She snapped both close-up and distance photos for scale. Already wearing gloves, she lifted the box out and took several more snapshots, then carried the box to the bed.

  She sat and opened it. Schematics for a bomb lay on the top.

  That flutter of excitement turned into a rapid beating of wings.

  “Russ!” she yelled. “You’ll want to see this.”

  His footfalls pounded down the hallway, but she didn’t wait and dumped the contents onto the bed.

  “What do you have?” His voice came from nearby.

  “Bomb schematics and copies of the threats sent to the mill.”

  “Let me see the schematics,” he demanded.

  She thumbed through the pages and gave him the ones he asked for. As he studied them, she looked through the others. “Emails are between Carla Nye and Dean Keenan.” She scanned the top one. “He talks about bombing a logging company to end the news media’s lack of attention to clearcutting.”

  Russ looked up. “Schematics aren’t for a photoelectric cell though.”

  “Yeah, I noticed that. The plans could’ve changed for the bomb, but she was in possession of the threats. Demonstrates intent. And they both can be brought up on charges for the threats alone.”

  Russ dug out his phone. “I’ll get a statewide alert out on both of them. Secure and log this information as evidence, then take it to Nick from Veritas and get him looking into Keenan. Also request the team send someone over here to print the room. This information too. Never know if Carla or Keenan are going by an alias, and prints could reveal their true identities.”

  “Will do.”

  “I’ll see if Colin has found anything else about Sovereign Earth. Maybe he can get us a phone number for Keenan. Or even Carla’s burner. A long shot at best, but why not have him run it?” He strode from the room.

  She gathered up the documents to place them in a large evidence bag. Her shoulders rose and she felt lighter. Maybe, just maybe, she’d found the lead that would take them directly to their bomber and prevent her family’s company from getting a bad reputation. Even clear Finn’s name.

  But more importantly, prevent another explosion and loss of life.

  Finn waited near Dr. Dunbar as she and her assistant worked to recover the body. The petite woman looked nothing like someone he would expect would work with skeletal remains. He’d seen men and women badly burned in his SEAL days, and the gruesome sight never got easier, but she seemed to be oblivious to it. Or maybe she was very good at compartmentalizing or looking beyond the fact that this was a human being to concentrate on the bones.

  Finn checked his watch. Three hours since Sierra had returned from her visit with Ryleigh to Gates’s place and from viewing his truck. Ryleigh texted to say she’d gone to Eckles’s house, but that was the last Finn had heard from her. He was jonesing to know what was happening. Their shift at the crime scene was nearly over, and he thought they were going to chase down leads together. But without any additional word from her, he didn’t know what she was planning.

  A vehicle rumbled to a stop at the road, sounding like his truck. Ryleigh? He hoped so. He poked his head around the still-standing wall to find her walking down the incline toward the buildings. She was carrying what looked like a large evidence bag, and she stared down at her feet so he couldn’t gauge her mood, but her shoulders were rigid.

  He stepped out of the building to meet her.

  She looked up. “We may have a lead.”

  She told him Pauline Eckles was connected to a woman named Carla Nye and a Dean Keenan, both tied to Sovereign Earth.

  “Is Keenan still in a leadership role with them?” Finn asked.

  “As far as we know.” Ryleigh lifted the bag. “And I recovered bomb schematics along with copies of the bomb threats sent to Tobias in emails between Nye and Keenan.”

  “Whoa, the motherload.”

  “Exactly.” She grinned. “I’ll ask Nick to track the pair down and look into these emails.”

  Finn jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “He’s inside collecting computer pieces.”

  She frowned. “And the remains? Still here?”

  He nodded. “Looks like Kelsey and her assistant are about ready to transport them to her lab, where she’ll examine the bones.”

  “So she’ll be leaving then?”

  Finn nodded. “Not that evidence collection will stop. Sierra will take over processing the forensics in the area near the body, but Russ wants Kelsey to determine cause of death ASAP. He wants to be sure it was the explosion or fire, not something else that killed him. There’s no hope of fingerprinting the victim, and she can also get the victim’s DNA running.”

