Chapter 3
Afew hours later, I set out for my long-awaited week away from everything. I shot a glance at the heavy gray sky hanging over skeletal tree branches. The news reports had been spot-on. Weather was moving in. The air teased my cold nose, damp with a hint of something fresh and clean. I knew that scent—the promise of snow.
We didn”t get snow often in these mountains anymore. Not like when I was a child. Back then, we had a few good snowstorms every year, canceling school and leaving the forest blanketed in white. The snow rarely lasted long, except in the most shaded parts of the woods, but I loved the quiet, loved the way trails of animal footprints would appear, one by one—tiny divots from the chipmunks and the squirrels, the bigger tracks of the deer.
A flake drifted down through the branches, white and tiny. I stopped and looked up at the heavy gray sky above the trees. More flakes fell to dust the cold ground. That wasn’t a good sign. A big, fat snowflake usually meant low accumulation. Tiny flakes meant we were in for some real snow.
I kept walking. I wasn’t turning back. I”d been looking forward to this too much. For the first time in a year, I was leaving Heartstone Manor behind. Despite the foreboding weather, I felt lighter with every step, the woods surrounding me, protecting me from the Manor. I needed this break. I needed to get away. Not from my family, but from Heartstone.
When I first heard the terms of my father”s will, I’d been shocked to learn he’d left us anything at all, especially his daughters. And then that codicil, Prentice’s final fuck you to his children. I didn’t want his money, but if I wanted to keep my business, I had to live in that fucking house for five long years. I”d fled Heartstone for college when I was seventeen. Ford made sure Prentice didn’t notice that I never again slept another night under Heartstone’s roof. Not until Prentice was dead.
Since I”d been back, I spent almost every night in my hammock under the trees. The few times there’d been heavy rain or strong winds, and Griffen had asked me to stay in the house, I’d acquiesced but barely slept, the memories sneaking back in the dark to keep me awake.
I knew there was no one living in Heartstone Manor who would hurt me. Not now. Not under Griffen”s watch. Not with Hawk there to keep us safe. I knew no one would hurt me, but my subconscious wasn’t buying it. The terrified girl inside me didn’t believe. My hammock was safe. The Manor was filled with secret nightmares.
I picked up my pace, step by step, putting distance between me and the Manor. There was a hush in the woods as I moved deeper into the trees. The quiet pressed in on me, the falling snow a layer of insulation, muffling everything. No birdsong. No crackle of leaves as squirrels raced around the forest floor. Even the rising wind was nearly silent.
It was the snow. Of course, it was the snow. We hadn’t had weather like this for most of the winter. There’d been a flurry or two, and school had been delayed once or twice for freezing rain, but not much more than that. The newscasters had been talking about this storm hitting hard farther north. Maybe they’d been off, and we were going to get more than we bargained for.
I gave a mental shrug. I could handle this. The snow was coming down faster with every minute, but visibility was good, and my footing was solid on the trail. Even at this relaxed pace, the cabin was less than an hour”s hike. Once I was there, I could wait out any weather the North Carolina mountains could throw at me. If I”d been in Maine or Montana, I might have taken a different approach, but here? I”d be fine.
I shifted my pack, squinting into the branches above to gauge the falling snow. Was it coming faster, or had the wind picked up? Either way, I wasn’t turning back. I took a deep, icy breath, the cold air freezing the inside of my nose, my eyes watering.
Something tickled between my shoulder blades, and I looked behind me.
Nothing but my tracks in the snow. The woods were still and silent. I was alone. I turned back to the trail and forced myself to keep moving despite the lingering sense of being watched. It was the snow throwing me off. I thought of the mama bear from this morning. No, I wasn’t prey to her, especially with this pack making me look twice my size. And she”d already had her wander in the woods this morning. With this snow and the temperature dropping, she”d be tucked up tight in her den with her cubs.
In theory, there were plenty of things in these woods that could hurt me, but this close to the Manor and town, it seemed unlikely. We didn”t have any major predators in these mountains. People said there were still cougars out there, but the only ones I”d ever seen were at the nature center in Asheville. Every once in a while, somebody posted a picture on social media, swearing it was of a cougar hanging out on their back porch. But the pictures always turned out to be faked or taken in California.
There was nothing here big enough to cause me harm, I reminded myself, resisting the urge to stop and look behind me. I was just tweaked by the bears from this morning. Those cubs had been cute but way too close.
My hand drifted to my pack where I”d stored my nine-millimeter. I’d packed it more out of habit than anything else. I knew my way around these woods, and I wasn’t worried about bears or other wildlife. Or other humans. The people who hiked these woods were ninety-nine percent nature lovers like me. Still, it paid to be cautious. When I was alone in the forest, I carried the gun, just in case.
It wasn’t a big deal. My father had taught all of us to handle a gun when we were kids. I tried to go to the range every few months to keep my skills sharp. I’d only used the gun a few times. Once to scare off a fellow hiker who thought he could take advantage of our isolation to get what he wanted. With him, all I’d had to do was pull the gun and aim it at his balls. We hadn’t been that far from the trailhead. I’d held the gun on him until we got back to the parking lot, and I could call West, our police chief. The second time, I’d used it to fire a warning shot at a black bear that had wandered too close. That time, the blast of the bullet had been enough to scare off the bear.
In all the years I’d been disappearing into these woods, I’d only used the gun those two times. I packed it anyway. There were more than bears in these woods. We had coyotes, bobcats, and foxes. Of the three, the coyotes were the most likely to cross my path now that the fox and bobcat populations had been winnowed down by humans. Nothing would be out hunting in this weather, especially not for something as big as a human.
