Chapter 1 #2
I scratch behind his ear, and he licks me again excitedly, as if he’s been alone and starved for attention for far too long. But he has clearly been well cared for, so he’s likely just enjoying the scratches.
Despite how awful I’ve felt all day, watching the people in McBride Mountain enjoy the festival while I spent my time watching them and waiting for eyes to drift my way filled with concern and question, a grin pulls at my lips.
I climb back in the truck and pull the door shut. The dog immediately leaps onto the passenger seat, tongue hanging out, tail wagging, and I lean over and pop the glove compartment to pull out a bag of beef jerky.
“You want a treat, buddy?”
He pushes up on all four paws, practically bouncing in place.
“That’s what I thought.”
I open the bag and tear off a piece, letting him nibble it from my fingers excitedly. He nudges the bag for more, and I laugh as I pull it out and let him take it. “I guess I won’t be going home alone tonight.”
* * *
LUCKY
Panic seizes my chest, squeezing so tightly that it’s all I can feel. The ache in my feet barely registers anymore as I rush down the shoulder of the narrow, winding mountain road before the sun even fully rises.
Where is he?
“Gizmo?”
My voice carries out across the pavement and disappears into the endless trees, swallowed up by the ominous mist hovering over everything.
It’s eerie.
Yet, the way it clings to the ground and rolls up the trees, covering the mountain, gives it an almost ethereal quality—like I’ve stepped off Earth and arrived in some alternate realm.
But this isn’t any realm I want to be in.
Not one where Gizmo is gone.
Despite how loudly I yell for him, I don’t hear his scurrying paws or bark of response. Only chirping birds waking to a new, bright morning in North Carolina greet me.
I try to breathe through the anxiety threatening to drown me.
You’ll find him, Lucky.
You. Will. Find. Him.
That’s what I have to keep telling myself because from the moment I woke and found him gone, it has felt like my entire world had fallen apart—what was left of it in the first place.
And in the last forty-five minutes since I realized he was missing and started my walk into town, it has only gotten worse as I near what passes as civilization out here.
It can’t be much farther now.
At least, I hope not…
The straps of my backpack bite into my shoulders, weighed down with all the items I’ve dragged with me on this trek, and every part of my body screams for a break from hiking the desolate road under my feet, but I can’t stop.
I can’t.
Not until I find him.
He has to be okay…
I won’t let myself consider what could have happened to him out in those woods in the dark.
I can’t.
If I actually thought about it, I would lose my ability to think clearly, and that’s when things go to shit—a lesson I’ve learned far too many times in too many painful ways.
The sign bearing the words Welcome to McBride Mountain looms on the side of the mountain in the distance, but rather than being welcoming, I tense up even more than I already was.
Towns are bad.
Towns mean people.
People mean questions.
Questions mean scrutiny.
And I can’t afford that.
But I can’t worry about the possible fallout of having to lie my way through McBride Mountain.
I’m on a mission—one far more important.
I have to find him.
For the millionth time this morning, I blink away the burn of unshed tears. The feeling is so foreign now. It’s been so long since I’ve allowed myself to feel anything, and even longer since I allowed myself to cry that my body forgot how—until I woke and found Gizmo gone.
He’s all I have save for the items in my backpack, and I cannot lose him.
I won’t.
The worn soles of my Chucks eat up the pavement as I make my way around the bend and spot the first buildings in the distance.
Thank God.
It feels like I’ve been walking forever, even though the sun is barely up. But maybe time just moves at a glacial pace when something so important is at stake.
Anything could have happened to him.
He could have wandered off and fallen into the water or some deep, dark ravine…
A wild animal could have gotten him—a coyote, a mountain lion, a bear…
No.
I shake my head to clear away those dark thoughts that could lead to a spiral I won’t be able to get out of, and a car slows as it passes me, the driver leaning forward to glance out his window at me.
Wide eyes take me in before he speeds up again and drives into town.
Shit.
Wincing, I angle my head down, using my bright blue dyed hair to conceal my face.
It seemed like a good plan at the time I did it—change my appearance, do something that I normally never would so no one will recognize me, hide by being loud. But people always say hindsight is twenty-twenty, and now, the way it is going to draw attention to me seems like a horrible idea.
What the hell were you thinking?
Once the car is well past me, I tuck my locks behind my ear and continue my hike into town, keeping my head dipped as a few people who are up at the asscrack of dawn start to trickle past in their vehicles.
I walk past a stop sign that seems so lonely and out of place on the empty road and almost laugh, scanning all directions of zero traffic to search for any sign of a vet’s office.
If someone found him, that’s where they would have brought him to get scanned for a microchip. At least, that’s what anyone with any human decency would do, but I’ve experienced the worst of human nature and know not all people are good.
Some are inherently evil and get off on the pain and suffering of others.
Unfortunately, that’s most people.
Hopefully, someone found him and is one of the few good ones…
That’s the thought I cling to as I proceed onto Main Street.
Directly in front of me on the sidewalk, a massive wood carving of an eagle holding what looks to be a croissant stands in front of one of the cute shops.
A light breeze picks up, and an incredible smell hits me.
My mouth waters instantly, my stomach churning, reminding me I haven’t eaten a real, sit-down, full meal in almost a week.
Chocolate.
Sugar.
Cookies.
I would know that smell anywhere.
A memory flashes through my head, one of the very few good ones that resides there, of baking chocolate chip cookies in a small kitchen with flour on my cheeks and joy filling my heart.
With it, a smile starts to pull at my lips.