  Ryleigh arched a brow. “I had no idea he thought we might have another cause of death.”

  “Guess he figures if the victim died before the explosion, then he can’t be our bomber.”

  “Good point.”

  “Did you locate anything else at Eckles’s place?”

  She shook her head. “Not yet, anyway. But Russ and his deputies are really just beginning, and we’ll send someone from Sierra’s team over there too. I’m here to get Nick going on this and get a progress update to report at a task force meeting Russ said he would call.”

  “You’ll want to talk to Blake for that. He’s been running around here like mad and compiling information from everyone.”

  “First, I need to get Nick started on searching for our suspects.” She looked at the building, but didn’t move.

  Finn understood her hesitancy. She didn’t want to go in. No one wanted to see such a horrific sight. He was glad to be out of that building for a while and didn’t really want to go back in either, but if it made Ryleigh more comfortable, he would gladly tag along. “I’ll go with you.”

  She gave him a tight smile and led the way inside. Nick held a plastic bag and dropped a minuscule item held by tweezers inside. Ainsley was taking pictures nearby as Trent and Grady looked at an item in another plastic bag.

  Ryleigh picked her way over to Kelsey, stepping over hunks of debris in her booties.

  Kelsey was bent over the victim’s head and spraying something into his mouth. She looked up and held up her bottle. “Spray glue to help stabilize the remains. Sets a virtual cast over the victim’s jaw. It can help prevent damage during transport, perhaps giving us a better chance at dental identification.”

  “If you can get dental x-rays for the suspected victim, right?” Ryleigh asked.

  “Right,” she said. “Shawn will begin hunting those records down.”

  “Were you able to locate Gates’s keys or phone?”

  “Definitely no phone, but keys are still a possibility. I didn’t find any keys under the remains. Some of the fabric from his jeans were fused to the bone so they might be caught up in that. I’ll get back to you as soon as I know anything.”

  “And I’ll let you know if we find keys here,” Sierra said.

  “Thank you.” Ryleigh moved over to Nick. “I have a top-priority job for your team.”

  “Spoken like a true law enforcement officer. Everything is priority. Good thing I have a big team.” He chuckled.

  She smiled as if she knew he was right, and she deserved to be called out. She told him about Eckles, Nye, and about Dean Keenan and the documents. “Can you try to locate them?”

  “Absolutely, but with Carla having just gone underground, she might be hard to find.”

  Her expression fell. “You don’t think you’ll find anything?”

  “I said hard, but not impossible.” He grinned as he closed the bag in his hand. “I’ll give my team a head’s up and get them moving on it. They’ll get the basics going, then I can tweak what they come up with, and we’ll go from there.”

  “Thanks.” She held up her evidence bag. “What do you want me to do with this?”

  “Give it to Blake for safekeeping. He can start a log for the other scene, and I can review the documents in a cleaner environment. When I’m done, Sierra can run prints.”

  “Thank you.” Ryleigh smiled at the team, her genuine thankfulness evident to all.

  “You’ll want to see this.” Grady stood and held his bag up to the light, Trent looking on.

  Ryleigh stepped over to them.

  Finn followed and got a clear look at the bagged item. “The photoelectric cell?”

  “It’s a photoelectric cell all right.” Trent’s dark eyes gleamed with interest. “There’s enough here to ID the make and model. Don’t know if that’ll help us, but a bomber who uses photoelectric cells might have a preference for this brand, and this bit could lead to him or her.”

  Ryleigh patted her bag. “The schematics we recovered don’t use a photoelectric cell.”

  “We need a look at those,” Grady said. “Trent can get cleaned up to examine them while I keep at it.”

  “And here I thought you’d give the newbie all the scut work.” Trent grinned at Grady.

  “Hey, I happen to enjoy the scut work.” Grady laughed. “But seriously, man. Don’t expect a break from it all the time.”

