“You think I planned it?”
“C’mon, City Boy. No self-respecting resident of Fog Harbor forgets about the tide tables. How else are you gonna get Doctor Rockwell to spend the night alone with you? Your charm and good looks? You’re sneakier than I gave you credit for, though. A lighthouse. That’s some Nicholas Sparks shit. Hell, it sounds like something I would’ve thought of.”
“If I planned it—which I didn’t, for the record—I certainly wouldn’t have marooned us out there with the seventy-year-old lighthouse keeper. Listening to him snoring all night. Let me tell you, it wasn’t exactly my idea of romance.”
Will’s thoughts betrayed him, going straight to the 3:25 a.m. moment when he’d deliberately reached for Olivia and pulled her close to him, inhaling the vanilla scent of her shampoo like his life depended on it. Coward that he was, he’d pretended to be asleep.
As JB turned down the dirt road to the rental cabin, he busted out a laugh. “Guthrie Smalls, huh?”
“You knew?”
“Of course I knew. Chief Flack filled me in. She told me you went out there to talk to him. Besides, there’s no way you’re smart enough to come up with a scheme like that. So, what did the old guy have to say? I assume he’s the reason you were lugging that trash bag like a broke-down Santa Claus.”
“I’ll give you the details later. Bottom line, we’re running out of suspects. Jonah Montgomery’s not our man. And neither is Pedro Mendez.” Will side-eyed his partner. “I didn’t realize you were a closet Nicholas Sparks fan.”
“The Notebook is a literary masterpiece. Don’t try to convince me otherwise.” JB parked in the clearing in front of the cabin, alongside a fleet of police vehicles. Nora waited under the porch light, staring out into the inky spaces between the trees, where the shadows seemed to pulse with life. Will shivered watching her.
“Wouldn’t dream of it.” He thrust the door open and headed for the house, trying to shake off his lingering worry. About Cy. About Thomas. Most of all, about what they’d find out there in the dark, dark woods.
Will shook the firm hand of California State Police Sergeant Kingsley, a tall black man reminiscent of a redwood. Solid, sturdy, and immovable. Distinguished, too, in his perfectly pressed uniform. Unlike Will, who’d been wearing the same rumpled clothing for nearly twenty-four hours. Kingsley’s eyes catalogued the blood spot on Will’s slacks, the bruise on his face. Thankfully, he extended Will a small kindness and said nothing.
“Catch me up, Sergeant. Detective Benson said there’s been a thorough search of the interior of the house. What about the perimeter?”
When Sergeant Kingsley started walking, flashlight in hand, Will and JB followed. Wordlessly, he guided them around the side of the quaint log cabin—an Airbnber’s dream—where the local crime scene techs busied themselves dusting the sill outside Thomas’s bedroom for fingerprints. The window had been opened, the curtains parted on the inside.
“Based on his aunt’s statement, we suspect he went out this way. The front door was still locked from the inside when she discovered him missing. She said he has a history of running away.”
Will frowned at the three feet of distance between the sill and the ground. In the dirt below, he spotted two small footprints. Then, two more. He followed the trail a short distance until it dead-ended at the treeline, where the beam of Kingsley’s flashlight revealed the thick underbrush.
“A cursory search of the grove turned up nothing. Now that we’ve secured the K-9s, we’ll head out into the woods to do a more thorough look-see. A little boy couldn’t go far out here on his own. We’ll probably find him tuckered out and hunting for grasshoppers under a fallen log.”
Will opened his mouth to argue. To remind Sergeant Tree Trunk that that little boy was the only witness to the murder of his family. To question whether Thomas would’ve jumped from a window alone in the pitch-black. To ask the sergeant how he managed to make the search for a missing boy sound like a fairy tale.
JB nudged Will. “Let’s go talk to Nora, and get the timeline down before we head out.”
As they trekked back to the porch, leaving Sergeant Kingsley at the window, JB shook his head, dismayed. “What kid goes hunting for grasshoppers in the middle of the night?”
Nora had finally run out of tears, and the vacant look in her eyes made Will’s heart heavy. Guilt could do that to a person. Suck their pain dry, leaving only a husk behind.
