Truth in the Bones

by Vickie McKeehan

  “Fine. I’m hungry and exhausted. Fire or no fire?”

  “We have protein bars. Maybe eating them instead of cooking, we wouldn’t attract bears.”

  “But wouldn’t a fire keep them at bay if they come snooping around?”

  “I think that’s a myth.”

  “But a fire would make things so much cozier.”

  Josh rolled his eyes. “Looks like I’m building a fire.”

  In the drizzle of rain, they gathered wood and kindling from the little strip of shoreline and built a fire in the circle of stones Skye had made.

  “This isn’t so bad,” Skye said, warming her hands above the flames. “What about dinner? It’s either beef jerky or one of those MREs. I packed the pot roast so it’s on top.”

  “Jerky’s fine. I’m too tired to break out the MREs.”

  “I’ll do it if you want. We still have to set up the tent.”

  “Okay, fine, I’ll unpack the tent while you make food.”

  She dug out the flameless heater and unpacked two meal packets labeled pot roast with veggies. She slid the first packet into the heater, adding a stingy amount of water to the bag to activate the heat. She let the contents set for a few minutes before repeating the process. When the food packets were a toasty, soft mush, she unzipped the cutlery bag and brought out two spoons. “Dinner is served.”

  Josh abandoned the chore of assembling the tent and dug in, inhaling his pot roast without looking up. “Good call on the food. Hot and tasty is much better than a protein bar.”

  Skye wasn’t so sure about the tasty part, but it would keep her belly from rumbling. As she stared into the warmth of the fire, a wave of gloom hit her when she thought about home. She missed Sierra. The thought of hearing the baby’s voice had her checking her phone. But there was no signal. No point in grumbling about the situation, she decided.

  When the satellite phone rang, she hurriedly dug it out of her pack. “Hello? Hello?”

  “Skye?”

  “Harry, is that you?”

  “No, it’s Winston. What’s going on out there? Harry told us you’d taken off into the mountains. Any sign of Smith?”

  “Not yet. Is there any way at all to locate him faster than what we’re doing?”

  “Do you know if he’s relying on a GPS?”

  Just when she started to respond, the line went dead. She stared at the blank screen. No signal. “Damn it! The call dropped. I thought a satellite phone was supposed to be reliable all over the world no matter what.”

  Josh looked up at the clouds, spitting rain. “Not if it doesn’t get a clear signal. And we’re jammed into this natural-forming canyon in bad weather. Not exactly ideal conditions.” She looked so downhearted, he went over and wrapped his arms around her shoulders. “You look wiped.”

  “I’m not exactly the best camper, am I?”

  “Hey, me either. I love nature as much as the next person, but…this might be pushing it.”

  She looked over at what was supposed to be a dome shelter. “That tent looks complicated.”

  “It was advertised as easy to put up in the dark, big enough for three people. No doubt one of those marketing gimmicks since this really looks small. The three people must be tiny children. Once I get it put up, we won’t be sharing it at the same time. That’s the upside.”

  She nodded. She’d already thought about their need to post a lookout. “I figure we sleep in two-hour shifts. That way, one of us is always awake and standing guard.”

  “Where’s Kiya when we need her?”

  For the first time in hours, that brought a smile to Skye’s lips. “She’s around.”

  After finishing his meal, Josh stood up and went back to assembling the tent. “It’s not the ideal situation but it beats letting Smith sneak up on us. I’ll take the first shift while you get some sleep.”

  He noticed she kept checking the phone for a signal without success. “I know you want to say goodnight to Sierra, but I don’t think there’s any chance of phone service out here. Get some sleep.”

  After securing their backpacks high enough off the ground in a nearby tree, Skye tried to get comfortable in her sleeping bag. Even after stretching on another pair of socks over the ones she already wore, she still shivered from the cold. Despite wearing leather gloves on her hands and a ski cap on her head, she had trouble getting warm. Somehow, she managed to finally drop off to asleep anyway.

