by Mary Alford
“Good. Can you and Megan take a quick ride down Aspen Glen Road? I heard a car start up a little distance from here. It might be nothing.”
“Or it could be our perp. We’re at the intersection now. Talk to you soon.”
Noah shoved the phone in his pocket and clicked on his flashlight, moving to the edge of the road. He flashed the light in the direction of Rachel’s childhood home. Her bare footprints were in the snow along with a second, much larger, shoed set of prints. His gut told him the noise he’d heard was the perp escaping down the road that ran in front of Rachel’s home. There were numerous back roads intersecting Aspen Glen. The man could be anywhere.
He’d knelt to examine the prints when voices carried his way. Noah rose and spun toward the sound. Two people hurried his way, guided by the light of a lantern. He recognized Thomas and Jane Beachey immediately. They must have heard his vehicle.
Not knowing if Rachel’s attacker was working alone, Noah sought to warn the older couple. “Thomas, I need you and Jane to return to your house right away. Lock your doors. I’ll explain later.” Thomas hesitated before gathering Jane close. With another troubled glance behind him, Thomas urged Jane toward the house.
Noah opened the SUV door and climbed in beside Rachel. Even visibly shaken she was still as pretty as he remembered. When he looked at her, all the things he’d once hoped for came to mind. A simple life with her as his wife. Children of their own. Things his father’s interference had robbed them of.
“I know this is hard, but I need to you tell me everything that happened tonight.”
She rubbed her hands down her arms, probably to ward off more than just the chill of the night. Noah cranked the heater up a couple notches while Rachel told him about waking up to find a stranger standing over her. “He had a gun, Noah. He pointed it at my side and forced me to go with him.” She gestured toward her left side. “He said, ‘He has plans for you.’ I have no idea what he meant by that. His face was covered with a ski mask and he had on gloves.”
The attack was planned. Deliberate. Confusing. Why would someone wish to harm either Rachel or Eva? It didn’t add up in his mind.
“We struggled. I managed to rip the mask off, but it was so dark. I couldn’t see anything...except his eyes.” She shuddered visibly. “I will never forget those dark, angry eyes for as long as I live.”
He clasped her hand, and she turned to face him. The extent of what she’d gone through showed in her drawn expression. All he wanted to do was take her in his arms and reassure her everything would be okay. Yet he couldn’t lie to her.
On the hill behind him, red-and-blue lights strobed in the starless night. A patrol vehicle, sirens blaring, blasted down Spruce Road. The vehicle slid to a halt when the driver spotted his cruiser in the middle of the road.
“I’ll be right back,” he told her. When she didn’t respond, Noah climbed out and hurried to his colleagues. Aden Scott exited his vehicle first, followed by Deputy Megan Clark.
“Sheriff’s on his way. Ambo is five minutes out. We drove a good way down Aspen Glen, but there was no sign of a vehicle. What do you have here?” Aden pointed to the cruiser where Rachel waited inside.
Noah outlined the few details he knew so far. He shined the light on the ground where retreating footsteps appeared to be heading through the woods the same way they’d come. “I heard a car’s engine start up a few minutes after I spotted Rachel. If it was him, he’s long gone.”
Aden nodded. “Let’s hope not. We’ll follow the footprints and see what we can find.”
Clicking on their flashlights, both Aden and Megan started out.
Noah went back to the vehicle. Rachel stared straight ahead, showing obvious signs of shock. Her shoulders hunched defensively. She’d never looked so vulnerable before. Growing up, Rachel had always been fearless. Seeing her as a victim now just wouldn’t compute with what he knew about her.
He’d give anything to ease her pain, but he had a feeling this was just the beginning.
“There’s an ambulance on the way. They’ll need to examine your injuries.”
Her huge green eyes found him. “I am fine, Noah. I do not need an ambulance.”
