Last Resort
Last Resort
Hannah Alexander
IT WAS A STORY TO PUT HIDEAWAY, MISSOURI, IN THE NATIONAL HEADLINES…A MISSING CHILD: Carissa Cooper, twelve, vanishes near her home–abducted, possibly by someone close to her.A WOMAN IN CRISIS : Noelle Cooper races back to her hometown to help in the search for her cousin and steps into a web of secrets that has haunted her family for generations.A MAN OF FAITH : Nathan Trask will do anything to protect Noelle from danger. Noelle's childhood friend, he might be much more…if she dares turn to him.
Last Resort
Hannah Alexander
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
In loving memory of Ray Overall,
February 2, 1913 to August 9, 2004,
stepdad extraordinaire, whose kindness
and gentle support gave hope and renewed life to
his wife and stepsons.
Contents
Acknowledgments
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
As with every book we write, we depend heavily upon others to help us reach our deadline with integrity. We very much appreciate our editor, Joan Marlow Golan, for enthusiastic support, patience and kindness. She and her excellent staff make our job so much easier.
Our agent, Karen Solem, guides us with expertise and wisdom when we stumble through the often confusing world of publishing.
Cheryl’s mom, Lorene Cook, keeps us going when deadlines loom and the world threatens to fly apart around us. What would we do without you, Mom?
Thanks to Vera Overall, Mel’s mom, who never stops spreading the word about the books she loves to read.
Thanks to Marty Frost, who has always believed in us, always served as a sounding board and inspiration.
Thanks to Barbara Warren, who rubs her hands in glee, red pen in hand, eager to attack and critique our latest work until it shines.
Thanks also to Jackie Bolton, for serving as an expert into the mysterious mind of the teenager.
Thanks to brainstorm buddies, Nancy Moser, Steph Whitson Higgins, Deborah Raney, Colleen and Dave Coble and Doris Elaine Fell, for helping us plot late into the night.
We owe a debt of gratitude to some wise individuals who helped us mold this book with insight into the spiritual gift of discernment. Sylvia Bambola, Till Fell, Brandilyn Collins, Janet Benrey, Carol Cox, Brenda Minton, Sharon Gillenwater, Barbara Warren, Colleen Coble and Kris Billerbeck, thank you for your patience as we pestered you with questions. Dr. Bill Cox and Jerry Ragsdale, thank you for additional input as you took time out of your church duties to give us direction.
We are always blessed by an online group of writers called ChiLibris and by the combined wisdom, Christian love, support and troubleshooting that is always available just a keyboard away.
Another group of prayer warriors, WritingChambers, constantly blesses us with their writing—the thing they do the best.
Praise and thanks go, most of all, to our Lord, without whom we would have no reason to write.
Chapter One
Not again. I can’t let it all start over again. I’ve got to stop this madness, even if it costs me everything. I can’t live if I take another life…and now Carissa.
She’s the light that fills Cedar Hollow. She brings sunshine from the gloom that seems to haunt Cooper land. I’ll take my own life before I lay a hand on—
But she knows too much about me. She’s been searching for secrets that have to stay hidden, telling everybody she’s gathering information for her school report. What if she’s lying? Maybe the report is a cover-up….
Now that I think about it, she’s been looking at me differently.
The kid is too smart for a twelve-year-old. She has other ways of knowing about me. I can’t trust her. I trusted before and look what happened. I can’t ever let my guard down or I’ll lose everything.
I can’t let Carissa tell what she knows.
Carissa Cooper stepped carefully along the muddy lane that led from the sawmill to the house, hugging the old business ledger that Dad had asked her to fetch. Aiming her flashlight at the tire tracks in front of her, she glanced into the darkness. Fear crept up and down her spine like spiders on patrol.
She wasn’t usually scared of the dark anymore, but something about the movement of shadows bugged her. They shifted, changing shapes, skittering along the forested roadside with the movement of her flashlight, like the monsters that had waited for her in her closet and under the bed when she was six. She’d been scared of everything then, right after Mom left.
Now she knew better. Still, tonight she couldn’t help imagining that eyes were watching her from those waiting clumps of brush and weeds.
If only her big brother Justin had come with her. If only he weren’t still so mad at her.
“Should’ve kept my mouth shut,” she muttered under her breath.
The sound of a quiet thud reached her from somewhere deep in the forest to her right. Horse’s hooves? She stopped and listened, but all she heard was the whisper of leaves brushing against each other in a puff of wind. The branches made shadows leap across the trunk of the old walnut tree in the glow of her flashlight…like bony arms reaching out for her….
The breeze died and the movement stopped.
Carissa swallowed hard, sweeping the light around her. She had less than an eighth of a mile to go, and here she was acting like a ’fraidy cat. She brought the small circle of light back to the muddy track as she stepped forward again.
What was all the fuss about with Justin anyway? So he was weird. Nothing new. He wasn’t the only weird person in their family; he was just acting a little weirder lately. His habits were always making them late to church, late to school. It was embarrassing. This morning she’d counted the number of times he’d checked the front door to make sure it was locked before they left for school. Seven. Same as yesterday. Monday it had been fourteen. Probably to make up for missing his counting process Sunday morning, since they hadn’t gone to church.
And she was getting sick of him turning out all the lights in the house at night before everyone went to bed. Last night she was in the bathroom brushing her teeth when he turned out the light on her, and when Carissa shouted at him, Dad got onto her. It wasn’t fair.
She shifted the business ledger under her arm. If she dropped it in this mud, Dad would freak. He didn’t like his stuff dirty. He and her cousin Jill were probably already wondering what was taking her so long, even though the whole family knew she was doing research on the history of the Cooper sawmill and the deaths ten years ago that nobody would talk about. She could get a good grade on this report if she could dig up enough information, but did they care? No. What she wanted never mattered.
This morning had been the worst thing yet, when Mom had called and Dad wouldn’t let her talk to Carissa or Justin. Then Dad had freaked when Carissa picked up the extension. How could he pretend Mom never existed? Sure, Mom had been a jerk, but she was their mother. How could kids be kept from seeing their own mother?
That sound again—that thump of something heavy hitting wet earth in a slow rhythm. Horsewalk.
“Gypsy, is that you?” Her mare wasn’t supposed to be in the front pasture, but sometimes she jumped the fence.
Carissa shuffled the ledger beneath her arm to keep it from sliding out of her sweaty hand. It continued to slide. She grabbed for it and dropped the flashlight straight into a gooey puddle. The splatter of mud startled her. The darkness seemed to attack her with glee.
“Stop it, stupid,” she muttered to herself, reaching into the puddle.
She came up with a handful of mud, and heard the splash of water mingled with a rustle of brush somewhere behind her. Heart banging in her chest, Carissa tried again, feeling through the slick goo for the flashlight. She searched with both hands, forgetting the book until it slipped from under her arm and fell, splashing her with more mud.
Oh no! Dad would freak. He’d warned her not to—
More rustling, closer.
Carissa froze, still stooped over, grasping the mud-slicked book. Had she really heard something? Was her mind playing tricks on her? She waited, holding her breath, listening.
Nothing.
“Justin? That you? You’d better stop it or I’ll tell Melva.” Reporting him to their stepmother was a threat that sometimes worked.
Still no answer.
“Justin, I mean it. Stop it right now.”
It had to be Justin playing a trick on her. She listened for his soft snicker. Nothing.
“Never mind Melva, I’m telling Dad.”
She continued to search for the flashlight, but her movements grew slower and slower. She frowned.
Usually Justin would be making weird noises by now, just to scare her….