  “I still don’t get why the bomber chose a photoelectric cell,” Ryleigh said. “We have abundant sunshine this time of year, but he couldn’t predict the weather. And he had to place the cell near the window and account for any temperature difference it might provide too, right?”

  “Yeah,” Grady said. “It’s odd, I’ll give you that. I’ve never seen or heard of anyone who used this method for detonation and I’ve seen a lot of devices in my time. What about you, Trent?”

  “Nope, never.” He snapped off his gloves. “And I agree this is odd. If I planned to use a photoelectric cell, I wouldn’t use one in a situation like this. It would be far more effective as a package or briefcase bomb. That way, when the item was opened, light would hit the cell and kaboom.”

  “Maybe the bomber chose this method because they’re not commonly used for bombs, and he hopes it’ll throw us off track,” Ryleigh said. “Or even point to someone else.”

  “That seems possible,” Finn said, letting the implications settle in. “With the unpredictability of the device, we have to assume whoever built this bomb was okay with a loss of life.”

  “At least he chose a maintenance day when there would be a limited crew onsite,” Ryleigh said. “But yeah, he had to be good with the potential of killing people.”

  “Doesn’t sound like most ecoterrorists I’ve read about,” Trent said. “They’re all about preserving life and restricting their efforts to damaging the property.”

  Ryleigh nodded. “Have you found any evidence of the white or red plastic from the company’s explosives?”

  “Nothing yet,” Grady said. “But anything that survived the blast could’ve melted in the fire.”

  “Determining the type of explosive is very important for us to move forward,” Finn said.

  Grady worked the muscles in his jaw. “Understood, and chemical analysis will give you that. But we might never be able to tell you if it’s from this company’s stash.”

  “What about any sign of an accelerant used for the fire or chemicals left behind?” Ryleigh asked.

  “Nothing,” Trent said. “But we’ll take samples back to the lab to be sure.”

  “Let me look at that bag.” Sierra joined them and took the evidence from Grady. She turned it in her hands and held it up to the sunlight. “Minimal soot and should be easy to clean for fingerprinting. Plus, we’ve had success in getting better prints lately on difficult objects with a new technique we’re piloting called vacuum metal deposition.”

  “How does that work?” Ryleigh asked.

  Sierra gave the bag back to Grady. “VMD involves the thermal evaporation of metals—mostly gold, silver, and zinc—inside a special chamber. The controlled high vacuum conditions cause the metals to form thin films, developing all fingerprints present so we can see them.”

  “And you can do that on a burned item like this?” Finn asked.

  Sierra nodded. “If we can safely remove the soot first. Which we can often do.”

  “How long will the process take?” Ryleigh asked.

  “Hmm, well.” Sierra tilted her head. “To use the custom-built chamber, I first have to get this back to the lab. But once there, it should move along fast. Again, depends on the cleaning process.”

  No matter how long, it was too long for Finn’s liking. Each minute they didn’t know the bomber’s ID was a minute his own name could be linked to it. “Can others at your lab run it?”

  “Sorry, no. Just me.” She held up a hand. “And before you suggest I take off to do it, I’m not leaving here until I’m certain the rest of my team can properly handle the remaining work without me.”

  An answer Ryleigh’s tight expression said she didn’t seem to like. “I don’t mean to be difficult, but getting the bomber’s ID is crucial. I know you used a helicopter when you recently helped Mackenzie. Would you consider flying back on that, running the test, then returning if needed?”

  “I don’t know.” Sierra glanced around the space. “There’s a lot of work to do here.”

  “The evidence isn’t going anywhere,” Finn pointed out. “And with the bomber at large, he could strike again.”

  “They have a point.” Kelsey looked at Sierra. “The clear weather is supposed to hold for days with no risk of rain. Besides, you had them fly in for me due to my pregnancy. It’s the least we can do for you in yours.”

  Ryleigh gaped at Sierra. “You’re pregnant?”

  “Yes.” Sierra eyed Kelsey. “But I’m only four months along and wasn’t announcing it yet.”

