by Jen Blood
“That’s good,” Cheryl said. She sounded relieved. “Good idea. Do that.”
“The hell I will,” Dean said. He stepped forward. “You think you found my daughters, I’m damned well going to be here. And I’m not traipsing around the goddamn woods like a fool. You saw her down below. Let’s stop wasting time talking about it and get down there.”
He was right about one thing: time was definitely an issue. Nearly twenty minutes had passed since I’d seen the figure in red. I didn’t want to lose her now.
“Fine,” I said. “But leave your gun behind. We won’t need it down there.”
Dean’s jaw tensed. His fingers tightened reflexively around the barrel of his rifle. I waited for him to launch into a diatribe on the second amendment. Instead, he nodded. “Fine. We leave the gun behind. Let’s just get on with this.”
Moments later, the gun was safely stashed inside the hollow of an old maple tree, the bullets in Dean’s rucksack. Wade led the way with Bear and me and our dogs behind him, Dean bringing up the rear. For a moment, I watched Ren’s dog, Minion, pulling her eagerly along the side of the ravine behind Cheryl and Festus. My stomach turned. I reassured myself with the knowledge that Cheryl knew what she was doing – probably better than I did. Ren was in good hands.
“The trail’s this way,” Wade said, interrupting my thoughts. “And that’s using the word ‘trail’ loosely.”
Dean merely grunted.
Bear and I both kept our dogs at a close heel this time, much to Casper and Phantom’s chagrin. Rain was pouring down hard enough that it felt at times the mountain was about to come down with it, and there was no way I wanted the dogs to lose their footing when there was a thirty-foot drop just to one side of us.
We moved forward slowly, carefully. Wade was right—his idea of a trail could use some refining. We pushed through thick brush and dense trees until we came to a rough path carved from stone, every step treacherous. Phantom stayed in a reluctant heel at my left side as we moved, glancing at me occasionally when I lost my footing and inadvertently jerked her leash.
“How was the search this morning?” I asked Bear, after we’d been walking for nearly twenty minutes and things seemed to be evening out. Wade was far enough up ahead that I didn’t have to worry about him overhearing, and it seemed like Dean had enough to worry about just surviving the descent.
“There were a couple of places where Caz started to alert, then it seemed like he changed his mind,” Bear said as we made our careful way down.
“Did you bring him back through to let him work the scent a little more?” I asked.
“What do I look like, an amateur?” he said, with just a little more attitude than I like. “Of course. I let them spend a good amount of time in each spot, waited for the winds to shift, worked it from different angles. Nothing.”
“And you didn’t see anything yourself?”
He looked uncomfortable at the question. We always used to speak openly about his ‘sensitivities,’ but since moving out to Windfall Island, he’d changed. For the first time since he learned to talk, I knew he was keeping something from me.
“Bear?” I prompted when he didn’t say anything.
“I don’t know,” he finally replied. “I mean… It’s hard to say. I don’t think so.”
“But you’re not sure?” I asked. I turned to look at him in profile. He’s taller than me now, topping out at over six feet, with a chest and shoulders that have just started to develop after years of being a gangly, gawky kid. I suddenly have a knockout on my hands, one that girls—and women, for that matter—look at twice wherever we go. Thank God, he hasn’t caught on to that yet.
“I don’t know,” he repeated. “Out on the island, I’ve gotten so used to it I hardly think about it anymore. Hell, half the time I can’t tell who’s alive and who’s dead.”
It might have passed for a joke if not for the bitter edge to the words. I didn’t say anything, letting him work through that on his own.
“Anyway, I haven’t seen anything like that here. I think I’ve heard something, but I’m having a hard time telling for sure.” He hesitated. “I know it’s weird, but it almost feels like something’s whispering from the ground. I just can’t make out the words. It’s just sort of this…voice, that I feel beneath my feet.”