While JB plopped onto the nearby rocker and removed his pocket notepad, Will stood by Nora’s side, following her empty gaze into the redwood grove. “I know you’ve already spoken to the state police, but it’s important that Detective Benson and I understand exactly what you saw and heard this morning.”
Nora’s heartbreak consumed the space between them, making it hard to breathe.
“What happened?” Will asked gently.
His words took forever to reach her. Hers, when they came, brittle as the dry summer grass. “Like I told the other officer, I put Thomas to bed around eight like usual. We read his favorite story, and he fell right to sleep. He must’ve been exhausted from the day. I checked on him again before I laid down.”
“What time was that?”
“Ten thirty or so. The news had just started, and I couldn’t deal with hearing about it all again, so I downed the rest of my glass of wine and took a shower. Before I headed into the bedroom, I peeked inside. Thomas had taken Ranger Rob from the nightstand and laid him on the pillow next to his head.”
A laugh clunked from her throat, flightless and broken as a dead bird. “I remember thinking how lucky I was that we found him today. Lucky. Can you believe it?”
“When did you notice he was missing?”
“Around three. I had this awful dream a man was standing in the doorway, watching Thomas sleep. His hands were on fire, and the whole place went up in flames. I woke in a cold sweat, certain I’d heard Thomas cry out. It’s silly, but I lay there for a while, too scared to get up. Then, when I couldn’t find him, I thought he’d gone to the bathroom or gotten scared and hidden in the closet. I looked for about fifteen minutes before I called the police. That’s when I noticed the window was open.”
Will swallowed a lump. Fear that went straight down into the pit of him.
“In Thomas’s bedroom?”
Nora nodded. “I think I’d been too panicked to notice before.”
“Was anything missing? Clothing? Toys?”
“Ranger Rob. That’s it. We never did find his stuffed dog.” She raised her shaking hand, extending it toward the forest. “That little boy is out there barefoot in his pjs, for God’s sake. Oh God, this is all my fault.”
Forty-Five
“Nick’s on his way here.” Emily tossed out the warning as casually as a flip of her strawberry-blonde curls over her shoulder. “He heard the call on his scanner and wanted to help. He’s been in these woods before.”
“Good for him.” Olivia had no right to be upset with her sister. She’d kept plenty of her own secrets. But Emily careened toward bad decisions like a tornado in a wheat field, and Nick had trouble written all over him. “I have, too. Remember that abandoned gold mine?”
“Oh, yeah. What was it called again?”
“Clawfoot.” As a teenager, Olivia had trekked out to the mine on a Halloween night dare, she and her giggling friends listening for the scratching of the miners who’d supposedly perished within it when it had collapsed following an earthquake. Since then, there’d been a number of additional cave-ins, leaving the mine a dangerous place. Inhospitable to all living things but a colony of bats.
“That thing has been boarded up for years.”
Olivia nodded, her attention drawn to the porch, where Nora wobbled forward. Her face had turned the pale color of the moon, her legs suddenly seesawing beneath her. She swayed like a felled tree. Then, with everyone watching, she crumpled, collapsing into Deck’s arms.
Deck caught her and lowered her to the porch.
Oli
via hurried up the steps of the cabin, with Emily behind her. She grabbed a cushion from the porch swing and helped slip it beneath Nora’s head. Her eyes blinked open, and she struggled to sit up.
“Easy,” Olivia cautioned. “You passed out.”
Resigned, Nora lay back down. “Promise me you’ll find him again. He’s all I’ve got left of my sister. All I’ve got left.”
Olivia patted Nora’s hand, raising her eyes to Deck’s. It was his promise to make, but his mouth stayed shut in a hard, unforgiving line and his gaze laser-focused behind her. Olivia cringed at the sight of Graham approaching from his pickup truck, Chief Flack at his side.
“What the hell is he doing here?” Deck demanded. “He should be in jail right now.”
“There’s this thing called bail, Decker, and due process. Maybe you’ve heard of it?”
“I’ve heard of nepotism. Corruption. Abuse of power. Should I go on?”
“I told you he’d be an asshole about it, Chief.” But Graham looked right at Olivia when he said it, even after she shook her head at him in disapproval.