  Kelsey blushed. “Sorry. I forgot. Forgive me?”

  Sierra gave her coworker a good-natured roll of the eyes. “You know I will.”

  “Then let me make that call.” Kelsey smiled. “As a bonus, your techs and Winter can come down on the chopper instead of driving. They’ll get here sooner, and I can fly back with the remains and get them started sooner too.”

  “Perfect!” Ryleigh clapped her hands, and the sound echoed through the ruins.

  She might be excited about this development, but Finn knew they still had an uphill battle. Sure, they might soon have the victim’s ID—even the bomber’s ID. That would be great. Still didn’t mean they could run right out and find him.

  More likely, a manhunt would ensue, and that could turn deadly.

  14

  Russ called the update meeting at noon, and he instructed Ryleigh to grab sandwiches, chips, and bottles of water that Reid served to the Veritas team. So she and Finn had loaded up and brought meals back to Russ’s conference room, and Ryleigh had dug in with everyone else. She was famished. Stress did that to her. Others couldn’t eat when stressed, but she could consume a side of beef and still have dessert.

  She’d chosen a thick slab of roast beef on a melt-in-your-mouth bun. It was so delicious, she wanted to know where it came from so she could get it again when she was back in town. If Tobias didn’t fire her company.

  She set down her bun. “Anyone know where Reid got the lunch?”

  Colin swallowed. “Now that’s something I can answer. Reid had his cook make them. She not only cooks for Reid and the staff, but she makes meals for campers the first few days while we teach them how to fend for themselves. She backs off once they get their own meals together, but she still feeds us.” He patted his stomach. “I’ve had to work out more to get rid of all the homemade rolls and bread since I came here.”

  “Her name’s Poppy.” Russ smiled fondly. “She’s worked for our family for years. She lives with Reid and his daughter.”

  “She’s a strict vegetarian, but she’ll even serve meat,” Ryan said. “But if she’s around when you eat it you get an earful.”

  Ryan and Russ laughed together, showing a softer side of Russ that Ryleigh knew existed. Too bad she hadn’t seen much of it so far.

  He balled up his paper napkin and shot it toward the trashcan. “Kills her to use disposable products too, but her heart for helping others does at times transcend her drive to recycle.”

  Ryan nodded. “Her grandparents came to Oregon in the sixties’ hippie movement. That’s where she met our mom, and she’s still involved with the group.”

  “Might she know about ecoterrorists in the area then?” Finn asked.

  “Maybe,” Ryan said. “I can ask her, but if I don’t get a meal for a month, I’m coming for you.”

  Ryan laughed, and Finn joined him. Ryleigh liked seeing the two men getting along when they’d had a tense beginning.

  Russ fired an intimidating look at Finn. “In light of the recent findings, we need to talk about your continued involvement with the task force.”

  Finn didn’t even blink an eye. “You know I’m not involved in the bombing, and the evidence will bear that out.”

  “I know you had means—a key to the explosives’ depot. Opportunity—access to the building and explosives.”

  “What about motive?” Finn fired back. “Why would I want to blow up my place of employment? Makes no sense.”

  “I don’t know.” Russ continued to stare. “But I’ll figure it out.”

  Finn’s hands curled on the table, but that was the only indication of his irritation. “Sounds like you want to kick me off the team.”

  “I would like you to voluntarily remove yourself.”

  “No.”

  “Figured you’d say that.”

  “Remove me from the group, and I’ll go off on my own to investigate.” Finn fired a challenging look at Russ. “Is that what you want? A rogue investigator messing in your case?”

  “You know I don’t.”

  “Then there has to be a compromise that we can both live with.”

  Ryan cleared his throat and both men shot their attention to him. “Finn, you and Ryleigh are basically working as one right now, right? Russ, why don’t you insist that Finn doesn’t investigate without Ryleigh at his side?”

  Russ’s shoulders relaxed. “I can live with that.”

  “Me too,” Finn said.

  “What about me?” Ryleigh fired a look between the men. “No one asked if I could live with it.”