Chapter 42
CHAPTER 42
FORD
We caught a break when the police received a tip from a tourist who’d been taking a selfie video from the parking lot of the park that led into the maritime forest at the center of the island. On reviewing the footage prior to posting, she spotted the girls ducking into the woods, seemingly alone. Having seen the news of the girls’ disappearance, she’d brought the footage to Carson. The video had been taken around two o’clock, and was the latest confirmed sighting. So the search had been moved to the park.
Carson was now certain that the girls were simply playing hooky and that we’d find them in the woods, maybe with a sprained ankle or broken bone that was preventing them from making it out on their own. I’d never hoped so much for normal teenage delinquent behavior in my life, but my gut said this was nothing so simple. I didn’t know if that was based on anything real or if it was because the parking lot was right near Osprey Beach, where Gwen Busby had disappeared. My brain bombarded me with memories of that other search all those years ago. Never mind that the lowering dark and the frigid rain were nothing like the bright, sticky heat of that early summer day.
I remembered Miles Busby’s panic as we’d searched and searched for his sister. The same panic bubbled beneath my skin. A desperate determination to burn the world to save my child. Had Miles been making fevered deals with whatever deity might be listening? Or had he been thinking about the looks on his parents’ faces if they failed to find her? Anticipating the blame that they’d heap on his head for failing to protect his sister? The blame he’d no doubt lived with for thirteen years.
The beam of my flashlight cut through sheets of rain, searching for any sign of my daughter. Every shadow looked like a body. Every rustle of leaves in the wind sounded like a cry for help. My heart hammered against my ribs, threatening to burst.
“Ford.” Bree’s voice anchored me, her hand squeezing my arm. “We’re going to find her.”
I nodded, not trusting myself to speak. She’d insisted on staying with me when the search parties split up, probably sensing I was close to losing it completely. The steady pressure of her touch kept me focused, kept me moving forward instead of spiraling into panic.
Somewhere in these woods was my little girl. My daughter, who I’d only just found. Who I was only beginning to know. Who trusted me to keep her safe. And I’d failed her.
“Left,” Sawyer called softly, redirecting our line to maintain the search grid.
I adjusted course, scanning the ground for any trace. A footprint, a scrap of clothing, anything that might tell us which way they went. But the rain had turned the forest floor into soup, obscuring any tracks that might have been there.
Frustrated, I lifted the beam, panning it ahead to check my course. And I saw something. A quick glint where no glint should be. I swept the light back, trying to find it again.
There. A hint of reflection from a dark knot in an old oak tree.
“Hold up.” I approached the tree, heart in my throat. Nothing natural would catch light that way.
I reached into the hollow, and my fingers touched smooth plastic. Pulling it free, I found a zip-top bag in my hand. Inside, I could make out a notebook and something else folded beside it. My hands shook. I didn’t need to open it to know that this was Peyton’s map. She took it everywhere, keeping it close like some kind of security blanket or talisman.
“What is it?” Bree asked, moving closer.
“Peyton’s map. And I think these are Ed’s notes. Her notes.” I held the bag carefully, not wanting to damage the contents. “She wouldn’t have left these behind willingly.”
Bree called out. Sawyer, Willa, Daniel, and Gabi converged on our location.
I held up the bag. “She was here. This was stuffed in the knot of that tree.”
Daniel frowned. “Why’d she shove it in there?” Concern deepened his Louisiana drawl.
“Hiding it from somebody. Nothing else makes sense.” I turned a circle. “If they were on their own up to this point and then heard someone coming, she could have shoved it in there in a hurry.” My kid was nothing if not resourceful. Her cross-country trip from Oregon proved that.
“She must have thought whoever was coming was a threat, otherwise why hide it?” Gabi said.
“And she hasn’t come back for it, so maybe she was right.” Daniel’s tone was grim. “Fan out. Maybe we’ll find some sign of which way they went.”
“Can I see that?” Bree held out her hand for the bag.
