One Step Too Far

by Lisa Gardner

  I glance around wildly. Bob does too. The towering cliff face, the exposed boulder field, a distant bluff. I can’t make out a single sign of life, not even a bird soaring overhead, though now that I’m aware of the sensation, I can’t let it go. I want to whirl in circles. I want to scream at the top of my lungs, “Show yourself.”

  But nothing moves. No one appears.

  “Let’s get to the cave,” Bob suggests quietly, the urgency in his voice unmistakable.

  Martin is already walking north. But then I spy what I’ve been looking for. The bloodstained rocks from yesterday afternoon.

  As much as it pains me, I turn in that direction. Because I understand Martin way better than he realizes. I also have to do what I have to do, even when I know it’ll lead to nothing but heartache.

  “I’ll meet you there,” I tell them, gesturing toward my new destination. I hold up my red emergency whistle. “I’ll stay in contact. One is good. Three is bad.”

  “Separating is already bad,” Bob states.

  “And yet here we are. You heard the signal yesterday, right?” I glance at Marty, who nods. “Then you’ll be able to hear me now.”

  “Frankie, no—” Bob grabs at my arm. I pull away.

  “You have your job, I have mine.”

  “You don’t have a job!”

  “Yes I do. I work for the dead. And my path takes me over there.”

  I don’t wait. Though my hands are shaking and I have a queasy feeling in my stomach, I head for the bloodstained boulder where we discovered Neil’s collapsed form yesterday afternoon. I hope Bob doesn’t follow. I wish desperately that he will.

  But Martin has already resumed his beeline for the mysterious cave. After another moment of unhappiness, Bob succumbs to his employment agreement and follows.

  In a matter of minutes, they are nothing but a cloud of dusty footsteps drifting farther and farther away.

  I wait to see if our invisible watcher will go with them. But I’m not that lucky. Martin and Bob disappear. The itching between my shoulder blades remains.

  I take a deep breath, then I get to it. My personal quest for the day.

  I don’t like feeling like prey. Which, after much consideration, leaves me with only one option. To hunt the hunter. And hope I find him first.

  CHAPTER 25

  Two things have bothered me since Neil was attacked. Who and how? Then it occurred to me that maybe those questions go together. Neil’s attacker had to have materialized right here, on this bloody boulder, inches behind his target. Meaning it had to be the only other person in the immediate area—college buddy Scott. Or there’s something else we’re missing.

  The sun is already high in the sky, heating up the canyon. The air is so dry and dusty, I feel each breath like a coating of grit in the back of my throat. I don’t drink any water just yet, however.

  I need to marshal my resources. For all my best guessing, there are too many things I don’t understand and too many bad things that can still happen between now and our nighttime chopper rescue.

  The top of the bloody boulder is completely exposed. No trees for a stalker to hide behind, no nearby clumps of grass for shelter. I jump down, landing not so gracefully on a strip of sandy pebbles below, then take a fresh look at my surroundings. The rocks around here are completely helter-skelter. Some have collapsed together close enough that it’s easier to stay on top, leaping from one to another. But other boulders are so massive, or rest so askew, there’s no choice but to work around them. The area I’ve landed in is nothing more than a narrow ribbon winding here and there. Wide enough for two people across, or one Bob. It doesn’t allow me to see much ahead, which only heightens my nervousness.

  I walk around the base of the boulder Neil had been traversing. If someone had been down here in this corridor while Neil stood up top, would he have noticed? I would think movement would attract his attention. But on the other hand, standing where I am now, I’d be invisible to anyone watching from the other side—say, the direction I’d come from.

  I can’t circle the entire boulder, as it abuts a curved rock of equal size. I try exploring the pebbled path instead, realizing belatedly I should have first checked for signs of boot prints. Then again, I’m not sure this kind of surface would retain any. The loose stones shift so much beneath my feet, I feel like I’m swimming as much as I’m walking.

  I make it fifty feet along the path before hitting a pile of rocks that require me to clamber up again. I try another direction but meet the same fate.

