Chapter 11
Chapter Eleven
River
The sun hadn’t even cleared the ridge when I pulled up to the trailhead. The air was thick with the scent of pine needles, wet soil, and something sharp and earthy—decay buried under memory.
Finn was already waiting, leaning against his SUV with a thermos in one hand and his jaw set like he hadn’t slept. His hair was damp from a shower, and his uniform shirt looked like it had been ironed by pure force of will—the creases almost too precise.
“You’re early,” I said, tucking my keys into the pocket of my cargo pants as I approached.
“So are you,” he replied, handing me the thermos without being asked.
I took a sip. Black, hot, strong. The way we both drank it. The familiarity was a little too easy.
The gravel crunched beneath our boots as we headed toward the trailhead.
A few cars were parked at the edge of the lot, windows fogged with the memory of warmth.
A woman stood beside one of them—athletic leggings, windbreaker, hair scraped into a high ponytail.
She stretched one calf, then the other, but her eyes kept flicking toward us.
Not curious. Not friendly. Just… assessing.
Her gaze dipped to Finn. Then to me. Then back to him again, like she was running a comparison she wasn’t meant to. “Morning,” she said as we approached, her smile bright but too crisp.
Finn tipped his chin. “Morning.”
She held his gaze a moment longer than casual trailhead politeness required. “Out early, Sheriff.”
“Looks that way,” he replied, tone unreadable.
I gave a polite nod as we passed, but she didn’t return it—at least not to me. Instead, she gave Finn one last quick once-over, as if committing him to memory.
“Enjoy your hike,” she called lightly, opening her car door.
When we reached the trail register, I leaned in, voice low. “Friend of yours?”
Finn snorted under his breath. “Not really. Jordyn Vale. One of my new deputies.”
“Seemed…observant.”
“That’s one word for it.” His jaw worked, a flicker tightening the edges of his expression. “She applied to every department within fifty miles. Maple Ridge was the one that hired her, and I think it had more to do with her lineage than her qualifications.”
“Huh.” I glanced back toward her car. She stood half in, half out, typing quickly into her phone. “Is she always that…intense?”
Finn gave the kind of shrug that wasn’t a shrug at all, more a performance of indifference instead of the real thing. “She’s eager. Tries hard.”
Tries too hard sat on the back of my tongue, but I swallowed it. “She stared at you like she was checking for a serial number.”
That earned a faint, unwilling laugh. “Yeah. She does that.”
There was something he wasn’t saying, but the moment passed as he nudged his chin toward the trail.
“Come on,” he said. “Let’s get a move on.”
I followed, but the prickling at the back of my spine didn’t fade, though I wasn’t entirely sure of its cause.
We fell into step easily, no need to say where we were heading.
The path wound behind the old fire road, where the canopy thickened and the trail narrowed to a footpath barely wider than our shoulders.
Birdsong echoed through the trees—too cheerful for the weight the morning carried.
“I used to hate this trail,” I admitted after a few minutes of silence. “Dad dragged me out here occasionally when I was sulking or being a teenage pain in the ass.”
Finn glanced over. “He ever say why he chose this one?”
“Not really. Just said it was ‘quiet in the right way.’ Whatever that means.”
Finn’s brow furrowed. “That’s almost exactly what Eleanor’s husband said about it, despite him also saying that Eleanor also felt like it was just slightly off. Clearly, that didn’t stop her from coming here.”
We walked a little longer in silence before I asked, “Do you ever stop being a cop in your head?”
He shot me a half-smile. “Do you ever stop being a psychologist?”
“Touché.”
“Besides,” he added, “you’re the one who brought a freaking notebook on a hike.” He jerked his chin in my direction.
“It’s called preparation, Callahan. You should try it sometime.”
That earned me a low laugh, warm and slightly unexpected. It tugged at something I wasn’t ready to think about.
After another half mile, the trail dipped sharply, the forest swallowing us in shadow. Fallen branches crisscrossed the path, and I stumbled, catching myself on a cedar trunk slick with moss.
Finn reached out automatically, steadying me.
And he didn’t let go right away.
“You okay?” he asked quietly.
I nodded but didn’t move. “You ever think this whole thing was a mistake? Coming back to—or in your case, staying in—Maple Ridge? Us getting involved again…” I stopped. “In whatever capacity we are,” I hastened to add.