Was that breathing she heard?
“Justin Cooper! Dad’ll skin you alive when he finds out you made me drop the ledger.”
No answer. This wasn’t like her brother.
But then, Justin hadn’t been acting all that brotherly lately.
There was another rustle of brush, followed by another thud that sounded like a horse hoof.
Noelle Cooper’s fingers stiffened in the process of making change for a customer. She caught her breath at the sudden unreasoning concern that gripped her.
“You okay?” the bearded man asked as he stared at the coins Noelle held poised over his outstretched hand.
She breathed again. Forcing a smile to her lips, she relinquished his change. “Sorry, Jack.” She closed the cash drawer. “Guess it’s past my bedtime. Hope you like that yogurt. If you want to cut your fat intake, you can skim the cream off the top, but for better taste stir it all together.”
She waved him out the door, casting a glance around Noelle’s Naturals, her health-food and supplement store. No other customers had slipped in while she was waiting on Jack, so she reached for the keys to lock up.
It was eight o’clock, straight up. Everyone else had gone home. Mariah, Noelle’s silent business partner, kept encouraging her to keep the doors open a few minutes past closing on Thursday nights for a customer who had to drive clear across Springfield after work, but that man hadn’t been here in three weeks, and there were hardly any cars parked in the shopping center lot.
Besides, Noelle felt strange…enervated…weak. Understandable enough, since she’d slept only a total of ten hours or so the past three nights. The insomnia was probably brought on by Joel’s return. It had been too much to hope that her ex-husband would disappear from Springfield, Missouri, forever.
On top of everything, Mariah was away on a buying trip to Kansas City, and Noelle had been at the store since seven o’clock this morning. Why was it every time her partner left town all the grouches and complainers descended? For the past three hours, Noelle’s face had ached from forcing a smile. If one more crank walked through that door…
She locked it and returned to the cash register to balance her money with receipts, but then she paused and leaned against the counter. “Okay, Lord, what’s happening here?” she whispered.
A ripple of unease brushed her nerve ends, as it had several times the past few days. But why? Usually, when she felt this kind of spontaneous sensation, she could take a few minutes to focus and she would calm down. This time it felt stronger. Different. She closed her eyes and breathed deeply, picturing her favorite hiking trail, down by Hideaway. She would go hiking again soon. Very soon, she promised herself.
The constant bustle of Springfield tended to get on her nerves, and she tried to escape from the city at least two or three times a month. Although the nearby nature center offered a good occasional respite, she also needed a quieter trail now and then, with lots of trees and without anyone race-walking past her, chattering on a cell phone. Noelle loved people, but the public could overwhelm her. When she was hypersensitive, as she was now, she craved solitude.
She stretched her arms over her head to ease the tightness in her shoulder muscles. Everything in the store looked in place. She straightened a package of pumpkin seeds on the sale rack and returned to the counter, still unable to shake her anxiety.
There was something different about the way she felt tonight. Noelle knew it wasn’t simply stress. Not this time.
The last time she had felt this way a loved one had died.
Carissa didn’t move. Her heart was pounding so fast she could hardly breathe, and her throat felt so stiff she could barely swallow. She prayed silently, the way her favorite cousin, Noelle, had taught her to do when she was afraid. Keep me safe, Jesus. Keep me safe.
Something rustled the bushes at the side of the lane, and Carissa felt a low whimper sliding up her throat.
What if it wasn’t Justin? Maybe it really wasn’t anybody she knew. But who else would be down here in Cedar Hollow at night?
More rustling…
Carissa stopped breathing.
A footstep. Between her and the house.
Forgetting about the flashlight in the puddle, Carissa swung around and raced back through the darkness toward the sawmill. She clutched the muddy ledger to her chest like a shield as she stumbled over weeds along the lane.
She heard more rustling behind her, a splash of mud, the sound of labored breathing…and a soft whisper that blended so closely to the rustle of brush, Carissa couldn’t be sure it was human…. It sounded like the wind in the trees, except the whisper kept time with the rhythm of footsteps, and she thought she heard her name…Carissssssaa…
She let the ledger fall to the ground as she raced through the darkness toward the sawmill, stumbling into branches that seemed to reach out from the black line of trees on both sides of the lane. As she emerged into the lumberyard, the moon peered out from the clouds. She pivoted to her right and sprinted toward the side door of the huge building that housed the sawmill.
The footsteps behind her grew fainter, and when she reached the door, she risked a glance over her shoulder. A shadow broke loose from the hovering trees, but she couldn’t tell who it was.
She yanked open the door and ran inside. She cracked her shins on something solid and tripped, falling hard on her left side. Her temple smacked the floor, stunning her. She’d left out a box when she’d been searching the sawmill earlier. Stupid!
The footsteps came closer, slowed and stopped. She sensed her pursuer was poised in the doorway, listening to her harsh, shallow breathing.
She scrambled to her feet, stumbled again, dizzy and confused.
A hand touched her shoulder. She screamed and skittered backward. Something caught her at the ankles. She fell back, slamming against the cement floor. Total darkness engulfed her.
Noelle dropped the bills back into their slot and shoved the cash drawer shut. Time to go home and go to bed.
She looked up to see a customer reaching for the handle of the front door—the door she’d locked a few moments ago. Groaning inwardly, she motioned for the man to wait, then retrieved the keys from the drawer.
She could feel her neck muscles tightening as she walked toward the front of the store. She glanced outside at the dark sky, then at the pale impatient face of the waiting customer. She wasn’t up to this, really she wasn’t. She needed to get away sometime soon, away from the demanding customers, the complaints and traffic. She couldn’t take—
Again, that feeling of focused concern struck her, more powerfully intense this time. And even more focused.
She caught her breath. It had been so long since she’d experienced this…this response. She closed her eyes, ignoring the man at the door.
“Oh dear Jesus.” It was a prayer not a curse. “Is this—” She opened her eyes, startled. “Carissa!”
Chapter Two
Nathan Trask gritted his teeth and braked his black Chevrolet pickup to avoid hitting a flop-eared hound darting out in front of him, the dog’s black nose following a scent.
“Sorry, fella, but that raccoon’s probably long gone,” Nathan muttered as the dog plunged into the brush on the other side of the road. “Could be we’re both following a false trail.”
A car honked behind him, and he increased his speed. Traffic in Springfield could rival the congestion of St. Louis or Kansas City during rush hours, but at 6:30 a.m. on Friday, Highway 160, south of Missouri’s third largest metropolis, held some of the attractions of a country lane. Touches of yellow and burnt orange decorated the trees along the road this autumn morning, hinting at more color to come.
But today, the beauty didn’t ease Nathan’s tension. He knew, from a lifetime of experience, that Noelle Cooper had a formidable understanding of logic, and the idea that Nathan had been considering these past few hours was not logical. His best friend from childhood might think he’d gone nuts.
He forced his hands to relax on the steering wheel and unclenched his jaw. Maybe his desperation to find Carissa, along with a night without sleep, had addled his brain. But his memories of Noelle’s particular gift were vivid, more so in the past few months, as the friendship that he and Noelle had shared long ago reestablished itself after years of life’s intrusions.
He wasn’t romanticizing the past, was he? Jumping to wild conclusions about Noelle’s ability to find Carissa when the rest of them had failed?
Noelle adored Carissa, and she needed to know what was happening. He was doing the right thing, if for no other reason than to inform Noelle about something she deserved to know, since she and the girl were family.
