he said, “I want you two separated for this. I need two good sets of eyes out there, and I don’t want them both in the same search area. Williams, you’ll be with a volunteer named Katherine. Reyes, with Declan and April.”
Every person in the crowd had donned their high-vis vests, flashlights in hand. They collectively looked left and right, as if in search of a final directive. More than a fair share of the volunteers seemed overly concerned, as if they were spooked before ever stepping foot in the woods. Carter felt it was necessary to wrangle them back in one final time before sending them on their way:
“Everyone! Everyone please, listen up for just a minute more. You’ve all been provided with your vests and flashlights by now. This is not something to take lightly; please ensure you are wearing the vests and using the flashlights everywhere you go. We’re all here to find a missing person, we don’t want to go getting lost ourselves now do we?” At this he smiled at the crowd, though few smiled back. “As you all must be aware, we do not have enough officers to assign to every group but know that we have separated them so that they are as spread out as possible. Stay together with your partner or group, stay hydrated, and if you feel yourself getting uncomfortable, don’t be afraid to say so—we’re all volunteering here. The grid we’ve created is much smaller than you may think; call out if you need any help and someone should be able to hear. Thank you.”
During his second speech, Williams had approached the woman Carter had pointed out. Katherine was a short woman with glasses, mid-twenties, with dark brown skin and beautifully curly hair. She wore a pink sweater over a button-up with no jacket, even though it was supposed to rain. After exchanging names—all that Williams found to be strictly necessary—she led the woman to the edge of the woods.
I’ve been up for an ungodly number of hours, Williams thought, and now they stick me with a fucking librarian.
It wasn’t that she had anything against reading, or libraries, or librarians even—she actually enjoyed them. It was the fact that she was ten hours late to bed, which also meant that she was ten hours late to her day off. Neither of which really got to the issue at heart—the fact that she was shy one body. The missing person had continued to niggle at her the entirety of the night. There was the accident itself, the smashed in window, the glass being blown inward rather than out, and the fact that there was next to no blood. Williams, so often entirely sure of herself, felt like she was floating in the unknown. Weightless and aimless, on a precipice.
She was probably just overtired, but her anxiety bled out as sarcastic snark.
“So, what exactly do we do?” Katherine said, pulling Detective Williams back in. “Or I guess I mean, what exactly do we look for? Am I stumbling on a body or looking for clues? Do we get deputized then?”
“Pardon me?” Williams said, yawning and pulling her hair up as best as she could into a ponytail.
“Sorry, sorry, I’m most definitely rambling. I guess I’m just a little anxious and once I started talking it just keeps coming and coming. I never realized until just a second ago that we could possibly stumble across a body out there…oh god what if I even trip on it?”
“Katherine, look at me,” Detective Williams said. “You’re not going to trip on anything. You have your flashlight, yeah? Use it. Pay attention. Keep your eyes peeled, and we’ll find whatever we’re meant to find. I’m personally hoping for the missing person to be recovered alive, thank you.” She paused to breathe deeply after each statement.
Use it. Breathe. Pay attention. Breathe. Keep. Your. Eyes. Peeled.
All things considered, they might have stuck Katherine with someone less sleep deprived, less venomous. Or they might have thought to stick Williams with someone who didn’t need babysitting.
“Sorry,” Katherine mumbled, crestfallen. Don’t be stupid, she mouthed repeatedly to herself, but not discreetly enough that Williams couldn’t see.
“Don’t worry about it, I’m not exactly comfortable with all this myself, you know,” Detective Williams said, trying to reel herself in. Katherine not so different from how she actually felt. “They have us covering a pretty small area, not that that will mean it’s easy to do. We’ll walk this direction for two miles, keeping an eye out. If we see anything of note, I’ll radio in. If not, we’ll more than likely be instructed to keep going deeper, as long as we’re up for it.”
They walked in silence for several minutes, flicking their flashlights left and right. They didn’t walk at any predetermined pace, nor did they take it unnecessarily slow. Detective Williams wasn’t sure what she expected at this point. Or, more importantly, she wasn’t exactly sure what she wanted—should she be the one to find a clue, a body? It could just as easily be someone else, somewhere else. Of course, there was no way of knowing; she just felt conflicted with the possibilities. On the one hand, if she found something, she could show them that she could handle herself well. On the other, she really wasn’t positive she wanted to be the one.