There was nothing out here to worry about except the weather.
I slowed when I reached the spot where the trail split into three narrower trails. The one on the far left circled back to the Manor. The one on the right dropped down the hillside. If I followed it far enough, I’d end up at the Inn at Sawyers Bend. I stayed on the center trail, the one that led to the cabin. Squinting at the sky as I walked, I watched the snow fall, the clouds above dark against the trees.
This part of the trail to the cabin could be hard to navigate on a good day. With the light dimmed by the clouds and falling snow, only someone who knew the way would be able to find it. Not a problem for me. I could walk this trail blindfolded. So why did something feel off?
Turning, I looked behind me, surprised to see all but my closest tracks already covered by snow. I wasn’t turning around, despite the weather and the itch between my shoulder blades. I scanned the silent woods. Nothing moved. Not a squirrel. Not a bird. Nothing.
Shaking my head, I unzipped the side pouches on the right side of my pack and pulled out the nine-millimeter and a compact holster I could clip into my waistband. The gun on my hip didn’t help, mostly because I couldn’t figure out what had me so spooked. The snow? The quiet?
I resettled my pack back on my shoulders, scanned the woods yet again, and forced myself to move forward. It was either that or turn back, and turning back was not an option. All I could think about was the cabin—the firewood I”d carefully stocked up over the last few weeks, the hot cocoa packets in the cupboard, along with powdered milk, soup, and tins of beef stew. I’d even brought out fresh eggs and a half gallon of ice cream a few days before.
This was a vacation, after all, and I planned to make the most of it. If it kept snowing like this, tomorrow the woods would be a gorgeous fairyland, sparkling in the sunshine that always came after a winter storm.
I wanted the fairyland, and it was only a short hike away. Setting one foot in front of the other, I kept my eyes on the trail. I knew where I was, but visibility wasn’t great in the snow. I’d been around long enough to know that even the experienced could get into trouble in the woods if they got careless. Step by step, I noted landmarks and kept moving, the itch between my shoulder blades ever-present, driving me forward.
I tried to shake off my unease. I couldn’t help stopping and turning to look behind me again. Nothing. My footsteps filling in from the rapidly falling snow, winter-bare trees, and glimpses of gray clouds above. Nothing else. I stood there for too long, fighting a war in my head.
Something”s off.
Go home.
Now.
If I went home and the snow kept coming down like this, it was unlikely I”d be able to make it back to the cabin before my vacation days ran out. If I didn”t go now, I couldn’t go at all. I had hikes and fishing trips booked after my return, and I wouldn’t cancel and ruin my clients’ vacations just because mine had been ruined.
And it would only be ruined if I was a wuss and went home because of a little snow and a case of the creeps. There was nothing out here.
Right hand floating over the gun at my hip, I turned back to the trail, gauging my distance from the cabin. If I kept a good pace, it couldn’t be more than twenty minutes from here. If I kept a good pace. I kept my ears pricked and my eyes sharp, scanning the woods.
Nothing. Always nothing. Not a bird, not a squirrel, not a chipmunk. Nothing bigger than a deer. No threats. No bear, no coyote, no fox, no bobcat, no cougar. Nothing. And still, the sense of invisible eyes drilling into that exact spot.
I watched. I listened.
And still, I never saw it coming.
A blur of white barreled out from behind a tree, flying into my shoulder and knocking me to the rocky ground, tearing off my pack as I fell. I went down hard, my hip landing on a sharp rock, pain flashing up my spine and down my leg, stealing my breath, the back of my head bouncing off the cold earth.
Panic set in. I was pinned to the ground. Everything was gray and white. My eyes focused. The body on top of me was human, not animal. Male, based on the size and weight. He was clothed head to toe in gray and white camo, a matching balaclava covering his face. In the dim light under the trees, I caught a flash of dark eyes. No one I recognized. No one I knew.
I wasn’t thinking, my fear flooding from me in an explosion of sound. “Get off me! Get off me!”
Hard fingers encircled my left wrist, dragging it down, pushing me to my side, and pulling my hand behind my back. He was trying to restrain me. Why? What did he want?
It didn”t matter. I couldn’t let him tie me up. I couldn’t let him take me. I wouldn’t.
I went wild, kicking, screaming, yanking on my wrist as hard as I could. His grip didn’t budge. I swung my right fist, hitting nothing but hard muscle through his cold weather gear. I’d been to enough self-defense classes to know that if he got my hands secured, I was screwed. Rocking my shoulders and twisting my body, I tried to dislodge my attacker, remembering the weapon at my hip far too late.
I managed to get my hand down my side, yanking my gun free of the holster with a rough jerk. There was a split second of utter stillness from the body on top of me. He moved so fast I couldn’t track him, his arm flashing down, setting fire to my arm with one strike. My fingers went numb, the gun slipping to fall into the snow. From my wrist to my shoulder, pain burned up the nerves of my right arm. I screamed again, the sound sharp and desperate, cut off by my sob as I tried to breathe through the agony.
Rough hands rolled me over, my face shoved into the wet snow, filling my mouth and nose. I dragged in air, choking and coughing through the snow. Rocking my shoulders, I pulled at my hands. He pinned me easily, feeling like he weighed a thousand pounds. I managed to twist my hips, tilting us just enough to the side to knock him off-balance. Just a little, but the ground on this side of the trail dipped toward a ravine. A little off-balance was enough. Struggling, we rolled toward the ravine.