by Carol Miller
She was greeted by a sigh twice as weighty as her own. “Lordy, Daisy. I didn’t think you would ever get here.”
Daisy blinked in surprise. Instead of Chris standing on the deck of his cabin, she saw—and heard—Bobby.
“Sorry, Bobby. I thought you were Chris.” She chuckled to herself at the mix-up, then gestured toward the book in his hand. “Brushing up on your Confederate trivia?”
“My Confederate what?” He raised the book to look at it.
Her breath caught in her throat as the sunlight glanced off the cover. “Is that blood!” she exclaimed.
Bobby didn’t answer, but his expression showed no astonishment at the sight of the ruddy streaks on the tan spine.
A thousand possibilities flooded into Daisy’s brain, and they were all bad. “Good God, Bobby! What did you do?”
“I didn’t—” He shook his head frantically. “It wasn’t—”
When it became clear that he couldn’t piece together anything coherent, she cut him off. “Whose blood is that?”
Gurgling, he pointed at the cabin door.
“It’s Chris’s?” Daisy dashed up the stairs to the deck. “What happened? Is he all right?”
Before Bobby could respond, she flung open the door. Just as she had at Laurel’s cabin, Daisy took one step inside and immediately halted.
Unlike his sister’s place, Chris’s cabin hadn’t been hit by a tornado. It was messy, but the bed hadn’t been torn apart and most of his clothing was politely heaped together next to his duffel bag. The rocking chair and sofas were still in one piece too. Except that wasn’t what startled Daisy. It wasn’t the condition of the room. It was the occupant. Chris wasn’t sitting on the red-checkered cushions, as she had expected. Rick was. And the blood dripping onto the fabric from his face blended right in.
He didn’t look at her. He didn’t look at anything. Rick’s eyes were closed, and his shoulders were slumped forward. He was more reclining against the side of the sofa than sitting on it. Although he was obviously alive and breathing, he didn’t seem fully conscious. He wasn’t making any effort to stop the dripping blood.
“You couldn’t pick up a shirt and clean his face?” Daisy rebuked Bobby, after recovering from her initial shock.
Instead of a shirt, she grabbed what appeared to be a relatively clean towel from a hook in the kitchenette. Leaning over the arm of the sofa, she inspected Rick’s injury. There was a substantial cut on his right temple, combined with a nicely swelling bruise. She wiped the blood from his cheek and jaw as well as she could, then she pressed the towel against the lacerated skin. Rick moaned and shifted. The wound was evidently tender. Daisy lightened her touch but tried to maintain enough pressure to stop the bleeding.
“You hit him?” She frowned at Bobby, who was standing in the doorway. “What were you thinking? He could have killed you.”
Without any doubt, Rick was tougher, stronger, and a much better fighter than Bobby. Throwing a few brotherly punches was one thing. Whacking Rick upside the head with a giant history tome was quite another. It led to pistol-whipping, and pistol-whipping most frequently led to shooting. Ninety-nine times out of a hundred, Bobby was going to be on the losing end of that fight.
His eyes widened in dismay. “I didn’t hit him.”
“Then why are you holding a bloody book, Bobby?”
“It was on the floor.”
“And?” she retorted.
“And I picked it up when I heard somebody on the steps. I thought I might need it. I didn’t know it was you out there, Daisy.”
She said a silent word of thanks that she had heard the creaks coming from inside the cabin and had promptly scurried away from the deck. Otherwise she might also be lying semiconscious with a cut and welt on the side of her head.
“I was looking for Laurel,” Bobby explained, shuffling into the room. “I went to her cabin first, but she wasn’t there. So I came over here. You told me she might be sitting with Chris.”
Daisy made a mental note that she needed to be more careful in her conversations with Bobby in the future. Apparently he liked to do exactly what she said, no matter how offhand her remarks were.
“Except Laurel wasn’t here neither. But Rick was. He was over there.” Bobby motioned in the direction of the bed. “On the ground next to it.”