  At midnight, Josh woke her up to take her turn. “Sorry, but I can’t stay awake any longer.”

  “It’s okay. Get some rest.” She crawled out of the warmth and into a frigid wind that whistled down through the cliffs and the surrounding boulders.

  An hour ticked by, then two. She thought she heard the leaves rustling behind her and got to her feet. Pulling the Ruger out of her waistband, she scanned the area from one end of the riverbank to the other.

  She saw the eyes first, almost glowing in the dark, belonging to a mule deer come to check things out. She relaxed her finger on the trigger about the same time she spotted Kiya.

  “Where’ve you been for the past six hours?” Skye whispered. “I haven’t seen you since we reached the waterfall.”

  Kiya responded by curling up at Skye’s feet.

  Breathing a sigh of relief, she took the gesture as a sign that they were safe for the rest of the night. But she remained vigilant until Josh relieved her around three.

  One look at the sleeping wolf had him gesturing to Skye and mouthing the words. “When did Kiya show up?”

  Bleary-eyed, she smiled and leaned in to whisper, “You should know by now the wolf comes and goes.”

  With that, she stumbled back into the tent, collapsing on top of her sleeping bag.

  Twenty-Seven

  Saturday afternoon

  Smith and the boy had hauled their asses up yet another narrow trail. They’d hung onto slippery mountain cliffs, stopping only long enough to scarf down cold MREs, a chicken and dumpling concoction, that would’ve tasted much better hot.

  He chose paths that were overgrown and seldom used and difficult for the inexperienced hiker to follow.

  The kid was slowing him down. Brayden showed signs of suffering from altitude sickness. The kid had complained about nausea and fatigue. The boy was either really sick or a great actor. Smith hadn’t decided for sure which one applied.

  He was doing his best to cover ten miles a day, but with a puking kid it wasn’t working.

  The problem was simple. If he shot the boy outright, someone might hear the gunfire and call someone. That’s a risk he refused to take. If and when he decided he’d had enough of the teen’s whining, he’d end the boy’s life by slitting his throat and burying him somewhere off the trail.

  At times the mountain passes were so dense with thick forest and ground cover, the path disappeared. The constant drizzly weather made their footing muddy and slick.

  “Can’t we take a breather?” Brayden whooshed out.

  “We need to get to the second stash of supplies. I have more weapons there, some extra clothing and blankets and more food and water. We need to keep moving until we get to the trout stream. That’s where I left the bulk of the gear. It’s another two thousand feet down. We’ll have to make it through a gorge, but if we push the rest of the day, we can get there before nightfall and then camp next to the brook.”

  “I don’t know if I can make it that far down the passage.”

  “Come on, Brayden, man up! Don’t be such a wuss. Move your ass now or I’ll dump you over the side of the cliff.”

  Brayden crawled to a sitting position and forced himself to stand. The boy was able to make his way down the ravine by gripping the rocks until his knuckles bled.

  For most of the afternoon they snaked their way around the winding canyon wall until they reached a clearing. At the junction where two cascading creeks tumbled around steep canyon walls, the natural marker provided a perfect spot for him to remember where he’d hidden his stash. Even though h
e hadn’t been here since last summer—or was it the summer before that—Smith couldn’t remember for certain. All he knew for sure was the old mine shaft had been a brilliant place to leave a second hoard of supplies.

  In front of them was the bubbling trout stream, not wide, but it had a swift current made by the snowpack melting with the warmer temperatures. The flood water was so loud, the stream whooshed around fat boulders in a hard-driving rush to the other side of the chasm.

  “We made it!” Smith boasted. “I told you we would.”

  Brayden was exhausted from the harrowing ordeal of getting down from those last few hundred feet. He simply grunted at Smith and crawled up on a flat ledge where he slumped across it. The boy had passed out.

