Chapter Twenty-Six
The water was higher than he’d expected.
As soon as Jake crossed Whisper Creek—now a churning, mud-slick ribbon overwhelming the low spot of Orchard Lane—he knew he wasn’t getting back that way.
The current had swallowed half the road already and every second that passed made it more dangerous.
One bad slide, or more likely hydroplaning, and the truck would be dragged down into the drainage ditch or thrown into a tree. Or worse.
The rain lashed the windshield in frenzied sheets, wipers barely keeping up. Branches whipped against the side of the truck as Jake turned onto the overgrown, unpaved road that led to the rotting equipment shed, headlights bouncing off thick bushes and towering cypress trees.
He gripped the wheel tighter. Bobby was out here alone.
Trapped. Scared. Ryan had said he was in the storage shed, but what if Bobby left, tried to walk home?
What if he was on the ATV and got stuck in the creek?
Or thrown off in a ditch? Every bad thing that could have happened to his little brother ran through Jake’s head.
Jake couldn’t even call this road a driveway.
The path was a mess of roots, stones, and axle-deep mud.
Parallel impressions in the mud were deep, caused by years of heavy equipment coming and going.
The tires spun more than once, and the truck groaned in protest, slipping sideways before finally catching enough traction to crawl forward.
Jake cursed as he lurched over a sunken dip that nearly swallowed the front end.
A wall of rain blurred everything beyond the high beams.
The trees parted at last, revealing the sagging silhouette of the old equipment shed. It hunched against the storm like a wounded animal.
Jake exhaled a shaky breath. He hadn’t realized how tightly he’d been holding his chest until now.
He pulled in as close as he could—there was no room to turn around, only a wall of brush and storm-thrashed trees.
The branches beat the shed’s siding like they were trying to claw their way in.
Lightning cracked nearby, followed by a roll of thunder that vibrated through the cab of the truck.
Jake stepped out; boots instantly swallowed by standing water. Not just mud—liquid dirt, thick, cold enough to bite. His flashlight beam shook as he trudged toward the shed, ten feet feeling like a hundred. Each step threatened to trap him in the muck. And if they had to walk out of here …
He didn’t finish the thought. They might be stuck here all night.
No. Mom needed him, he would get back to the ranch as soon as physically possible.
The shed door creaked open under his hand, groaning on rusted hinges.
Inside, it was little better than outside.
The walls blocked most of the wind and rain, though the wood floor was rotting and cobwebs hung thick in the corners.
The only dry space was the loft above, but even that looked like it might fall down any second.
A rust-streaked tractor sat in the middle of the space, listing to one side.
Fifty years ago it had been a state-of-the-art farm tool. Now it was junk.
“Bobby?” Jake called, his voice low but sharp.
Silence, then a small voice. “Up here!”
Jake raised the light. Bobby peered over the edge of the loft, soaked to the bone, his brown hair flattened against his forehead. He looked small. Lightning flashed again, illuminating his brother’s pale, muddy face—and for a brief second, Jake saw how scared he really was.
Scared, but safe.
“You okay?” Jake asked.
Bobby nodded. “Yeah … I guess so. Just a second!” He ducked back out of view.
Jake sighed, more out of relief than frustration. He closed the door behind him to get some respite from the driving rain. Even with his slicker and hat, he was drenched.
The floor squelched under his boots. The smell of mildew and old oil made his nose wrinkle in disgust—from the scent and the fact that the Mendozas hadn’t maintained the small barn or anything in it for decades.
Something—a rat, maybe—scurried across a support beam above. Then the loft creaked.
“Here!” Bobby reappeared, holding out a plastic jug and a wire cage. “I didn’t want to leave them behind.”
Jake frowned as he walked over to the ladder. Bobby was too far up for Jake to just reach out and grab the items. He eyed the ladder. It bowed in the middle, half the rungs dark with rot. How the hell had Bobby climbed that thing?
“Hold on.” Jake tested it. The first rung bent. The second cracked under his weight. He reached as far as he dared—then the rung beneath him gave way.
He jumped back just in time, boots sliding. His knee slammed into the ground. The ladder leaned sideways like a dying tree, but remained mostly upright.
Bobby’s face paled. “Are you okay?”
“Yes. Be careful.”
“Can I drop them?”
“Leave everything,” Jake said. “We’ll come back—”
“But what if we find Cleo?” Bobby’s voice cracked.
“We’re not looking for that damn cat, Bobby!” Jake snapped, sharper than he meant. “Whisper Creek has flooded its banks, we have to go the long way home. We don’t have time to look for a cat.”
Bobby hesitated … then dropped the cage anyway.
Jake didn’t try to catch it. The metal clanged on the ground beside him.
Then Bobby stepped onto the ladder—and it gave way completely.
“Bobby!” Jake dove forward just as his brother fell, limbs flailing. He caught him hard, the boy’s slight weight knocking him backwards. They crashed onto the muddy ground together, Jake grunting as his back hit hard.
They didn’t move for a moment.
Then Bobby clung to him.
“I was so scared,” he whispered, voice muffled against Jake’s chest.
Jake tightened his arms around him. “I know, kid. I know.”
But Jake sensed it wasn’t just the fall Bobby was talking about.
“You were here alone a long time,” he said softly. “That would scare anybody.”
Bobby shook his head, breath hitching. “Not that.” A pause. “Avery. She was tied up.”
Jake’s chest tightened. That must have been terrifying for his little brother.
He sat up slowly, pulling Bobby with him. The storm outside raged louder now, wind howling through the cracks in the walls. “I know. Mom knows. We think that the people who went to the Mendozas’ house robbed Greg Baldwin and then got stuck in the storm last night.”
