Chapter 3
Bodie
The woods were quieter than I remembered, unnaturally so.
No trail chatter from weekend hikers, no birdsong worth mentioning.
Only the persistent, drowsy hum of insects and the occasional protesting creak of trees that had been shoved askew by floodwaters months back.
Many still leaned at odd angles, their root systems half-exposed, creating shadowy recesses beneath their upturned bases.
I tugged my ball cap lower, sweat already gathering at my hairline despite the early hour.
The air hung thick and still, heavy with the earthy scent of decomposing leaves and that particular mustiness that lingered in places where water had stood too long.
I checked the GPS marker on my phone, scrolling to the waypoint Sergeant Miller had dropped earlier.
He’d come out here at dawn, walked a careful quarter-mile loop through this sector, and left one of his old T-shirts tied off in a Ziploc bag at the end point.
My job was simple enough in theory: see if Rubble could track him down.
“Alright, rookie.” I unclipped her lead once we were well clear of the logging road, far enough in that she wouldn’t get distracted by lingering exhaust fumes or other scents.
Her ears immediately perked forward, dark eyes bright with eager expectation, tail already starting its telltale helicopter motion.
I pulled out the starter cloth Miller had rubbed all over himself this morning to create the scent article and crouched down so she could get a proper introduction. “Find him.”
She gave a low, throaty chuff of acknowledgment, tail shooting straight up like a flag, and immediately nosed into the underbrush with the confidence of a dog who’d been born for exactly this kind of work.
I followed behind her, pushing aside the grabbing fingers of branches and trying not to trip over the uneven terrain.
My boots sank into ground that was still soft and spongy from the spring rains, each step releasing the rich smell of wet earth and rotting vegetation.
Every few yards, she paused in her forward momentum, head swinging back and forth in a careful arc as she sorted through the invisible layers of scent that painted this forest in ways I could never comprehend.
Then she’d press on again with renewed purpose, pulling me around massive downed trees and brush piles that the cleanup crews hadn’t reached yet.
It wasn’t just training for her, I reminded myself as I ducked under a low-hanging branch heavy with new growth.
This exercise served a dual purpose—it was my chance to lay eyes on this particular sector, to assess how much storm debris was still choking the forest floor and creating potential fire hazards.
Since we’d finally restored full utilities and reliable connection to the outside world, firefighters, foresters, and volunteers had been working in steadily expanding circles beyond the town proper, clearing fallen timber and accumulated brush.
But there was still so much left to do, so many acres that hadn’t been touched.
Every splintered trunk and chaotic tangle of exposed roots served as a stark reminder of how much dry tinder was scattered throughout these woods, just waiting for one poorly timed lightning strike or careless camper.
We’d been blessed with an unusually wet spring that had kept the fire danger relatively low, but I found myself sending up silent prayers that our luck would hold through the rest of what promised to be a long, hot fire season.
We hadn’t covered more than two hundred yards when Rubble’s entire demeanor shifted.
Her ears flicked forward with laser focus, every muscle in her compact body going taut as a bowstring.
She gave one sharp, authoritative bark that echoed off the surrounding trees, then suddenly veered hard left, abandoning the faint trail Miller had deliberately laid out for us.
“Rubble, heel!”
She responded immediately, trotting back to me with quick, obedient steps, but I could see the barely contained energy thrumming through her frame.
Her muscles quivered with the overwhelming need to pursue whatever scent had captured her attention, and her nose continued to work the air, pulling in something that was completely invisible to my limited human senses.
I frowned, using the back of my hand to wipe away the sweat that had gathered at my temple. Even beneath the relative shade of the canopy, the temperature was climbing. “That’s not part of Miller’s trail, is it, girl? What’ve you got? Show me.”
Released from the constraint of the training exercise, she bounded ahead with obvious relief, weaving expertly between the jagged stumps of trees that had been sheared off by the storm and the massive trunks of felled pines that lay scattered like giant pickup sticks.
She paused every few feet to lift her nose and test the air currents, then pressed forward again with the kind of single-minded focus that made my chest tighten with a mixture of pride and unease.
That’s when I spotted the faintest glint of something partially hidden beneath a thick mat of fallen branches and brown evergreen needles that had accumulated over the months since the flooding.
At first glance, it might’ve been anything from a washing machine that had gotten caught up in the torrent to a piece of corrugated metal siding torn from someone’s barn.
I’d seen endless forms of debris that had traveled dozens of miles downstream before the waters finally receded, leaving behind a graveyard of belongings scattered through these woods like some twisted treasure hunt.
I slowed my pace, narrowing my eyes and trying to angle my head past the shadows and tangled debris.
For a heartbeat, the morning sunlight caught on the surface again, and something in my gut told me it wasn’t tin siding or random scrap metal.
The curve was too smooth, too deliberate.
Too manufactured in a way that made the hair on the back of my neck stand up.
Rubble barked once, sharp and insistent, then immediately began digging at the pile with both front paws.
She sent a spray of pine needles and rotted leaves scattering in every direction, her nose jammed deep into the gap she’d created, working with the kind of frantic energy that told me she’d found something significant.
