In Chap­ter 158 of “All the Col­ors of the Dark,” the set­ting unfolds at the Quartz Moun­tain State Park, where Saint is guid­ed to a bur­ial site by a silent sheriff’s deputy. The sur­round­ing area of Cedar Creek Trail con­tains sun­baked scrubs along­side the more rugged ter­rain of Black Jack Pass Trail, cre­at­ing an atmos­phere filled with sus­pense as Saint feels a sense of dread in her stom­ach. The deputy, whose vet­er­an nature is appar­ent, offers no com­fort, mak­ing the scene even more chill­ing as they approach the site of the remains.

The back­drop fea­tures the impos­ing gran­ite face of Baldy Point in the dis­tance, a stark con­trast to the ten­sion that hangs in the air as Saint reflects on her jour­ney from Hobart and Lone Wolf. Near­by climbers add a lay­er of nor­mal­cy to an oth­er­wise omi­nous event, with the deputy remark­ing on the unbear­able heat that is sure to come. His sto­ic demeanor remains as they reach the bur­ial site, where their attempts to guard the loca­tion have not ful­ly obscured the trag­ic dis­cov­ery before them.

Kneel­ing in the dirt, Saint sur­veys the skele­tal remains, her focus drawn to a sin­gle intact item that rests among the bones. The con­ver­sa­tion reveals that a dog from the Wichi­ta Moun­tain Climbers Coali­tion led to this grim find­ing as they were clear­ing a new trail. Reflect­ing on the cir­cum­stances of the bur­ial, Saint notes the dif­fi­cul­ty in bury­ing the body deeply due to the rocky ground, sug­gest­ing a fran­tic or hasty attempt at con­ceal­ment.

Saint’s exam­i­na­tion of the remains reveals a cru­cial piece of evi­dence: a met­al blue par­don cru­ci­fix adorned with larg­er beads at inter­vals, lead­ing to a direct con­fir­ma­tion of her sus­pi­cions. When the deputy queries if it’s the same indi­vid­ual linked to pri­or cas­es, Saint calm­ly affirms, acknowl­edg­ing her intu­ition had pre­pared her for this moment before she had any sol­id proof. This chap­ter skill­ful­ly com­bines ele­ments of crime, mys­tery, and the emo­tion­al tur­moil of dis­cov­er­ing the past, encap­su­lat­ing a haunt­ing nar­ra­tive in just a few pages.