Chapter Twenty-Nine
Jax
“Ava?” I press the phone hard to my ear, pacing toward the door as if I can move closer to her through sheer force. “What’s going on? Tell me.”
Her voice hits me like ice water. Raw. Unsteady. “Violet… she didn’t come back.”
Every muscle in me locks.
“What do you mean she didn’t come back?” I shove my arm through my coat sleeve, heart already pounding harder than the wind.
“She went to the store for hot chocolate. It was supposed to be quick.” Breath hitches on the other end. “She promised. She… she should have been home already.”
My boots hit the floor, hard and urgent, as I drag them on. “How long has she been gone?”
“I don’t know—maybe two hours? Maybe more? I thought she was inside. I thought she went to her room. I was at the clinic.”
She cuts off, a sound of panic slipping through clenched teeth.
“Okay,” I say, forcing my voice steady, though adrenaline is kicking me in the ribs. “Listen to me—”
“No,” she snaps back, fear sharpening into resolve. “I’m going. I’m not just waiting here while she’s—” Her breath breaks. “Violet knows these woods, but this storm—Jax, it’s coming fast—”
I wrench the front door open with one arm, the other hand gripping the phone like it’s the only thing tethering my sanity. Wind punches into the cabin, snow swirling past me in a furious rush.
“Ava, stop.” The command comes out harder than I intend. “You need to stay inside.”
“That is not a suggestion you get to make.” Her voice shakes, but her spine is steel. “I’m an EMT. I’m trained for rescue. You’re not.”
She’s right, but it doesn’t matter.
“You’re a mother first,” I say, voice low, unyielding. “If Violet comes home and you’re gone—if she panics and runs back out looking for you—you could miss each other entirely.”
Silence. Only the wind ripping through both our worlds.
“I can’t just sit here,” she whispers. “Not doing anything.”
“You are doing something.” I step into the storm, pulling the door closed behind me. “You’re staying warm. You’re watching for her. You’re making damn sure she has a home to step back into.”
The wind steals half her breath before she pushes the words out. “Jax… please find her.”
There’s a kind of vulnerability in her plea that could collapse me if I let it.
“I will.” I'm already moving, boots sinking deep as I head toward the path that connects our cabins. “I’m heading toward town. Straight down the main road. If she left the store, I’ll intercept her.”
“You’ll freeze in—”
“I’ve lived this mountain longer than most,” I cut in gently. “You know that. Let me do what I can do.”
Another beat of silence, then:
“How will I know?” she asks, her voice breaking. “If something happens to you? If something happens to her?”
“You’ll know when I walk back through your door with your daughter.” I don’t give fear room to argue. “Stay inside. Keep calm. Keep the lights on for us.”
The wind shrieks over the line, swallowing the end of her reply. I press the phone closer, straining to hear.
“Okay,” she finally says. “Okay. Just—Jax?”
I stop in my tracks, cold slicing through every uncovered inch of skin.
“What?”
“Don’t stop looking. Not until you find her.”
I breathe once through the terror lodged in my chest. “Never.”
The line crackles. I hear her inhale on a sob—
Then the call drops. I stare at the screen—the blank, merciless screen—as the storm swallows what little signal remained.
“Ava?” I try once. Twice. But it’s useless. The phone is nothing but dead weight now.
I shove it into my pocket and keep moving, faster, heavier. The wind beats against me like it’s trying to wrestle me to the ground. Snow blinds from every direction, erasing edges, smothering distance.
Think like Violet.
Fourteen. Reckless in that impossible hope that youth can outrun nature. Boots too light. Jacket zipped sloppy. Backpack bouncing like she’s just popping down the road for sugar—not stepping into a storm that wants to eat her alive.
“Violet!” I shout, but the storm steals her name, swallowing it without a trace.
My breath saws in and out, steam burning from my lungs. I push harder, legs pumping through drifts already climbing past my shins.
I force my eyes open against the sting, scanning every blur of white and dark.
The mountain groans—that deep, dangerous sound Ava warned me about—the kind that says the snowpack is shifting. Thinking. Preparing.
The flakes grow heavier, the wind screaming louder.
I call her name again, voice raw, throat frozen.
“VIOLET!”
Nothing answers but the storm.
My heart races, matching my stride. For every second she’s out here, the cold is taking pieces of her—fingers first, then skin, then bone, then breath.
I can’t think about Emily—how I couldn’t save her.
Not again. Not a second time.
I surge forward, every step a vow.
“Violet!” I shout again, voice crashing through the storm.
No answer. But I keep going.
Because mothers are made to wait. And I am built to search.