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  Sea of Bones

  A Skye Cree Novel

  Published by Beachdevils Press

  Copyright © 2019 Vickie McKeehan

  All rights reserved.

  Sea of Bones

  A Skye Cree Novel

  Copyright © 2019 Vickie McKeehan

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic format without written permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, incidents, locales, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, businesses or companies, is entirely coincidental.

  ISBN-10: 1797522784

  ISBN-13: 9781797522784

  Published by

  Beachdevils Press

  Printed in the USA

  Titles Available at Amazon

  Cover art by Vanessa Mendozzi

  You can visit the author at:

  www.vickiemckeehan.com

  www.facebook.com/VickieMcKeehan

  http://vickiemckeehan.wordpress.com/

  www.twitter.com/VickieMcKeehan

  For Allie

  From the deepest desires often come the deadliest hate.

  ~ SOCRATES

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-One

  Twenty-Two

  Twenty-Three

  Twenty-Four

  Twenty-Five

  Twenty-Six

  Epilogue

  SEA OF BONES

  By

  VICKIE McKEEHAN

  Prologue

  A week earlier

  Puget Ridge

  West Seattle, Washington

  There was something mystical, maybe magical about prowling under a harvest moon. In the Pacific Northwest moonlit evenings could be special. They were for him. Maybe because he excelled at surveillance and gathering details after midnight.

  He could get them to come to him. But where would the fun be in that?

  For several weeks, he’d kept tabs on her, following, jotting down any deviation in her schedule in the notebook he kept. He never went anywhere without it.

  There were a couple of insignificant changes in her activity, but nothing that would be much of a challenge. He just needed to select the right time, the perfect night, that seamless window of opportunity when the prey would least expect it.

  It was the thrill of the hunt, the eye for detail, the planning, and then ultimately the power of playing God. Knowing everything about his victims gave him that extra burst of adrenaline to carry it out, see it to a conclusion. The energy would rush through his veins like a B-12 shot, stirring his blood, pumping, pumping, pumping. The kill required patience and study. But the end game would always give up the stimuli he needed.

  He frequented neighborhoods where he had to blend in by riding his bike through its streets. Sometimes he walked a dog. The goal was to fade into the woodwork, be invisible to the naked eye. These days, no one paid much attention to what went on around them. He took advantage of that.

  He went over the escape routes he’d mapped out. He’d even practiced taking each one to find out which was the shortest and the best. There was no such thing as being overprepared. He believed in planning for every contingency. That way, nothing could surprise him.

  Getting to know everything about his victims beforehand assured a certain amount of success. That’s why he’d accessed her personal space, her house several times before tonight—to search out every nook and cranny, to locate any weapons, knives, guns, anything that could be used against him. He prided himself on knowing her home better than she knew it.

  It wasn’t that difficult. He looked for women living alone, busy, vulnerable women, dealing with stressful situations and too wrapped up in them to notice small changes back at home. He knew the neighborhood dogs by name. That’s why he always wore dog repellant during recon. He covered himself with the stuff each time he went on the hunt.

  And there was always another reason to go on the hunt.

  Stacey Dysart was next on his list. She’d lived in her little bungalow for less than six months, bought it with the fat divorce settlement the courts had given her after a messy breakup with a wealthy tech company owner.

  It hadn’t taken Stacey long to wade into the local dating pool but without much success. She’d been going out with a guy named Clayton Spencer for three months and broken up with him less than a week earlier.

  Ever since that event, he’d upped his stalking of Stacey. He knew it creeped her out. Knowing she had that feeling of being watched, he loved it, got off on it. Every time she took her stupid little chihuahua for a walk, he was there. Every time she bought groceries, he watched her from the parking lot. Every time she left for work, he went inside her house. He knew he was getting to her because she’d texted Clayton several times to knock it off. He thought it funny that she figured it was the ex who was pestering her.

  But it wasn’t Clayton who parked his car several blocks away from her home that night. He made sure his car couldn’t be tied to the future crime scene by keeping it several streets away from Stacey’s house.

  On the main thoroughfare into her neighborhood, traffic whizzed by, people coming home from work. Housewives jogged their usual routes in pairs, talking and even laughing at the gossip they shared. People got off at the bus stop as usual. Activity around him seemed so normal.

  As the October wind carried the leaves from one pile to the next, he saw Stacey’s bus pull up and waited for her to disembark to begin her final walk home.