  Without his captive to do his bidding, Smith had to remove the granite that blocked his way to the mine shaft. One by one, he chucked each stone toward the unconscious Brayden in a show of anger at the boy and disgust at their situation. After he’d gotten rid of most of the rocks, he carved out two years of rampant undergrowth to get closer to the narrow opening. A thick growth spurt of snowberry and sagewort made what should’ve been a slam dunk much more difficult. He hacked away at the vegetation like a madman using the only available tool he had on him, a bayonet with an eight-inch blade.

  He stood in front of the entrance remembering now that it was more like a pit than a mine shaft. It didn’t matter. The hole was large enough for a duffel bag stuffed with provisions. But when he stuck his arm inside, he felt nothing but liquid, six inches of the stuff, then ten, then twelve.

  “Where the hell is it?” Smith screamed, his shouts echoing off the canyon walls.

  Two years ago, he’d crammed his kill kit down into waterproof plastic bags. But now the bags were gone. He started to panic, knowing he’d left the bulk of his most cherished supplies here in this one spot—another arsenal, warm clothing, wool blankets, and more vital than anything else, the essential MREs to survive for days in the wilderness.

  He couldn’t believe someone had taken his stuff. To prove it to himself, he stuck his head into the opening. But he found nothing but a seepage of black water and the lingering smell of sulfur dioxide. At that moment, he realized someone had ripped him off, stolen his precious stash right out from under him. He let out a war cry that echoed through the valley.

  Brayden sat up and looked around. “What? What happened?”

  “We’ll have to catch our supper. Get up. Earn your keep. I didn’t drag you halfway across the Beartooth Mountains for you to rely on me every step of the way. Do you know how to fish?”

  “Sure.”

  “Then get your ass up and show me. We’re not moving from this spot without making our own provisions for the trail. All I want now is to get out of these fucking mountains and back to civilization.”

  “What happened to your stuff?”

  “Shut up. Never mind about that. We’ll make do with catching fish and eating what we find on the trail.”

  Twenty-Eight

  Sunday morning

  By dawn, the rain had moved east, leaving the woodland and watershed drenched in the smells of earth and moss. A reminder that spring would eventually take over and capture the verdant hillsides and lush green valleys.

  But for today, it made for a chilly start.

  Skye woke to whiffs of the most aromatic coffee she’d ever smelled. She knew it had to be instant, but it still ignited her caffeine addiction. Hunger clawed at her belly.

  The need for food had her crawling out of the tent. She looked up to catch a series of cotton candy clouds floating overhead behind a backdrop of solid blue. Stretching her back, she watched an eagle soar over the valley below them.

  Everything seemed so calm and serene as if they’d decided to get away from the city on a spur of the moment jaunt to paradise. She knew it wouldn’t last. As soon as they caught up to Smith all hell would break loose.

  Skye spotted Josh bent over the campfire. “You shouldn’t have let me sleep so long. It must be six-thirty.”

  “You needed it. Besides, I took a little nap myself and let Kiya play guard dog. Nothing’s creeping up on our wolf without setting up a ruckus.”

  Josh handed her a cup of instant coffee, a protein bar, and a packet of granola. “As soon as we’ve downed breakfast, I’m ready to hit the trail. You?”

  “Ready as I’ll ever be.” She checked the satellite phone and discovered there was still no signal. “It’s gotta have something to do with the waterfalls and this canyon we’re in. As soon as we get out of here, I’ll try calling Winston back.”

  After the meager eats, they took turns going to the bathroom before breaking camp, performing the ritual with painstaking detail. They made sure they’d burned all their wood to ash, made sure the fire was completely cold to the touch. They disposed of all their trash, including waste.

  Rolling up their sleeping bags, they stuffed the gear back into compact sleeves. They collapsed the tent, securing it back in its bag, and repacked their backpacks to what seemed like a much lighter weight.

  In the distance—somewhere above the canyon—Skye heard the whirring sound of a helicopter in a search pattern. “I’d say Harry finally got someone’s attention.”

  Josh scanned the smidgen of sky overhead. “He is persistent. I’d wave if I could lay eyes on a chopper…anywhere. Hard to see anything through a solid granite canyon wall.”

