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Tate was about two hundred yards up from where he’d started when he stopped, staring in disbelief at what was in front of him. The drag marks here could have been a gator dragging itself out of the water to sun, except for the human handprints on either side. A dozen feet from the water, he saw footprints. His heart sank.
“Son of a bitch.”
He grabbed his cell phone and made the call, waiting for Wade to answer.
“Yeah?”
“I found tracks.”
“On my way.”
Tate disconnected, then switched to camera mode and began taking pictures all the way into the trees.
“In here!” he yelled, when he saw Wade approaching.
His partner came running.
“You’re right. Someone crawled out of the water here. The likelihood of it being anyone but our killer is slim to none,” Wade said as he stared at the tracks.
Tate pointed. “They lead off in this direction. If we’re lucky, we’ll find his body.”
Wade didn’t bother commenting on what would happen if they didn’t.
“He has to be hurt,” Wade said.
Tate pointed down at the ground. “You can see by these tracks that his steps are all over the place, and dragging.” He stopped to take some more pictures. “If we don’t find a body, we’ll notify hospitals in the area. It’s just after 9:00 a.m., so let’s go.”
They walked for almost an hour before they came up on a little clearing. There was a mooring rope still tied around a tree and tire tracks less than fifty feet away. Once again, Tate felt blindsided.
“This can’t be happening,” he muttered, and then shoved his hands through his hair in utter frustration. “Nola had a dream that he wasn’t dead. Damn it! I can’t believe he not only lived through that explosion and the gators, he actually got away.”
“It must have thrown him clear,” Wade said. “It’s the only explanation.”
For the first time since he’d joined the FBI, Tate actually felt defeated.
“I do not want to file this report.”
“Let’s head back. There’s a lot we have to do,” Wade said.
“We need to get some more pictures. I need some of the tire tracks and of the mooring rope before we leave.”
“I’ll call Queens Crossing P.D. and have them begin notifying hospitals in the area to be on the lookout for a burn victim.”
“Tell them to put a guard on the motor home, too. I don’t think he’d have the balls to come back, but I’m not taking chances.”
“Will do,” Wade said as Tate began taking pictures.
As soon as he finished, he sent everything to his laptop and to Quantico, and then they began the long walk back.
“You do know that he could have driven off and died somewhere on his own,” Wade said as they retraced their steps.
Tate shrugged. Anything was possible. They’d just been slapped with that fact.
The trip back into Queens Crossing was all but silent. Finally it was Tate who broke the silence.
“Nola said the man’s real name was Hershel. We need to go through that motor home and see if we can figure out what started him killing. Maybe it will lead us to where he would go to heal.”
“Are we going to do it here?”