He turned right before he reached the city-limits sign, then drove six blocks and turned right again, admiring the picture-postcard attractiveness of this increasingly familiar neighborhood. Since running into Noelle in downtown Hideaway earlier this summer, Nathan had started finding more and more excuses to visit Springfield, despite the three-hour round trip.
As he pulled into her driveway—second house on the left, the gray brick with black trim—he spotted her red Ford Escort through the tiny square panes of the garage window, which meant Noelle hadn’t gone to work yet. Good. Maybe her partner could carry the load today, so Noelle could be free to come back to Hideaway with him immediately. After a cup of coffee; he really needed a strong dose of caffeine first.
Less than three seconds after Nathan rang the doorbell, Noelle opened the door. She focused on him slowly, pushing back a wave of tousled brown hair. Her brow cleared, and that familiar, affectionate smile lit the sleepy lines of her face.
“Nathan?”
“Morning,” he said, casting a glance at her long, teddy-bear nightshirt and terry-cloth robe. “Just get up?”
“Mmm-hmm.” She rubbed her eyes. “Thought I’d see if I had a paper yet.” She peered out at the empty sidewalk and front yard and shrugged. “Optimistic, I know. Come on in. Did you just get into Springfield? How about a cup of coffee? What are you doing here so early? Another meeting with those rural pharmacy suppliers?” She turned, leading the way back inside.
For a moment, instead of following her, he hesitated. Crazy. Definitely, he was crazy. What in the world made him think he could face this sane woman and blurt out what he’d been thinking? They were both adults now. Was he romanticizing memories? As a child, Noelle had possessed an extra special knowledge of certain events. Could she have that knowledge now?
She stopped and turned back, the tiny lines around her blue eyes deepening. “Nathan?”
“Coming.” He followed her into the foyer. “No meeting today. I came to see you. And coffee would be wonderful. Oh, and yes, I just got into Springfield.” Classical music played in the background, and he caught a whiff of pumpkin spice mingled with freshly brewed coffee.
She pulled a mug from a cupboard near the sink. “You came to Springfield at six-thirty in the morning—which would mean you left Hideaway at five? Ick! All this just to see me?” Her movements slowed and she turned, frowning at him. “So what’s up?”
“Your sister hasn’t called, has she?”
A heightened alertness stiffened her shoulders, and her eyes narrowed with sudden apprehension. “Why would Jill call me this early in the morning? What’s happened?”
“Carissa’s missing.”
Noelle stared at him for a moment, slow to comprehend what he was saying.
“She disappeared last night, somewhere between the house and the sawmill,” he continued gently. “We haven’t found her.”
Nathan’s words seemed to strike her one by one, in a timed delay. Then her eyes widened, and she drew in a deep breath.
Nathan reached for her as she paled.
She caught his arm. “Oh, no,” she breathed. “What…what time last night?”
“It was after dark, maybe around eight. She went down the hill to the sawmill to do some research for a school paper, and she was supposed to bring back a ledger for Cecil and Jill when she returned. She never returned.”
Noelle’s grip on Nathan’s arm tightened. “I can’t believe…they must be out of their minds with worry!”
“Cecil is blaming himself. Melva’s inconsolable.” Noelle had grown up in Cedar Hollow, down the lane from her cousin Cecil, and the two of them had been like brother and sister.
“And my sister?” she asked.
“Jill’s trying to reassure all of them, but it isn’t doing much good. Jill’s just as upset as the rest. I thought you’d want to help search.”
Years ago, when Noelle was in the process of a painful divorce from her abusive husband, she had returned to Hideaway to stay with her sister, Jill. During those months, she’d spent a lot of time with Cecil’s daughter, Carissa, forming a bond that had kept them close ever since. Though Jill lived in town, and Cecil’s family in sparsely populated countryside outside Hideaway—a hollow in the hills strewn with cedars, Carissa had used every excuse to visit Hideaway and spend the night.
Noelle released her grip on Nathan’s arm. “I’ll get dressed, and then I’ll follow you back. Put our coffee in a thermos, will you? There’s one in the cabinet above the stove.” She swung toward the hall, chatter gear kicking into high, as it always did when she attempted to tone down an emotional rush. “I’ll take my cell phone and arrange for extra help—”
“I’d hoped you would ride with me,” Nathan said before she could disappear into her bedroom.
She stopped and turned back, frowning. “Why? Then you’ll just have to drive me back home as soon as we find her.”
As soon as we find her. He’d always loved her positive attitude. “We need to talk on the way down,” he said. “I thought you might know some places we haven’t looked. You seem to have a special empathy with Carissa.”
“Can’t we do all that when we get there?”
He hesitated. Why did she have to be so contrary?
“Okay, fine, I’ll ride with you,” she said, changing her mind before he could speak, then pivoting again toward her bedroom. “Let’s just get there, okay?” She shut the door behind her.
Carissa awoke to the throb of pain in her head, and the sound of her own voice—a soft whimper that she had intended, in her dream, to be a loud cry for help. Staring into the thick blackness, she couldn’t remember the dream, or even why she’d been afraid—until she reached out and felt the hard, damp slab of stone beneath her, and heard the drip-drip of water somewhere nearby.
She barely suppressed another cry. Where was she?
She squeezed her eyes shut tight against the pain in her head and tried to think. Somebody had chased her. She remembered running back to the sawmill, someone grabbing her. She remembered falling. Then nothing. Whoever was chasing her had brought her here. But where was here? If only it weren’t so dark…if only she’d found her flashlight in the mud puddle.
Her eyes strained against the blackness. She blinked. Nothing. It was as if she were encircled by air as thick as tar. But if she could see nothing, then that meant nothing could see her. That thought brought some comfort. The darkness was her friend.
Unfortunately, it seemed she had an enemy more scary than the darkness had ever been when she was a little kid.
The drip of water caught her attention again. She turned toward the sound and gasped at the sudden burst of pain in the back of her head. Had her attacker knocked her out? Or had it been the fall?
And where was he now? Or was it a he?
Fear mingled with the pain. Carissa strained to see anything at all through the darkness, but there was no light. Her heartbeat pounded like a hammer on her skull. Her shallow breaths echoed against…what?
She raised her hand and tentatively pressed it deeper and deeper into the thick blackness. About a foot away from her face she touched something hard, and jerked back. She rubbed her fingers together and felt wetness. Forced herself to reach out again, she felt damp, gritty rock, forming a wall beside her.
A wall where?
Would her attacker come back? Maybe he thought she was dead. Maybe she would be dead if she stayed here.
She tried to sit up. Shafts of pain shot from her head all the way down her back, and she slumped sideways against the wall.
The smell of fresh, damp earth was familiar, but the sound of dripping was different from the sounds of the woods where she’d been walking earlier. She touched the wall beside her once more, and again rubbed her fingers together. Gritty wetness. She heard the water dripping in the distance, with a hollow echo, as though the sound was contained.
An underground cavern of some kind? She’d been in enough caves with Justin to recognize the feel and smell of one. How long had she been here? A few minutes? Hours? She had to get out.
She leaned forward and braced herself against the wet wall, trying to breathe past the pain, the way Melva had told her to do when she’d broken her arm last year. She couldn’t let the pain stop her, or she might die here.
Slowly, she stood up. Keeping her hand on the cave wall, she inched her way forward, stumbling in the dark over rocks and pebbles. Was this the right thing to do? What if she was going in the wrong direction?
Pain spread from her head down her neck. She took shallow, quick breaths and thought about sunshine and safety.