As serious as the present situation was, Daisy couldn’t help but think how good it was for everybody involved that Rick had been found next to the bed—rather than in it—and Laurel was nowhere in the vicinity.
“The book was next to him too,” Bobby continued. “I knew it was how he’d been hurt. I could tell from the way he was lying. Somebody had come up behind him and smacked him.”
Keeping the towel pressed against the wound, Daisy reached her other hand around Rick’s back. The Ruger was there, tucked into its holster.
“He must have been surprised,” she said. “He didn’t pull out his gun.”
Bobby’s brow furrowed. “I didn’t think of that. I could have used it instead of this stupid thing.” He dropped the book. It landed with a loud thump on the floor, making a sizable dent in the wood.
She looked at the resulting hollow. “I guess in one way Rick was lucky. He could have gotten a hole like that in his head.”
“He’ll be okay,” Bobby returned anxiously. “He’ll be okay, won’t he, Daisy?”
“He’ll be fine,” she told him. “Probably a doozy of a headache for a day or two. The cut itself won’t cause any permanent damage. It just needs to be disinfected and maybe get a few stitches.” Her gaze went to the spot where Rick had been lying on the ground. “It doesn’t look like he lost too much blood.”
“I moved him to the sofa,” Bobby said. “I thought that would be good. Then he could sleep it off.”
Daisy restrained a smile. Bobby equated the remedy for a possible concussion with that of a likker binge. But she didn’t bother correcting him. It would only make him more anxious, and she needed him to stay at least semi-focused.
“How come you don’t have a gun with you, Bobby?” she asked.
“Laurel doesn’t like ’em.”
She knew that to be true. Laurel had been uncomfortable both about the revolver in the bag at the bakery and during the discussion with Rick regarding concealed weapons permits.
“When I see her,” Bobby went on, “I always leave my Winchester in the truck.”
“Where is your truck?”
“At the trailhead.”
“What trailhead?”
“The one for the trail that goes up the mountain and then down to Fuzzy Lake. It’s the trail Laurel, Chris, and the rest of ’em were using for their so-called hunt.”
That grabbed Daisy’s attention. Was it an old trail? Old enough to be on the maps that had been stolen from the historical society? Would the geocachers try to use it to search for the treasure?
“The first thing I do whenever I come to the campground,” Bobby told her, “is go to the trailhead. It’s where Laurel parks. That’s how I can be sure if she’s here or not. Her phone is pretty iffy by the cabins, and it’s even worse when she’s out on the trail.”
“Is the trail part of the area that’s closed?” Daisy asked.
“I think so.” He shrugged. “I think Laurel said it was all closed.”
“It probably doesn’t matter either way,” she replied, more to herself than to Bobby. “If they want to keep searching, they’ll keep searching—closed or not.”
“Who’s searching? Huh?”
Daisy responded with a question of her own. “Was Laurel’s car at the trailhead when you got here today?”
Bobby nodded. “Chris’s car too. And Rick’s truck.”
“But you haven’t seen Chris?”
“Naw.”
“Have you ever gone on the trail, Bobby? Do you know what it’s like?”
“I ain’t been up it myself, but it looks the same as any other trail in the mountains, at least from the beginning.”
“I think you better take me to the trailhead,” Daisy said at last to Bobby. “Can you find it okay from here?”
“Yup.” His eyes also went to Rick. “Are you sure we can leave him?”
“We won’t be gone long.” Under her breath, she added, “Hopefully.”
As carefully and gently as she could, Daisy leaned Rick’s head—together with the towel—against the sofa cushion. Then she took a step back. He looked comfortable, and it seemed to be a safe position. He couldn’t topple over. He couldn’t choke or suffocate. The wound was elevated and protected. Rick would be all right alone until they returned.
Bobby started toward the deck. Daisy began to follow him, but she stopped abruptly in the doorway. Spinning around, she walked back to Rick and bent over him. He murmured at her. His breath was warm against her neck. Daisy leaned closer. Her hand went to his shoulder. Her fingers glided down his arm. Then she pulled the Ruger from his back.