“Okay,” I said when he didn’t go on. “You know I won’t push you one way or the other. But if you do hear or see something…”
“I’ll let you know,” he said with a curt nod. “Don’t worry. I’ll let everyone know.”
It took half an hour to get to the bottom of the ravine. By that time, my rain gear was soaked through and sweat had left my underclothes damp and my skin clammy. We all stopped once we hit bottom, out of breath and shaking with adrenaline. Dean’s color was bad, and he didn’t look all that steady on his feet once we were on even ground. I wished someone would step up and make him go home, but I knew that wasn’t up to me.
“You go upriver, I’ll head down,” I told Bear, shouting over the sound of rushing water. “The riverbank isn’t wide enough for both of us to search the same direction.”
Bear agreed. We were on a bank of loose gravel no more than four feet across, the water so close I was doused with cold spray every time I looked toward it. I told Dean to stick with me, and sent Wade with Bear and Casper. I watched for only a second or two as Bear and Wade strode off together before I returned my attention to Phantom.
I still didn’t want her off lead given our surroundings, but I loosened my hold on the leash and gave her the command one more time. “Find them.”
I waited. Unless I’d gotten completely turned around, this was roughly the spot where the girl in red had stood. I’d seen her run in the same direction we were headed.
Phantom didn’t move, her nose in the air, searching for a scent.
Dean shifted impatiently beside me. “What’s wrong?”
“Just give her a second,” I said.
I took out Melanie and Ariel’s clothing and gave the dog another good whiff. She snuffled both items top to bottom, intent, before I took them away again and replaced them in the plastic bags that would ideally retain their scents. “Find them, Phan,” I said. “Go on, girl.”
Once again, she lifted her nose into the air. Apparently finding nothing, she snuffled at the ground for a few seconds. Just under the roar of the water, I heard her whine. She looked at me, puzzled.
There’s nothing here. There’s nothing to find.
Then who the hell had I seen down here?
“What the hell’s going on?” Dean demanded. “You said you saw her—saw one of the girls.”
“I said I saw someone,” I corrected him. “Let’s just move. Phantom may pick something up along the way.”
She didn’t.
We walked for fifteen minutes, until the riverbank had narrowed to a two-foot strip of gravel and going any farther would put everyone at risk. We’d gone around the same bend I’d seen the figure in red follow, but there was nowhere she could have gone but straight up—another five yards ahead of us, the riverbank vanished completely. On either side, rain-soaked granite rose at an impossible angle.
“You sure whoever you saw went this way?” Dean asked. He mopped his brow, his color still gray. His rain gear wasn’t nearly as effective as mine, and it was cold out here—if he stayed out much longer, he risked hypothermia.
“I could have been wrong,” I said, certain that I wasn’t. “Let’s go back, meet up with Bear and Wade. They may have had more success.”
I expected an argument, but apparently Dean was too tired for it. He went on ahead, and I thought suddenly of my own father on the days and weeks that followed Clara’s disappearance. I knew firsthand how deep the pain ran for Dean Redfield right now, and I wanted more than anything to offer some reassurance; to tell him that we would find his daughters. That we would find both girls, and they would be all right.
I kept my mouth shut, all too aware that that was mo
st likely a lie.
We met back up with Wade and Bear a few minutes later. They, too, had found nothing.
“I still don’t see how anybody could make it down here,” Wade said. “What the hell they’d be doing all this way down. They’d have to do some serious hiking before they even got to the edge of the ravine.”
“Hikers come through here sometimes,” I said. “This isn’t far off the Long Trail and the AT. Maybe the woman I saw was someone else.”
“A hiker who vanished into thin air?” Wade said doubtfully. “Seems like a stretch to me.”
More likely that my eyes had been deceiving me—that was the implication. That I’d led them all on a wild goose chase.
“We should get back up topside and catch up with the others,” Dean said. “Maybe they’ve had better luck.”
We started back up, the climb even steeper than I remembered it coming down. We’d almost reached the trees again when Bear stopped short ahead of me, his gaze fixed on a stretch of dense forest about fifty yards from us.