If anything, it would likely be the group that had Eric Mathers in it. He and his son were diehard hunters, and they had a dog with them. Williams was a skeptic on the whole “hunters can be great trackers” thing, because isn’t hunting just an extreme sport of patience, sitting in wait until something passes? The dog could be a great help though.
“Oh shit, oh god, what is that?” Katherine said, pulling Detective Williams from pondering.
Shit.
Ch 2
Searching
I
Detective Williams whipped her flashlight around frantically, trying to spot what had made Katherine freak out. To their right, she saw nothing. To their left, about fifty feet from where they stood, was a clump of leaves and detritus. To her, someone with a bit more experience looking for people and looking at bodies, it appeared to be a ground-up pile of leaves, nothing more. She had to admit, though, it was of a body shape.
The two women edged forward. Katherine practically choked off blood supply to Williams’ arm, gripping tighter than a blood pressure cuff. Williams pulled them forward, closing in on the leaf pile. She was almost positive it was nothing more than what it looked, but something still felt off about it. Williams removed Katherine’s hands from her arm and lightly pushed her toward the right. Williams skirted around to the left; she had a sickening feeling in the pit of her stomach, her hand creeping its way toward her holster.
By the time Katherine got up the courage to stumble out front and center, Williams was already squatting down to appraise the situation. The area in front was devoid of leaves and twigs, almost as if someone was attempting to make a snow angel without snow. The closer Williams looked, the more bits she seemed to pick up on. Under her right foot was a pull straight through the leaves. She directed her flashlight and saw gouges made in the dirt, almost as if they were nail marks. She removed her phone and started taking pictures of the surrounding area.
Katherine let out a breath that she had most definitely been holding in. “Not a body,” was all she could get out.
“True, but look at this, someone was here. It looks like someone was on the ground, pushing up the leaves. Then there’s these gouges in the dirt, like they were putting up a fight. I’m not great with this stuff, but there doesn’t seem to be any obvious footprints. But if they put up a fight, that…that means that whoever pulled them from the car wasn’t trying to help. It wouldn’t make sense to bring them a mile into the woods to get them help either,” Williams said, pieces falling into place.
“So, we are looking for a body?” Katherine said, whimpering.
“Hold on, let me call this in,” Williams said, grabbing her walkie.
II
Chief Carter asked for Detective Williams to get clear photos before heading in. The forecasted rain had started in earnest, spoiling the chances of a real police photographer getting into the woods. The chief waited for them under the pavilion. A few other people, including Senior Detective Reyes, waited with the Chief.
“Ah, Detective Williams, Katherine, I’m glad you’ve made it back in one piece,” Carter grimaced. “Sorry, a figure of speech. Apologies. Please, let me see the pictures.”
Carter swiped through them slowly, looking at each and zooming in randomly. As he got toward the end of the pictures, the ones Williams assumed were of the fingernail grooves in the dirt, he zoomed in and took an even longer look at each. He passed the phone to Reyes and turned back to the group of people. “This definitely looks like a struggle of some kind. However, nothing shows anything that indicates a second person. Could the driver have run off into the woods confused or disoriented? The struggle on the ground could have been them trying to get back up? Especially if they were drunk or concussed. Reyes, what do you make of it?”
Reyes finished with the pictures, tossing Williams back her phone. With a fresh cigarette between his two fingers, he nodded. “I’m with you on that, Chief. Nothing shows a second person by any means. Concussed or drunk fits a few of the theories that Williams put out there, too.”
This was their way, Williams and Reyes. He centered her, reminding her of what needed to be done and that she was good at it, and then he let her do her thing. Reyes ensuring the Chief was aware that Williams had good ideas was just another layer to it. It wasn’t lost on Williams that she was the one out there, the one taking the pictures, yet Reyes was the opinion the Chief cared about.
“So maybe you should double down on all the local bars in the area that were open last night. If someone had their keys taken from them, that could lead us right to them.”
“I- I’m not sure about that anymore.” Williams’ face burned bright at having interrupted. “When we were out there, the way the leaves looked from the back, it almost seemed heavy. Like the body had impacted the ground, maybe sliding a little—and that’s why the leaves were pushed up. I guess an injured or inebriated person could drop that hard to the ground, but the whole thing just feels off.”