Chief Flack raised her hands between them, trying to hold back the storm. “It was my idea. Graham knows the redwood grove. His uncle, Marvin, owns part of the land.”
Olivia could feel Deck’s heat. His jaw clenched tight as a vise. “Of course he does.”
“He’s agreed he won’t be directly involved in the search.”
“Well, that’s a relief.”
Graham produced a folded square from his pocket. He approached the cabin, holding it out to Deck like a peace offering. Or a rigged explosive. “After I turned sixteen, I’d drive up to Fog Harbor every weekend from Santa Rosa and stay with my uncle. We’d hunt elk and deer in that grove. I know it like the back of my hand.”
When Deck stayed silent and seething, JB spoke up. “I don’t like it either, but it would be useful to know where the hell we’re going. The troopers said it’s more than a thousand acres of dense forest.”
“He’s right.” Graham avoided Deck’s eyes. “I want to help, man. Seriously.”
Deck sighed, snatching up the paper. He jerked his head toward the periphery, where the other volunteers had begun to gather, Nick and Wade Coffman among them. “Do it over there then. Stay away from me.”
Olivia squeezed Nora’s hand. “It’s okay. We’ll find Thomas and bring him home to you. You have my word.”
While Nora struggled to her feet, leaning on Olivia, Deck unfolded Graham’s rudimentary, hand-drawn map of the grove. Pencil strokes designated its borders and features. A squiggly line for the Earl River bisected the edge of the property. At its center, a small circle marked the Clawfoot Gold Mine that had been abandoned for at least three decades.
After phoning in to work to cancel her patient and intern meetings, Olivia slipped an orange reflective vest over her blouse, hoisted a walking stick, and summoned her courage for the second time in as many days. At the entrance to the grove, the two police K-9 dogs—German shepherds Lucius and Augustus—pulled at their handlers’ leashes, yelping with excitement, anxious to track the scent they’d picked up from Thomas’s pillow. Their high-pitched whines cut through the stillness of the early morning and raised the hairs on Olivia’s arms. But the thought of Thomas alone out there gave her strength.
When Sergeant Kingsley finally signaled to the group, the dogs charged ahead, forging a path through the tangled brush. Emily took her arm and together they walked into the unknown.
Forty-Six
The blackbirds’ singing marked the first sign of the impending dawn. But deep inside the redwood grove, the night wore on, never-ending. Flashlights flitted like fireflies, skittering across the dank forest floor, searching for signs of life. Above it all, the unwavering spotlight of a helicopter commissioned by the state police guided the way. The soft whir of its blades comforted Will, but not as much as the sound of Olivia’s breathing behind him, reminding him he wasn’t alone out there. He’d left JB to supervise at the cabin, since tromping through the forest with an irregular heartbeat seemed ill-advised.
Every few minutes, Will glanced over his shoulder to check on Olivia and her sister. Her navy slacks, covered in her own dusty handprints. Auburn hair, whipped back into a ponytail. Her tired eyes, shining and determined in the glow of her flashlight.
“Thomas!” Will added his weary voice to the chorus of weary voices. They’d been trekking through the grove for about thirty minutes now, moving between the ancient trunks that seemed to huddle together, intent on hiding their secrets. In the spaces between, the dark stretched out endlessly.
The police K-9s led them through the underbrush with the rest of the volunteers. Will couldn’t shake the feeling someone was one step ahead, laughing while he bumbled around in the woods aimlessly, looking for a black cat in a coal mine. He wondered if Olivia felt the same, but he kept quiet. Left to their own devices, his doubts and fears multiplied.
For a little boy like Thomas, danger lurked everywhere. Behind every tree trunk. Inside every hidden hole in the earth. Under the cold waters of the Earl River. All sorts of predators roamed these woods—bobcats, mountain lions, coyotes, black bears. Even bats. But those weren’t the sort on Will’s mind, as he poked every mound of leaf cover with his walking stick, half expecting to find the unthinkable.
