Bones by K. J. Dahlen
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BLURB:
When human bones are
discovered in a cave just outside of town, it’s up to Sheriff Max Reardon to
find out who the bones belonged to. But someone in town doesn’t want the bones
identified and they go to great lengths to try and stop Max’s investigation.
They
break into Max’s house and try to destroy the evidence and when that doesn’t
work, they frame Max for murder. Can Max clear his name and bring the murderer
or murderers to justice?
EXCERPT:
Max squatted near the
opening in the rocky outcrop and took off his sunglasses. He was hot and tired
and had just about given up finding this place. He wasn’t eager to go inside
since the inside of the opening was dark and uninviting. But Max knew he had to
go in there. The small hole in the side of the cliff was barely big enough for
a child to scramble into let alone a full size man, but he knew he didn’t have
a choice. God, I hate small places, he
thought as he crawled inside. The hole was small and cramped and Max had to
bend over to get through. I really hate small
places, he emphasized as he struggled to get through the cramped opening.
The hole in the cliff had been harder to find than he expected. The directions
given to him by two young boys hadn’t been all that clear.
The boys said the opening
was straight up from the dam below and a little left of the big oak tree. What
they failed to tell him was which big oak tree. The whole hill was littered
with oak trees right up to the base of the cliff.
It had taken him the better
part of an hour to find the opening. There had been a lot of hillside to
search. The boys had told him they left an old t-shirt to mark the opening, but
Max hadn’t found the t-shirt. Some small animal or the wind must have carried
it away. He hoped he had the right entrance this time.
He’d found a couple of other
openings in the rock face that had led him nowhere. This opening appeared to be
the one the boys had described. According to the boys, this small cave led to a
cavern with the treasure. Max hoped it led somewhere.
His hands and face were
scratched up from pushing brambles and brush out of his way. The thought had
also occurred to him that the seldom visited, rocky part of the side of a cliff
just a little ways north of the town Max was sheriff of, might be just the spot
to run into a snoozing wolf or worse yet a rattlesnake. He heard something
scramble out of his way a couple of times, but he hadn’t heard the symbolic
rattle of the snake so whatever remained hidden from his sight wasn’t a snake.
He’d tried to make enough noise to ward off unexpected company and hoped he
hadn’t sounded like a complete idiot in the process. If anyone had spotted him,
they would have thought he was drunk in the middle of the morning and that
would never do for a sheriff.
The flashlight he held in
his hand did little to penetrate the utter darkness that surrounded him. The
cave walls and floor were slimy with what Max didn’t even want to hazard a
guess and it smelled even worse. It smelled like something crawled in this
narrow opening and died. The boys who found the cave might think this little
venture was "neat", but Max didn’t. He’d lost his sense of adventure
for little games like this a long time ago. He couldn’t believe he was here
now.
The boys had been in this
cave a couple of days before and had found what they thought was an Indian
burial place. They had been reluctant at first to tell anyone of their find but
eventually told their dads. As a result, Richard Crabtree had brought his son,
Timmy, to see him. Max could tell that Timmy hadn’t wanted to tell anyone about
his secret place and Max hadn’t been all that interested in the boy’s tale.
Most of it was just the imagination of a ten year old. It wasn’t until Timmy
mentioned the skeletons that Max became interested.
Max knew enough about the
local tribes in Wisconsin to know they didn’t bury their dead above ground in
forgotten caves. The boys told him that they hadn’t seen or found any other
Indian artifacts and Timmy was positive someone else had robbed the cave of all
its treasure. As sheriff, Max felt bound to check out their story. If there
were skeletons in there, he had to find out why.
All-in-all, this is an enjoyable mystery that kept my interest
from beginning to end.
Laurie
Reviewer for Coffee Time Romance & More
Reviewer for Coffee Time Romance & More
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