“It seemed intentional, violent even,” Katherine offered.
“Thank you so much for the help, Katherine, as well as the rest of you kind folks, but if you’d step out to the tent over there, there’s water and some light food. We’ll be back with you in just a couple of minutes,” Chief Carter said, dismissing them as diplomatically as possible.
As they filtered out from under the pavilion, Carter made a face. “I’d forgotten they were here to be honest with you both. I don’t like this. Our timeframe for a lead is disappearing right before our eyes and we don’t even have a person or a body recovered. There might not have been significant blood on or in the car, but broken bones? Internal bleeding? Our time window to find a living person seems to be running out.”
Reyes pointed toward the trees. “So send us back out there. The rain sucks, but it’s not an actual impeding factor. We need to search, so send us searching. Far as I’m concerned, we’re bound to find something.”
The way Reyes emphasized something made it clear he didn’t believe it could be a someone. At least not anymore. Reyes lit a new cigarette with the butt of his last. He put the first cherry out with his first two fingers and flicked the butt. Something about this investigation seemed to be unraveling him, as if he knew he was up against something unbeatable.
III
Thanks to Mathers and his son, Detective Williams and Katherine were now the proud borrowers of a four-wheeler. As they needed to head deeper into the forest, the hunters had briefly left to get their ATVs for the growingly difficult terrain. Truth be told, Williams thought ten quads for a single family was a bit over the top, but for the moment she’d swallow the commentary and give their legs a break.
Williams was particularly thankful since the engine and tight quarters meant focusing intently—no time for Katherine to ramble. They had just hit a dense area of woods where the branches and brambles seemed to lean down and grow up in menacing angles. Katherine’s breath caught in her throat. Williams simply lowered her head and drove right through them. She wasn’t going to let it get to her. Wasn’t going to let Katherine’s sighs, gasps, and circulation-ending grip pull her into her hysterics.
She wasn’t leaving these woods till she found something. That was not entirely what the Chief wanted, but he needed a break in the case, so she was going to find it.
Williams figured they were around three, three and a half miles in, having driven for a decent amount of time. It was afternoon, and aside from a few walkie call-ins that were eventually debunked, or insignificant, no one had found anything of particular interest. The rain, on the other hand, had taken its sweet time starting, but was now coming down in sheets, the wind making it a horizontal onslaught that they were unfortunately driving straight toward.
Drenched to the skin and awake for over thirty hours, Williams pulled the four-wheeler around a final tree before stopping and keying it off. Grinding her teeth had been the norm for the entirety of the drive. She was passed exhaustion, now on her third, fourth, or even fifth wind. The teeth grinding had given her a mind-melting pressure headache, which did nothing for her mood. She needed to be on the ball more than ever. The rain, the current cloud cover, as well as the waning light, were bound to make it difficult enough as it was.
Get it together, Williams thought, do your job already.
The rain whipped at the perfect angle to sting her eyes, and even the light from their flashlights was making her head hurt. She felt like she might vomit, but she swallowed it down rather than appear weak in front of Katherine. A twig snapped to her left and she whipped her head around.
“Over here, Detective, I think I see something,” Katherine called from what appeared to be a clearing a bit up the path.
Williams headed toward Katherine, keeping her flashlight pointed at the ground to ensure she wouldn’t miss anything. Entering the clearing to the side of Katherine, she saw another area of mushed leaves, practically identical to before.
“This one’s larger than the first one, right?” Katherine asked.
“At least double the size. Easy,” Williams replied.
At that moment, the detective’s walkie gave off a loud bout of static. Within the clearing, it echoed twice as loud. Katherine let off a clipped scream.
Williams shushed Katherine, trying to be soothing. “It’s just the walkie. Let’s try to listen.”
More static rang out in two decisive bouts, nothing intelligible. Williams started walking around, in and out of the clearing, with the walkie held slightly in the air.
“You really think that’ll work? Are police walkies anything like cellphones, even?” Katherine asked.
“Shit, I don’t know,” Williams retorted, incredulous. “My mother’s house used to sit right outside a pretty large area of woods. Service was great, then over the years it got worse and worse. Who’s to say whether or not it had anything to do with the woods. But no, this walkie should work much better. With the storm and the woods though, all bets are off.”
The walkie static chirped again. Katherine let out another scream. This one longer and increasingly shrill. The kind of scream that brings “bloodcurdling” to mind.