But it quickly vanishes, replaced by the reality of the situation.
There isn’t any time to stop for a snack. There isn’t any time to stop for anything.
If I don’t find him…
That burn returns to my eyes, blurring the sidewalk under my feet as I keep my head dipped slightly.
Don’t even think that way, Lucky.
You will.
He isn’t gone.
I know that, deep in my gut, but I haven’t been able to stop wondering if some wild animal got him in the night. Or if he could have run out onto the road and got hit and whoever did it grabbed his little body and took it with them.
A door opens to my right, and I jerk at the sound, spinning toward an older woman with her white hair tied back in a bun. She offers me a friendly smile, stepping out from below a sign that says “Claire’s Bakery” in hand-painted letters. “Hello, dear. You’re up early.”
Holy hell.
I press my hand over my chest, trying to calm my thudding heart as I force myself to smile back at her. “Hello. I, um…lost my dog. I’m wondering if you might have seen him, or if there’s a vet’s office where someone might have brought him to get scanned for a microchip?”
Her brow furrows. “A dog? What does he look like?”
“He’s a French bulldog. Mostly white with a dark patch over his left eye.”
The woman’s eyes brighten. “He sounds adorable, but I’m sorry, I haven’t seen him. Where did you lose him?”
Shit.
I am not about to delve into where I spent last night with anyone in McBride Mountain—or anywhere, for that matter—and the way she’s assessing me, sizing me up, I can already tell more questions are coming if I don’t get on my way. “Um…thank you for your help.”
She smiles, still watching me carefully as I take my first steps to move on down Main Street. “If you want to check with the vet, he’s all the way down and over a block north, but he isn’t open this early.”
Crap.
“You could wait at the diner just up the street. It’s near the vet’s office. Or you could step in here and have a cookie.” She motions back toward her bakery. “They’ll be done in a few minutes.”
My stomach grumbles again.
A cookie does sound nice, but I want to be as close to the vet as possible so I can get there first thing when he opens. And I can already tell Claire isn’t going to stop asking questions if I step into her place. “Thank you, I appreciate your help. I’ll head over to the diner now and wait.”
She nods. “No problem, dear. I hope you find him.”
Her eyes follow me as I walk away.
They always do.
In these types of towns, strangers get a lot of attention. Which means I need to find Gizmo and get out of McBride Mountain as soon as possible.
I glance up at a sign draped across the road, announcing a Memorial Day Festival that must have happened yesterday, so I might be in luck.
Maybe there are enough tourists here for the festivities that no one will notice me too much.
Just one more stranger lingering after the long weekend to enjoy the North Carolina scenery.
If I’m lucky.
But the irony of my name is that I never have been.
I hustle down Main Street, lined with more carvings of animals in front of various businesses as it starts to come more alive—a few more cars and trucks, several people coming out of the shops that line the sidewalk to set out signs and brush off the areas in front with brooms, but every single set of eyes watches me as I move past them.
“You haven’t seen a French bulldog have you?”
Each person I ask shakes their head and offers me luck in finding him, and the irony is not lost on me.
My skin crawls at all the attention focused on me the longer I’m out here on Main Street, and I tip my head down slightly while keeping my attention focused on my target: the small diner that’s just ahead on the right.
I glance at my watch and find it’s not even seven yet, which means the vet is unlikely to open for at least another hour, perhaps later.
Shit.
That means killing time.
A lot of it.
I pause at the small parking lot for Wilson’s Diner. A carved bear holding a picnic basket stands directly outside the front door, and only one truck sits in the dozen or so spots, so at least there won’t be very many people in there while I wait.
Gathering my nerves, I approach the front door and tug it open.
A bell jingles over my head, and I step in.
The smells of breakfast hit me instantly.
Oh, my God.
Bacon.
Eggs.
Pancakes.
Toast.
My stomach rumbles even harder, and I place my hand over it in a useless attempt to quiet the sound before anyone hears it.
A woman with dark hair graying at her temples stands behind the counter, wiping it down. She smiles at me. “Can I help you, honey?”
“Hi, I, um…just need to sit for a little while, while I wait for the vet to open.”
Her brow furrows. “The vet?”
“I lost my dog. You haven’t seen him, have you? He’s—”
“I have him.”
The deep voice rumbles through me like an avalanche charging down the mountain about to engulf me completely, raising goosebumps on my skin as it somehow simultaneously heats it.
I freeze on the spot, slowly turning my head toward the man seated in the corner booth with a half-eaten breakfast plate in front of him.
Mossy green eyes lock squarely on me, but I tear my gaze away and down to a very familiar dog curled up in his lap who doesn’t seem at all concerned about the fact that he hasn’t seen me since last night.
“Gizmo!” I rush across the restaurant toward the booth, and Gizmo finally lifts his head and tilts it, as if he’s surprised I’m there. “Oh, my God, I was so worried!”
Without even considering the huge stranger sitting on the bench seat, I bend down and scoop Giz up into my arms from the man’s lap. I clutch him to me as the man assesses me with an intensity that raises the hair on the back of my neck.
Retreating a step, I examine him the same way he is me.
Heavily tattooed, muscled arms encased in a tight t-shirt are crossed over his barrel chest beneath his broad shoulders as he reclines slightly against the back of the booth.
The man with the dark coppery-red hair screams danger and would be intimidating to anyone, and given how Gizmo usually reacts to strangers, let alone men, there’s only one way this guy could have him.
I straighten my spine and glare at him. “Why the hell did you steal my dog?”