Mask of the Deer Woman - Hardcover

Dove, Laurie L.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0593816102 ISBN 13: 9780593816103

Verlag: Berkley, 2025

Inhaltsangabe

To find a missing young woman, the new tribal marshal must also find herself.

At rock bottom following her daughter’s murder, ex-Chicago detective Carrie Starr has nowhere to go but back to her roots. Starr’s father never talked much about the reservation that raised him, but they need a new tribal marshal as much as Starr needs a place to call home.

In the last decade, too many young women have disappeared from the rez. Some dead, others just… gone. Now, local college student Chenoa Cloud is missing, and Starr falls into an investigation that leaves her drowning in memories of her daughter—the girl she failed to save.

Starr feels lost in this place she thought would welcome her. And when she catches a glimpse of a figure from her father’s stories, with the body of a woman and the antlers of a deer, Starr can’t shake the feeling that the fearsome spirit is watching her, following her.

What she doesn’t know is whether Deer Woman is here to guide her or to seek vengeance for the lost daughters that Starr can never bring home.

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Laurie L. Dove is a reporter and editor whose work has appeared in numerous publications and garnered several honors for outstanding journalism. She graduated with a master’s degree in Creative Writing and Literature from Harvard University. She is an adjunct professor who currently lives and writes in Kansas. Find her at lauriedove.com.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

Chapter One

FIVE DAYS EARLIER

Carrie Starr stepped out of the Ford Bronco held up by mismatched tires that she'd just cajoled into lumbering across the Saliquaw Nation. It was her official service vehicle, and apparently the one perk afforded her by the Bureau of Indian Affairs, because the cinder-block building that served as her office sure didn't qualify.

It was Wednesday, her third day as tribal marshal, the result of a new federal statute meant to stem the tide of missing Indigenous women, and already she had the junkyard truck and an office that doubled as a storeroom. There were no deputies or dispatch, no crime-scene techs or ballistics experts-none of the human capital she'd had access to in Chicago. There was a working landline, which was a bit of a surprise, but it rang to a heavy seventies-era handset that reassured her that low expectations could always sink a bit more. The one call she'd gotten on the avocado green throwback had been from a woman screaming down the line. At first she'd thought it was a prank but had decided not to take any chances and kept the receiver to her ear instead of slamming it down.

The woman eventually began to make sense, and from what Starr had been able to gather, was demanding an audience with the new tribal marshal.

So here she was. Day three. Standing in front of a rickety mobile home on a dusty reservation where she didn't belong, working a job she didn't really want, sure she wasn't ready to face a fuming mother convinced her daughter was missing.

A wary brown dog trotted by like it was late for an appointment, sidestepping three men wearing different versions of the same flannel jacket and stoking a fire in a fifty-gallon drum. Behind them was a gray mobile home almost identical to the one she was about to approach. Rectangles of warped plywood staked to long handles listed against the faded siding. The messages were more of the same she'd already seen fastened to buildings, fences and telephone poles around the reservation.

NO PIPELINE was a popular one, but there were a few DON'T FRACK THE FUTURE signs, and even an outlier that made one side of her mouth lift a little: HIDE YO KIDS HIDE YO WIFE THEY FRACKIN EVRYBDY.

The men watched her read the signs. The fire smelled good, made her think of better things. She was just about to dip back into the driver's side of the Bronco and take a pull from the bottle under the seat when a door slapped open behind her.

"Odeina Cloud," the woman announced, sandwiched behind a sagging screen door. "You Carrie Starr? I called about my girl, my daughter, Chenoa."

Starr cringed. The only thing worse than being on the reservation where her father had been raised was being called by her first name. He'd been looking through the bottom of a bottle when he'd plucked Carrie's name from history, but it had been the wrong kind. Named her after Carrie Nation, a white woman who preached in an Oklahoma church and filled her wagon with bricks so she could smash saloon windows for selling the devil's drink. He'd made sure Starr carried a stranger's history instead of knowing her own. She made sure no one called her Carrie anymore.

"Marshal." Starr tapped the badge on her chest. "Marshal Starr," she said, turning to look at the men behind her.

"Well, isn't that fancy?" said the woman in the doorway. She looked Starr over. "You're a tall one. Just gonna stand there?"

