Chapter Twenty Three
Missing Ranger
Rachel Williams
Bishop covers me with the blanket and sheets and throws on his pants, going to check the door and see who is still fucking knocking.
We were having a moment.
Watching as he opens it and has an urgent conversation held in whispers, I wait impatiently to hear what the hell required immediate notification before the sun is even out.
By the time he closes the door, I am dreading what he’s going to say.
He doesn’t look up right away. He goes to the table with all the files. His fingers move over the pages, tracing lines, flipping back and forth between reports like he’s stitching something together only he can see.
When he finally lifts his head, his eyes are sharp…too sharp. The kind of sharp that means he’s found something he wishes he hadn’t.
“Beth is missing.” He says without looking up.
Fuck. “How do they know?”
“Her truck is here, but there is no sign of her. But there was apparently a struggle in her cabin.” He says in monotone.
That can’t be all.
“What is it?” I ask, sitting up fully now, the blanket pooling around my waist.
He exhales, slow and steady, his eyes roaming over my naked body again. But I can see the tension in the way his jaw flexes. “The reports… they don’t match.”
I slide off the bed, padding toward him. “What do you mean?”
He taps a page, then another. “The times. The ME estimates. The ranger logs. They’re wrong. All of them. Wrong in the same way.”
I lean closer, reading the lines he points to. The numbers blur for a moment…too early in the morning, too cold in the cabin, but then I see it. The mismatch. The impossible timeline.
“They found the bodies before they should’ve been dead,” he says.
A chill crawls up my spine.
“So they were moved,” I whisper.
“Staged,” he corrects softly. “Placed.”
I swallow hard. The idea of someone arranging bodies like props makes my stomach twist. “Why would the ME ignore that?”
He shakes his head. “Not ignore. Someone fed them the wrong information. Someone who knew how to make it look natural.”
I look at him then. His shoulders are tight, his eyes darker than usual, his whole body coiled like he’s bracing for impact.
“You think the killer has help?” I ask.
“I think he has access,” Bishop answers. “To reports. To systems. To people who don’t ask questions.”
The cabin creaks, a long, low groan that makes me glance toward the window.
The woods outside are black, silent, too still.
And suddenly I feel it again, that prickle at the back of my neck.
The sense of being watched. The same feeling I had earlier, before Bishop fucked me against the window like he was trying to crawl inside me.
He felt it too. I know he did.
“Bishop…” I whisper.
He doesn’t turn toward the window, but his eyes flick there, just once, just enough to confirm what I already know.
“He was out there,” I say. “Tonight.”
Bishop’s voice is low, steady, terrifyingly certain. “Yes.”
The air feels colder. The cabin smaller. The woods closer.
And the truth settles between us like a shadow.
The rage hits first. Hot and humiliating. Then the shame follows, colder, heavier, settling in my chest like a stone I can’t cough up.
The killer isn’t just hunting. He’s watching.
And Bishop sent out a message.
A message he knew the killer would see. A message he didn’t warn me about. A message he didn’t even ask me about.
I don’t trust my voice. I don’t trust my face. I don’t trust myself not to break open in front of him, so I turn away. Before he can say anything, before he can look at me with that calm, controlled expression that makes me want to scream.
The bathroom is the only place to go.
Barely a door between us.
But it’s a door I can lock.
I slam it shut and twist the lock hard enough my fingers ache. The sound is too loud in the tiny space, echoing off tile and mirror. I stand there for a second, breathing like I’ve run a mile, hands shaking.
He knew we were being watched. He knew someone was out there. He knew; and he served me up as the main event.
Why? Why would he do that? Why wouldn’t he tell me?
I turn the shower on, the water roaring to life, drowning out everything else. Tears fill my eyes, blurring the edges of the world, every muscle tight, every thought spiraling.
I step under the spray.
The water is freezing. Good. I need the distraction.
I press my palms to the tile and bow my head, letting the cold hit the back of my neck, my shoulders, my spine. My breath comes out in sharp bursts, each one carrying a piece of the fury I can’t voice.
I want to scream at him. I want to demand answers. I want to ask why he keeps making choices that involve me without ever including me.
But I can’t say any of it. Not yet. Not when my voice would crack. Not when my anger is tangled with fear and something worse. Something that feels like betrayal.
He should have told me. He should have trusted me. He should have….
A sob punches up my throat, but I swallow it down hard, refusing to let it out. I brace myself against the wall, forehead pressed to the tile, water pounding over me like it’s trying to wash the thoughts out of my skin.
I’m furious. I’m humiliated.
I’m scared.
And underneath all of it, buried deep where I don’t want to look, is the truth: I’m hurt.
Because Bishop didn’t protect me. He didn’t warn me. He didn’t choose me.
He chose the hunt.
I can deal with this. I can. Beth is missing. I need to function.
She needs our help.
I just need to scrub him off of me before I go insane.
Finally ready to face him, I step out of the bathroom in a towel and head for my bags to get dressed. He’s standing in the same spot, frozen his posture tight, his eyes tracking me the second I step out.
He looks like he wants to say something; explain, apologize, justify it; but I don’t give him the chance.
“Get dressed.”
My voice is flat. Controlled. Barely holding together.
He straightens. “Rachel-”
“Now.” I don’t raise my voice. I don’t have to. The word lands like a command, like a line drawn in the floorboards between us. “Beth is missing.”
I see it hit, calculation, flashing through his eyes in a single heartbeat. He’s already reaching for his shirt, already moving, already shifting into the version of himself that reacts instead of thinks.