I was reluctant to let go of this last connection to Peyton, but did as she asked before turning back to the search.
“Over here!” Sawyer’s voice cut through the drumming rain.
My heart seized as I splashed through puddles toward him. He stood beneath a massive live oak, examining something caught in the lower branches.
“What is it?” My voice sounded strange in my own ears.
He pointed his flashlight at a scrap of purple fabric snagged on rough bark. “This looks like the shirt Peyton was wearing today.”
I reached out with trembling fingers to touch the torn cloth.
“There’s more.” Sawyer swept his beam across the ground. Broken branches. Churned mud. Signs of bodies hitting the ground hard. My stomach lurched as I pictured my daughter struggling against whoever had grabbed her.
“Two sets of adult-sized boot prints.” Sawyer crouched to examine the mud more closely. “Looks like they came from that direction.” He gestured toward the deeper woods. “The girls’ tracks stop here.”
I braced myself against the oak’s trunk, bile rising in my throat. This was my nightmare made real. Someone had taken my daughter. Those federal agents had been right. She’d been a target all along.
“Ford!” Bree’s sharp voice pulled me out of the fear spiral. “You need to see this.”
I hustled back to where she huddled with Gabi and Willa, the notebook open. Their faces were lit by the harsh glow of phone flashlights, casting deep shadows across their worried expressions.
“Read it.” She thrust the book toward me with trembling hands.
“I don’t think now is the time to review her thoughts on a treasure hunt.” My blood beat a frantic rhythm, urging me to act , even though I didn’t know where or how. Every second we wasted here was another second my daughter could be getting further away.
“It’s not her thoughts on the treasure hunt.”
I scanned Peyton’s neat handwriting. The pages were filled with her careful observations, each entry dated and cross-referenced like she was building a case.
“Look here.” Bree’s finger landed on a page headed ‘Island Crime Timeline.’ Her nail tapped against the paper with increasing urgency.
Below it, Peyton had meticulously documented every break-in and search that had occurred since David Galef’s murder. She’d drawn arrows connecting seemingly random events, creating a pattern I hadn’t seen before. My daughter, it seemed, had been paying far more attention to the island’s troubles than any of us had realized.
Theory: Someone’s searching for something specific. But what?
On the next page, she’d noted:
The map was created by Hillary Russell. Signature hidden in the artwork. She was David Galef’s ex-girlfriend. Coincidence?
My hands shook as I turned to the last entry.
Compared treasure maps in museum archives, as well as to the other maps made by Hillary in the gift shop. All match except one location, which does not fit the art style of the rest of the map.
Why would Hillary mark something different? What if she didn’t? What if he did? What if X doesn’t mark treasure at all? What if it marks information/evidence, and the map accidentally got mixed up with the batch destined for the museum gift shop? Maybe that’s what they were arguing about when I saw them at school.
I frowned, trying to process what Peyton was suggesting. “It’s a huge leap.” Surely my thirteen-year-old hadn’t just solved the motive for a murder that had been stumping police for weeks. It was just that she had a big, active imagination. Then again, kids sometimes saw things adults missed, their minds not yet trained to dismiss the improbable.
“Except someone broke into Pop’s place looking for something. And remember, he was insistent that she needed to be kept safe. We didn’t know why. What if they stumbled on all of this while they were doing their treasure hunt?” Bree insisted. “People knew the two of them were working on this map. If she’s right, this location could lead to the reason David Galef was murdered.”
And if someone was willing to murder Galef over that information, they likely wouldn’t bat an eye at adding to the body count. The idea of it made me break out into a cold sweat.
“The location is remote by island standards, but it isn’t far.” Willa’s finger traced the path on the map. “We can check it fast, just in case. Everyone else will continue the grid search.”
It still felt like a long shot, but it was action. In this moment, I needed to move like I needed to breathe. And if there was even the remotest chance that this was real, then I had to follow up.
“Let’s go.”