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Meg’s eyes narrow in on the silent radio in Danny’s hands as she waits, goose bumps once again rising along the flesh of her arms. Staring at this single connection to Silas, she feels an almost violent wrench of her gut, as though a physical part of her has been yanked back to the staging area.
Abruptly, Darcy’s voice rings back out over the airwaves, and they’re all put out of their misery. “That’s a negative, Team Seven. Neither Matheson child owns a blue baseball cap. Bag it and plot it but assume it unrelated.”
The surge of bottled-up adrenaline leaves Meg’s body as quickly as it came, and she sinks down onto the splintered planks of the dock.Unrelated.Goddammit. She releases a pent-up breath, letting her gaze fall to a particularly round pebble stuck in the sand, polished smooth from the elements of wind and water, and then nudges it with one boot.Dammit, dammit.
Danny waits a moment, then calls in. “Command, this is Team Five.”
“Go ahead, Team Five.”
“We’ve reached our assigned coordinates and are holding at Long Lake.”
“What’s the status there, Cairns?”
Danny frowns, and Meg feels a weak smile threaten the corners of her mouth. Radio communication within the unit is casual compared to what Danny’s used to in the fire department. With civilian volunteers making up the bulk of the search-and-rescue team, even search managers often discard radio-number protocol in favor of first or last names. She can distinctly remember Jan Radcliff, a member of over twenty years, conducting an impromptu lesson on the art of rolling out pie dough over the radio on a less urgent search about a year ago. The only radio conduct that’s strictly adhered to is the use of a simplistic color code to categorize a victim’s status: black for deceased, red for critical, blue for unharmed. Easy enough, Meg supposes, for all the amateurs like herself to remember.
Danny presses the talk button to answer Darcy’s question, which will amount to more disappointing news in the Lemon. “We’ve got nothing.”
“After the lodge-side slope, you covered the area between the Lakes Loop trail and Long Lake?” she confirms.
“In a loose grid. Yes.”
“And did your grid span the lakeshore?”
“Negative.” Danny deliberately shifts away from Meg’s gaze. “We tried to hike the circumference, but our consensus is that the vegetation is too thick for the boys to navigate.”
Darcy pauses. “Got it. Stand by, Team Five.” Meg pictures her studying her topographical map, trying to determine if any sections of her search radius have slipped through the cracks, and where. “Okay,” she finally answers. “Take the northern end of the Lakes Loop trail back around to the T above the lodge, then return to the staging area. No use retracing your steps, unless you think it needs another sweep.”
In other words, finish the loop. “But you want us to return to staging?” Danny sounds surprised. “Because we’re good to remain in the field for another few hours. Maybe heading to the north—”
Darcy’s voice is firm. “No, you’re not. Your team needs food and a break. Return ASAP.”
Danny signs out, strapping the radio back to his chest and turning the volume down to its previous level. It’s still high enough for Meg to hear the chatter, but only while she stands close to Danny.
Silently, they fall into a line, heading back up the access trail single file. If Max is reluctant to leave the lake, he knows better than to say so.
As difficult as it was to navigate her way down the slope, it’s twice as strenuous going back up. By the time they’ve reached the fifth of the dozen-odd switchbacks, Meg’s thighs are burning, and her chest aches with the effort of sucking in the cold, damp air. She pauses, bent double, at a curve in the trail, concentrating only on the sharp protest of her muscles. She welcomes the pain, because in its own twisted way, it brings relief. Just like hunger or any other human discomfort, it consumes her mind,distracting her wholly. Selfish or no, for this single moment in time, on this trail, she’s not thinking about the Matheson boys. She’s not thinking about being at odds with Danny. She’s not even thinking of Silas, and the way his return seems to have shed light into the cracks and crevices of the life she built with Danny with such scrutiny. She’s thinking only of herself, of the steady, punishing trail, and, despite the pain radiating along the backs of her calves and the headache mounting behind her eyes due to her predawn wake-up call, it’s a welcome reprieve.
Once they reconnect with the Lakes Loop trail, the team resumes calling out for the boys at regular intervals but remains single file. Meg’s not sure if it’s simply the power of suggestion or if the miles they’ve covered since she crawled out of bed this morning have caught up to her, but now that they’re on their way back to a meal and an hour or so of rest, it’s all she can do to hike with any semblance of energy. She peers into the tangle of sage and thin lodgepole pine as she hikes, but she knows it’s not adequate. Someone will have to cover this section again during the afternoon.
She dreads returning to the staging area to face Silas without any hope to offer. Will she find him still in the command center, being grilled by Walters? Or, worse, hobbled on the sidelines with absolutely nothing to do? She knows Silas; nothing would feel worse to him than inaction.
She ventures a glance at Danny as they hike. His head is down, his eyes warily on the trail in front of him, and his face reveals nothing now but the steady, hardened tug and pull of physical determination. Perhaps his own fatigue has softened the edges of his anger.
He’ll get over this bump between them; he always does. This wall between him and Meg isn’t anything new, and maybe heismore detached, the way he’s worked so hard to avoid this wilderness.
They hit the T-shaped cutoff to the lodge five minutes later, and as they clear the final slope and drop down into the center of the lodge grounds, the buildings are no longer deserted, as they were on their first pass through this morning. Now deputies from the departmentare combing the space; the doors to the small guest cabins ringing the center common space are propped open, and she can see a growing conglomeration of brown uniforms at the entrance to the main lodge kitchen and living quarters.
Meg falters in the middle of the trail. Maybe it’s not just Danny who’s attempted to put up a barrier after all, because she feels wholly unprepared for this sight. And it’s not just worry for the Matheson boys that threatens to disarm her. It’s everything: the authorities and the lodge, the forest and the search. All of it is dredging up memories she’s silently punished herself for over the last fifteen years.
It’s their job,she reminds herself firmly.Don’t I know that better than anybody?This lodge is the last known location of both Spencer and Cameron. Ofcoursethey’re searching it. It would be nothing less than unprofessional if they neglected to turn it completely inside out, and Meg knows it.
She watches the deputies—most of whom she’s known for years—shine their Maglites into the darkened cabins, hampered by both the touchy electrical wiring and the lack of light allowed through the boarded-over windows. There’s no crime-scene tape, and no media, so she knows no one has found cause to charge Silas with anything, and yet Sheriff Walters himself is standing on the bottom step of the rec room porch, directing someone on his two-way radio. His presence causes Meg to remember her feet, and when she strides back into the center of the staging area, she’s no longer half hoping to avoid Silas. Despite the awkwardness of their reunion, a sense of loyalty has seized her. This isSilas, caught in the web of this nightmare, and she suddenly doesn’t care how much time has passed. There’s too much history between them to not be at his side. There’s too much at stake to pretend that the last time this lodge was teeming with searchers it didn’t change everything. As she enters back into the fray, she scans the hastily erected tents and the com van in the parking lot, urgently seeking him.
14
SILAS
Four months prior to Howard search