CHAPTER
21
The gun was too big for her little hand—and Daisy had no doubt that it had one heck of a recoil—but considering the circumstances, having the Ruger was much better than not having the Ruger. Rick certainly wouldn’t be using it in his current condition.
When she caught up with Bobby, he was already down the deck stairs and marching toward the side of Chris’s cabin. He was so preoccupied with his concerns about Laurel, he didn’t even notice that Daisy had taken his brother’s gun.
“Do you think Laurel will be at the trailhead?” he asked her. “She wasn’t there before. Do you think she could be sitting there now?”
“Maybe.” Daisy was pretty confident that Laurel wouldn’t be sitting at the trailhead, but she didn’t want to alarm Bobby any more than he already was.
“I don’t get it.” He scratched his arm. “If she’s not there, where could she be? She’s not at the inn. She’s not at the bakery. She’s not at her cabin…”
They turned the corner to the back of Chris’s cabin. This time no vultures retreated to the trees. The two heaps of garbage behind the plywood hut looked the same as they had earlier that week, sans the flour-dusted sneakers, which Daisy had removed and given to Deputy Johnson. Bobby circled around the trash. She followed him. On the far side was a footpath of trampled grass through weedy scrub.
Daisy stopped and frowned at the path. “You’re sure this is the right way, Bobby?”
He nodded.
“Because it’s going to get dark soon, and I don’t want to go roaming into the wilderness if you’re not absolutely positive this is the way to your truck and the trailhead.”
“It’s the way,” he answered without hesitation. “I’ve used it at least half a dozen times before, and I’ve never gotten lost on it.”
Her frown remained. Even though that was as convincing as Bobby could be when it came to his lousy sense of direction, Daisy still had some trepidation. He must have gone to Laurel’s cabin at least half a dozen times before too, and he had still managed to become confused about which cabin was the right one. But she figured that in this instance, he couldn’t get them seriously lost, as long as they stayed on the path and didn’t branch off to any side shoots.
“Fine.” She motioned forward. “After you.”
Bobby took the lead, which was what Daisy wanted. If he was in front of her, then he couldn’t accidentally wander away without her noticing. When she later had to go back to Rick to check on his wound and return the Ruger, she didn’t want to have to explain to him how she had let his brother go missing while trekking to his truck.
They walked in silence for several minutes. It was an easy path—flat, relatively straight, and no rocks or brambles.
“About Laurel’s cabin,” Daisy said after a while, hoping that Bobby might have some insight on the subject. “Do you have any idea why somebody would rip the place apart?”
He shook his head. “I don’t get that neither. Who did it? There isn’t anyone here. There isn’t anyone anywhere around here. Who even knows that she’s here?”
Daisy’s mind went immediately to the geocachers. They fit two of those categories. They weren’t at the campground, but they could very easily be around the campground. And they definitely knew that both Laurel and Chris were there.
“I thought at first maybe somebody was mad at her.” Bobby began scratching his arm again. “But why would they be mad at her? It wasn’t her fault the so-called hunt had to be canceled.”
“I don’t think they’re mad,” Daisy responded. “I think they might have been looking for something. Didn’t it seem to you from the way the bed had been torn apart and the sofa cushions were slashed open that they might have been looking for something?”
“Looking for something? Looking for what?”
That was an excellent question. She knew of only two things that were missing—the revolver from the bakery and the maps from the historical society. Except Laurel didn’t have either one. It was nonsensical, really. If the geocachers had stolen the maps and the revolver, they wouldn’t then be searching for them in Laurel’s cabin. So it had to be something else. But what? Money, jewelry, excess prescription drugs? Those were all equally nonsensical. When she and Beulah were previously at the cabin, Laurel had left the door unlocked. People with money, jewelry, and excess prescription drugs didn’t leave the door unlocked.
“I’m worried, Daisy.” Bobby scratched his arm harder.