“You do,” he insisted. “You have some nasty cuts on your feet. Not to mention those scrapes on your face.” Anger rose to the surface when he spotted what appeared to a flamed impression of a handprint on her cheek.
I think he has Eva... Rachel’s words haunted him, as did her fear.
“Why do you think he took Eva?” he asked because his brain was working overtime searching for answers. “She’s going through her rumspringa, correct? Is it possible the time got away from her and she stayed with a friend?”
Rachel didn’t let him finish. “Nay, Eva told me she would be home by ten and she wouldn’t be late. Not now.”
“Why not?” he asked, curious about her response.
“Because Eva has been training with Hannah Wagler to take over as the community teacher in a few weeks’ time. She loves her students and wanted to get a gut night’s rest to be prepared for them. They are very important to her. She’s missing, Noah. I know she is.” Her answer wiped away the last of his doubts. They’d need to speak with the last person who saw Eva, and soon.
“Tell me what happened yesterday. Did anything unusual take place? What were Eva’s plans for the day?” He couldn’t imagine anything bad happening to the little girl he once knew so well.
Rachel swallowed visibly. “Nothing unusual. Eva and I rode to church service together. It began around nine. Afterward, there was the church meal. I said goodbye to her around three. She planned to attend the youth group singing. Afterward, she was going home with her friend, Anna Lapp. She said she would walk home after spending time with Anna. Eva was excited about the following shool day and only planned to stay at Anna’s a little while.” The words trailed into a sob.
Noah reached for her hand and held it while he digested this new information. The walk from the Lapps’ place would take Eva around half an hour, which meant Eva may have gone missing somewhere between nine fifteen and nine thirty. He checked the time on his phone. More than three hours had passed. Finding Eva quickly was imperative. The first forty-eight hours were critical in a missing persons case.
An ambulance pulled in behind the vehicles, followed by another police cruiser. Sheriff Walker Collins had arrived on scene.
When the sheriff approached, Noah opened his door. Walker leaned in. “I hear there’s been a bit of trouble here tonight?” He introduced himself to Rachel. “EMTs are here. Let’s get you looked at.”
Getting out, Noah circled around to Rachel’s side and opened her door. She stared up at him with a desperate look on her face.
He held out his hand. “Megan and Aden are doing everything they can to find this man. You need to take care of yourself for Eva.” He walked her to the ambulance and waited beside her with Walker while EMT Jake Oliver cleaned and bandaged her feet and applied antibiotic cream to the scrapes on her face. Her attacker had slapped her. Why would the man want to hurt someone as sweet as Rachel? Nothing about what happened tonight made sense.
“You’ll have some bruising and tenderness for a few days,” Jake told her, “but none of your injuries are serious.”
A noise behind them sent both Noah and Walker whirling. Aden and Megan headed their way.
“Did you find my sister?” Rachel asked as soon as they were close.
Aden shook his head. “No, I’m sorry, we didn’t.” He turned to Walker. “The perp parked at the end of the drive. Probably approached without his headlights on to not wake anyone.”
Megan handed Rachel a pair of shoes. “I found these by the door and thought they might belong to you.”
“Denki,” Rachel murmured and slipped her injured feet inside, wincing when she put pressure on them.
“I’ll call in the crime
scene unit to go over the house and take photos of the footprints and tire tracks. Hopefully, we can get some answers for you soon,” Walker assured Rachel.
She clutched the blanket around her shoulders against the biting wind.
“Let me take you to the house so you can change into something warmer,” Noah said, noticing. “Then we’ll go to the station. I want you to look through some mug books. You said you ripped the mask off the man?” She nodded. There was a slim chance she might be able to identify the man from the photos. “I know you said you didn’t get a good look at him, but maybe going through the books will help you pick him out. While you’re doing that, I’ll speak to Anna Lapp. It could be that Eva changed her mind and spent the night with her friend and I’ll find her there safe and sound.”
“I’m going with you,” Rachel said without budging. “I want to speak with Anna.”
