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arson?” Doug frowned.
    “This’ll end up at trial,” Josie said.
    Doug nodded several times and put a thumb in the air as if agreeing. “And, the insurance company, or companies”—he paused and looked at both officers as if stressing the point—“will be crawling all over us. As you know, a trial could be a year or two away. We need photographs, video, and detailed notes. The fire marshal really stressed that.” He looked at Cowan. “You play the most crucial role right now. The body will tell us all kinds of things about the fire. When it happened, maybe even if something was used to start or accelerate it.”
    “Understood.”
    “The scene is well preserved,” Josie said. “There’s been no water damage, nothing to disturb the house, as far as we can tell. The only tracks we found were a set of tire tracks, on the other side of the road. With the road closures, no one should have been coming through here, though.”
    “Don’t put too much weight on the tracks. There’s always a few Peeping Toms after a fire passes. We’re trying to do our job, and they want a first look at the disaster.”
    “What about evidence collection?” Josie asked.
    He pointed a finger at her. “That’s what we need to talk about. It’s completely different at the scene of a fire. I don’t want to insult your intelligence, but this is usually what the state fire marshal would take care of.”
    Josie waved his concern away and he continued.
    “Here’s my worry about you going in to take care of the body,” Doug said, tilting his head toward Cowan. “We may have evidence around the body that’s extremely fragile. Possibly unrecognizable.”
    Josie watched Cowan process the information.
    “What do you suggest?” he said.
    “I would like to limit foot traffic as much as possible.”
    Josie put a hand up to interrupt him. “My first priority is identification of the body and finding the Nixes. Can you and Otto take care of processing the scene in the living room so Cowan can get in there and hopefully find identification?”
    Doug nodded. “What are you thinking?”
    “For now, this is an unidentified body,” she said. “Lou hasn’t made contact with the Nixes. She would have let me know if they had returned her calls. I know they’re good friends with Hank Wild, the owner of the Hell-Bent. I’d like to start there first. I’ll talk to Hank about how to track them down.”
    “That makes sense,” Otto said.
    Doug faced Otto. “I’d like you and me to take the video camera and walk together. We’ll start outside the house, then through the point of origin. We can make our way back through the dining room where the fire burned out. I want very minimal foot traffic on our first walk-through. Just observations. Then you can take it slower. Just be extremely careful when you reach for anything to pick it up and catalog it. It may look solid, and then disintegrate in your hands.” He turned to Otto. “It’s critical that you check for evidence before Cowan walks around the body. It’s a different kind of investigation when everything you look at is charred gray and black and evaporates when you touch it.”

 
    SEVEN
    The Hell-Bent Honky-Tonk drew well over a hundred people every Friday and Saturday night for live music, cold draft beer, and a packed dance floor. Located off Highway 67 in the midst of rolling ranch country, it drew people from all over far-west Texas. The owner, Hank Wild, had a knack for discovering talent and developing singers and bands into local celebrities. Over the past five years, two different local bands had been signed by Nashville labels, all because Hank had enough clout with the industry to get the scouts to make the long trip west.
    It was hard not only to bring big-name acts to such a remote area, but also for the locals to travel several hours to see an out-of-town show: the band had better be worth the drive. The Hell-Bent was the solution. With its success, Hank became a