She shuffled forward along the uneven rock for a few more minutes, keeping her right hand extended in front of her while staying in contact with the cave wall. A wrong step could plunge her to her death if there was a drop-off. Justin had warned her never to get lost in a cave. Too late now.
She felt along the surface of the mud-slick cavern floor with her toes until the pounding pain in her skull grew too harsh, then she paused to breathe away some of the throbbing.
A moment later, she continued inching forward.
But was she going the right way? Should she wait a little longer, in case someone was coming for her? Dad and Melva and Jill would be looking for her soon. People got lost in these Ozark caves. Some died. Maybe she should wait a little longer….
How had her attacker been able to carry her this way? Maybe she should—
Stone clattered against stone somewhere behind her, and she froze, listening. She almost called out, then she realized that Dad or Melva or Justin or Jill would be shouting for her. There was a shuffle of footsteps, another clatter of rock. Carissa dropped to her knees, pressing her lips together to keep from crying out at the sudden pain.
She waited.
Silence.
She crawled forward, keeping her left hand on the wall to guide her as the soles of her shoes slid across the muddy earth. She could hear her own loud breathing.
A flash of light shot over the dripping rocks, then disappeared. She froze to watch and listen.
Was that a whisper? Or just a change in rhythm of the dripping water?
The light flashed again, and Carissa caught sight of a stalagmite just ahead, with a shelf of white rock beyond it. A hiding place. If she could reach that spot and—
Another whisper, then the sound of footsteps. Someone was coming, but any other sounds of an approach disappeared in the thumping roar inside Carissa’s skull, pain growing worse as her fear mounted.
She scrambled past the fat stalagmite. Digging her fingers into tiny crevices, she pulled herself up the stone wall. A narrow space behind a slab of limestone looked like a perfect fit for her as the light flashed through the cave again. She crawled into the space, then collapsed, gritting her teeth against the sharp stabbing in her skull.
She heard the sound of rocks scattering, then footsteps below her. Light flickered across the white limestone. She cringed. Could she be seen?
There was a loud gasp. “No!” The voice was a whisper. The searcher paused, as if looking around. Then: “Carissa? Carissa…” Like the hiss of a snake.
More footsteps, as if the searcher roamed through the cave. More whispers echoed from the walls of rock, like the sound of dry leaves blowing in the wind, but Carissa couldn’t make out the words. She held her breath, trembling with terror.
That whisper…something about it was familiar. But what? Or maybe it wasn’t the voice. Maybe it was something else. She sniffed the air. A scent?
Whoever was holding that light and filling the cavern with whispers knew her name.
The footsteps shuffled past her hiding place, and the light faded in the distance. Darkness and silence floated down over her again like a shield. At last, all was dark, and all was silent once more.
Chapter Three
Noelle fastened her seatbelt and settled the thermos beside her as Nathan pulled out of her driveway. She fished her cell phone out from her purse then punched in Cecil’s home number. When a stranger answered, she asked about the status of the search and was told Carissa had not yet been found.
“Thanks.” She disconnected. “Nothing yet.”
“We can try again in a little while.”
She closed her eyes and leaned her head back. Oh, Carissa, where are you?
Nathan’s warm hand touched her arm. “You okay?”
She nodded as tears stung behind her closed lids. “I’m fine. Carissa will be, too.”
His hand tightened. “You know that for sure?”
She opened her eyes and looked at him, hearing the odd note in his voice. “I’m praying it’s true.” She hadn’t stopped praying since Nathan had broken the news to her. Actually, she’d been praying before that.
He nodded and returned his attention to the road.
She knew this drive well, all the rolling hills, stark cliffs and misty valleys that stretched from Springfield to Branson on Highway 65, and then west on 76 to the Hideaway turnoff. These wooded Ozark hills kept their secrets well.
She closed her eyes, once again picturing her young cousin’s smiling face, her mischievous blue eyes and shoulder-length ringlets of soft brown hair. Oh, Carissa.
Tears smarted Noelle’s eyes again, and she straightened in her seat. “Tell me about the search. Where have they looked? How many are helping?”
“No one has rested,” Nathan said. “Not even Aunt Pearl. They’ve combed Cedar Hollow from end to end. The police, the forest rangers, even some local guardsmen were called to help.”
“So you’re saying they called out the guards before they called me?” That stung, and yet she knew this wasn’t the time to allow her personal feelings to become involved. She’d called the Coopers last night from the store, and left a message on their machine.
“Sorry.”
“How’s Aunt Pearl holding up?” Noelle asked. Her sixty-seven-year-old great-aunt Pearl lived on the original family homestead, about a quarter mile from Cecil’s home. Cecil and his family lived in the same sprawling two-story house in which he had grown up, halfway between Pearl’s house and the sawmill. Ordinarily, a sawmill would need to be situated closer to civilization, but Cooper’s had been in operation for over fifty years, with an excellent reputation. It never lacked for business.
“I’ve hardly seen anything of her,” Nathan said. “She’s obviously upset.”
“How’s her heart?”
“She’s strong as an ox, you know that. I wouldn’t be surprised to discover she’s covered the whole property on foot herself.”
“Surely there have been places the searchers have missed,” Noelle said. “Nobody could possibly cover all two thousand acres in one night. Who, besides the guards and police, is searching?”
“Thirty people from regional search-and-rescue squads, plus the Cooper sawmill employees. Dane Gideon came over with his ranch hands before I left this morning, and as the word’s spread, the churches got involved. Everyone has combed the woods as thoroughly as possible, then started over again. When I left this morning, it looked as if there were more people than trees in that forest.”
Noelle felt a rush of gratitude for the strong community that had always been a part of Hideaway, and the surrounding countryside, and once again tears filled her eyes. “And family?”
“Cecil stays out there all the time. He won’t eat, won’t even sit down for a short rest.”
Noelle could easily believe that. The paternal instinct ran strong in her cousin. “What about Melva?” she asked. Cecil’s second wife had always adored Carissa and Justin. Indeed, the family joked that Melva had married Cecil because she’d wanted to mother his children.
“She’s not holding up well at all,” Nathan said.
Noelle closed her eyes and willed herself not to let the tears fall. Why hadn’t they returned her call last night? She stayed up late waiting and praying, until she’d finally received assurance that everything would be okay. But now? Where was all that holy assurance now?
“Your sister’s been keeping a close eye on Melva,” Nathan said. “Typical Jill.”
Noelle sighed and turned her head to stare out the passenger window, across a rare open valley. “Jill didn’t call me.”
Nathan didn’t reply.
Noelle gave him a sharp glance. “What aren’t you telling me?”
“Maybe you should have a talk with Jill when we get there.”
“Why?” She studied his expression. His attention remained on the road, hands at the ten and two position on the steering wheel, back straight, a sure sign he was covering. “Let me guess. She told everyone not to call me.”
He grimaced.
“She did!”
“She said you had a lot going on right now, and this would be too much for you.”
Noelle scowled and crossed her arms over her chest. She should have known better than to tell her sister about Joel’s return. Now Jill was all distressed, begging Noelle to scamper back home to Hideaway with her tail between her legs, like a whipped cur. Again. Jill to the rescue. Again. But Noelle didn’t need rescuing this time.
“She’s only concerned for your welfare,” he said.
“Don’t even start with that, Nathan. I’m thirty-six. She still sees me as a seven-year-old child who’s lost her mother. For Pete’s sake, that was twenty-nine years ago.” And Jill never seemed to remember that she’d lost her mother, too.
“She mentioned that you had a difficult time after the sawmill accident.”