“That’s not happening,” he assured her without considering it. “Until we’re sure what’s truly happening here, you need to stay out of sight. Chances are, Eva grew sleepy and decided to spend the night at Anna’s house.”
“And what if she didn’t? What if she is out there somewhere hurt? She could have been in an accident on the way home. I’m going with you to speak with Anna. Eva’s my sister, Noah. She needs me.” She lifted her chin. The courage he’d seen in her so many times in the past returned.
Noah faced the sheriff. “What do you think?”
Walker considered it for a moment. “The young lady is more likely to answer your questions with Rachel there. Do it,” he agreed. “But make sure you check in with Janine when you arrive and before leaving the Lapps’ place.”
Expelling a breath, Noah accepted Walker’s suggestion despite his misgivings. “Okay. But I want you close at all times,” he told Rachel. While he understood the benefit of having her at the Lapp interview, he still worried about keeping her safe.
“I’ve called in Ryan and Cole. I know their shifts don’t begin for,” Walker glanced at his watch, “another six hours, but we need everyone on this.” He surveyed the desolate stretch of road. “We’ll set up some floodlights. If she’s here, we’ll find her.”
“What if she’s not here?” Rachel’s question was directed solely at Noah, and he didn’t have an answer.
“The best way you can help Eva now is to identify the man who attacked you.”
He noticed her shivering still and took off his coat and placed it over her shoulders. “It’s freezing out. Let’s get you inside the cruiser where it’s warm.”
He and Rachel headed toward his SUV along with Walker. Rachel braced against the biting wind that threatened to knock her down. The Montana weather could be brutal, and it appeared winter was setting in early in the shadow of the mountains. Though barely November, already they’d had several feet of snow.
He clutched her arm to keep her steady. Opening the door, he waited until she slid inside.
“Looks like the rest of the team is here.” Walker crooked a thumb behind them.
Noah mentioned the Beacheys coming to investigate. “It’s possible they saw the man.”
“I’ll have someone speak to them. We’ll start canvassing every square inch of the place,” Walker said. “I’ll let you know the minute we have anything.”
“Thanks.” Noah asked Megan to ride over with them to the house so she could stand guard while Rachel changed.
While Megan hopped in the back, Noah got in next to Rachel. She appeared in a daze. Noah prayed they would find Eva alive.
He touched her arm. “Don’t give up hope.” She twisted in her seat. The desperation on her face made him want to gather her close. He didn’t have that right anymore. He’d broken her heart once, and he doubted she’d want his comfort now. Instead, he put the SUV in Drive and slowly turned around and eased past the slew of police vehicles.
Driving the short distance to her house, Noah parked out front. He couldn’t imagine how terrified Rachel had been to awaken and find a masked stranger standing over her.
The three of them got out and went inside.
“Here, put these on,” Megan said and handed Rachel a pair of latex gloves. “We don’t want to contaminate any evidence the attacker may have left behind.”
Rachel slowly nodded and took the gloves.
“I’ll be right out here,” Noah assured her when she hesitated.
The bedroom door closed behind them, and quiet returned to the house. Taking out his flashlight, he shined the light around the living room he remembered from his youth. The furnishings appeared the same. A couple of rockers flanked the woodstove, a sofa across from them. A small wooden desk placed under the window. He pictured Rachel sitting there, looking out at the breathtaking views of the mountains she loved so much with that awestruck gleam in her eyes that he remembered from the past. As kids, they used to play all over these mountains. Knew every square inch by heart.
Seeing her home again flooded his heart with bittersweet memories. Rachel’s family had treated him like one of their own. His childhood home was a stone’s throw from theirs, at the edge of the West Kootenai Amish Community. At one time, before that final summer, he’d talked to Rachel about joining the Amish faith. When his father found out, he’d become furious. Being Amish was not what his dad had planned for Noah’s future. He’d go to college. Make something of himself.