Dean was struggling to keep up behind us, while Wade had gone on ahead.
“What is it?” I asked Bear.
His body was tensed, his focus riveted on that single stretch of forest. I followed his gaze, but saw nothing.
He didn’t look at me when he answered. “A…woman, I think. I don’t know. A shape. Something running. You don’t see it? She’s wearing red—maybe the same woman you saw in the ravine.”
I searched the woods once more, Phantom still beside me. Behind us, I could hear Dean closing the distance. I shook my head.
“I don’t see anything.”
He looked frustrated at that, and shifted his focus to Casper. The dog’s usually vibrating body was still while he waited for Bear’s command.
“Find them, Caz.”
He gave the dog enough lead to run, and Casper tore through the woods with Bear behind him. Meanwhile, Dean caught up to me, gasping for breath.
“What is it?” he asked. “You found something?”
“I don’t know yet,” I said.
“What did he see?” Dean pressed. There was a combination of fear and hope in his eyes that was unmistakable. Visceral.
“I’ll go check, but I want you to go back to your house. I’ll report back as soon as I know anything.”
“The hell I will,” Dean said. In the distance, I heard two sharp barks break through the stillness—Casper’s alert. Dean paused for just a moment to look at me, his strength magically restored at the prospect of news. “If it were your boy, could anyone make you stay behind waiting for news?”
Just the thought sent a bolt of dread through me: the scenario no parent ever wants to face. I shook my head.
“Come on,” I said. “Wade should already be there. I’ll get in touch with Jack, and have them meet us there.”
Dean continued on, making his painful way through the trees. I radioed Jack, and rushed on ahead.
* * *
Chapter 8
THE GIRL HAD DARK HAIR and pale skin, and she wore a red sweater that made tracking her easy enough as she wove in between the trees. Casper wasn’t paying attention to her, though. The dog had caught a scent and was working that hard, his nose moving back and forth between the ground and the air. It didn’t really matter—the girl was headed in the same direction they were. Whether Bear followed the dog or the ghost, he knew he’d end up in the same place.
Somewhere behind him, he heard his mother talking to someone. The asshole who wouldn’t leave them alone to do the search, he thought impatiently. That meant she’d be lagging behind, and right now… He hated to admit it, but right now he wasn’t sure he wanted to end up where he was going. At least, not alone.
He tuned out the amorphous figure making its way through the woods, and focused on staying on his feet while Casper dragged him through the underbrush. Bear felt the air around him getting thicker, harder to breathe, and knew they were close. Casper helped focus him, and the dog’s find rate was a hell of a lot more reliable than Bear’s was. Bear wondered, sometimes, what would happen if he stopped relying so much on the dog and found out what he was capable of on his own.
“Bear!” his mother called from behind.
“Up here,” he called back. Wade, the forest ranger, had caught onto what was happening and circled back. He looked on as Bear continued tracking.
Casper came to an abrupt halt in a grove of beech trees up ahead. The dog glanced back at Bear, barked twice, and then ran back toward him. Other dogs had passive alerts—a couple of barks, lie down, call it a day. Not Casper. He wasn’t the passive type.
The dog ran straight toward him, full tilt, and punched him in the pocket with a wet canine nose.
“What’ve you got, Caz?” Bear asked. He’d been fooled by the dog before. More than once, Casper had gotten bored with the search and false alerted just for the sake of getting his reward. Now, Bear knew better than to surrender the dog’s prize until he’d verified something had actually been found.
He didn’t really need to verify this time, though.
Casper stuck close beside him as Bear approached, the dog whirling ecstatically—his victory dance. Once Bear had visual confirmation, he choked back his own horror over what they had found, and focused on the dog.
“Good boy, Caz. Good find!” He forced enthusiasm into his voice and pulled the tug toy from his front pocket. Instantly, Casper calmed. The dog sat in front of him, every ounce of focus fixed on the prize. Bear could hear others approaching—he’d been expecting his mother, but clearly she wasn’t coming alone.
