Chapter 10 #3
“We sometimes hide behind the woodshed where you get the wood for the s’mores. We like the way it smells.”
Okay, that one was close by, so they ran there first. Unfortunately, she wasn’t there.
“It’s alright,” she assured them. “It was only the first spot we checked. Where else does she like to go?”
“Um…there’s a small dock where we had that picnic that time. It’s where you said I could learn to fish, but then we never did. It’s smaller than the dock I fished with Walker, Axel, and Slater. But I wanted to fish with you.”
Hugging him, she said, “And we will one day soon, I promise!” Then she looked at Slater. “It’s the spot down by our cabins and past Axel’s storage building.”
“Maybe I should get the drone,” Slater suggested.
“Good idea. We’ll meet up at some point.” She and Jonah took off in one direction while Slater went in the other. In the distance, Lexi saw the lights of a patrol car, but she ran after Jonah, who was leading the way.
Note to self…use the resort gym more…
Passing the cabins, she began shouting Annabeth’s name, and so did Jonah, but there was no response.
They rounded the far corner, passed Axel’s shed, and continued down the path to the dock.
Guests didn’t come down this way, but it was a quiet spot the owners and their families knew about—including her.
They had picnicked here a few times with snacks while they read in the afternoon and sometimes on a Saturday when Connor was working and she was hanging out with the kids.
“Come on, Annabeth,” she whispered. “Please be on the dock.”
Jonah reached the area first and called out, “She’s not here!”
Shit.
Now what?
Frustration and overall helplessness had her by the throat. Every minute they didn’t find her meant something could have seriously happened to her. She had truly hoped her son was going to know exactly where to find Annabeth, but she realized now that she was asking a lot of a four-year-old.
Hanging her head, she took a moment to catch her breath. Jonah came up beside her and put his little hand in hers. “We’ll find her,” he said confidently. “Whenever we play hide and seek, I always find her.”
Crouching down again, she looked at his sweet little face before pulling him into a fierce hug because she needed to. Tears streamed down her face because she was so scared and didn’t want to think the worst, but right now, she almost couldn’t help it.
When she felt like she could compose herself, she slowly pulled back and forced herself to smile. “Okay. Sorry. I just…I’m worried about Annabeth.”
His expression grew somber, as if he were suddenly realizing the gravity of the situation.
His shoulders sagged a bit. “She likes all the spots we used to read, but her favorite one is with the boulders. We only read there once, but sometimes Annabeth says she goes there by herself when she wants to be alone.”
For a moment, Lexi couldn’t get her bearings. “The boulders…” Standing, she glanced around trying to remember the spot. “Oh! Down by the path past the gazebo, right?”
He nodded.
It was all the way on the other side of the lodge, but there was a path along the lake they could take. Cursing how out of shape she was, she straightened and let out a long breath. “Okay, let’s go! You lead the way, Jonah!”
“Yay!” he said as they took off, and Lexi did her best to keep up.
The ground was uneven, and she considered pulling out her phone and calling Slater to tell him to position the drone near the gazebo, but she wasn’t coordinated enough to do it without tripping and hurting herself.
There were rocks, sand, gravel…every kind of terrain as they made their way along the path.
Some of it wasn’t an actual path, but it was worn enough from people cutting through the brush areas over the years.
Stray branches slashed at her arms, and one particularly aggressive one hit her in the face, but she kept going.
“We’re almost there, Mom!”
Thank God. With any luck, this would be the place they’d find her.
The trail curved and opened up the way she preferred.
There were soft pine needles underfoot, and it was a little easier to navigate.
She used to know every twist and turn by heart when she was a kid, almost like her son seemed to now.
The one time she brought the kids here to read, she remembered hanging out here during some of her childhood summers.
But it was so far out of the way that they only came here once because of time constraints.
The spot was just past the next bend—a hollow between two massive old trees where the ground dipped down and the air smelled like moss.
There were three boulders, and they had laughed because it meant a seat for each of them.
They had read and shared cookies, and Annabeth had said it felt like a magical spot from one of her favorite books.
She sat there now, hugging her backpack.
Jonah had come to a stop without saying a word, but Lexi had already spotted Annabeth through the trees.
She said a quick prayer of thanks before squeezing her son’s shoulder and whispering, “Stay right here, okay?”
He nodded, and she pulled out her phone and typed a quick text to the group.
Lexi: I found her! We’re on the path past the gazebo!
It would take too long to describe beyond that, but she needed to get to Annabeth before everyone else did. As if sensing her, the little girl turned her head, and the look of utter sadness broke Lexi’s heart.
“You found me.”
Nodding, she gingerly climbed down the small incline and sat on one of the other boulders. Jonah silently followed even though she asked him to stay put.
“Are you mad at me?” Annabeth asked quietly, her voice quivering.
“Oh, sweetie, no! Of course not. Why would I be?”
“Because I ran away.”
“Well, I’m not going to lie, you scared us all.” Pausing, Lexi took in how tired she looked. “Do you want to talk about it?”
Annabeth shrugged.
“I get it, you know,” Lexi began tentatively. “Sometimes things happen, and I would think that I just wanted to run away from it all.”
“And did you?”
“Some people might say I ran away by coming here to the resort. I left everything I had known to move me and Jonah here.” Another pause. “But everyone knew where I was going and that I was going to be with my friends and people who cared about me.”
She could hear faint voices in the distance. Connor’s. The way he called her name—half scared, half hopeful—made her chest tighten. “Your dad’s very worried, Annabeth.”
Without responding, Annabeth pressed her face into her knees, her small shoulders shaking.
“It’s going to be okay,” Lexi promised. “Whatever’s going on, your dad isn’t going to let anything bad happen.”
“You don’t understand,” she said when she lifted her head, tears streaking down her cheeks. “I don’t want to go with Grandma and Grandpa. I want to stay here.”
Standing, Lexi moved closer, wrapping her arms around her.
“I want to be here with you and Jonah, and I want us to build campfires on chilly nights and make s’mores. I want us to do homework together.” She let out another shuddering breath. “I want us to be a family all the time like we were for the last few days before they showed up.”
Oh, boy…
“They ruined everything. You and Jonah were supposed to move in with us. We were gonna make the cabin like a real home, and I was finally going to have a little brother. But all my grandparents care about is our stupid last name. They don’t care about what I want or what Dad wants.”
No argument there.
A breeze rustled the trees, and she heard the pounding footsteps of everyone coming to them. But she wanted to protect Annabeth a little longer.
“You’re not going anywhere,” she promised, bending down so they were eye level. “No one is going to take you away from your dad. We won’t allow it.”
“But…but last night I heard Grandma say…”
“It doesn’t matter what she said,” Lexi said fiercely but lovingly. “Your dad would never let you go, and neither would I. We have all our plans that we started making, remember? Do you think we’re going to let anyone ruin them?”
That’s when she realized she meant it. She let the Winslowes rob her of the life she and Connor were planning all those years ago. It would be a cold day in hell before she let them do it a second time.
“I love you, Annabeth, like you’re my own daughter, and no one’s taking you away.”
The next thing she knew, Annabeth was wrapped around her like a vine, holding onto her for dear life. “I love you too, Lexi.”
And that’s how Connor found them as he wordlessly stepped in, hugging them close.
She felt Jonah join the group hug, and the wave of relief that washed over her nearly made her weak.
But she knew she wouldn’t fall.
Her little family was there to catch her.