What the fuck is she doing?
Williams turned around and stepped back into the clearing. Katherine, having found some kind of bravery within herself—or idiocy—had stepped up to the leaf pile. Her cheeks had blanched, and tears ran down her face. The look on her face was one of pure dread. As Williams approached, she felt as if each step forward elongated the distance between them by two. A trick of the mind of course, her brain giving her time to decide “fight” or “flight.” Williams just couldn’t figure out if it was in favor of, or against, her psyche. Her breathing hitched as she edged closer.
Circling around the backside of her, Williams came into full view of the cause of Katherine’s distress. The air was redolent of earth and the sickly-sweet aroma of decay. Intermixed with the leaves was a body. Or, more accurately, what remained of one. Filthy and torn clothes covered a rigid and prone form. Williams steadied herself with a deep breath and panned her flashlight from the shoes upward: one shoe was missing, the foot itself tinged blue and filthy, various cuts and abrasions evident. What remained of their lower half shared a similar fate, but with the added filth of released bowels post mortem. Their shirt was completely torn in two, the flat chest emaciated and bruised, the sleeve of the tee shirt still present on the left shoulder, the arm stuck out at an unnatural angle. With the remainder of the left side gone, the chest could be seen; practically skin and bones, tight and malnourished. Blue and cold from the look of it, the wet sheen from the rain gave it an odd quality, one that Williams would try for the remainder of her days not to think about.
The right side of the shirt, still loosely readable as having once been white, was brown and spottled with bits of rust—what vaguely registered to Williams as dried blood. The victim’s neck was another story. Torn and popped viscera and muscle, as well as a thin layer of fat, showed at the peak of what once would have been connected to their head. The victim’s head, still possibly within the area, was not attached to the body.
Oh shit!
Katherine vomited off to Williams’ right, pulling her attention back to the living person that she still shared the clearing with. Katherine was shaking and sobbing uncontrollably. “If it wasn’t…wasn’t for the leaves, I…I really could have tripped over it!” she stuttered.
“I’m so sorry you had to be the one to find it.”
Katherine’s shaking continued and it became clear to Williams that she was on the cusp of shock. The hours of being in the cold downpour weren’t doing them any favors either.
Why the hell didn’t she wear a coat?
“We went to high school together,” Katherine mumbled weakly before slumping toward the ground, passed out. Williams was just able to grab her before she hit her head on the ground.
It’s always the strangest moments that bring memories back to someone. In Williams’ eighth-grade health class they were shown a video on reproduction. For the most part the class thought it was a little gross, but mostly funny. One kid, though, was especially squeamish and passed out, hitting his head off the desk next to his. One of the high schoolers that was running the class jumped right into action. Afterward, he ran the class through what he had done, stating that the lightheadedness that happens before passing out is due to a lack of blood flowing to the brain, and that elevating the legs helps to circulate it back faster.
With the memory ripe in her mind, the need to help someone else grounded her. She ripped off her coat and put it under Katherine’s head on the ground. Next, she elevated her legs, leaning Katherine’s shoes against her hip to keep them in the air. When Katherine started to come to, she passed her a water bottle and instructed her to take slow, deliberate sips.
When Katherine was finally steady enough to get up and sit on the four-wheeler, Williams instructed her to stay put—that she’d be right back. The shock still showed on Katherine’s face. Williams imagined that if she were more herself, she would have squealed, “Don’t leave me here with…it!”
Outside the clearing, Williams was finally able to get a clear chirp out of the walkie. She walked for a couple more minutes before pressing the button, “This is Detective Williams, over.”
“Kid, it’s Reyes, over. Been trying to reach you on your cell for probably an hour now.”
“Sorry, the storm and woods are really messing with the service. The walkie too, over,” Williams responded. “We found them, Reyes. They…” She released the button and took a deep breath. “They didn’t make it. Look, Katherine’s definitely in shock. We’ll need an ambulance for when we get back. Were you able to get a hold of the owners of the vehicle? Someone will have to let the wife know. The victim is male, over.”
“Shit. Look, Brennan and Shotz finally contacted the owner of the vehicle from last night…the Chrysler 200 was stolen. The entire family is on vacation, so they didn’t even know.” Reyes answered. “Whoever you found, we’ll still need to investigate to get an ID, over.”
