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Or . . . even an elk.
You’ve seen tracks.
It could even be a rabbit.
Or it could be a person, a monster who wrote letters from prison all dressed up in vines and Bible verses.
And what about Marilyn? Now that she’d remembered her sister’s part in the bloody confusion, she couldn’t stop thinking about it. Did Marilyn not remember? Why hadn’t she said a word?
Stop it. Concentrate. Someone could be out there.
Her pulse was pounding in her ears as she cracked the door. Merlin bolted through, then Lucy slipped into the darkness herself, hiding behind the ever-dwindling pile of firewood. The snowy landscape showed no signs of an intruder, but the rush of the wind was loud, the snow swirling and dancing from the dark sky.
You’re safe.
Renee is safe.
Calm down.
But her heart was thudding, every nerve strung tight.
Slowly, she moved around the perimeter of the cabin searching the darkness, squinting against the icy pellets of snow, the dog at her side, the wind blustering and blowing, howling through the trees. Merlin wandered out to the edge of the forest along a path they’d broken earlier, past the snow fort that was now nearly buried in a thick, white blanket, just another hillock near the ice and snow-encrusted evergreens rimming the clearing. She saw a broken tree branch, splintered from its trunk but still hanging, probably what accounted for the noise that had frightened her.
Again, her lurid imagination was overriding her sanity.
Cold to the bone, she walked backward, up the steps of the rear porch, her eyes on the forest, never daring to look away as she slipped back inside.
“Renee?” she said. “Sweetie? I’m back.”
But something felt off in the cabin.
It was too still.
Was her daughter hiding? Frozen in fright? Had Lucy freaked out her daughter to the point she couldn’t speak? “Honey,” she said, her hand going to the wall switch to turn on the light. “It’s okay.”
“Is it?” a deep male voice said, and as she spun, a gloved hand clamped hard over her mouth while, with his other hand, he stripped her of the rifle and reached into her pocket, withdrawing her baby Glock. “I don’t think so.”
* * *
Crouching so that no one could see him in a mirror, Ian approached the vehicle cautiously. It seemed abandoned, the snow piling ever higher on the roof, trunk, and hood. How long had Watkins been here? Ears straining, heart thudding, eyes scanning the snow-covered landscape, Ian half-expected someone to jump out at him. He saw the footprints, fresh from the looks of them, heading up the mountain, but he paused at the white Ford and peered through the frosty glass of the windows. It was dark in the interior, but there was no movement.
Using the flashlight on his phone, he shone the bright beam through the icy glass to the empty driver’s seat and the passenger seat.
Then he brushed snow from the rear window, illuminating the back seat.
The beam landed on a person. Instinctively, Ian raised his gun, only to realize that the man lying face up on the back seat was dead, his wrists and ankles bound with zip ties. His face ashen, his tongue lolling from his throat, his eyes fixed, and the ugly, jagged scar that ran from his drooping eye down his cheek where Lucy had tried to kill him, was all too visible.
Ray Watkins.
In the rotting flesh.
“Jesus,” Ian whispered, backing up and nearly tripping.
What about Lucy?
Renee?
He didn’t bother checking for a pulse.