“Easy, girl.” My voice automatically dropped to the calm, controlled tone I used at crime scenes.
I shoved in beside her compact frame, grabbing at the smaller limbs first and tugging them free one at a time.
They were damp and half-rotted, heavy with months of accumulated rain and decomposition.
The wood came apart in my hands with a soggy, unpleasant sound that reminded me why I hated working flood recovery.
Beneath the debris, the glint resolved into something that made my blood run cold—a patch of paint, faded green and dulled with layers of dried silt. The color was wrong, too familiar in a way that sent my mind racing through missing persons reports and unanswered calls.
My stomach dropped like a stone.
I yanked another branch loose, then another, my movements becoming more urgent as the outline began to take shape. A door panel, dented and scraped. A wheel well, half-buried in hardened mud that had turned almost to concrete over the months. The chrome bumper twisted at an unnatural angle.
A car.
Floodwaters must have picked it up during the worst of the storm surge and carried it here like a toy, finally dropping it in this remote section of woods where it got pinned under a mess of fallen trees that no cleanup crew had been able to reach.
My pulse hammered in my ears as I crouched lower, using the tail of my shirt to brush away thick layers of muck from what remained of the driver’s side window.
Cracked safety glass stared back at me, spider-webbed and streaked brown with dried sediment that had baked on in the many months since the flood.
“Aw, hell.”
I pushed harder against the debris, hauling away a particularly thick branch until I’d cleared enough space to peer inside the vehicle’s dark interior.
The dim light filtering through the canopy revealed the frame of a driver’s seat, its fabric torn and completely waterlogged, stuffing spilling out like cotton batting.
And there, slumped against the headrest in a position that told me everything I needed to know, was the unmistakable silhouette of human remains.
A purse lay crumpled on the passenger-side floorboard, half-buried in the same gray silt that coated everything else, its leather strap twisted like a dead snake around the gearshift.
The world seemed to narrow suddenly, reducing itself to nothing but the sound of Rubble’s heavy panting beside me and the distant, almost mocking hum of insects going about their business in the trees above.
Everything else—the training exercise, the heat, even the ache in my back from hauling debris—faded into background noise.
I closed my eyes for a long beat, bracing one hand against the car’s battered frame and feeling the sun-warmed metal through my palm.
The reality hit me like a physical blow: I’d found someone.
After months of searching, of following leads that went nowhere and fielding calls from desperate families, I’d finally found someone.
I worked my way around to the rear of the vehicle, my boots slipping on the slick combination of mud and decomposing leaves that carpeted the forest floor.
Branch after branch, I hauled aside the debris that nature had deposited over the car like a burial shroud, each piece heavier than it looked, waterlogged and stubborn.
Sweat stung my eyes as I cleared away a particularly thick oak limb that had pinned down the rear bumper.
The license plate was there, just where it should be, but mud had caked over most of it in thick, gray layers.
I poured some of my water on the tag and used a fresh evergreen bough to scrape away the hardened sediment, working methodically until the white background and blue lettering became legible beneath the grime.
The bottom dropped out of my stomach. The numbers and letters stared back at me like an accusation, each character as familiar as my own reflection.
Even as my mind reeled, I unclipped the radio from my shoulder and keyed the mic with an unsteady thumb.
“Gibson to Dispatch. I’ve got a vehicle out here in the national forest, looks like it was caught in the September flood.
” The words came out steady and professional, years of training keeping my voice level even as my chest tightened.
“Send a unit to my location to assist with recovery. Stand by for plate.”
I read off the number slowly, each digit feeling like a small betrayal as it left my lips, then waited in the oppressive silence of the forest. Rubble pressed her warm bulk against my leg, her weight solid and reassuring, though her soft whine betrayed her tension—that low, almost inaudible sound she made when she sensed something was wrong.
A few seconds stretched into a small eternity before the dispatcher’s voice crackled back through the static. “Ten-four, Chief. That plate comes back to Evelyn Maddox.”
I’d known. I’d memorized the plates of all our missing.
But hearing it out loud, my throat tightened like someone had wrapped their hands around my windpipe.
Emmaline’s grandmother. The woman who’d raised her after her mom had bailed in high school, who’d taught her how to braid challah and fold perfect croissants, who’d been the backbone of the Maddox Bread Company for fifty years.
The woman who’d been missing since the night the flood hit, when half the town had been evacuated and emergency services were spread so thin we couldn’t keep track of everyone.
“Copy.” I forced the word out, keeping my tone flat and professional even though my pulse was hammering against my collar and my free hand had started to shake. “Secure this call. I’ll file the report when I return to the station.”
“Ten-four, Chief.”
Mechanically, I clipped the mic back onto my shoulder and stood in the dappled sunlight filtering through the canopy above.
One hand found its way to the car’s twisted bumper, the metal warm from the afternoon sun but somehow still cold against my palm.
Rubble nudged my arm with her snout, her brown eyes solemn and knowing in the way that only a dog’s could be.
I gave her ears a rough scratch, my fingers working through her coarse fur as I tried to process what this meant, what I was going to have to do next. My voice came out low and hoarse when I finally spoke. “Yeah, girl. I know.”