Untamed Wolf. Linda O. Johnston

is the main thing. And taking pictures, too. In fact, since you’ve already taken some, I can be in charge of the rest, at least for now. Plus—well, if you need assistance I’ll see what I can do. I can at least hold things out of the way, act as a second pair of eyes, whatever.”

      He nodded. “That sounds doable.”

      “Fine. Let’s get started. Put these on first.” She handed him one pair of the rubber gloves, keeping a second for herself. Then, drawing her gaze abruptly away from Jason, she strode toward the pile of metal remains, aiming her camera and snapping initial pictures.

      This was the same camera she’d used to take pictures of his shift. She had already downloaded them onto her laptop computer and made a backup copy, password protected both files, then erased them from the camera.

      Alpha Force’s cover would not be blown by her.

      Taking closer pictures of the Jeep now would be better, though. “Why don’t you do this in a narrative?” she suggested. “I have a lot of memory left on the card in this camera and can take videos.”

      “Good idea.”

      Great. They seemed to be in agreement. For the moment, at least. And the division of labor seemed reasonable.

      Sara considered herself fairly competent with a camera, but less so with a car.

      Even so, she wanted to do a damned good job of supervising Jason as he conducted his preliminary analysis of what had happened to the Jeep to cause it to catch on fire.

      Maybe even help with it herself.

      Assuming, of course, that the fire hadn’t destroyed all indications of its initial cause.

      Jason began at the rear of the hulk. There was nothing left of the canvas that had once been the removable exterior covering, but the metal framework, blackened and curled in places from the heat, remained mostly intact.

      “Is it cool enough for you to touch anything?” she asked.

      “Yeah, it’s fine now.” He was already bending over the back of the thing, mostly looking. But then he probed a few places with his fingers.

      For the next few minutes, Sara mostly recorded and listened as Jason used his knowledge of cars to study every centimeter of what he was able to see and described what he was doing.

      At first, he apparently saw nothing that he seemed to think was out of place in the remains of a burned-out Jeep.

      At one point he asked, “Do you happen to know if General Yarrow was carrying anything in the bed here?”

      “He didn’t mention anything.”

      “Well, we’ll need to check with him. I see a few things that are definitely not part of the car, but they don’t look especially dangerous, either.”

      Without moving them, he pointed them out to her. One was the burned carcass of what appeared to be a battery, and the other was a small piece of metal that could have been from a child’s toy, maybe even a model of the Jeep, judging by its angles.

      Then there was what was probably the remains of a steel fishing rod and a lure box containing what once had probably been hooks but were now just melted puddles of metal. Some additional small, melted clumps of metal. Nothing useful or conclusive. In the passenger seat were the remains of what must have been the general’s overnight bag, still partially intact.

      Sara dutifully continued to shoot the video, recording Jason’s mention of each item and exactly where it lay in the midst of ashes and other debris.

      She was impressed with Jason’s meticulousness and attention to detail in the ruined Jeep. He pointed out the parts he recognized, those that were no longer recognizable but had qualities that allowed him to make assumptions, and more.

      He occasionally asked for her to gently touch something, holding it out of the way so he could pry even farther into some inside area. She shot more pictures of each of those areas when her assignment was complete.

      Eventually, after more than an hour, Jason was through.

      “I know it’ll all be speculation,” Sara said, holding the camera on Jason, “but do you have any initial opinion about the origin of the fire?”

      His handsome features grew even sharper as his expression hardened. “Nothing conclusive, nothing I can point to that proves it was anything but some odd mechanical failure or spontaneous combustion or unavoidable accident,” he said, “but despite finding nothing obvious during this first examination, I knew this Jeep well after servicing it for General Yarrow. I believe this was somehow deliberately sabotaged, set on fire. And I’ll do anything I can to find proof.”

      Sara turned off the camera and looked at him, seeing the frustration and sorrow on his face. She wanted to do something to comfort him, but all she could do was to acknowledge her agreement. “That’s my belief, too,” she said quietly. “But since you didn’t see anything to hang that opinion on—”

      “I will,” he said grimly. “Count on it.”