“Stolen?” Back to square one, again?
“You okay, kid?” Reyes called over the walkie.
Williams’ cheeks burned red at the fact that he would even ask, over the department radio no less. He should know better. She wasn’t any less angry that he was just looking out for her. “I’m fine. Look, I tried to drop a pin on my phone, but it died from trying to search for service for so long. I’ll have to come back out here to try to find the spot again with the recovery team. I’m fine, over.” She let go of the button, cursing herself for saying it twice. No one would believe her; they could probably tell just from her voice. She didn’t even believe it herself. She was anything but fine, but no one else needed to know that. She needed to be strong, to appear strong. She was no one’s problem but her own.
If she had just been faster, better, this could have been avoided, couldn’t it? It wasn’t her fault, she knew that, but she couldn’t shake the feeling all the same. Just like the stake out that broke up her parents. If she had done better, gotten whatever they needed from her right, everything would have worked out.
IV
The ride back in the rain had been a difficult one. When they had finally made it out of the woods, an ambulance was waiting for them both. Two paramedics helped Katherine off the back of the four-wheeler and into the ambulance. Senior Detective Reyes had pulled his car up right in front of Williams, getting out and opening the back door for her, ushering her in and brokering no arguments. He drove off right in front of Chief Carter, who didn’t look happy.
The back of Reyes’ car was where Williams had woken up, hours later, with a thick wool blanket covering her. Reyes sat in the driver’s seat, the window cracked open, smoking the butt of a cigarette. “This rain is foul—didn’t want to leave you alone with the car running.”
“You didn’t have to do that. What time is it?” Williams asked.
“A little after eight. You needed it, kid,” Reyes replied, smiling.
He wasn’t wrong there; she most definitely had needed it. Still did; another twelve hours probably wouldn’t do her justice. “You need sleep too though, you’ve been up just as long as me. We both worked Friday.”
Reyes laughed heartily, belly shaking. “I’ll tell you two things you missed. After our final questioning on Friday, you decided to go driving around like a jackass, and I napped in the office. I’m also a single, middle-aged man. I went home and had a beer or five and passed out on the couch at eight. Knowing you, you were probably still awake when we received the call early Saturday.”
Right again. “Alright, fine, whatever, old man. Thanks for this. The blanket too,” Williams smiled. “I soaked your backseat though.”
Detective Williams tried to look out the car window, but the rain and her sleeping had fogged up the inside. “Where are we, the precinct?”
“Yeah, kid, Chief Carter is waiting for us. They recovered the body,” Reyes answered.
The body. The misfortune of the entire day came back to her in a rush. That’s the beauty and sin of a real “is that person alive?” sleep; the utter bliss of waking up with no idea what’s happened or where you are. She remembered now, and briefly wished she didn’t.
She pushed down her guilt at having a moment of joking with her partner. “Oh god,” Williams groaned, “Is Katherine alright?”
“Yeah, they gave her something to calm her, and made sure she was drinking enough fluids. She’s probably home now.”
Williams sat up and Reyes offered her a water bottle and a hot coffee; she chose the latter. Taking a slow sip to test the temperature, Williams took a deeper pull, finding it serviceable. She took a deep breath, releasing it loudly. “What the fuck are we going to do about this case, Reyes, ‘cause we’ve clearly got something going on here,” she said reluctantly, not wanting to put it out there, even though she needed to. “The body we found looked like it was flesh and bones, practically no substance. The first spot we found looked like there was a struggle…the body we found, well shit, it didn’t look like it could have struggled against a thing. Then they go another two or three miles or so—then they get their fucking head cut off? It makes zero sense. I need more than that. I’m trying to make connections; I just don’t know what we’re dealing with.”
Already Williams was worried that what Shotz had said was sticking with her. She had been working far too hard to appear rattled already, she couldn’t slip up just because things weren’t making any sense.
“I’m sorry, kid, but it gets stranger,” Reyes said, frowning around his cigarette. “A lot stranger.”
About the Author
C. J. Daley lives in New York. He has written a full-length debut novel, as well as a full accompanying short story collection. BestGhost is his first sampler on the road to releasing the novel. He hopes this won’t be the last you hear from him, and if you enjoyed the free novelette, please consider leaving a review on Amazon, Goodreads, StoryGraph, or Literal Book Club. Or share with a friend.
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