“Sure I did. So did everyone else. It was shocking and horrible, and Jill didn’t even take time to grieve. She was too busy taking care of everyone else. Come on, Nathan, she’s pulling the big-sister act again. It isn’t healthy for her or anyone else. And besides, that accident was ten years ago. I wasn’t exactly in the best mental state at the time.”
Ten years ago, Noelle and Jill had lost their father and grandparents in an accident at the sawmill when a load of cedar logs had fallen off a flatbed truck, crushing them. Four years later, Cecil’s wife—Justin and Carissa’s mother—had suddenly left home, abandoning her family. Two years ago, a tornado had ripped through Cedar Hollow, barely sparing the homes and sawmill. Some people said Cedar Hollow was cursed. Sometimes, Noelle agreed.
From her peripheral vision, Noelle saw Nathan give her a brief glance. “You’ve lost weight,” he said.
“Thank you for noticing.”
“Haven’t been eating?”
She shook her head. “I needed to lose the weight anyway, but I guess I’ve been a little on edge the past couple of weeks, what with Joel back in town.”
There was an expressive silence, and she could have bitten her tongue. Apparently, Jill hadn’t shared that tidbit with Nathan.
“You didn’t tell me.” There was a note of accusation in his voice.
She felt an uncomfortable nudge of guilt. She reminded herself firmly that there was no reason to feel guilty. “Now you’re beginning to sound like Jill.”
“Okay, let me make sure I’m clear on this.” His voice bit with a hint of sarcasm. “Your ex-husband—who has proven in the past to be violent—has suddenly reappeared in Springfield. You’re nervous enough about it that you’ve lost your appetite, yet you don’t think it’s reasonable for anyone to become concerned?”
“I’m simply saying I don’t need more than one person overreacting to the crises in my life. I’m capable of taking care of them myself.” Okay, maybe she was overreacting. Yes, she and Nathan had renewed their friendship, and she valued that friendship highly, but she was answerable to no one but herself. These past few years of independence had given Noelle a sweet taste of freedom. She intended to guard that freedom with everything she had.
She glanced at Nathan’s profile, the even features, the high forehead, and resisted a pang of chagrin at the concern in his expression. “I’m telling you now, okay? And yes, I’ve lost some sleep over it. I just don’t think anyone else should have to worry.” Especially since she had landed herself in this mess to begin with. She didn’t intend to drag friends and family into the ugly aftermath of her past mistakes.
“Has he tried to contact you?”
She hesitated. “Let’s just say he’s made sure I know he’s back.”
“Please don’t tell me he knows where you’re living now.”
“He could easily find out if he wanted to, but he’s been coming into the store the past couple of weeks.”
Nathan’s grip tightened on the steering wheel. “He’s been coming in? As in, more than once?”
“Twice when I was working, but he always purchased things, so it isn’t as if he’s harassing me.”
“Has he said anything to you?”
“He barely looked at me.” Okay, so it wasn’t completely objectionable to have Nathan concerned about her welfare.
“Do you think he’s up to something?”
“I can’t tell. Six years ago I was able to read him and know when to expect an outburst, but he’s been gone a long time. Now we’re strangers, and I don’t know what to expect.”
They rode in silence for a moment. During the divorce proceedings, which had been drawn out for eighteen excruciating months, Noelle had received several threats from Joel, along with a broken windshield. There had also been numerous anonymous telephone calls to her place of employment, where she’d worked as a nurse for a pediatric group, calls that ultimately had resulted in the loss of her job when the harassment had become too intense—Missouri’s status as a “right to fire” state hadn’t helped. Three of the five physicians in the group had requested her termination, with no reason needed.
Because of her past work record, she’d found it impossible to find another nursing position, which was her own fault. Testing positive for methamphetamines had cast an indelible smudge on her reputation, though she hadn’t touched drugs again. She only wished she’d never taken those pills the first time, had never fallen for Joel’s promise that they would “keep her alert.”
The situation with Joel had become so frightening that she’d requested a restraining order. She hadn’t received one, because she couldn’t prove her estranged husband was the culprit. During the final six months before the divorce hearing, she’d gone home to Hideaway and stayed with Jill. And her concerned older sister had stepped back into her “mommy” role, to the point of insisting that Noelle eat three healthy meals a day and attend church twice a week. It was then that Noelle had begun to seek God’s direction in earnest, for the first time in many years.
“You don’t think Joel’s sudden reappearance could have anything to do with Carissa’s disappearance, do you?” Nathan asked.
Noelle looked at him, startled. “Like what?”
“Would kidnapping be out of the question?”
“Kidnapping!”
“At this point I don’t know, but having met Joel a few times, and knowing what he’s done to you in the past, I wouldn’t dismiss the possibility. From all accounts, he’s a vindictive scoundrel who should be rotting behind bars.”
She blinked at him, startled by his adamancy. “But Carissa? After six years? I don’t think that’s likely.” And yet, what if…?
She glanced at Nathan’s profile again. Nathan Trask had a kind nature, which was obvious in his expression, in the laugh lines around his eyes. He was also an attractive man, with a high, broad forehead, dark-green eyes, dark-brown hair that he kept short and combed back. Right now, his usual five o’clock shadow had nearly become a beard, and his facial lines were ones of weariness. He had good reason to be cranky.
“Maybe I should be driving,” she said.
“I’m okay. The coffee helped.”
Sitting back, she tried to relax, and again thought about last night. She shivered.
“Cold?” Nathan reached toward the console for the heat dial.
“I’m…fine.” She folded her arms over her chest and tried to let the passing roadside beauty calm her—the bright yellow splashes of goldenrod against the deep red of autumn sumac, highlighted by sprays of purple asters.
It was no use. Her mind wouldn’t stop whirling with questions.
“Noelle?” Nathan said at last.
“Hmm?”
“What else is going on with you?”
“What do you mean?”
“There’s something else you’re not telling me.”
She gave him a look of aggravation. Nathan Trask had always possessed an irritating ability to read her mind. “Why would you say—”
“Just tell me, okay? I’m not in the mood to dig it out of you.”
“Okay, fine.” He really was a grump today. And she shouldn’t be saying this. It would only invite more questions and cause more worry. Could she trust him not to share too much with Jill? “It’s nothing, really. I had a little episode last night, probably from low blood sugar, since I haven’t been eating a lot, and didn’t—”
“What kind of episode?”
She had his complete attention now. “Watch the road, would you?”
“I’m watching the road. Tell me what happened.”
Rats. She knew he’d get upset. For a few more seconds she stared out at the colorful roadside. Like Jill, Nathan had the “older sibling” complex. He tended to be bossy, and from the time the first of his two younger sisters was born, he had also tried to boss Noelle even though she was his age, and a neighbor rather than a sibling. She’d established her boundaries with him when she was about five. She didn’t intend to have to do so again.
Still, it wasn’t totally disagreeable to have Nathan so concerned about her.
“Okay,” he conceded. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to snap at you. What happened? How did you feel?”
“I felt very concerned for no reason,” she said, then glanced at him to make sure he was watching the road again. “You know how it is when something occurs to you, that seems so real, as though God has spoken?”
He glanced at her again. “That’s a lot more than just nerves or blood sugar.”
“Joel’s arrival is definitely a stressor,” she said.
There was a pause, then Nathan asked, “What time, exactly, did it happen?”
She frowned at him.
He met her gaze briefly, then looked away. “This may have everything to do with Carissa.”
She thought so, too, but why would he?
He took a deep breath and exhaled, then combed his fingers through his hair. The morning sun shining in through the window showed the lines around his eyes and the evidence of his lack of sleep and his worry. “What time did you have the attack? You said it was last night—was it after dark?”
