Free Zero-Degree Murder (A Search and Rescue Mystery) by M.L. Rowland Page A

if someone was hurt?” Gracie asked herself. “It doesn’t make any sense.”
    Cashman reappeared beside her. “Wanna walk farther back to see if you can get a signal?” he asked. “I can search on down the hill.”
    Gracie pushed herself to her feet. “Not a good idea to separate,” she said. Which Cashman knew full well. “Never leave your partner” was one of the most fundamental tenets of search and rescue. “Never go off on your own.”
    “How ’bout we at least find where they went down?” Cashman suggested.
    Gracie dragged her attention away from the stain. With flashlights and headlamps trained on the dirt, she and Cashman scoured the area until they found where someone had descended into the canyon—a furrow of churned earth and leaves leading down one side of the outcropping.
    “Let’s follow it down,” Cashman prodded.
    Gracie stood her ground, chewing the inside of her cheek. Leaving the trail to go down into the canyon was tricky business—bushwhacking off-trail, off-radio, in the dark, on a steep, rocky slope leading to who knew where. She had been there and done that. It totally sucked.
    Don’t get dead
flickered through her mind.
Don’t take unnecessary risks. Don’t do anything stupid. Don’t become a victim yourself
. “I think we need to backtrack down the trail to find a signal,” she said. “We need to let Ralph know what we’re doing. About the tracks. And about the blood.”
    “Fuck the blood!” Cashman yelled. “And fuck Hunter!”
    Gracie took a step backward. “Cashman!”
    Steve backed off immediately, softening his tone. “Sorry, Gracie. But if somebody’s hurt down there, a half hour could mean we find a DB instead of a person. You can stay here. Or go try and radio. I’m goin’ down.”
    Gracie stared at her teammate. This was a side of Cashman she had never seen before. She had never even heard him raise his voice, much less yell at anyone, least of all her.
    “Not a good idea, Steve,” she said. “Ralph needs to call in more teams.”
    “I’ll mark where I went down.” He hauled out a long strand of neon green flagging tape and tied multiple strands around the branches of a manzanita bush growing out of the dirt next to the trail.
    “Cashman, are you hearing me?” Gracie asked, struggling to keep the irritation out of her voice. “This is not a good idea. We need to radio in.”
    “I’m Team Leader,” he said without looking at her. He drew out his GPS and held it aloft to collect the satellite signal. “I’m goin’ down. You can come with me. You can stay here. Whatever you want.”
    “What the hell!” Gracie stormed several paces up the trail, then stopped, breathing slowly, deeply, trying to squelch her anger.
    The risk in altering their course without notifying the Command Post was monumental. Once they left the formal, maintained trail, they would be flying blind, off the radar. If anything bad happened, they would be on their own. Gracie alone with Steve Cashman.
    What was she going to do? Let Cashman go down into the canyon by himself? Hike all the way back to the Command Post alone?
    Cashman was right about time being critical. She would never forgive herself if someone died because she had a thing about sticking to the rules.
    She turned and stomped back down to the outcropping. “Dammit, Cashman, you win. But I don’t like it. One. Bit. Don’t ever do this again.” Gracie hauled out her own GPS and took a waypoint.
    With a voice in Gracie’s head shouting a fortissimo, “I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” she and Cashman plunged down off the side of the trail and into darkness.

CHAPTER

19
     
    M ILOCEK ground his back teeth together. Frustration burned in his chest. The arrival of Search and Rescue presented yet another complication.
    He had crept up behind the searchers, tailing them as they followed the tracks to the rock promontory. Motionless and invisible back down the trail, he listened as they discussed the stain