Chapter 12 #2
“I’m here for your gear,” he said.
“It’s just there.” She gestured.
“I see it.” Next to the bed. And seriously . . . panda jammies? He couldn’t help the smile. “I hope you packed the thermals. Those jams aren’t going to work on the mountain.”
She never took her eyes from what she looked at on the desk and simply shook her head. He caught the smile on the left side of her face, though, and moved closer to look over her shoulder.
Sarah glanced up at him, the scent of her freshly shampooed hair filling his senses. But the paper with shaky scrawl drew his attention. “What’s this?” Was he intruding, or did this have something to do with their venture?
“This is the cryptic letter my grandfather wrote. It’s a deathbed confession. He left this for my brother, and that’s why I believe Aaron was killed. For this letter. But then his home, Tessa’s home, was searched. She was followed and was scared for her life.”
“What’s the confession, exactly? Why didn’t you tell me earlier?”
She twisted her head to glance up at him, her brown eyes shimmering. “I had to be sure about you.”
“And now you’re sure?”
“I think so, yes. As sure as anyone can be.”
Fair enough. He glanced to what lay on the desk.
“I know it’s cryptic,” she said. “But it’s about a mission that never made the newspapers. My grandfather, Walt Ellison, says that Sentinel One—the name of the World War II plane that crashed—still haunted him. And he says that he ‘died’ on that mountain.”
“Your grandfather. Not your great-grandfather?”
She shook her head. “He had a family late—in his forties. Then my parents also waited to have children. They were in their mid-thirties.”
“Sounds like my family,” he said.
“My parents died, and Grandpa Walt raised us in a small town in Oklahoma. Grandpa Walt was a hundred and one when he died.”
“What does he mean that he died on the mountain?”
“I wondered the same thing, so of course I did some digging. I can’t find any evidence of my grandfather serving in World War II,” she said.
“He died on the mountain, but he was never there. What are you getting at?”
“I wonder . . . did he reinvent himself and use a different name?” she asked. “And if so, then what would his name have been on the SO? Do we have a manifest, even?”
The historical information was obscure, and probably on purpose.
“I know that sounds out there.” She lifted a shoulder, her expression tight.
“Not at all. I think you could be right.”
“He never claimed to have served. He made kitchen cabinets for a living, and then even after he retired, he loved woodwork and carved amazing wildlife images. Bears. Eagles. Wolves. He got sick about two years ago, and Aaron was at his side when he died only last month. I was . . . I wasn’t able to make it in time.
I don’t know if he told Aaron and gave him a deathbed confession then or what.
All I know is that Aaron left this letter for me in a safety-deposit box.
Makes me wonder if he feared for his life, then why didn’t he tell me before? I just don’t understand.”
“I would like to say that maybe he was protecting you, but now here you are, so I’m not so sure.”
“Well, the letter starts with ‘If you’re reading this, I’m dead. This is what some might call a deathbed confession, and I have to tell someone.’” She looked at Ryder then. “The only problem . . .”
“He doesn’t say all that much,” he said. “And you’re making this trek because you believe your grandfather was on the plane that crashed in the Cascades, or he somehow knew about it, and your brother was murdered. What else haven’t you shared?”
Sarah Ellison was going to get him killed. Get them both killed. The thing was, he wasn’t walking into this blindly. She knew much more than she’d told him—even here tonight—and he was still all in.
She tugged an envelope from the outer zipper of her hiking pack.
“This was in the safety-deposit box too. An old topographical map. I couldn’t make heads or tails of it because of the outdated place names.
I tried using AI to help me, but it made no sense.
I guess now would be the time to show you.
Is this anywhere near where you found that metal piece? ”
She was only now showing him this? He tamped down his growing frustration. “Let me see that.”
Impatient, he wanted to snatch it out of her hands but waited for her to place it on the desk. She moved the desk light to shine directly on the old, laminated map.
“Looks like arrows showing the plane’s intended flight path, but that’s a guess. And X marks the spot.” He pressed his finger against it. “I can’t read the writing along the sides.”
“I can’t either.”
Ryder stood back, his hands jammed in his pockets. “If I’m interpreting this correctly, I think I know where that is, but how accurate was he? How did he make it off the mountain without anyone knowing?”
“Do you recognize where this is or not?”
“Maybe.”
“I thought you knew this mountain like the back of your hand.”
“I know it, sure, but geography can change over time. Glaciers shift. Rocks slide. You name it. We’re talking about decades here.”
“Is this where you found the piece that was stolen?”
“It’s in the vicinity. But up on Blackspire, vicinity is a relative term.”
“Whatever that means.” She lifted her face again, her brown eyes searching. “Bottom line, can you get us there?”
“Do you want to see where I found the piece of metal or go to this point on the map?”
“Can’t we do both?”
“We can try, but I can’t make any promises. The weather, the terrain, how long it takes us to get to point A. Maybe if you can give me an idea of your goal, more than what you’ve told me . . . What are you looking to find, specifically? Do you even know?”
She blinked and looked back at the map and then put it away in the backpack. “Whatever my brother had hoped to find.”
“Hold on. Pull the map out again.”
“Why?”
“I need to take a picture so I can refer back to it.”
“Great idea. I should have thought of it myself.”
“You could leave the original here.”
“In what, a safe? Do you have a secure place I could leave it?”
“Yes. I’ll take care of it.”
She narrowed her gaze—only slightly—then handed it over.
She still didn’t fully trust him, but after what she’d been through, he understood.
He would understand her better if he knew the details, but slowly .
. . she was letting him in, trusting him with what she held close.
She might be making this up as she went too, which he understood all too well.
While he hadn’t wanted to betray her trust, he appreciated having someone that he trusted digging into this.
She wouldn’t like it, so he wouldn’t tell her that his brother was going to learn what he could about that fated flight of the Sentinel One—he would text him this new information tonight.
This incident had been much more than a training-exercise crash—a plane lost in the Pacific Ocean.
“You should get some rest. I’ll put this away somewhere safe. Plus, I need your gear. I’ll add yours to the pile by the door.”
She stood to look at him, and the dim lighting softened her already beautiful features as she stared at him. His heart stuttered. He turned before she could see his reaction and lugged her backpack out. Dropped it by the door, then headed to his room.
He got a text from Wade.
Viv was found dead. Foul play suspected.
He sucked in a breath and responded, asking Wade to let him know anything more he learned. But was her death connected to the information Ryder had shared?
He’d already packed firepower but added more ammo.
Always had to be prepared on the mountain for four-legged creatures, but worse than that—those of the two-legged variety.
Ryder sat on the edge of his bed and stared at his shaking hands.
He squeezed them into fists. Opened them.
Squeezed. Opened. Until he shook off the sudden tremors.
He’d gone up the mountain recently to try to face the trauma of that terrible day when he’d been useless and watched his father fall to his death. All the missions in which he’d succeeded as a SEAL, and he’d failed his own father.
Sarah Ellison was putting too much hope in him, but he’d agreed to take this on. And it felt like maybe, just maybe, solving this mystery, protecting someone, was exactly what he needed. And he’d been waiting for this chance—to make up for all that had gone wrong before.