The Fire Carrier — Jean Hager

SPECTER OF DEATH

I n the Oklahoma woods a small-time criminal turned prison escapee sees a light moving in the night. Henderson Sixkiller knows that he has come face to face with the Fire Carrier, the ancient Cherokee phantom. The next day, Henderson is still missing, and policeman Mitch Bushyhead is investigating a report of a dead body in the Woods.
For Bushyhead, the dead man and the runaway are two parts of the same dark story unfolding in the heart of his intimate, close-knit town. A woman has fled her abusive husband. Another woman is hiding her, and two young men are paying the price for a cycle of family violence. As Mitch pieces the puzzle together, he is drawn to a killer he cannot bear to suspect--and a motive that ties the old Cherokee world to the new and dangerous one around it.