CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN

Rachel could still feel her adrenaline rushing where they now stood outside the coroner's office, their discovery of the killer's identity racing through her mind.

It was still only theory. Miguel hadn't been seen.

But she had the scent now. She knew she was finally on the right trail.

Gravel crunched under Ethan's boots, his voice a low growl into the radio. "Suspect is Miguel Ortiz, mid-thirties, has a scar across his left cheek. Might be driving a red Ford F-150, license plate unknown." He glanced at Rachel, his brow furrowed with concern.

Rachel's hand gripped the car door handle, the metal cool and firm under her touch. She swung it open, the sound crisp in the morning air. "Ethan," she called, her tone clipped, "let's move."

He nodded, ending the transmission with a curt, "Morgan out."

Sliding behind the wheel, Rachel watched Ethan stride towards her, the lines of his face set in grim determination. In the driver's seat, her posture was straight, alert. The engine hummed to life beneath her fingertips.

"Reservation," she said, as Ethan buckled in. "We're missing something. The totems, they're a piece of this puzzle we can't ignore. We need to go to the reservation."

Ethan's gaze locked onto hers, an unspoken agreement passing between them. "Cultural angle?" he asked, already reaching for the case files strewn across the backseat.

"Has to be." Rachel's eyes were on the road, but her mind sifted through the evidence: ritualistic murders, Native American totems tucked away like secrets. She didn't know where Miguel was, but her instincts told her to go back to the reservation. She needed to find him. But how?

The car sped off, tires biting into the asphalt with urgency, heading back to the heart of the reservation where old beliefs and modern horrors were intertwined.

The speedometer needle crept higher, pushing the limits as Rachel's foot bore down on the accelerator. The landscape outside blurred into streaks of green and brown—a frenetic race against time.

"Sequence," she muttered, her thoughts vocalized for Ethan's benefit. "Victim one, throat slit. The knife wounds were postmortem."

"So…"

"Why did Miguel kill his wife all of a sudden?"

"Something Charlie said?"

"Why just the one wound before death on Lucy, though?"

A pause.

Ethan posited, "What if Charlie killed Lucy? And in revenge, Miguel killed Charlie?"

"Big Joe said Charlie went to speak with the Ortiz' to blackmail them. Why would he kill Lucy? There's no cash in that."

Ethan scowled, tapping his fingers against the glass of the window. "Something… that would make Lucy sad. Isn't that what he said? The blackmail would upset her."

"How sad?" Rachel murmured.

"What was that?"

"Exactly how sad do you think he made her?"

"I… I don't know. What do you mean?"

"What if… what if he dug up something so horrible from her past… that she killed herself. "

"You think she slit her own neck?"

"It's possible. Doable. Especially if she was on something at the time, trying to cope."

Ethan went quiet. The chatter continued over the radio, but Rachel reached out, turning down the volume. She drove even faster.

"Then Miguel found her… in a rage, he stabbed her for leaving him. Or something like that."

"Then killed Charlie?" Ethan guessed.

"It's possible."

"But just conjecture. What about the other victims?"

"Miguel is getting revenge on his old childhood friends," Rachel said. Because of something that caused his wife to kill herself..."

"Going with that theory… it leaves us with the question, what? What did he have on her?"

"Something he could prove," Rachel said. "Something there was no hiding from. Something that really hurt. "

Before Ethan could respond, Rachel's phone was already pressed to her ear, the call connecting with a crackle of urgency as she connected with the halfway house.

"I need to speak with Big Joe," she said suddenly as the phone was answered.

"Er… who is this?"

"Ranger Blackwood. Tell him to get on. Or else," she added.

A sigh. Steps. "Joe!" the voice shouted. "Some Ranger on the phone for you, big fella."

The sound of weary footsteps, muttering. For a moment, she half expected the phone to hang up. But then a heavy breathing sound and a grunt blasted across the line.

"What?"

She felt a flicker of relief but didn't waste time with pleasantries. "Big Joe, it's Blackwood. I need you upstairs in Withersnow's room."

There was a pause, a muffled grumble from the other end. "You said I was free to go."

"Yeah, well… you're gone, aren't you? Let's not do it again."

"House rules…" he muttered.

"Listen," she snapped, "I don't care about the house rules. Get to his room now. Check the floorboard we uncovered. I want photos of everything you find."

"Everything?" Big Joe's voice, skeptical.

"Every damn thing, Joe. Send them directly to me." Her eyes never left the road, even as she commanded his compliance.

No response.

"Joe, listen," Rachel's voice cut through the static, "I'll make it worth your while."

A grunt echoed in her ear. Big Joe's reluctance was almost tangible, a muddy footprint on an otherwise clean operation.

"The cash," she said. "There's cash in there. It's yours."

A hesitation. "All of it?"

"Yes."

"Free and clear?"

"Yes! Now go!"

"Rachel?" Ethan muttered at her side.

But she ignored it. Sometimes, one had to use unique bait.

Rachel tossed the phone onto the dash, her gaze unswerving as the landscape blurred past. A siren of urgency wailed in her veins. She pressed harder on the accelerator, the engine growling.

Minutes slipped by like shadows at dusk, each one stretching longer than the last. Then, her phone buzzed. Her hand shot out, snatching it up. On the screen, a cluster of images was downloaded one by one, each thumbnail promising a clue, a secret unveiled.

"Got something?" Ethan asked, his profile tense against the backdrop of flashing scenery.