He offered the tug to Casper, who fixed sharp white teeth around it in an instant with a low growl. Bear obligingly held tight, the two of them pulling like that until something broke Bear’s concentration. A whisper in the stillness as they moved farther from Casper’s find—a darkness in the air, as much physical movement as it was sound.
“I’m working with Caz,” he shouted back toward the site, where he could see his mother just arriving with Wade and Dean Redfield.
Keep that dog away from me, a male voice said. A threat if Bear had ever heard one, but he knew it hadn’t been whispered aloud. He let Caz win the game of tug—a prerequisite after a successful find—and let the dog take his prize. Looking back toward his mother and the men, Bear couldn’t tell whose thoughts he’d heard.
He remained a good distance away, watching. This time when the thoughts came, he could almost see them working their way through the air—tiny black threads that stitched themselves together in whorls and slashes in the air.
Jesus. God, no.
The father of the dead girl, Dean, sank to his knees by Casper’s find. By the body. Bear took up the slack in his dog’s lead and approached cautiously. He knew enough to stay back as much as he could to keep from contaminating the crime scene, but the old man obviously didn’t know the way this kind of thing ran.
Bear’s mother held up her hand to stop him from coming any closer. She was on the radio, presumably with Agent Juarez.
“Yeah, I’m sure,” she said. “There’s only one body here. Get here quick.”
That was the end of the conversation. Jamie told Casper he’d done a good job, and Casper’s tail wagged frantically, the fool grinning from ear to ear. Phantom was an empath who would deflate at every shitty find, but Casper was all about the fun. As long as he won the game and got his prize, he couldn’t care less how the rest of the world felt about it.
Bear looked back toward the body—at the sight he’d purposely avoided up till now. The old man was still on his knees.
Unlike the girl in red Bear had seen running through the woods, this one was naked. Blood saturated the site—her front and back had been cut deeply, and Bear’s cheeks heated with embarrassment when he realized where she had been attacked. He averted his eyes rather than looking any lower, focusing instead on her hands. They were bound, wrapped tight with a thick woven rope they used regularly out on the island. What confused him,
though, was the sight of two loops outside her own hands, frayed and dark with blood.
Someone else had been there.
“What about Ariel?” Dean asked from his place on the ground. He wiped tears and snot away with the back of his arm. When his eyes drifted toward Casper, Bear automatically stepped forward to keep himself between them.
“She’s not here,” Jamie said.
“The way she’s been cut up,” Dean said, his voice tentative. “It looks just like Katie and June—” He struggled to his feet. His eyes were bright blue, still swimming with tears. Bear took another step back when the man staggered toward him. “You’re going to keep looking, right? You keep looking all night if you have to—Ariel’s still out there somewhere. The killer is still out there. You see that rope? Ariel got away.”
“We’ll need to talk to the police,” Wade said. “This proves we have a predator out here—someone who isn’t afraid to kill. We need to move very carefully from here on out.”
“Fuck careful!” Dean shouted. “She’s hurt. You need to find her.”
“Dean,” a voice called from behind them. Bear turned. Casper got to his feet, but made no move to leave Bear’s side. Agent Juarez stood between them, his expression strained. Cheryl and Ren were with him, both of their dogs at a close heel. The lady reporter he’d seen back at base had followed them in, her cameraman tagging along behind.
“You see what they found?” the old man said. He practically ran toward Agent Juarez, gesturing wildly.
Ren handed her dog off to Cheryl and came to Bear, her eyes fixed on the dead body.
“Melanie was here—the same way they found the girls last time when you sons of bitches starting nosing around my land,” Dean said. “You need to figure out what the hell’s happening. How my brother is doing this if he’s locked up.”
“You found her?” Ren whispered to Bear, while the old man continued shouting.
“Casper did,” Bear said. “He caught the scent.”