  Fifteen more minutes of aimless wandering and that’s that. Sure, there are these makeshift corridors that would allow someone to traverse between the boulders and be less visible. But none of the paths get very far before forcing the person to return topside.

  Scott or I should have been able to spot a stranger appearing or disappearing among the rock piles like some dusty gopher. Not to mention Martin racing in from the north, or Miggy and Bob closing ranks from the south.

  Meaning Scott was lying? Meaning he had to be our perpetrator after all?

  I don’t like it. What does he have to gain? He already won the girl. Even if his buddies feel put out by the new happy couple, I can’t see their disapproval being something worth killing over.

  I wind my way back to the original boulder, very thirsty now. And hot. My lips are cracked, my fancy wicking shirt glued to my back. I don’t want to be a hiker anymore. I want a hotel room and a hot bath and pitchers of water and a greasy cheeseburger topped with crisp dill pickles. And not necessarily in that order.

  I look up, squinting against the sun. I can just make out my hand, coated in fine particles of dust. Feel the grime down my arms, streaking my legs, powdering my hair.

  Just like that, it comes to me. I’ve been looking up and to the side. What about down? Where already, I’m a near-perfect match for the sand beneath my feet?

  I heft off my pack. Then, crouching low, I start an awkward duck walk, peering along the bases of the rocks around me. My knees have just started screaming when I see it. Where Neil’s crime scene meets the other, more massive boulders. A black opening, not quite two feet tall. Like the narrow mouth of a subterranean cave.

  I stick my arm forward. Then I remember snakes and snatch my hand back. I dig around in my pant-leg pocket for the pencil flashlight instead. I aim the thin beam into the dark space. The light illuminates an endless well of space.

  Deep breath in. Anything coiled and forked-tongued comes popping out of that opening, I’m going to personally hunt Nemeth down and kill him. Assuming I don’t die of fright first.

  I scoot forward on my hands and knees, wincing against the rock shards digging painfully into my flesh. I’m close enough now that I can feel a waft of cool air from the opening. That seems encouraging. I sniff experimentally. Smells like dirt, which is better than other options. Where’s Daisy when I need her?

  Another deep breath. I have no choice now but to flatten out and stick my head and shoulders in. I squeeze my eyes shut. Count to three. Thrust forward.

  Forcing my eyes open, I see it’s an underground cavern of sorts. Or maybe cavern is the wrong word. More like a cave-sized air pocket formed eons ago as these boulders collapsed. It’s deeper than I expected, maybe five to six feet tall, and surprisingly wide.

  I hesitate. This space is plenty big enough to house a person. A perfect underground hunting den, where an opportunistic predator could lie in wait, then scramble up to attack before dropping back down to obscurity.

  Scott could’ve been telling the truth after all.

  I should enter and explore. Check for signs of human passage.

  I don’t want to go in there. And not just because of snakes. But because nothing good comes from exploring underground tombs. Everyone knows that.

  My only other option is to fetch Bob and Martin. I already know Marty won’t come, and Bob
. . . Well, the space isn’t that small, but neither is it that big.

  No guts, no glory, I tell myself.

  I turn around and scoot backward, feetfirst into the opening. Then I allow myself to fall into the abyss.

  * * *

  —

  I hit the ground with a puff of dirt that promptly makes me cough. I wield my flashlight like a weapon, stabbing first that dark corner, then that one, that one, that one. A spinning circle of lighted jabs.

  When nothing leaps, bites, or rattles, I finally release a shaky breath. I’m here. I’m alive. Fuck, how am I getting back up?

  I stare at the opening overhead. Not five or six feet up; more like eight.

  Another shaky breath. I’m here now. Might as well tend to the matters at hand.

  Using my flashlight, I turn my attention to the space around me. The floor isn’t really flat, but a sandy mound of dirt and pebbles that have collected in the crevices between the jumbled rocks. It shifts beneath my feet, which makes it a challenge to walk.