“It was just after closing time.”
“You close at eight—which means this happened about the same time Carissa disappeared.”
“Yes.” She didn’t want to go there. Not yet. It was too soon and she wasn’t ready.
“You know what I’m talking about.” He braked when a car cut in front of him. “It’s as if you somehow knew something had happened to Carissa.”
“You can’t be serious.” Hypocrisy will get you nowhere, Noelle Cooper.
He nodded. The tightness around his mouth revealed his determination. He was going to discuss the subject no matter what she said.
“Nathan, I’m not psychic. I’m surprised a former pastor like you would suggest such a thing.”
“No, not psychic. But you’ve always been able to perceive things others don’t,” he said. “I remember you had dreams several days before your mother died.”
“You remember that? We were seven.”
“You told me about it, and it stuck with me. It scared me, because every time you had a dream after that, I was afraid someone would die.”
She closed her eyes and leaned back against the headrest. Growing up as country neighbors, she and Nathan had ridden horses and bikes, hiked, explored caves, and wandered over the extensive acreage of the combined Cooper and Trask properties. They’d done homework together when they were old enough for homework. She’d shared her thoughts and dreams with him, and he’d remembered, after all this time.
“So you do know what I’m talking about,” he said.
“Just because I had dreams before Mom died doesn’t mean anything.”
“Remember that orange-and-white kitten of mine that got lost when we were ten? I told you about it, and you went right to it. I’d looked for at least two hours, and you found it in five minutes.”
She shifted uncomfortably in her seat. This was just great. She was stuck in a moving vehicle halfway to Hideaway with Nathan Trask, who seemed to be very much in the mood for an argument.
She pointed to a sign. “There’s your turn. Focus on your driving for a few minutes, will you?”
He shot her a quick glance that said, “This subject is only tabled, not closed,” but made the turn in silence.
Chapter Four
Ihave to think…have to get control! Where did she go? What if she knows it’s me? She could beat me to the house, she could tell the others that I tried to kill her!
But I didn’t kill her. I stopped myself. I can stop this if I try hard enough. I can keep the fear from controlling me.
She’s just lost in the cave somewhere, scared and alone. I need to go back and find her and take her home. Maybe if I stay with the others when this thing hits…when this slow, shifting spiral into terror strikes me…their presence might force me to control my actions.
Yes. I’ll have to find her. Everything will be okay.
Carissa won’t be able to find her way back without my help. I’m in control.
I can stay in control.
Nathan took a bypass around Branson’s busiest highway, increasingly aware that Noelle’s silent observation of the passing roadside was a sign that he’d struck a nerve. This new road had very little traffic, but he waited to speak, respecting her wish for silence, until they were on the far side of Branson.
“I wish you’d at least talk to me about it,” he said at last.
She cleared her throat but didn’t answer. A few moments later, she sighed, but still didn’t speak.
“It’s okay,” he said at last. “I understand. It’s difficult. The kind of gift that you’ve been given can’t be an easy thing to live with.”
She gave a soft snort. “Gift? You’ve got to be kidding.”
“That’s what I’d call it.”
“Do you remember where I found the kitten?”
“At my grandmother’s, up the road, in the milk barn.”
“Big surprise,” she said dryly. “Cats love milk.”
“I’d just finished looking everywhere in that barn before you led me to her.”
“So I got lucky.”
“I can’t count the number of times you’ve practically told me what I was feeling without my having to say a word.”
“That happens with friends,” she said.
Nathan drove in silence for a few more moments while Noelle returned to her study of the passing hills and hayfields. She wasn’t fooling him. He knew her too well. She couldn’t deny something they had grown up knowing—she had been blessed with an unusual amount of empathy.
No, not just empathy. Intuition, too, and more…
They’d never talked about it, when they were children, because then it hadn’t seemed like such an unusual thing to them. He suspected that for the past ten or twenty years she had even tried to deny the gift completely. Or maybe she hadn’t experienced it. Noelle’s lifestyle in her late teens and twenties had not given her much of an opening for guidance by the Holy Spirit.
He couldn’t remember when she’d first shown signs of this special sense about other people. She was right, she did have a logical thought process and a natural gift for reading body language. She also had a genuine affection for people.
But there was something extra, besides all that, and the best definition he could find was to call it “a discernment.” Some might say it was unnatural, but if anything it was supernatural, a spiritual gift from God, because, somehow Nathan was sure, Noelle had never attempted to “conjure” this gift.
He couldn’t help wondering about last night, but for now he wouldn’t push it.
“Be gentle with Jill when you see her,” he said, knowing Noelle would appreciate the change of subject, even if it did mean talking about another uncomfortable issue.
“Fine. I’ll just tenderly punch her in the nose.”
He grinned as he negotiated a sharp curve past Reeds Spring. “I think she feels partly responsible for Carissa’s disappearance. Carissa was bringing back a ledger from the office for Jill to look at. You knew Jill and Cecil formed a business partnership for Cooper’s Sawmill?”
“Yes, she told me. Sounds like Aunt Pearl’s not crazy about the idea.”
“Pearl doesn’t like losing authority, but Cecil and Jill finally managed to convince her that they need to modernize if they’re going to retain their edge in the market.”
“Meaning computers,” Noelle said. “Jill told me two weeks ago that they’d already purchased two. Also that Melva’s tackling the job of entering data for the whole year, and Jill’s learning the system with her. Aunt Pearl must be fit to be tied.”
Nathan chuckled. “She hates anything she can’t understand.”
Noelle glanced at him. “But Jill has her nursing job at the clinic. How does she have time for both?”
“Maybe you should talk to her about that.”
“I did, but Jill wouldn’t listen. Remember, I’m the baby sister without a brain in my head.”
Nathan heard the frustration in her voice. Noelle and Jill loved each other very much, but they never quite overcame the clash of wills that should have been settled between them long ago—Jill’s fierce need to nurture versus Noelle’s equally fierce need for independence. Jill nurtured not only her sister, but her extended family, the patients she worked with at the clinic and the clinic staff, as well. Consequently, she had little time to nurture herself. She was often irritable and stressed.
Nathan braked for a slow moving car in front of him. “Jill’s working a lot these days, and the clinic is still desperately searching for medical personnel willing to relocate to Hideaway.”
“I know. She’s asked me at least ten times in the past month if I’d consider a position.”
“And your reply?” Nathan resisted the urge to check out Noelle’s expression.
“I told her it shouldn’t be hard to find someone,” she said. “The town caters to tourists, including medical personnel, and surely some of them could be enticed to stay permanently.”
“It hasn’t happened yet. Jill isn’t the only one who would like to see you back home in Hideaway.”
From the corner of his eye, he saw her glance at him. “Really?” she asked softly.
“Bertie Meyer talks about you all the time. So does Carissa.”
“Oh.”
Was that disappointment in her voice? And if so, who else had she hoped would want her back in Hideaway?
He suppressed a smile. “They’ll need several new staff members if Dr. Cheyenne Gideon manages to convince the city board of directors to support a hospital designation for the clinic.” He glanced at Noelle. “You’re still a nurse. Why ignore the skills you worked so hard to learn?”
“Don’t start with me. I’ve had enough of that from Jill.”
“Have you ever considered the possibility that she’s right once in a while?”
“Have you ever considered the possibility that you’re a nag?” Noelle teased. “Besides, you’re the one who can’t settle on a career. From preacher to pharmacist in four years. You never told me why you made that giant leap.”