He didn’t answer for a long moment. Then, he said, “Yeah. All the time. But not today.”
Something settled in my chest at that. A small but solid anchor where the rest of me felt a bit adrift.
We kept going, following the barely there markers Finn remembered from cross-country skiing long ago.
At some point, the trail vanished completely, giving way to uneven terrain and rising cedar groves. That’s when Finn stopped walking. He crouched near a thicket just off the main path, where the earth sloped downward toward a cluster of gnarled roots.
“What is it?” I asked, stepping closer.
He pointed. “There. See that?”
I looked up and saw a faded shape in the bark of the biggest tree. What looked a little like a faint evil eye. It was growing in, the tree attempting to heal itself, but it was there.
“And there,” Finn continued. “That dip. Looks like erosion exposed something.” He tugged on a glove he pulled from his pocket and brushed his hand over the earth. “And the soil’s been disturbed.”
I crouched beside him, my heart thudding. “Animal, maybe?”
“Maybe.” But his voice was tight now. Focused.
We started clearing the area slowly, using sticks and gloved hands, careful not to damage anything. The more we dug, the quieter the forest became. Even the birds had stilled.
Then Finn went completely rigid.
I looked up, my eyes meeting his for a moment before I followed his gaze to the patch of ground he’d just cleared.
A scrap of purple fabric. Faded, rotted.
Then leather.
A boot. Half-buried. Cracked with age but unmistakably footwear.
“Oh, my God,” I breathed, my hand immediately flying to my mouth to cover the gasp.
Finn didn’t speak. His hand moved with surgical precision, brushing away more dirt. A second later, something caught the light.
A delicate silver chain tangled around some decomposed fabric. The pendant was dull but still visible. A compass rose.
I stared at it, my breath lodged somewhere between my lungs and throat. “Eleanor wore that every day,” I whispered. “In middle school. I had her for social studies. She said it was her good-luck charm.”
Finn sat back on his heels, wiping a forearm over his face.
“Is this really her?” I whispered.
His voice was low. “We need to call it in. I need to get some backup out here. And forensics.”
“I know.” But I didn’t move. Couldn’t.
Everything felt suspended. As if the woods had been holding their breath for fourteen years and had just now exhaled.
“She’s been here this whole time,” I murmured, grief slicing clean through me. “While people speculated and whispered and moved on...she was here.”
Finn reached for my hand. I let him take it.
“We don’t know yet what all is buried here. But still, I’m so sorry,” he said softly.
What did he mean? For me having to find Eleanor like this? For everything else? For the years that had vanished and the truth that’d never surfaced?
I squeezed his fingers and somehow found my voice. “Let’s bring her home.”
I stayed kneeling beside the shallow grave until Finn touched my shoulder and gently pulled me to my feet.
“We have to secure the scene,” he said. His voice was tight again. Professional now. Detached, even if his eyes said otherwise.
I nodded and carefully stepped back, feeling the cold press of realization sink deeper into my skin.
He made the call, gave coordinates. Then he roped off the area with some emergency tape he always kept in his pack. A half-hour later, the woods were crawling with movement and low, urgent voices.
Eryn was the first to arrive—Finn had called her right after his people. She had her dark hair pulled back in a braid, her eyes sharper than usual. She crouched beside the disturbed soil without a word, her gloved hands already moving.
“This is recent erosion,” she muttered. “But this burial? Old. Too shallow to be professional. But deliberate.” She glanced up at me. “You okay?”
“No,” I said honestly, a little shocked that she’d asked. Cared. We’d only just met, and it had only been once. On video.
She nodded sharply, like that was the right answer.
Myra arrived next, dressed for work in a crisp polo with the county ME seal, her forensics bag already in hand. She stepped up beside Eryn and exhaled slowly.
“How’d you beat me here?” she asked, then focused on what had been unearthed. “Damn,” she said. “You really might have found her.”
The weight of that statement settled like a fog. I hadn’t realized how badly I needed someone else to say it. To believe it.
Before I could process that, footsteps crunched behind me.
“I swear, if you step on evidence—” Myra started, then cut off when she saw who it was.
Nivea and Andra stood at the edge of the clearing behind the tape, both looking slightly winded but alert, press badges visible.
“Relax,” Nivea said, holding up her hands. “We came in the back way. And we didn’t touch or disturb anything.”