  This time, I check for boot impressions before taking a step. There’s a depression very close to me, then another and another. The soil is too loose to hold something as distinct as tread patterns, but from a layperson’s perspective, it certainly looks like someone has been moving around in here.

  I take a first tentative step, sliding to one side, before I find a more solid base, probably a larger rock beneath the shifting sand. I make it to the wall, where I feel the craggy edge of a bus-sized boulder. Did it break free from the cliff face a millennium ago? Was it delivered here by glaciers? Tossed by a giant?

  Bit by bit, I pick my way around the uneven perimeter. I’m not sure what I’m looking for, just evidence of human occupation.

  Nothing immediately jumps out. And yet the space doesn’t feel abandoned to me.

  Then I come across the first gap in the wall.

  Two huge boulders toppled against each other, leaving a V of empty space between them. It’s tall enough for me to wedge myself through.

  To where? Another void? Or a tighter and tighter space till my chest compresses and my lungs seize up, and I . . .

  I can’t go there. At the thought alone, my hands are shaking so hard I’ve turned my flashlight into a disco ball. I’m breathing too shallowly, my heart starting to race. All at once, this space is too dark, too scary, too empty for me.

  Forget snakes. I am already in a grave. If I can’t reach the opening above, claw my way out, Bob and Marty will never know. They’ll walk right over the top of me. Then they’ll be gone and it’s not Marty who will be joining his son forever in Devil’s Canyon.

  Why did I come to Wyoming? Why do I keep doing this to myself? Paul is dead but I’m still chasing the bullet, waiting for it to finally punch into my gut, spill my own blood. All these searches, these strangers I help find and bury. It never changes anything.

  Other people find closure, other people move on. Not me. Every place I arrive, I already see myself leave. Every door that opens, I already know will close.

  I don’t want to be me anymore. I want to be the kind of person who falls in love and stays. Who has a job other people actually understand. Who returns night after night to a place I call home.

  I want to build a time machine and go back to the night my father and I went camping. Except this time, I won’t be hungry. My father won’t have to head to the kitchen and pretend magic wood sprites are fixing us dinner. Instead, he and I will stay next to our adorably unstable tent. We’ll gaze up at the sky and watch the stars appear. We’ll share stories and he’ll know what he’s saying and who he’s saying it to.

  He’ll remain himself with me.

  Maybe I’ll lean my head against his shoulder. He’ll pat me on the top of my head. And then we’ll fall silent. We’ll just be.

  My entire life, I have always wanted to just be.

  I’m crying. I can feel the moisture on my cheeks. More salt tracks through the endless layers of grime. I don’t know why. There’s no point to my tears, no use in wishing for the lessons I never learned.

  I’m a drunk who followed in her father’s footsteps.

  Until one day he was dead. And I became sober.

  Now I live every day, spinning and wanting and wishing. But sober. Each and every day.

  Even when it hurts.

  I look up at the opening above. It appears too high, too hard. But my panic is receding, my resolve returning. If I can go each and every minute without taking another drink, then I sure as hell can do this.

  I’ve seen what I needed to see. Someone could’ve very well been hiding here, waiting for Neil. Furthermore, there are more than just the caves in the cliff wall for taking cover; there appears to be at least some kind of warren of subterranean hideouts.

  Most likely, Scott was telling the truth and someone else attacked Neil, then disappeared into this hidey-hole without any of us being the wiser.

  Someone who wasn’t just watching us, but knows this area intimately. An enraged local? Ghost of a past hiker?

  Or Timothy O’Day himself? Having made it this far, maybe he did survive. And all these years, he’s waited for his revenge?

  That doesn’t make sense to me either. But one thing’s for certain. I’m climbing my scrawny ass out of this damn tomb. Then I’m racing like hell toward Marty and Bob. Not just to tell them what I’ve learned, but to warn them as well.

  Danger is everywhere.

  And we’re much more vulnerable than we knew.

