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Hayley’s bottom lip trembled and tears started to well up in her eyes. This finally jerked Chris out of his stupor. He jumped forward, toward the bed. “Hey. Hey, now,” he said, sitting on the edge of the bed and cupping her swollen face in his hand. “It’s over, Hayley. He’s gone. I’m here.”
She struggled to sit up and when she did he put his arms around her. She cried into his shoulder and all his guilt surged up again. He hated that he couldn’t protect her, hadn’t protected her, even though he’d sworn he would. And here she was, having to pick up the pieces all over again.
“It doesn’t feel like it’s over,” she sobbed.
Chris tightened his hold on her. “That’s because it just happened. It’ll take time, baby. But he can’t hurt you anymore. That much is absolutely true.”
She pulled away from him and gingerly wiped face. He winced inwardly, knowing how much pain she was in physically as well as emotionally. He hated that he could take away neither.
“I want to go home,” she told him.
And those words, while not “She’s dead,” or “I don’t think we’ll ever find her,” put a knife into his own heart all the same. Because all he had to do was look into her eyes to see which home she meant.
Steeling himself against the ever-expanding pain in his chest, he nodded to her. “I’ll call them, baby. They’ll be here soon.”
Chapter 37
Chris zipped up his jacket on his way toward his Harley. It was September now, the leaves were turning, and though the afternoons were nice, the evenings were getting colder. It was dark now every night when he forced himself to finish up at the garage and head home. He straddled the Harley and fired up the engine. He rolled out of the Burnout parking lot, but instead of turning right, he turned his now-usual left and gunned the engine.
The lights of the city gave way to long shadows. He passed rolling fields, dimly lit by the flood lights of barns nestled back from the road. He headed toward the hills that he knew were there but couldn’t see in the dark. He’d driven this way enough times now in the last two weeks to know it, even by moonlight. He wound his way up the hills, through the brush pine. The road was gravel not paved and would require snow chains to navigate in just a few months.
He nosed the bike off the county road and up a small one lane drive, climbing higher in the hills outside Rapid City. His approach triggered motion lights mounted high on both sides. He rolled to a stop in the circular drive and killed the Harley’s engine.
It was a two story log cabin, built in the 40’s. And frankly, it looked it. He was honest about that. Easy had taken one look at it and declared it a roach motel. But then the sullen younger man had put on his work gloves and helped Chris pull up the baseboards that had cracked over the years.
In the weeks since her parents had taken her back to Raleigh, Chris had spent his nights driving around. Sometimes in town. Sometimes on the open road. Occasionally exploring the back roads that threaded through the hills. It was better being in an empty house. Pepper was still there, but seeing her only reminded him that Sarah wasn’t.
They guys had taken to calling her that, when they asked about her, which was pretty frequently at first, but had dwindled now only occasionally. They weren’t blind to the fact that the longer Sarah was gone, the more surly their former Lieutenant had gotten.
It hadn’t taken more than a week of night exploration for Chris to finally realize what it was he was really doing. He was scoping out houses. His own house was forever tainted from the moment Markham had pulled up in front. Even if Sarah never returned, Chris couldn’t continue to live there. So when aimless driving had given way to actual searching, he looked for places that she would love.
He’d chosen the cabin even before he’d gone inside it. It was uninhabited, a For Sale sign pounded into the gravel driveway. He’d found it at night and its distance from the city proper meant that the stars shone above the dwelling like diamonds against velvet. A high rock wall rose behind it making the driveway the only point of approach, which appealed to Chris’ Army Ranger instincts. It had a two car garage on the side and a large overhanging porch on the second floor. He couldn’t bring himself to say out loud that Slick would love it, but he knew she would.
He’d hassled the realtor the next day to get a walk-through. He’d over looked the aging wallpaper, the cracked linoleum in the kitchen, and the crumbling fireplaces, one in the living room and one in the master bedroom, and told her he’d make an offer. He returned with the boys three days later for the inspection. Whatever Hawk thought of the place, he kept it to himself and Tex busied himself with inspecting the overhanging covered porch on the second floor. Only Easy turned his nose up at the place. “Shooter,” the younger man intoned. “You’re not really going to drop half a mil on this place.”