“And we’re just observing,” Andra added. “Off the record. At least, for now.”
Part of me was grateful that all of them were here. A good portion of our little club, all standing guard at the beginning of something big.
But then I heard it. Another set of footsteps—too fast, too loud.
Lucas Grant stepped into the clearing like he owned it. “Well, well,” he said with a too-rehearsed calm as he looked at me. “Now this is interesting.”
Finn stood to his full height. “Who called you?”
Grant shrugged. “I was in the area,” he said smoothly. “Town business. I heard the call come through dispatch.” His gaze flicked to me again, then to the disturbed soil, then to Eryn’s slow, methodical movements. “Doesn’t explain what the rest of you are doing here.”
“It’s her,” I said before I could stop myself. “Eleanor Jenkins.”
He stared at me with a look of polite skepticism. “Respectfully, Ms. Bennett, you’re not a forensics expert, nor are you law enforcement.”
“And yet,” Myra said, standing now, arms crossed, “she might be the one who finally got us here. So, maybe ease up on the condescension until we’re sure, yeah?”
Grant raised an eyebrow but didn’t argue. Not directly, at least.
Just then, Finn’s brother, Sean, arrived. His suit was too clean. His expression careful. And when he stepped forward, he didn’t look at Finn.
Weird.
“Grant,” Sean said, giving him a small nod of acknowledgment. “What’s the situation?”
Finn stepped between them.
“No. That’s not how this goes. I’m the sheriff,” he said coolly.
“This is my jurisdiction. We found evidence, potentially connected to an open cold case. And my team is processing the scene. There’s nothing to tell you yet, Mr. District Attorney.
We don’t even know what we’ve found exactly. ” He gave his brother a sharp look.
Sean hesitated. “Well. Just thought you might want—”
“What I want,” Finn interrupted, “is for this not to be turned into a political circus. Or a jurisdictional tug-of-war. So, unless either of you has crime scene credentials or something productive to contribute, you’re both free to observe from outside the perimeter.
Like everyone else who’s not directly involved. ” He jabbed a finger into the distance.
That went over about as well as expected.
Grant didn’t move. “I knew Eleanor, you know.”
The clearing went still.
Finn’s jaw twitched. “Yeah. And? Plenty of people did. She was a fixture at the school and in the town for many years.”
“No, I knew her.” Grant’s voice softened slightly, but something about it felt false to me. “She was…troubled. Smart, but troubled. She talked about leaving a lot. Starting over somewhere. Sometimes, I wonder if she meant to disappear all along.”
“Funny,” Finn said, ice creeping into his tone. “You didn’t mention that during the initial investigation. There’s none of that in the reports.”
Grant shrugged. “No one asked.”
My pulse thudded too loudly in my ears. I wanted to scream. To ask what else he’d conveniently left out.
But Finn stepped forward, close enough now that his body partially shielded mine. It was subtle. A bit protective. I felt it like a wall of heat.
“She didn’t disappear,” he said, his voice low. “Not like you’re insinuating anyway. Someone put her here. Or left her here. Buried her like trash. And if I find out you knew more than you let on—”
“That a threat, Sheriff?”
“No. It’s a promise.” He stood straighter.
Eryn rose suddenly. “Gentlemen,” she said with sharp finality, looking pointedly at the mayor and Sean, “we have a potential homicide victim here. At the very least, key evidence in an active cold case. Unless either of you wants to be added to the chain-of-custody log—which means mountains of paperwork—I suggest you clear the scene. Or at least back the hell up like the sheriff ordered so I can do my damn job.”
Grant looked like he wanted to push further, but Sean tugged his sleeve slightly.
“Come on,” he muttered. “Let them work.”
They left. Finally. But not without one last glance over the shoulder from Grant—at me.
If I were being honest, the look chilled me more than finding Eleanor’s belongings in the ground did. There was no curiosity in it. No surprise. Just the steadiness of a man confirming something he already knew.
Behind him, Sean finally looked at Finn. Just once, and just for a second, before turning and following Grant out of the clearing.
I couldn’t read what passed between them, but Finn went very still when it happened. It was the kind of stillness that wasn’t about the scene, the evidence, or the job. It was about something older.
He didn’t say anything about it. And I didn’t ask.
But I filed it away.