Chapter 7
Chapter Seven
River
After some exchanged texts and video calls, we’d agreed to meet at the trailhead near the old ranger station.
It wasn’t exactly a casual hike. This was where Eleanor Jenkins’ car had been found all those years ago.
No signs of struggle. No phone. No trace.
Just a locked sedan off a fire road and more questions than answers.
The path behind the station was narrow and overgrown, shaded by tall pines and heavy with the kind of silence that pressed in on you the deeper you went.
“Next time, we meet somewhere with air conditioning,” Myra muttered, swatting at a mosquito.
“You suggested the trail,” Nivea said, shaking her head with a grin. “Said it would help us clear our heads and walk through the case.”
“I meant digitally.”
I smiled, falling into step behind them. Truth was, I didn’t mind being out here. The woods were quiet in a way the town wasn’t. Out here, there was no Finn. No lingering glances. No history pressing in from every side.
We walked for a while in silence, broken only by the crunch of boots on gravel and the occasional comment about a low branch or tricky footing. When the trail opened up to a small overlook, we paused to catch our breath.
“Eleanor’s car was found near here, right?” I asked, scanning the tree line.
“Just off the old fire road up ahead,” Myra said, adjusting her ball cap. “GPS pinged her phone for the last time not far from this ridge.”
Nivea squinted toward the break in the trees. “So weird. It’s like she just vanished mid-step.”
“Yeah,” Myra said, her tone flat. “Just that abandoned car and radio silence.”
We stood there for a moment, letting the weight of that settle.
“You okay?” Nivea asked, glancing my way.
I shook my head. “I’m fine.” I hesitated. “I just didn’t think being back would be this…loud, you know? I thought I was ready. But seeing Finn again—”
“Hits harder than you expected,” she finished.
I gave a dry laugh. “That obvious?”
“Only if you have eyes,” Myra said.
Libby had asked if she could share things with the club after what had gone down at my first meeting.
I told her she could. Neither Finn nor I was going anywhere, and we were all in this cold-case business together.
Besides, it wasn’t like it was a secret.
And the more people knew, the less awkward it would be. Hopefully.
“You don’t have to talk about it,” Nivea added, “unless you want to, of course. But for what it’s worth, it doesn’t look like he hates you.”
“Us hating each other isn’t the problem,” I said quietly.
They didn’t push.
“He ever try to reach out?” Myra asked after a beat. “I mean, while you were gone?”
“No. And I didn’t expect him to. We both said things we can’t take back.”
“Still,” Nivea said, “the way he looked at you at the meeting… I’d bet good money there’s still something there.”
“You’d lose that bet,” I said, brushing a leaf from my shoulder. “And even if there are remnants, what’s left isn’t worth digging up.”
We started walking again, the woods pressing in on either side.
“Changing the subject,” Myra said, “I went through Eleanor’s personnel file again this morning. Something’s definitely off. And I don’t just mean the stuff that’s missing. Her evaluations were spotless. Like, almost too spotless. Practically templated. I’m not sure that’s exactly normal.”
“So…what? She was being protected? Set up somehow?” Nivea said. “Either way, someone wanted a paper trail that looked clean and was just confusing enough to throw someone off.”
I nodded. “You think Autumn might have more? Maybe something in the older board meeting notes?”
“She said she’s looking,” Myra said. “Told me she’d flag anything that felt out of place.”
“Good.” I nodded. “We need something to go on.”
We were about halfway down the Birchwood Loop when Myra finally said, “It’s kinda weird being here, right? Knowing this is where her car was found.”
That pulled me out of my thoughts. “Yeah. I was thinking the same thing. How many people passed by it that day or the days after and didn’t even realize?
It’s like that case in Wisconsin. Where the woman’s car was found in that guy’s back forty behind his auto salvage or whatever.
That one took way too long to discover, too. ”
The trail was quiet once again, aside from the crunch of gravel and the snap of twigs under our boots and the whisper of breeze through the trees.