He gave up. She wouldn’t be pinned down, and if he tried, she’d just change the subject again. “Not much of a leap. After Natalie died, I felt overwhelmed by the pastorate, so I gave the church my resignation and went back to school to follow in my mom’s footsteps.” It was an oversimplification of a very complicated and painful time in his life, and her prolonged silence told him she knew it.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “Your wife was so young to be taken like that. It must have been awful for both of you.”
“I tried to be there for her as much as I could, while still trying to shoulder all the responsibilities of the church myself.” And Hideaway Community Church had become his undoing, especially after the aggressive ovarian cancer took Natalie in such a short time. “It became too much for me during her illness. I couldn’t cope with the needs of so many, and even though the church was supportive, I guess I felt like a failure.” As always, he had an uncomfortable tendency to spill his guts to Noelle.
“I was so caught up in my own problems at the time, I wasn’t there for you,” she said.
“I brought it on myself, with my inability to delegate responsibility in the church. I had the erroneous attitude, thinking of myself as God’s anointed, who should be able to do it all. I was wrong.”
“I’m sorry,” she said softly.
“I knew what a rough time you were having then, with Joel,” Nathan said. “I’ve heard the comment that a divorce is more painful than a death. In a way, not only is divorce the announcement of the death of a relationship, but it’s also, in the eyes of many, a sign of rejection.”
“For me it was a sign of failure,” she said quietly. “By the time the judge pronounced us no longer husband and wife, I felt as though I’d been released from prison.”
He gave her a quick glance.
She shrugged. “The drugs, the abuse.” She pressed a forefinger against the small scar beside her left eye. “This is just the most visible scar he gave me. I kept thinking I could hold out and see him through all of it, that I was the one person who could rescue him from himself.” She gave a bitter snort. “I discovered I wasn’t so special, after all.”
“Then I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you, either.” Nathan risked another glance at her; she was staring out the window again. “And so you changed professions because of the experience, just as I did.”
“I didn’t have a choice. I couldn’t find a job after I was dismissed from the clinic. No one wanted to take a chance on a proven drug abuser.”
Nathan’s foot involuntarily eased from the accelerator and the truck slowed. He couldn’t keep the shock from his expression.
“I did offer to drive if you need me to,” she said dryly.
“That’s okay.” He regained his composure. “I guess there are some things I still don’t know about you.”
“There are some things you won’t want to know. Let’s just say I made a mess of things once too often, and I’ve been paying for it ever since.”
“But you shouldn’t have to keep paying for it for the rest of your life.”
“Maybe I should. Get over it, Nathan. I have.”
“But you always wanted to be a nurse.”
She returned to her brooding.
Time for yet another subject change. Amazing how they’d once been able to discuss anything together, and now they had to tiptoe around so many areas of their lives.
She pointed to the first outlying buildings of the town of Hideaway, the breathtaking view of the lake to their right and the picturesque town square to their left—a square on which the brick storefronts faced the street that encircled it on all four sides.
Nathan drove past the clinic, general store, feed store, bakery and bank, then followed the curve in the road through a charming residential district, lush with trees and shrubbery and lined with a variety of homes, from colorfully painted Victorian houses to neat brick Colonials and ranches and small lake cabins. This early in the morning, all was quiet. Nathan and Noelle passed Jill’s two-story Victorian on their way out of town.
“Nothing stirring in town yet,” Noelle said.
“Which means everyone’s probably still out at Cedar Hollow.”
“Which means they haven’t found Carissa yet.”
Nathan returned his attention to the road as he picked up speed.
The first sight to greet Noelle as Nathan sped along the paved country lane toward Cooper land was the trees—lush, green and tall, except for a narrow swath of twisted and stunted growth to the right of the lane for about a quarter of a mile that followed the curve downhill into Cedar Hollow. It was the only remaining evidence of the tornado that had torn through the hollow two years earlier. This was the Coopers’ very own tornado alley—with the tops of the trees ripped off and scattered for miles, along with the roof of the old barn behind Cecil Cooper’s house.
Turning in her seat, away from the window, Noelle watched Nathan drive. His muscles rippled in his bare forearms as he steered to miss a pothole. Due to the number of logging trucks that came this way, the county road crew had to struggle to keep this road repaired.
Nathan’s face seemed to brood in the flickering shades of light and shadow as he drove under an arching tunnel of trees.
Noelle’s gaze returned to the road. A few hundred feet ahead, she saw the sturdy cedar stand that supported four mailboxes, belonging to Cecil and Melva, Great-Aunt Pearl, the Cooper Sawmill and the last in the line to Nathan. Forever a country boy at heart, he had returned to his roots when he moved back to the farm where he’d grown up, in the house that was hidden from view to their right, behind a thick stand of lodgepole pine.
Nathan turned left into the paved driveway on Cooper land. The sawmill was a quarter of a mile along this wooded lane.
“Did you hear Harvey Sand died?” Nathan asked.
“Jill told me.” Harvey had done the monthly and annual accounting for Cooper Sawmill for the past fifteen years. His secretary had found him unconscious at the bottom of his staircase at home last Friday morning. “Did he ever regain consciousness?”
“Not that I heard.”
“So they still don’t know what happened for sure. Is the sheriff continuing to investigate?”
“Probably. You know Greg, always suspicious.”
Noelle peered around at the growing gloom as the clouds seemed to congregate over Cooper land. How appropriate today, with Carissa missing. Obviously, some rain had already fallen, judging by the dripping leaves on the trees and the damp pavement. “Nathan, Jill said you were still doing some counseling for the family.”
“She did?”
He sounded hesitant, and Noelle glanced at him. Once more, his posture was perfectly correct, his grip on the steering wheel precise, his gaze straight ahead at the road. Interesting.
“Are you trying to get to the bottom of the Cooper family psyche?” She was only half joking.
He looked away. “You know I’m not a counselor.”
“I know you’re not a psychologist, but once a pastor always a pastor.”
“Just because someone’s a pastor doesn’t mean he’s a good counselor.”
“You have a knack. Don’t be so modest.” She’d heard enough local gossip to know that his solid common sense had helped to heal more than one fragile marriage in Hideaway.
“Okay,” she said. “I understand all about confidentiality.”
“Right. I’m liable.”
“Even if it is family.”
“Exactly.”
“Okay.” She was dying of curiosity, but that had landed her in trouble before. She studied Nathan’s closed expression. Okay. For now, she’d drop the subject and focus on finding Carissa.
Nathan glanced sideways to see Noelle’s dark brows drawn together, her blue eyes narrowed in concentration. What was she thinking? He knew she wasn’t sulking over his refusal to disclose confidential information to her.
Again, he glanced at the scar beside her left eye. He’d noticed her rubbing her finger over the indentation several times, an automatic gesture that revealed more about her than she probably wanted anyone to know. What did that man do to her? When Nathan and Noelle were younger, she’d had an impulsive sense of fun, an almost constant light of humor in her eyes. She’d often poked fun at herself, but not at others. Her face had always been in motion, expressing her thoughts and feelings without words. In repose, her facial features gave the appearance of exquisite elegance—her nose almost too delicate and straight, her cheekbones almost too high, her dimpled chin too perfect. When they were growing up, it was that beauty that people had seen in her, often missing the sharp intelligence behind the radiance of her eyes, framed by long, dark lashes.
Nathan blamed Noelle’s beauty for the end of their friendship. When they entered high school, she’d become a focus of attention for the guys, and Nathan, a nerd, had faded into the background of her life to watch her flit from one relationship to the next in rapid succession. It was then that he’d painfully realized he no longer had a best friend. It was then, with the sense of sadness, that he’d discovered Whom his real best friend had always been.