  His adrenaline kicked in. Patience. He had to tamp down the rage, rein in the urges. He would wait for darkness.

  ****

  That creepy feeling at the base of Stacey’s neck kicked in and wouldn’t go away. She often felt it most every evening, certainly for the past week as she got off the bus and walked
to her house. Glancing over her left shoulder, she scanned the sidewalk, north and south. But she saw no one watching her. If she ever caught Clayton Spencer following her, ever caught him in the act, she planned to go straight to the police and take out a restraining order, maybe get his sorry ass thrown in jail for a few days. Then she’d see how funny he found stalking her to be.

  Since Clayton had cheated on her and slept with her ex-best friend, the two of them deserved each other. Why couldn’t they just move on together and leave her alone? Why did Clayton feel the need to mess with her mind like this? It made her fume to think he couldn’t just leave her alone.

  She quickened her pace because the feeling seemed somehow stronger today, that feeling of impending doom in her belly that she couldn't shake.

  Even though she hadn't seen Clayton in a week, she knew he was out there somewhere waiting to do something horrible to her. The revenge factor seemed ludicrous though since Clayton had been the one who’d made a move on her best friend. And the best friend hadn’t hesitated to stab her in the back.

  As Stacey rounded the corner, she looked up and caught sight of her house. Grateful to be almost there, she gathered her coat around her tighter and tried to outrace the wind to her front doorstep.

  She took out her keys. Fumbling with the key chain, she dropped it twice on the steps leading up to the porch before nervously sticking the key into the lock. Once inside, she stretched the chain across the doorframe, then turned the deadbolt. Only then did she slump against the door and let out a huge sigh of relief.

  Her little tan and white chihuahua named Biscuit darted from the other room to greet her. She picked up the adorable bundle and kissed his nose. “There you are. Did you guard the house for me today while I was gone?”

  The pooch replied with a yip and a lick to her nose.

  “That’s a good boy. But you know what we have to do, what we always have to do.” Feeling anxious about those monsters on the outside, Stacey opened the entryway closet and grabbed the bat she kept there.

  One-handed, she did what had become her habit. With Biscuit held up against her breast, she started walking around the house with the bat, turning on lights and checking each room, one by one, until she was convinced that she was the only one in the house. Finding nothing out of the ordinary and no one lurking in the shadows, she circled back to the foyer to put away the bat.

  For several weeks, though, different things had been out of place. A cup not where she had left it, coins on the dresser missing, little knickknacks turned the wrong way, picture frames moved.

  Maybe Clayton was trying to drive her crazy. Or maybe it was her ex-best friend Missy Holloway. Maybe it was some kind of ghost or spirit. Maybe her house was haunted. She’d been so desperate for the feeling to go away, she’d even tried burning sage to cleanse the house, something she'd read in a book that she’d picked up at the bookstore. But nothing seemed to work. Small items still went missing or had been moved entirely from where she’d left them.

  She had to get her mind off this intensely weird feeling that things were spiraling out of control. She changed out of her work clothes and into her comfy yoga gear and headed into the kitchen.

  While Biscuit munched on his gourmet dog food, she busied herself by heating up the chicken soup she’d made over the weekend and got out French bread to go with it. She ate in front of the TV, doing her best to laugh and relax at the antics on Friends. Curled up on the sofa with reruns and Biscuit, she watched several more sitcoms, dreading the idea of going to bed alone.

  She did the dishes and around ten o’clock decided she couldn’t avoid bedtime forever. But she tossed and turned for the first thirty minutes, making her wonder if she should resort to taking an Ambien. The pill might help to ease the creepy feeling in her belly, maybe even wipe out the anxiety she felt, but she’d be battling grogginess for most of the next day. Her boss was already beginning to suspect she had a problem with insomnia. Which is the reason she opted to fall asleep without drugs? Somewhere around midnight, exhaustion took over, and she drifted off.

  Half an hour later, she woke to a stream of bright light, blinding her vision. All she could see were white dots floating in a sea of black. A horrible odor hung in the air.

  She tried to yell out, but before a sound could escape her lips, a pair of hands clamped her throat shut. As the fingers tightened around her neck, she struggled and tried to fight. A weight crushed down on top of her chest, the air squeezed out of her lungs.