It was peaceful in that way only the woods could be.
But now, layered over it all, was a sense of something unfinished.
Like the forest itself remembered what had happened here.
“How does someone just disappear?” Myra murmured. “It’s like erasure.”
Nivea let out a low whistle. “Poetic and chilling. I like it.”
I gave her a look, but she just shrugged. “Hey. I host a true-crime podcast. I appreciate that shit,” she said.
We kept walking. I’d always liked this part of the loop, where the trees opened up to a slight overlook, the hills rolling in the distance. It should’ve been a good memory, but today, the air felt heavier. Like something unspoken was pressing against all of us.
“What do you guys think happened to her? Really?” I asked finally.
Myra glanced at me. “You want the narrative that follows the quote-unquote official story? Or what I actually think?”
“Both.”
She stopped and turned to face me, brushing a strand of hair from her cheek.
“Officially—and I use the term lightly—she was apparently under a lot of stress. The board said she’d been reprimanded, but as we just discussed, there doesn’t seem to be a record of that anywhere, so who knows if it’s true?
There were also rumors of emotional instability, but none of the people close to her who were interviewed afterward actually corroborated that.
That report she supposedly filed is also suspiciously missing.
Word was that maybe she had a breakdown. Maybe she ran.”
“And?” I urged.
“Like we’ve been postulating, I think she knew something,” Nivea answered, crouching to retie her boot. “And someone wanted her quiet. Or gone.”
We all stood in that for a moment. No one needed to say it out loud. This wasn’t the first time Maple Ridge had hidden something behind polite smiles and neatly trimmed hedges.
“You think the case has anything to do with people we know?” Nivea asked gently.
I drew in a breath. “Funny you should ask. I mentioned it in passing at the meeting, but my mom and Eleanor worked together. A lot, actually. Before Mom…before she got sick, she was a teacher, too. Art and English, mostly. She and Eleanor got close. They weren’t just coworkers. They were also friends.”
I ducked under a low branch. “After Mom was committed, there was so much shame, despite how utterly misplaced it was. No one really talked about her job. Or her friends—especially not people from the school. Even just a little over a decade ago, the stigma around mental health was a thing. Not that it isn’t still now, but… you know what I mean.”
“Do you think your mom could’ve known something?” Nivea asked.
“I really don’t know,” I said. “But if she did…” I shrugged. “If Eleanor got too close to something dangerous, and Mom knew and tried to help—or stayed quiet about it…maybe that explains why everything spiraled so fast for her.”
We kept walking. No one rushed to fill the silence this time.
Eventually, we came to the clearing where the car had been found. Obviously, there was no marker, no evidence tape. This was a fourteen-year-old case. Now, the area was just open space and scrubby grass.
“I was thinking about that time over the last few days. I was twenty and back home when Eleanor disappeared,” I said quietly.
“I vaguely remember the day the news broke now. How my mom came home from school with tears in her eyes. She went straight into her art studio and didn’t come out for hours.
When I finally checked on her, she was just…
sitting there. Staring at a blank canvas like something had been ripped out of her. ”
Nivea reached over, fingers brushing my sleeve in gentle solidarity. “Sounds like she was carrying more than anyone realized.”
“She was,” I whispered. “Not long after, she had her breakdown. They said she wasn’t safe.
That those around her weren’t safe. Insisted she needed long-term care.
She never came home.” I paused, swallowing the lump that rose every time I thought about what came next.
“After the scandal broke with my father…all the accusations and whispers—my dad couldn’t take it.
Not only had he lost his wife, his career was also—” I swallowed hard. “And then…”
Silence settled between us, heavy but not entirely uncomfortable.
“So, yeah. I packed up, left Maple Ridge, and didn’t look back.”
Myra’s voice was steady, grounding. “Well, maybe it’s time to stop running.”
Nivea nodded. “If this case ties in at all to what happened with your parents…we’ll find the truth.”
“No. We’ll find the truth regardless,” I said, conviction filling me with purpose.