  “So, your super powers stop there, huh?” she teased. “Other than that, this could be your own Fortress of Solitude.”

  “The only fortress I prefer is my study back home with you sitting on my lap and us watching Sierra toddle around the playroom.”

  She let out a low sigh. “I really like the sound of that. If only…”

  They hefted their gear and took off heading west. The elevation started climbing almost immediately. The visuals were stunning. The glacial valley seemed to hang above them. Towering spruce and pine dotted the high basins full of fat, grazing bighorn sheep and moose.

  The rocks spiked in shadowy, craggy formations, walling off everything around them. Skye looked down at the valley below the trail and spotted a massive herd of bison. Tapping Josh on the shoulder, she pointed downward.

  “If only one of those critters was Smith,” Josh grumbled. “The higher in elevation I go, the more it seems like I’m battling a lack of oxygen to the brain.”

  “Now’s not the time to feel like a slow-witted hiker,” she muttered. “No falling over the cliff. I say we stop at the first wide spot in the trail and try to call Winston or Harry, or try to reach anyone back in Seattle and see if they have any ideas on how to find this guy.”

  Because the path took an even steeper uphill angle, Josh didn’t argue. It seemed pointless. It was too late to second guess their decision to take off after this guy by themselves.

  For the next hour, they had no choice but to stick to the winding path because it narrowed into little more than a rocky ledge. Taking in the scenery was easy. The harder part was imagining how long it had taken glaciers to carve out the picturesque landscape. The ice age had basically taken a blob of metamorphic rock and worked its magic, leaving behind natural vistas and lush woodland valleys that provided shelter to all kinds of wildlife.

  After maneuvering the first switchback on the other side of the mountain, the trail started to smooth out. Maybe here the phone would work. Skye checked the signal and found three bars. She whooped loud enough to stir the echoes bouncing off the cliffs.

  She dialed their home number and was elated when she heard Travis’s voice. “Dad? Boy am I glad to hear your voice.”

  “We’re glad you called,” Travis hollered into the phone.

  “How’s Sierra?”

  “She’s fine, missing her Mama, I think. What’s the story with Smith?”

  “We were wondering if there’s another way to track this guy. There’s too much area to cover and we haven’t seen hide nor hair of another soul since starting out. We’re beginning to think this
was a bad idea.”

  “I’m gonna let you speak to Winston. He had some innovative ideas about that last night.”

  “I’ll let him tell them to Josh.” She handed the phone off and bounced on her toes. “Need to pee. Now.”

  Josh grinned and took the phone. “What’s the plan, Winston?”

  “You guys mentioned this guy is a fitness freak, right? A big time Army Ranger in survival mode, correct? I tracked his credit card purchases and found he owns a FitBit. You know what that is, right?”

  “Holy shit. They’re activity trackers.”

  “You got it. You can download the information from it just like any other digital device. In fact, it’s as good as any GPS system. All you have to do is download this app to track any FitBit within a certain radius of where you are. You can then upload the data to an application like Google Earth. It would allow you to track wherever he’s going or wherever he’s been. It works on the same principle as Find My iPhone.”

  “Winston, you’re a genius, a lifesaver.”

  “I can walk you through the steps if you want.”

  “That’s okay, I think I can handle it from here using my phone. Hold it a second, though.” He turned to see Skye wringing her hands, eager to get a chance to talk to Sierra.

  “Is Sierra anywhere around you?” Josh asked.

  “Sure. Travis and Lena are sitting at the kitchen table, trying to get her to eat some kind of veggie pancake. She’s not having any of it though.”

  “I’d love to see that,” Skye said as she took the phone. “Sierra, can you hear Mama?”

  While Skye finished her conversation, Josh searched his phone for the right app. He found one that cost five bucks called FitBit Finder. The app promised it could locate the nearest FitBit within five hundred feet. He hit the button to download it and waited.

  “I need to talk to Winston again,” Josh said, motioning for Skye to give him the phone.

  “Bye, baby. Mama will be back home soon,” Skye promised, reluctantly relinquishing the line.