  She wanted to scream but she couldn't get any sounds out of her mouth. Her lungs burned as she fought for air. Before the life slowly drifted out of her, she caught the smell of chloroform. A cloth covered her nose and mouth. She gasped and took a deep gulp of tainted air.

  Before blackness descended completely, he hovered over Stacey’s face for a few long seconds admiring how peaceful she looked. The rush of endorphins soared through his veins as he leaned down to whisper in her ear. “Relax, baby. Don’t worry. I promise to take you somewhere you’ve never been before.”

  One

  Present Day

  Seattle, Washington

  Skye Cree sat at her desk inside the chrome high-rise that was practically her second home. From her third story office, she could see parts of the skyline, a middle shot of the Space Needle, along with the rest of the downtown skyscrapers.

  During the past year, Skye had finally given in and agreed to expand The Artemis Foundation. A decision made necessary because the little office suite had outgrown its space. The renovation meant the staff no longer had to step around ugly file boxes blocking various traffic areas. Four months later, the office had a fresh, more professional look to it, along with a different layout.

  The new square footage allowed for a tidy, modern reception area, complete with the logo on the wall behind it, two separate offices, a small conference room, and the kitchen area that doubled as a supply room.

  Skye now had her own place to sit and study crime scenes or read over the ever-present missing person files that crossed her desk on a regular basis.

  Since her office was larger now, Skye could watch her three-year-old daughter Sierra sit and play at the little table in the corner, either building something with her giant Lego blocks or coloring with her crayons.

  Today, Sierra was hard at work connecting her Legos together in a wild zig-zag pattern. The higher the architecture, the more the structure resembled the Leaning Tower of Pisa. The other member of the family, a Malamute mix named Atka, lolled at the child’s feet, looking up now and again to see what Sierra had created.

  After stacking the blocks and carefully building her masterpiece, she’d set the last block in place, only to look over at Atka for approval and wait until the dog turned his head. Once Sierra got Atka’s attention, she would knock it all down and start the process all over again.

  Skye was getting restless. For the past hour, it seemed all she’d accomplished so far was a bunch of paperwork. The Foundation could be inundated with correspondence that would have to be answered, especially letters from families needing help with cold murder cases and missing persons.

  Maybe that’s why she didn’t like sitting behind a desk for most of the day. She preferred getting out, hitting the ground, and actually searching for victims.

  Filing, correspondence, and bookkeeping were best left up to Judy Howe or maybe Lena Bowers. But today, Judy had gone to speak at a high school assembly, talking to teenage girls about taking safety precautions and Lena was off with her new husband, Travis Nakota.

  Skye still couldn’t believe her good fortune. To have Lena as her stepmom was almost too good to be true. And now, the couple was just getting back from their honeymoon. She tried not to dwell too much on that part of the equation. But seeing her father happier than she’d ever seen him before and lovey-dovey with Lena would take some getting used to.

  From the time Skye had first met Lena at eighteen, the woman had always been her mother figure, someone steady to look up
to, someone who dished out good advice and never let her down. There was something comforting about that.

  That’s one reason Lena had been greatly missed these past few weeks. Like Judy, Lena had taken steps to refine her role at the Foundation, broadening her duties to take on more administrative tasks, allowing Skye the chance to do what she did best—running down killers and rescuing victims.

  Like Judy, Lena had embraced the cause. Both women had found their niche. It wasn’t just bookkeeping either. Both women excelled at talking to victims’ families. Skye could attest to the fact that Lena and Judy were the glue that held the place together while she dealt with solving cold cases.

  But these past few weeks, the administrative tasks had sidetracked her to the point that she was secretly itching to get back out on the streets. Patrolling at night meant touching base with the seedier side of Seattle’s underbelly. The one on one kept her on top of what was happening. There was no other way to battle the bad guys if she didn’t know about them firsthand. Her better half had made it clear that decision would be met with resistance.

  Josh Ander was opposed to any talk that began with going back out and prowling the streets to look for the bad guys. It didn’t mean she wouldn’t cherry pick a better time to bring it up though.

  She glanced over at Sierra and smiled. At least her daughter was having fun. She had to admit that Sierra was the main reason she no longer hit the streets like in the old days. After all, becoming a mother brought with it a whole new set of responsibilities, ones she took very seriously. She didn’t want Sierra to grow up without a mother. Because of that concern, she’d reluctantly parked her butt at what was essentially a desk job, a boring way to look for the criminal element.