“I saw one of the men earlier and hid in the barn. I knew Avery was in trouble, but I was so afraid of being seen I hid.”
“You did the right thing.”
“But what if I could have gotten help earlier? And when the man left, I went to help, but Avery was all tied up in Gianna’s room. And there were still people there. We have to get her!”
Bobby was ten, he was old enough to know the truth.
“I talked to Mom before I came here. She went to the Mendozas, and they’re fine, but the two people who were with that man you saw, they took Avery.”
“It’s my fault!” Bobby sobbed.
“You are a ten-year-old kid who hid from kidnappers, Bobby. You got away and you got help. You called Ryan, right? I wouldn’t have known where you were if you hadn’t told him. You did the right thing.”
But Bobby was shaking his head, eyes wide and wet. “She saw me, and I ran. I should’ve stayed. I should’ve done something. I could have gotten help. I could have!”
Jake wrapped an arm around his brother’s shoulders and held him tighter. “You did what you had to do. And we’re going to find her, okay? We’ll get her back.”
But his gut twisted. He knew what these people were capable of. They had shot Greg Baldwin and his dog. They were ruthless and likely scared of being caught. Panicked criminals were even more dangerous, like a trapped animal.
At that moment, Jake missed his dad more than ever. He was supposed to be the man of the house now, and he was terrified that something bad would happen to Avery, something that Jake couldn’t stop.
His dad had been a rock. He never raised his voice, but a stern look was more effective than a verbal lashing.
He never raised his hand, but his quiet, “I’m disappointed in you, you know better,” was more effective than a beating.
He never held a grudge, his punishments were more instructive than punitive, and he taught Jake everything about farming, the land, the animals.
“It’s in your blood, son, like it’s in mine. Whatever you do with your life, you’ll end up here.”
The last time Jake had seen his dad was the morning he died.
Jake was driving to school, Avery in the front seat reading—Jake never understood how she could read in the car, but that’s what she did almost every morning on their drive to school.
Lyla was in the backseat staring out the window, her expression tight, brow furrowed, as if she was trying to figure out the cure for cancer.
And Bobby was chattering away about how he and Grandma had seen a fox when they picked blackberries that morning before school.
Jake had turned down Privett Road, past the Coulters’ land, down to the small section that his family owned just south of the Coulters, where their cattle currently grazed.
His dad was on his horse, riding back and forth to urge the cows east, where it would be easier to divide and load those they planned to sell Wednesday at the auction in Gainesville.
Jake was taking the day off school to help—a lot of kids did—and it was one of his favorite chores.
Jake was definitely more a cattle rancher than a farmer, while his dad preferred farming.
In fact, it had been Jake who’d convinced him a couple years back to increase their cattle because they were consistently turning a profit at market.
Jake honked, and his dad turned to look at them. John McKenna smiled, raised his hand in greeting. Bobby said—though their dad couldn’t hear—“Hi, Daddy!” and waved frantically from the backseat. “Jake, Daddy said I can go to market with you on Wednesday!”
Yeah, Jake knew. He wasn’t all that thrilled about it. His little brother was excitable and annoying and asked way too many questions.
Jake honked again as he passed, glanced at his dad in the rearview mirror.
He was still watching the truck, looking like a giant atop the horse.
Jake wanted to be the man his dad was. Strong, hardworking, loyal.
He wanted to raise his family here, at Whisper Creek Ranch.
They were expanding, and he could build a house for his own wife and kids. Someday.
He pushed aside the memory, which with everything else going on today threatened to bring him to tears, and said to Bobby, “We need to go. You okay?”
“Yeah. We’re going to find Avery, right?”
“Yes. Mom talked to Sheriff Perez.”
“I called Ryan on the radio because I didn’t want to go on our family channel because the bad guys have Avery’s radio. I didn’t want them to hear.”
“That was very smart,” Jake said, and meant it. Then he looked down and noticed that Bobby’s feet were bare. He hadn’t noticed at first because they were caked with mud.
“Where the hell are your shoes?” Jake asked, scanning the shed again. He looked up toward the loft.
“I lost ’em. In the field. When I was running.”
No shoes, broken ladder, rising creeks, and more than two miles of back roads between here and the house because they couldn’t go home the short way.
A flash of lightning illuminated the old barn, then the thunder hit fast, like a monster closing in.
“We need to go now,” Jake said. “Before we can’t.”
His cell phone wasn’t getting a signal, so he took out his radio. “Mom, it’s Jake. Over.”
A moment later, his mom came on. “I’m here, did you find Bobby? Over.”
“Yes. He’s here with me. We’re not going to be able to go back over the creek. I’m going around the long way, but I don’t know how long it’s going to take. Over.”
“Be safe. Over.”
Bobby grabbed the radio. “Mom, where’s Avery? Jake said she’s missing. What happened?” A second later, he pressed the button again. “Over.”
Her answer came right back. “Sheriff Perez is looking for her. They’re also looking for the Mendozas’ truck. We’ll find her. Over.”
“I know what the other truck looks like,” Bobby said. “It’s a black Ram truck with four doors. And it had a Louisiana license plate. I memorized it—223HPW. Over.”
Jake hit his brother lightly on the arm. “Wow, Bobby, that was smart.”
Bobby grinned sheepishly, then said, “It’s only smart if we can find Avery.”
The radio beeped and their mom said, “I have a pen, can you repeat that? It’s 223 and? Over.”
“HPW, over,” Bobby said.
“Thank you, Bobby. Be safe out there, both of you. Over.”
Jake got up, pulled Bobby to his feet. “You okay walking to the truck?”
Bobby nodded. “Do you think Cleo is okay? Do you think she found a safe place to wait out the storm?”
The cat again. “Yeah, I think she did,” Jake said. He opened the door and they stepped out into the driving rain.