Chapter Twelve #2
He found it a few hundred feet from the parking area, a blue Subaru Outback snugged up against a tall pine. He was sure this was Lily’s car.
Scott parked the truck next to the Outback, let Hunter out, then began unloading his gear. He shoved extra supplies in his pack and called for the dog. The big Lab was sniffing all around the Subaru, tail wagging. “Do you smell Lily and Shelby?” Scott asked.
He walked over and peered through the windows of the Subaru.
Nothing to see. Of more interest were the ski tracks leading away from the vehicle.
He followed the tracks along the edge of the avalanche field, to the place where they had discovered Jackson’s pack.
He spotted tracks of a dog, headed into the woods, the ski tracks alongside them.
He wasn’t a trained tracker, but it didn’t take an expert to identify the place where Lily had removed her skis.
The terrain was too crowded with obstacles to make skiing safe, which was why he had left his own skis behind at the truck.
He continued on foot, sinking to his knees in softer snow only occasionally, following Lily’s and Shelby’s tracks.
A few feet into the woods, the shadows deepened.
Cold crowded around him. He shoved his goggles on top of his helmet and donned a head lamp. “Lily!” he shouted. “Shelby!”
He stepped into a hole, lost his balance and ended up sprawled in the snow. He lay there for a moment, trying to catch his breath. Hunter bounded over and nudged at him, whining.
“I’m okay.” He shoved onto his knees, then stood. Now he was the one being foolish, stumbling around in the dark. He should go home. If Lily hadn’t returned to her apartment by morning, he could call the sheriff.
But the thought of leaving her out here alone, in the cold, tore at him. He cupped his gloved hands to either side of his mouth. “Lily!” he shouted again.
Hunter barked, then bounded away. “Hunter! Come back here!” Scott stumbled after the dog. “Where are you going?”
Then Scott saw the light—a small bluish moon bobbing through the trees in the shrouded darkness.
Hunter barked again, and raced toward the light.
“Over here!” a woman called. “I’ve found something!”
LILY HAD SPOTTED the shoe print half an hour before, just when she was about to turn around and make her way back to her car.
It was the clear impression of a single ski boot, but boy-sized, about twelve inches long.
Just the one clear print in a line of trampled snow, as if someone had traveled this way.
She followed that trail of disturbed snow, Shelby right in front of her. The dog began to whine. “Do you smell Jackson?” Lily asked.
Heart in her throat, she tried to move faster. The narrow beam of the light from her headlamp allowed her to avoid the largest obstacles in her path, but outside of that light was a black void.
Shelby barked again, then whirled and barreled past Lily, almost knocking her over.
“Shelby!” Lily shouted, but the dog paid no attention.
Lily peered ahead, trying to determine what had made the dog change direction so suddenly. Was there a big animal up ahead—a mountain lion?
In the distance, another dog barked. Not Shelby. Lily turned to look behind her again. Shelby barked in answer, then Lily heard someone calling her name.
Relief surged through her. She wasn’t going to have to do this alone. “Over here!” she shouted. “I’ve found something.”
She told herself she should have been surprised to see Scott moving toward her, but she wasn’t. He knew her feelings about Jackson’s possible fate, and he was just stubborn enough to venture out in the darkness to look for her.
He arrived just behind the two excited dogs—red-faced and scowling. “What are you doing out here by yourself?” he growled.
“I think you already know the answer to that question,” she said. She dipped her head to illuminate the path at their feet. “I’ve been following this trail. I think it’s Jackson’s.”
His frown didn’t fade. “This trail could have been made by anything. You could be following an elk, or even a moose.”
“Earlier, there was a boot print. A clear impression, just the size of a boy Jackson’s age. Come on. Maybe we can catch up with him.”
She started forward, but he grabbed her arm and pulled her back. “You’re going to get hurt if you keep floundering around in the dark.”
She tipped her head enough to shine her light right in his eyes, fully prepared to tell him he had no right to lecture her as if she were a child.
But then she realized all of the redness on his face wasn’t due to the cold.
She lifted her hand to his cheek, but stopped just short of touching him. “You’re bleeding.”
He put a hand up and smeared the trickle of blood. “It’s nothing. I tripped and fell a little way back.”
“You can’t just stand there bleeding. Do you have a first aid kit?”
“It’s nothing,” he repeated. “I’ll deal with it back at the cars.”
She turned away. “I’m not going back. Not when I finally found Jackson’s trail. If he’s out here, I’m not going to leave him.”
He took out his phone. “I’ll make note of the GPS coordinates and we can come out here in the morning, with the search-and-rescue team.”
“No. By then it might be too late.”
“Lily!”
“Scott!” she mimicked his tone and glared at him. “I’ll be fine. I know how to take care of myself, and I have a satellite phone if I run into trouble.”
“Where did you get a satellite phone?”
“I borrowed it from a friend.”
He drew himself up taller. “I’m ordering you to go back with me.”
“Or what? You’re only my boss during work hours. And if that’s how you’re going to act, I don’t want to work for you anyway.”
His shoulders sagged. “Please come with me? I’m not asking as your boss. I’m asking as your friend.”
Were they friends? Sometimes it didn’t feel that way, and yet who else would be out here with her in the freezing darkness? “I can’t,” she said. “I can’t leave Jackson out here in the cold. What if he’s lost, or hurt? What if someone is still after him?”
She couldn’t see Scott’s expression clearly in the darkness, but he shifted from foot to foot, as if physically wrestling with the problem. Then he hooked his thumbs beneath the front straps of his pack. “Then let’s get going and see where this trail leads.”
Slogging along in full dark now, the thin beams from their headlamps scarcely penetrating the gloom, they did their best to stay on either side of the trail.
The only sounds were the crunch of boots on snow and their own labored breathing.
Were they getting any closer to Jackson—or only headed farther away from safety?
A sharp whistle pierced the air, and a rush of wind brushed past Lily’s cheek.
Bark flew from the trunk of a tree. Then she was on the ground, flat on her stomach in the snow with Scott on top of her.
He was big and heavy, crushing the breath out of her.
She raised her head to yell at him to get off of her, but he shoved her back into the snow.
He spoke softly, his mouth next to her ear. “Stay down! That was a gunshot.”