As they drew nearer to the old mine at the center of the grove, Will kept calling Thomas’s name, all the while reminding himself there was no evidence the boy had ventured into the forest at all. No definitive sign he’d been taken either. The further in they walked, the louder Will’s cop clairvoyance nagged at him, mocked him. Insisted he’d made a terrible mistake. That he’d missed something essential. His head began to throb again, radiating outward from the eye socket that bore Graham’s handiwork.
Will stopped to rest beside a large redwood. Listening to the boots tramp through the brush and the labored sounds of the dogs’ breathing, he looked skyward, but the tree’s thick canopy blocked the stars.
“You okay?” Olivia asked, joining him beneath the boughs. In the moonlight, the branches looked faintly skeletal. Limbs disembodied and reaching for the sky.
As Will contemplated his answer, Lucius took off at a full gallop, nose to the ground. The dog tugged its leash from its handler and disappeared into the grove with the rest of the searchers in full pursuit.
Will ran as fast as he could in the dark, Olivia maintaining pace beside him. His flashlight could barely keep up with his feet, and he nearly tripped a dozen times. Each almost-fall sent a jolt of primitive fear to his pounding heart until he swore it would burst in his chest.
Up ahead, he spotted the shadowy entrance to the Clawfoot Gold Mine. The other searchers pulled up short at the giant mouth of a hole carved into a large rock face and partially boarded with half-rotted wooden planks. Lucius sat at attention in front of it, fixated on the ground.
“What is it?” Will asked Olivia, before he could see it for himself. She gaped at it in horror.
At the dog’s feet, Thomas’s stuffed dog lay covered in dirt, found at last.
Forty-Seven
Standing at the entrance to Clawfoot, Olivia stared helplessly at Thomas’s lost toy. A stray leaf clung to the dirty gray fur, and one of the ears had nearly torn from the head.
“Woofie.” But Deck already knew that. He crouched down to get a closer look at it.
“This belonged to Thomas,” he told the others. Slipping on a pair of latex gloves, he placed the toy in a plastic baggie from his pocket. “It’s been missing since yesterday.”
“How did it get here?” Emily asked.
Olivia shook her head, not wanting to contemplate an answer. She could still remember being here, years ago, terrified, with her silly friends egging her on and squealing with anticipation as they’d pried loose one of the rotting boards. When a twig had snapped behind them, they’d gone running, screaming like wild banshees, back to the road.
“Looks like somebody’s gone in there fairly re
cently.” The familiar bellow of Wade Coffman drew her attention. He gestured to the ground where his flashlight revealed three cast-off boards. They sat atop the grass, not beneath it. The forest hadn’t reclaimed them yet.
“Probably a bunch of kids,” countered Nick Spade. “There’s nothing else to do around here.”
Nick looked to Olivia for support. As if. “We have to check it out,” she said. “Thomas might have been curious and wandered inside.”
While Nick cast a skeptical eye her way, Deck settled the argument, addressing Sergeant Kingsley with authority. “I agree. We’ve come this far, and we’ve got the dogs here. If Thomas went in that mine, this is our best chance to find him.”
The officer guiding Lucius nodded. “I say we take a small group, Detective. We don’t want anyone else getting lost or injured. These abandoned mines are notoriously unstable. One wrong move, and the whole thing comes crashing down.”
Olivia watched as Deck counted off six men, including Wade and Nick, who reluctantly shrugged his agreement. They leveraged their walking sticks to remove the remaining boards from the entrance, tossing them into the thick grass. One of the planks was so decayed, it broke in two. Just as the last board had been cast aside, a sudden, vicious flutter of wings assaulted them.
Directing her flashlight upward, Olivia gulped down a scream. A small colony of bats took to the air. In a horrifying instant, they vanished just as quickly, their bodies camouflaged by the velvet sky and the enveloping darkness of the redwoods.
“I’m going in,” she announced to Deck, hoping to sway him with her confidence. Or wear him down with her persistence. Either way, she wasn’t about to wait on the sidelines tormented by the ghouls of her imagination. “Thomas trusts me. If he’s scared, I can talk him down. Besides, I know this place.”
One Child Alive: An absolutely gripping crime thriller packed with nail-biting suspense (Rockwell and Decker Book 3) Page 19