Noah swallowed deep and shoved those images aside. The past was over and done. Nothing he could do would change it now.
He moved to the kitchen dominated by a wood-burning cook stove. To his left, the handmade table Rachel’s father, Ezra, created years earlier was covered in a plain white tablecloth, a kerosene lamp sitting in the middle. Two plain wooden benches flanked either side.
A sound close by had him spinning on his heel. Rachel and Megan emerged from the bedroom. The somber black dress Rachel wore was a stark contrast to her white apron and prayer kapp. A reminder that she was in mourning. Noah’s good friend Isaac Yoder had told him Rachel lost her husband a little more than a year earlier. Another man had loved her. She’d loved him back. That was the hardest part, even though Noah had been the first to marry someone else.
“Ready?” he asked. A tiny frown line appeared between her brows as she watched him. He couldn’t imagine the things his expression must be giving away.
Once he’d dropped Megan at the search site, he and Rachel headed for the Lapps’ home.
“Do you mind if we go through the events of tonight one more time?” he asked because he needed something to fill the poignant silence hanging between them, and he didn’t understand why someone was targeting her and Eva. The Amish were peaceful people.
“I don’t mind,” she said and smiled at him for the first time. His chest constricted at the sight of it. He remembered the love they’d shared before it had all fallen apart.
“I’d drifted asleep in the chair in my bedroom while reading,” she said, her voice but a whisper. Noah had no doubt she would have been poring over God’s Word, finding comfort there. He’d never understood that need until Olivia’s death. Losing his wife had changed things for him.
Even experiencing death firsthand with Olivia, he couldn’t begin to understand how difficult the past four years had been for Rachel. Isaac told him about her father dying after he’d suffered a heart attack working in the field. If that wasn’t bad enough, her husband passed last year in a buggy accident...and now this.
“I wanted to wait up for Eva, but I grew sleepy.” Her voice trailed off. Was she reliving the nightmare? “Noah, I couldn’t breathe. He held his hand over my mouth and nose. I thought he would kill me.”
Noah had interviewed countless victims during his time on the force. He understood how difficult recounting the details of an attack could be. But Rachel wasn’t just any victim. He had a personal connection with her. Seeing her again made him feel like that young boy who had been cr
azy about her and desperate to find a way to defy his father and make her his.
“What happened next?” he gently asked when she grew quiet.
“He forced me out of the chair and tried to make me go with him.” She stopped for a breath. “Then he said, ‘He has plans for you.’”
His brows slanted together after hearing this again. “Have you figured out what he might have meant by that?”
Her beautiful gaze locked to his as realization dawned on her face. “Oh, no,” she whispered, her hand covering her mouth.
“What is it?” He dreaded her answer.
“I just remembered something that happened a few days ago when I was coming home from work at Christner’s Bulk Foods Store... I help Esther Christner out a couple of days a week,” she explained. “Noah, I think someone followed me from the town. When I was on my way home, a car sped past me and stopped suddenly halfway on the road. At the time, I thought the driver might have car trouble. But now, after what happened tonight...if another vehicle had not come along...” Her voice trailed off.
Noah’s gut told him the driver of the car had planned to take her then. The second vehicle had foiled the attack. Someone was deliberately coming after Rachel, and he needed to find out who before it was too late. For Eva. For Rachel.
TWO
Eva, where are you? Rachel felt so helpless. All she could think about was what might be happening to her sister.
Shutting out the dreadful thoughts was hard, but she had to keep it together for Eva.
She shifted in her seat. “Do you remember the Lapps live up this road on the right?” As much as she hoped they’d find Eva fast asleep at Anna’s home, she did not expect it.
“I do,” Noah said and glanced her way. “Until we catch this guy, the less you’re out in public, the better. The safest place for you now is at the station.”
He was worried about her. She understood, but she had to do whatever she could to find her sister because the thought of losing Eva was unbearable.