“I know, but try not to be.” She made an effort to sound more optimistic than she actually was. “We don’t know anything for sure, so there’s no need to worry yet. I could be completely wrong about them looking for something.”
“You could also be right,” he said. “Only what if instead of looking for something, they were looking for someone? What if they were looking for Laurel?”
Looking for Laurel? It was an idea that Daisy had never considered before. At the bakery, she had feared that the geocachers had returned to the campground to finish their search for the treasure and Laurel had somehow gotten in their way. But if that was the case, they wouldn’t be looking for her. On the contrary, they would do whatever was necessary to get her out of their way, just like they presumably had with Rick.
“That would explain why the cabin was torn up,” Bobby continued, following his own line of reasoning. “They were looking for her, they found her, and they tried to take her.”
Tried to take her? Why in the world would they try to take Laurel? You only took someone if you believed they might be useful to you. How would Laurel be useful to the geocachers? They already knew the trail, so they didn’t need her as a guide. And she only had permission to enter the closed area to collect the remaining caches—not to dig up treasure—so she couldn’t give them any special help with that. What could she help them with? Daisy’s thoughts returned once more to the maps. Maybe Laurel knew the trail or the closed area so well that she could better read or interpret the maps?
“They tried to take her, and she fought them.” Bobby’s voice rose. “She fought them, but she lost. And now they’ve got her!”
“But it didn’t look as though there had been a fight,” Daisy replied, trying to stay rational and keep Bobby calm. “There wasn’t any sign of a struggle in her cabin. It wasn’t like Rick and the book in Chris’s cabin—”
She didn’t finish the sentence. The instant that she said Chris’s name, it occurred to her that maybe it wasn’t Laurel who would be useful to the geocachers. Maybe it was her brother. Chris was the history professor, after all. He was the one who had done his graduate work on the war and carried around Confederate history tomes. Maybe he could better read or interpret the maps.
“What if they’ve hurt her!” Bobby exclaimed. “They gunned down Caesar in your parking lot. What if they’ve shot her
too?”
He was scratching his arm with such ferocity that he was ripping open his skin. Daisy reached out and grabbed his wrist to stop him.
“Quit it, Bobby! If you don’t, I’m going to have to take you to the doctor with Rick. You being all bloody and injured isn’t going to help Laurel—or Chris—a lick.”
Turning around, he blinked at her. “You think Laurel is with Chris?”
“Don’t you?” Daisy said. “It seems logical, doesn’t it? Neither of them is at the campground or anywhere else that we know of. Which must mean they’re together. If we find one, then there’s a mighty good chance we’ll find the other.”
Bobby went on blinking.
“Maybe there was a fight,” she told him. “Maybe Laurel was taken, or maybe Chris was taken. Maybe by taking one, they got the other. I don’t know, and I honestly don’t think the details matter at this point. Right now we have to get to the trailhead and see what we find there.”
To her relief, he didn’t argue or ask any questions. Bobby just turned back around and started walking on the path again. Daisy was grateful. She couldn’t explain to him what she didn’t understand herself. Had Laurel or Chris truly been taken? Perhaps by taking Laurel, the geocachers were forcing Chris’s compliance. Perhaps he really could decipher something on the maps that they couldn’t.
As they proceeded, Daisy noted that Bobby wasn’t picking at his arm anymore, nor was he whimpering about Laurel. His pace had quickened, and he appeared to be gaining courage with every step. She was pleased. Although he could be exasperatingly absentminded and a bit too whiny on occasion for her taste, Bobby had some tough country roots. Now was the time for him to show them. If there was going to be any trouble at the trailhead—or farther on down the line—she needed him to be ready for it.
The path ended abruptly. It opened into a small clearing, consisting of a few old knotty tree stumps and patchy dirt. If this was the site of the trailhead, Daisy realized immediately that there would be no trouble. It was for one very simple reason: there were no people in sight. There were, however, six vehicles—three trucks and three cars. Two of the cars belonged to Laurel and Chris. Two of the trucks belonged to Bobby and Rick. The third car and truck she didn’t recognize.