Chapter 57
The moment Liz had seen Joni’s bunk was empty, she’d known.
She hadn’t needed to pat down the pockets of her jacket to realize that the cocaine would be missing. Stupid to leave it there! Liz had been shortsighted, or maybe she just hadn’t been ready to admit how bad things were for Joni.
Now her boots pounded the hard, rocky earth as she searched the mountaintop. It was cold out here and she pulled down the sleeves of her jacket.
Glancing left, the ridgetop appeared empty as far as she could see, although a low mist hung in patches, obscuring sections. Joni must have been on the trail headed in the other direction, which descended from the peak toward forest.
“Joni?” she called into the still air.
She pushed on, her muscles stiff and unyielding. She felt unrested and dehydrated—she’d rather have been in the cabin, stoking the fire, opening a sachet of coffee while the kettle boiled, waking up gradually and forming a plan for the day.
Not this.
She rubbed her eyelids with a knuckle. They felt dry and irritated from the wood smoke and .
. . had she been crying in her sleep? There was a raw puffiness to them, and she’d woken with a heavy feeling, Patrick deeply on her mind.
This wasn’t the time to pick through the carcass of her marriage.
She needed to find Joni. Help her. Think of a way to get them all safely off the mountain.
She strode on, knees complaining, feeling rock and earth turn beneath her boots.
She rounded a large boulder marked with a red T-marker, the sight faintly reassuring. If they could support Maggie, perhaps it was possible for them to follow the trail down before the next nightfall.
In the distance, Liz noticed a pinnacle jutting from the mountainside, a platform of rock suspended from its edge. And there, standing on top, was Joni. With a rush of pleasure, she realized that this was it—the pinnacle from their school project!
Then an icy coolness flooded her body as she absorbed the scene. Joni was standing at the edge, her head tilted downward as she assessed the drop beneath her feet. One moment’s lapse in concentration—that was all it’d take.
Liz wanted to call out—tell her to step back—but she couldn’t risk startling her.
Then, suddenly, Joni moved, taking something from her pocket and turning it through her fingers. Then she raised her hand and let the object slip from her grasp, dropping it over the side of the pinnacle into the emptiness.