  CHAPTER 26

  I’m a panting, heaving, sweaty mess by the time I careen into Bob. He’s standing outside the opening of a large cave when I crash into him. He grabs my shoulders reflexively, then widens his eyes at my disheveled appearance.

  “Rocks. Air pockets. Den below. Caves above. Hideouts. Everywhere,” I manage to gasp out. I can’t breathe. I’ve been running ever since I crawled my way out of the underground chamber. The climb up to the opening hadn’t been so bad, with the craggy rocks providing plenty of handholds. Having to wriggle back into the exposed sun, however, wondering if our watcher was standing there, waiting for me. With a gun. Or a knife. Or a venomous snake.

  It had taken me nearly as much mental fortitude to force myself out of the subterranean cavern as it had taken me to blindly plummet into it. Then, standing up, my shoulder blades starting to itch, the fine hairs standing up on my arms . . . I’d grabbed my pack and bolted north. Veering around boulders, stumbling up rock piles, just running, running, running. The hunted hare desperate to reach safety.

  “You’re okay,” Bob says. “I got you. Here.” He reaches around me to remove my water bottle from the side pocket of my pack and hand it to me. I unscrew the top and drink desperately, water spilling down my chin in filthy rivulets.

  “Stop.” Bob pries the metal bottle from my hand. When my breathing has calmed another notch, he gives it back. “Now, come inside where it’s cooler. You can talk to Marty and me at the same time. Something about air pockets?”

  I manage to nod. My heart is slowing, my adrenaline fading. I feel faintly foolish, but still shaky. I pick my way slowly into the impressively large cave, Martin’s great discovery from yesterday.

  The space is so tall not even Bob has to worry about head space. It’s wide, too. Like, gather-twelve-of-your-closest-friends-and-enjoy-the-bonfire kind of wide. Which is where Marty is now, sitting on the rocky ground, staring at the charred remains of wood and ash, encircled by two dozen perfectly symmetrical, golf-ball-sized rocks.

  Marty’s right: The stone fire ring is a work of beauty, showing an aesthetic touch when none was required. Is this Tim’s signature? Particularly pretty campfires? Or is this how a lost, lonely hiker distracted himself? By searching through the endless supply of rubble to find the pebbles that were just right.

  Marty looks up as we approach. He isn’t just studying the rocks,
but once again touching them. As if he can still feel his son’s fingers upon them. Now he takes in my grimy appearance and frowns.

  “What the hell happened to you?”

  I do my best to explain. About subterranean pockets beneath some of the boulder piles. The potential for our watcher to be anywhere, everywhere. Above us on the cliff face. Beside us in one of the caves. Below us in a hidey-hole.

  My voice grows agitated as I speak. But Marty shows little expression. His attention appears miles away. I’m not sure he’s even listening, then I wonder if it matters.

  I don’t think Martin’s searching for his missing son anymore. He’s holding vigil for his lost family.

  “How big was the opening again?” Bob asks me when I’m done.

  “Maybe two feet high?”

  “So big enough for a male or a female.”

  “Yes. Though, couldn’t be a huge guy.” I glance at him pointedly. “But Martin- or Nemeth-sized would definitely fit.”

  “It would have to be someone who knows this area well. Even Nemeth never mentioned anything like an underground den.”

  “Gotta be a local,” I agree.

  “But why would one of the townspeople attack Neil?” Bob asks.

  “Why would anyone send threatening e-mails to warn Martin not to return? Then go through additional steps to sabotage this search before it ever began?”

  Martin finally manages a shrug in answer to all these questions. Then he returns his undivided attention to the circle of stones. I focus on Bob, who seems to be the only other functional adult.

  “Was Devil’s Canyon always the target of this year’s expedition?” I ask him.

  He nods.

  “And how many people know that?”

  “It’s public knowledge. Nemeth filed the paperwork requesting permission months ago. It’s a matter of protocol when leading an expedition into a wilderness area. Lets district rangers know what’s going on. Also, the permit can be used to launch rescue efforts if your party doesn’t return after the listed timeframe.”