But I’m not done.
“We don’t have time for whatever this is,” I say, gesturing between us, I think its best if we don’t.
The cabin feels smaller. The woods feel closer. The danger feels sharper.
I grab my coat from the hook, shoving my arms through the sleeves. “We’re wasting time.”
“Rachel,” he says quietly, “you shouldn’t go out there angry.”
I stop. Turn. Look him dead in the eyes.
“I’m not angry,” I lie. “I’m focused.”
He studies me for a beat. Long enough to know I’m lying, short enough to know he can’t push it.
He finishes dressing, holsters his weapon, grabs the flashlight.
I open the door to the night, the cold slamming into me like a warning.
“Let’s go,” I say. “Beth needs us.”
The cold hits me first when we step outside; sharp enough to sting my cheeks, enough to make the anger in my chest feel even hotter.
Bishop moves beside me, silent, scanning the tree line like he’s already tracking something. I don’t look at him. I can’t. Not yet.
We head toward the trail near Beth’s cabin where David is waiting, our boots crunching through frost-stiff leaves. The woods are too quiet. No wind. No animals. Just the kind of silence that feels placed.
We don’t get far before Bishop stops like he’s been punched.
I follow his gaze.
There, hanging from a low branch at eye level, is something small. Deliberate.
A strip of fabric from Beth’s pajamas.
Her flannel, blue and white, torn clean, the edges too straight to be accidental. It sways slightly in the still air, like someone touched it moments ago. Like someone wanted it to be found.
My stomach drops.
David stares at it with horror.
Bishop steps closer, but I grab his arm before he can touch it. “Don’t,” I say, my voice tight.
He nods once, jaw clenched.
But it’s not just the fabric.
Below it, pressed into the dirt, is a footprint. Not Beth’s. Larger. Deeper. The heel angled toward the cabin, toward us, as if the killer stood here, watching, waiting, deciding exactly where to leave his clue.
A chill crawls up my spine.
“He wants us to follow,” I whisper.
Bishop’s eyes narrow. “He wants you to follow.”
The words hit like a slap. I swallow hard, forcing myself to look at the fabric again. The branch it hangs from is low enough that Beth could’ve brushed it accidentally. But she didn’t. She wouldn’t tear her own shirt. And she wouldn’t leave it behind like this.
This was placed. Arranged.
A breadcrumb.
A lure.
I take a step back, suddenly aware of how exposed we are. How close the trees press in. How easily someone could be watching from the dark.
“He’s ahead of us,” I say. “He’s been ahead of us the whole time.”
Bishop doesn’t argue. He doesn’t soften it. He doesn’t try to reassure me.
He just says, “We’re going after her.”
I nod, even though fear is clawing at my ribs. Even though my hands are shaking. Even though the killer left this for us like a hunter marking the start of a trail.
I turn toward the deeper woods.
“Let’s move.”
David and Bishop fall in beside me, silent, tense, ready.
The killer wanted us to find him.
So we will.
We move fast, David leading with the flashlight, Bishop beside him, me just behind, scanning every inch of the ground like Beth might be hiding in the leaves. The woods feel wrong. Like the killer is walking just ahead of us, leaving the trail he wants us to follow.
The torn flannel wasn’t the only message. I can feel it.
We push deeper into the trees, following the faint depressions in the frost where Beth’s boots moved off the main trail. She wasn’t wandering. She was running. The prints are uneven, staggered, like she kept looking over her shoulder.
“Rachel,” David calls softly. “Over here.”
I hurry to him.
He’s crouched beside a patch of disturbed earth; leaves kicked aside, a scuff mark in the dirt. Bishop kneels next to him, eyes narrowing.
“She struggled,” Bishop says.
But I’m already moving past them, something catching my eye a few feet away. A glint. Small. Metallic.
I kneel and brush away the leaves.
My breath catches.
Beth’s necklace. The silver she was wearing. The chain is snapped clean, sharp, like it was yanked hard enough to break.
“She fought,” I whisper.
Bishop is beside me in an instant. “Rachel-”
“She fought,” I repeat, louder this time, anger and fear twisting together until my voice shakes. “She didn’t just go with him. She fought.”
I hold up the broken chain. The pendant is missing; ripped off, maybe taken.
David swears under his breath. “She wouldn’t let herself be taken without a fight.”
“No,” I say, standing, clutching the chain so tightly it digs into my palm. “She wouldn’t.”
Bishop looks around the clearing, his jaw tight, his whole body coiled. “He left this for us.”
I turn to him. “Why?”
“To show he’s in control,” Bishop says. “To show he’s ahead of us. To show he can take someone right under our noses.”
I shake my head. “No. That’s not all.”
They both look at me.
“He left this,” I say, holding up the chain, “because he wants us to know Beth fought back.”
David frowns. “Why would he want that?”
I swallow hard.
“Because he wants us angry.”
The woods seem to close in around us, the shadows shifting like they’re listening.
“He wants us emotional,” I continue. “He wants us off balance. He wants us to follow him without thinking.”
Bishop’s eyes lock on mine; sharp, understanding.
“He’s baiting us,” Bishop says.
“Yes,” I whisper. “And he’s using Beth to do it.”
The wind finally stirs, brushing through the branches like a warning.
I tuck Beth’s broken chain into my pocket.
“We keep going,” I say. “But we do it smart.”
Bishop nods once. David tightens his grip on the flashlight.
And together, we follow the trail the killer laid out. Knowing he’s watching.