Scavengers Read Online Free PDF Page B

smell of fresh linens and the regular, relaxed breathing of her youngest son across the room, fell asleep.
    She awoke to the sound of her husband’s quiet voice drifting into the darkened bedroom from somewhere in the front of the house. By turning her head a fraction, she could see the outline of Carlos, still sleeping peacefully. He had adopted a favorite position, scrunched on all fours with his legs drawn up under him and his rump in the air as if he’d fallen sleep while crawling.
    Estelle sat up and swung her legs over the side of the bed. With a start, she saw that it was almost five in the afternoon.
    Francis appeared in the doorway. “How are you doing?”
    “Okay…I think.”
    “You slept like a stone,” he said. He stepped into the room and peered at his youngest son. “This guy wanted to wake you up a while ago, but I told him that wasn’t such a good idea.”
    “
Y mamá?
”
    “Sleeping. This sleep is good stuff,” Francis said. “Irma took Francisco with her to do a little grocery shopping. I’m surprised you didn’t hear him.”
    Estelle pushed herself to her feet. “I didn’t hear anything. Did Jackie Taber call, by any chance?”
    “Nope.” Francis followed her out of the bedroom. “Alan did, though. I just got off the phone with him. He said to tell you that John Doe was shot once in the head, probably either with a rifle or a large-caliber handgun.”
    Estelle stopped in the kitchen doorway and leaned her weight back into her husband’s hands as he kneaded the muscles at the nape of her neck.
    “Someone worked his lower face over, too,” Francis added. “Alan wanted to talk to you about that. At first, he thought it was a case where the victim was beaten severely, and then shot. But apparently that’s not the situation here.”
    Eyes closed, Estelle tried to picture the scenario days earlier out on the prairie east of the MacInernys’ gravel pit. “What does he think happened?”
    “Shot first, then a systematic effort made to destroy the dentition,” Francis said.
    Estelle turned and looked at him, frowning. “That’s what he said out at the scene. That it looked like someone picked up a good-sized rock and did a number on his face.”
    “That’s what Alan thinks. Ragged sort of injuries. Not the sort of thing you’d see if he’d been bashed with the butt of a rifle or hit with a baseball bat.”
    “Whoa,” Estelle said, and rubbed her eyes.
    “This, by the way, is chicken soup,” Francis said, pointing at the crocked pot on the counter by the sink. “Enough for a fair-sized army. And the pot on the stove is
posole
. ”
    “I had some of the soup,” Estelle said. “What time did Irma go?”
    “Not more than twenty minutes ago. She had one errand to run at home, and then she’d be back. She was planning to spend the night again, by the way.”
    “She doesn’t need to do that. I think the worst is over.”
    “She thinks she does. I’m on call. And she was worried about you.”
    “I’m fine. I might have some more soup.” She made no move toward the Crock-Pot. Francis sat down at the kitchen table and watched his wife think. Her thick black eyebrows knit together so tightly they nearly collided over the bridge of her nose. After a minute, she stepped close to the stove and lifted the lid off the simmering
posole
. Whether she actually saw it was another matter. Francis knew that her mind was somewhere east of Posadas, out on the rolling, rock-strewn prairie.
    “I really question whether there was enough blood on the ground or on the rocks for him to have been shot there,” she said finally.
    “He could have been lying out there for a long time, Estelle. Several weeks, anyway. Between weather and critters, who can say?”
    Estelle frowned and shook her head. “There hasn’t been any precipitation since January fourth, and that was less than an eighth of an inch of snow, barely a frosting. Alan thinks the man was killed about three weeks ago, and that