"Photos from Joe." Rachel tapped the first image, and it filled the screen.

Her eyes flickered over the photo—a stack of cash, worn and crumpled. Then another tap—there it was, a gun, its metal surface rusted. She swiped to the next—a newspaper clipping, edges frayed, words screaming silent histories.

"Damn," she muttered, taking in the trifecta of evidence.

"Share the wealth, Ranger," Ethan said, a hint of dark humor in his voice that didn't quite reach his eyes.

"Money, a gun, and..." Rachel trailed off, squinting at the fine print on the clipping, the car's interior light too dim to do justice to the details. But she'd seen enough.

"Anything useful?" Ethan prodded, watching her scrutinize the images.

"More than you know." Her voice was a low growl, barely audible above the hum of the road.

"Blackmail," she whispered to herself, the pieces slotting together in her mind, a puzzle nearing completion.

Tires screeched as Rachel's foot slammed against the pedal. The car lurched forward, engine roaring in protest as she navigated through the darkening streets. She clutched the steering wheel, her knuckles white with determination. There was no time to waste.

"Blackmailers hoard their leverage," she said, her eyes narrowed in thought. "Keep records, proof..."

"Of what?" Ethan asked, his voice tight with anticipation.

Rachel flicked on the overhead light, snatching another glimpse at the yellowed newspaper clipping. It depicted a group of women, faces lined with grief and anger, protesting outside a stark building—the clinic. The headline mentioned forced sterilization, a scandal buried by time but not forgotten. Not by those who lived it.

"The fertility totems, the symbols" — Rachel's words came out rapid-fire — "they weren't just morbid decorations. They were a message, a statement."

"Wait, huh?"

She turned. "You know about the forced sterilization of Native women, don't you?"

Ethan just stared at her. "I… I've heard… What do you know?"

She said, "A lot. The sterilizations began in the early 20th century. It was a government initiative — an ugly part of our history. Native women were coerced into undergoing these procedures, often without their informed consent or even their knowledge."

Ethan's face paled, his eyes wide with disbelief as he absorbed her words. "You think this is about that?" he asked, his voice a harsh whisper. Outside, the world streaked past, the hum of the car's engine a low rumble beneath their conversation.

Rachel nodded grimly, her gaze returning to the road ahead. "I do," she confirmed. "It fits. The victims, the totems... even Lucy Thompson's suicide."

"But..." Ethan stumbled over his words, struggling to make sense of it all. "How does Charlie fit into this? And Miguel?"

Rachel kept her eyes on the road, her profile hardened by grim determination as she answered, "That's what we're going to find out."

The chatter of radios and dispatch calls filled their silence as they drove on—each report another echo in the grim symphony of events unfolding around them. But for Rachel Blackwood and Ethan Morgan, it all faded into background noise. They were focused on one thing alone—the truth hidden deep within a stained piece of history.

Rachel was still murmuring to herself, piecing it together. "It's a shameful part of history. Back in the day, there were cases of forced sterilization happening at clinics around the country. Native American women, particularly." Rachel's voice was steady, but her heart pounded. "The government, the medical institutions—they treated Native women like they didn't have the right to control their own bodies. Eugenics, they called it: a blight on our history."

Ethan went silent, probably grappling with the grim reality of it all. Rachel kept driving in the silence, her mind working in overdrive.

"Miguel's wife... what if she was one of those victims? There are still doctors who secretly practice eugenics. It's horrific." The hypothetical question hung in the air like smoke, noxious and choking.

"And Charlie knew about this?" Ethan's voice was thick with disbelief and an undercurrent of something more—outrage, maybe.

"Perhaps." Rachel's gaze was fixed on the road ahead, but her mind was elsewhere—piecing together a puzzle whose picture was becoming ever clearer. "If Charlie threatened to expose Lucy's past... that might have driven her to despair..."

"But why would Lucy kill herself over that? It's not like she did anything wrong."

"Maybe… the baby?" Rachel said. "The one she went in to abort… what if it belonged to Miguel? I noticed he was a few years older than the others. The friend group. They were teenagers, right? What if she was underage?"

Ethan whistled.

Rachel's temples throbbed with adrenaline as her thoughts spiraled. The dark roads seemed to stretch on endlessly, matching the twisted path her investigation was taking. "We know Lucy got pregnant young... Miguel might have been a father in his teens. But what if he didn't even know the child existed?" she mused aloud. "What if… what if he didn't know his wife was sterile?"

Ethan's silence was heavy with thought. "And Charlie used it against them? That kind of secret... it could ruin lives."

"What if she had the sterilization to protect her husband? If Miguel would've been in trouble for a statutory charge, she might've wanted to cover up the pregnancy…"

"And her friends?"

"Maybe they encouraged her. Helped her. Took her. Hid it from Miguel—maybe that's why he's hunted them."

"Still just conjecture."

"It makes sense. It fits."

"Charlie could've known about Lucy's sterilization and used that information as leverage... Then she killed herself, and it all comes out. That's enough motive for Miguel to retaliate," Ethan voiced out.

"And it all started in one place," Rachel whispered.

"The reservation clinic?" Ethan leaned in, trying to catch every detail in Rachel's theory.

"Exactly." Rachel's jaw was set. She tossed the phone onto the dash and accelerated, the car's headlights slicing through the twilight haze.

"Where are we going?"

"The clinic."