Odeina Cloud had glasses perched on the bridge of her nose, and even from a distance Starr could see that her long hair had once been the color of coal but was now shot through with silver that framed her round face. She looked more like a middle school principal than anything, even though she was wearing a mustard yellow waitress uniform with wide orange lapels and matching apron.

Starr wondered whether the woman would be able to smell the alcohol on her breath, and reached into a side pocket of her uniform pants, which were the same unfortunate brown as her jacket and shirt, to retrieve a mint. No sense getting detention today, she thought, and shook her head. She hadn't come this far only to tell the same stupid jokes.

Starr shifted her weight, feeling the pinch of her new BIA-issued boots, as a blustery wind kicked up the trailer's loose skirting, creating an open maw that felt like an omen. The thought of being inside this tin can created a trail of goose bumps under her sleeves.

There was something about the rez, even with its expansive spaces, that made her feel claustrophobic. The unease had set in almost immediately, from her first patrol over acres of dust and prairie grass.

Quinn would have laughed at her reluctance, at how she planted her feet on a square of red dirt between the busted-up Bronco and the woman beckoning her into the trailer. Her daughter had been a force of nature, not afraid of anything.

Stop it, Starr thought. This is not the time.

"Good grief," Odeina said, "you need me to hold your hand and lead you over here?"

Starr heard laughter erupt from the men feeding the drum fire and glanced back at the Bronco. She could picture the whiskey stowed under the torn upholstery of the driver's seat but willed herself to walk away from it. Incentivize yourself, she thought. It will be here when you're done.

Starr's boots kicked up puffs of dust that the wind whisked away. They made a hollow sound on a trio of metal steps that ascended to the trailer door. The afternoon light filtered through a cover of low clouds that turned it flat and cagey; in the trailer's dim interior it was nearly impossible to make out any details. The woman had already retreated from the doorway to somewhere inside and was talking too fast, her sentences running together like a stream Starr wasn't ready to dip a toe into-much less leap.

Starr's right hand settled on her sidearm as she let her eyes adjust, taking in the open stretch of kitchen and living room. There were slim hallways at each end, which she presumed led to bedrooms. She liked to know where she was and what kind of space she was dealing with before she turned her attention to anything else. She'd been in too many off-kilter situations with agitated people not to get the lay of the land.

Odeina, still talking, closed the door behind her. Starr caught bits and pieces of Odeina's diatribe, but her mind was a sieve. Something about college and a van, but now there was a cell phone that rang and rang. "Rang and rang," Odeina said again. Starr's head felt thick and her mouth dry. She needed water. Or something stronger.

Starr was an inch above six feet, and the boots made her six two. She towered over Odeina, who for some inexplicable reason had started whispering through clenched teeth.

"Okay, first of all, let's get this straight. And I'll say it real slow for you. My. Daughter. Is. Missing." She took a deep breath. "I have already talked to the sheriff's office, but according to his deputy, the rez is out of their jurisdiction. So I called the police department over in Dexter Springs. Same runaround. Then I hear from my neighbor over there"-she motioned toward the trailer across the road-"that we have some kind of new . . ." She searched the ceiling for a word.

"Tribal marshal?"

Odeina snapped her fingers and pointed at Starr. "Yes. Tribal marshal. You, apparently. Some kind of BIA nonsense, but good grief, I hope it helps. And it's about time, since our daughters are . . ." She pulled a name tag from her shirt pocket and fastened it over her heart. "Okay, here's the thing. You're not here to learn about anyone else but my daughter. So listen."

A buzzing started in Starr's head, far away and getting closer. She looked at Odeina in her uniform with the carrot-colored apron. She took in the orderly kitchen. The entire place was deliberate. Spare. The only thing that...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Berkley
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2025
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0593816102
• ISBN 13: 9780593816103
• Einband: Gebundene Ausgabe
• Anzahl der Seiten: 336
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: BERKLEY; https://www.penguin.com/?s=BERKLEY; ; Unit 2 Limavady Business Park; Limavady; County Londonderry; BT49 0HR; Vereinigtes Königreich
• Verantwortliche Person: GPSR Kontakt; gpsr@libri.de; ; Europaallee 1; Bad Hersfeld; 36244; Deutschland