Wild Sorrow

While tracking a wounded mountain lion, a sudden snowstorm drives Jamaica Wild and her wolf, Mountain, into an abandoned ruin. There, she discovers a ritually tortured and murdered elderly woman. The blizzard forces Jamaica to spend the night in the same place; she does not get a wink of sleep, especially after the wounded cougar she had been tracking also decides to seek shelter there. Mountain drives the cat away, but Jamaica recognizes that the animal is starving, and Jamaica is also concerned about the two thin cubs left behind by the cougar in a makeshift den not far away. Now she has two serious problems on her hands--a murdered woman and a desperate mountain lion. Things go from bad to worse when there are some creative attempts on Jamaica's life. Someone starts a small rock slide intended to knock her off a ledge when she is investigating near the old ruin where the woman was found. And then she is kidnapped, beaten and nearly raped. Adding to her troubles, Jamaica learns indirectly that her lover, Kerry, has applied for a job in Washington state; he appears to be the likeliest person to get the position, and hasn't told her about it. Jamaica discovers that the dead woman was a cruel nun who routinely inflicted harsh emotional and physical punishments on the Indian children who were forced to attend the boarding school that is now the old ruin where the body was found. The suspects are many among the elders of the Tanoah Pueblo where Jamaica's medicine teacher lives, and this makes it difficult to investigate. Meanwhile, Jamaica's friend at the FBI, Diane, is having serious problems with her landlord--not repairing the broken front door, problems with the gas line to the stove--and at one point, the stove explodes with Diane and Jamaica in the kitchen, a near deadly event. But maybe the murder has nothing to do with the old boarding school at all. Diane and Jamaica team up to solve this one, but Jamaica will still have to come to terms with Kerry's departure--or accept his proposal to go with him. This is the third in the Jamaica Wild series by Sandi Ault and they are really good. I also have blog posts on the previous two books, Wild Indigo and Wild Inferno, and am deeply into the 4th, Wild Penance.