From that time, the focus of his life had changed. His final interaction with Noelle—the one that had broken their friendship for several years—happened the day he’d overheard some guys in gym class comparing notes about her, shocking notes that had sickened him.
When he’d confronted her, right there in the busy main corridor at Hideaway High, there had been an ugly shouting match between them that had been talked about for weeks afterward.
Funny, until her divorce, Nathan hadn’t realized—hadn’t allowed himself to realize—how deeply Noelle had been a part of his life during their formative years. Lately, the more he saw her, the more he wanted to see her, aside from any question of romance. In fact, he’d reminded himself over and over again that a romance could put their friendship at risk, and he wanted to keep her friendship.
Nathan’s truck topped a wooded knoll and the gray-brown angles of the sawmill came into view. Several cars and pickup trucks were parked in the lot—more than usual. All the employees were beating the brush in search of Carissa.
Nathan’s truck bounced down the steep lane into the valley and over the low-water bridge that was already under at least five inches of water from the recent rains.
Noelle gave a sudden, soft gasp, and Nathan glanced at her.
“What’s wrong?”
She took a deep breath and blinked.
“Is it happening again?” he demanded.
She nodded and closed her eyes.
Chapter Five
Carissa’s eyes opened to complete blackness. All she could hear was the drip of water, and all she could feel was the hard stone floor beneath her. She sniffed the earthy, moist air, and remembered where she was. Tears filled her eyes and trickled down her cheeks. She tasted the saltiness on her lips.
“Jesus, please help me,” she prayed in a whisper. “I’m scared. Where am I? Why hasn’t anybody found me yet?”
Her soft words bounced off the rock that surrounded her…but when she stopped praying, the whispers continued, sliding past the rock wall, slithering through the blackness.
Her attacker was back! She clamped both hands over her mouth to keep from crying out.
There was a scuff of shoes on a hard surface, a flicker of light that turned the blackness to dark gray. The footsteps drew closer, the whispering voice became louder.
Carissa cringed against the wall, afraid to breathe. Could she be seen? Her head pounded once more with sudden pain, and she gasped aloud without thinking.
The footsteps stopped, and so did the whispering. Carissa squeezed her eyes shut. Make whoever it is go away, Jesus. Hide me! Please, Jesus, keep me safe!
The whispering started again, the footsteps drew closer. Then the words grew more pronounced.
“Control,” she heard, on an eerie breath of sound. “I’m in control. I can take care of this. She’s here and I can find her.”
There was a clatter of pebbles above Carissa’s head. The searcher was above her now!
She held her breath. Please Jesus please Jesus please.
Then the whispering faded, becoming less distinct. The sound of footsteps moved away. Carissa opened her eyes and peered out at the reflection of a flashlight beam against a white column several yards away. She stuck her head out of her tiny hiding place, but the light had disappeared.
She settled back into her hiding place and waited. Jesus was watching over her.
“Noelle, listen to me, please tell me what’s happening,” Nathan said quietly.
She blinked at the gloomy daylight outside the windshield, then realized Nathan was watching her intently.
“It’s okay,” he said. “You’re all right.” His voice was gentle, reassuring, as though he were speaking to a child. He caught her hands in his.
She tried to withdraw them.
He didn’t release her. “What’s this all about? Was this the same as last night?” he asked.
She nodded.
“How does that feel? What happens? What goes through your mind?”
“It isn’t anything dramatic or overflowing,” she whispered, as if speaking aloud might make this sudden knowledge disappear. “I’m sorry, I can’t explain, really. It’s too…new to me.”
“Once upon a time, you understood what it was.”
“Yeah, well, once upon a time I was an innocent child, but too many things happened to change that. It’s been many years since I’ve felt His blessing.” There. She’d admitted it to him. The faith of her childhood had failed her. Or maybe it hadn’t failed, but she had failed it…failed God…failed herself.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” he asked.
She straightened and withdrew her hands; this time he let them go. She sat back and stared out the windshield. “If this is a gift from God, as you say, then He must have made a mistake.”
“You know better.”
She raised a hand to stop his protest. “Would you just listen for a minute? You saw the way I was in high school—desperately in need of attention and love and willing to go to any lengths to find it.”
“I came to grips with that years ago,” Nathan said gently. “You’d lost your mother, and your father wasn’t home with you much. Your sister tried to make it up to you, but that was impossible. Why don’t you give yourself a break?”
“And why won’t you at least let me complete a thought without interrupting?” She kept her voice gentle, but she needed him to hear her out.
“Sorry.”
“During nursing school I dated a drug addict, and after graduation I married him. How stupid is that? I’m talking illegal street drugs, Nathan. And I used them myself. You think God wants to give a gift to someone like that?”
“I think you’re making judgments you should leave to God. Sure, you got carried away and blew it badly a few times. But you aren’t the same person you were then, so stop with the guilt complex and tell me what you were experiencing a moment ago,” he said.
“Oh, come on, Nathan, you sound like an overeager newspaper reporter. What do you think I was feeling?”
“I don’t have your gift, but you looked very concerned about something.”
“You got it.” Her voice caught. She cleared her throat. “Very concerned.”
“But about what?”
“Carissa. It’s urgent that we find her quickly. But we all know that.” She focused on the familiar features of his face, at the unusual cedar-green of his eyes. “You really think this is a message from God?”
“Yes I do. Your gift has returned.”
She watched for some break in his gaze, some hint of doubt. There was none. “I’m not some holy saint, Nathan. If this is a gift, there are many far more worthy recipients who—”
“Worthy?” he interrupted, impatiently. “A saint is simply someone who has put faith in Him. You’ve been a believer since you were six.”
“But you know I haven’t—”
“He can use anyone He pleases for whatever work He wants done, with or without that person’s help,” he interrupted again. “With you, I think He gives you special knowledge that you need to know, not something you conjure for yourself, because He’s the one in control, not you. When you dreamed about your mother before she died, I think He was preparing you.”
Noelle nodded. “Okay. So what’s He giving me now?”
“You’re here, aren’t you? Obviously you need to search for Carissa.”
She nodded, watching the tension in his expression. “You don’t look too chipper,” she noted. “I thought you dealt with this kind of thing before in your pastoral duties.”
“This kind of thing? You’re kidding, right? This is not your normal, everyday counseling session or grief process.” He slid back behind the steering wheel, shifted into Drive and eased forward along the lane.
“Okay, then if these episodes I’m having are connected to Carissa, why can’t I see where she is? Why didn’t I receive some brilliant flash of understanding, some mental map about where to go to find her?”
“Because you aren’t writing the script. God is. He’ll guide you when it’s time.” He glanced at her briefly. “So were there any other impressions a moment ago?”
Noelle gazed at the ceiling of the truck, reluctant to accept that this was even happening. But still…“I felt she was alone in the dark and frightened of some unknown threat.”
“Something? Or someone? Or just the dark itself?”
“Someone.” That much Noelle knew, though it was still a mystery to her how she’d reached that certainty. “But that doesn’t make sense. I can’t believe anyone would kidnap Carissa.”
“Could be revenge. You know Cecil. He has a way of—”
“Making people angry,” she finished for him. “I know. He’s always been quicker to engage his mouth than his brain. But still, only a nutcase would try to take that out on Carissa.”
“Excuse me, but a ‘nutcase’ is exactly who we’re talking about here.”
“Okay. Fine.” Noelle gazed out the window at the bright-red sumac bushes along the edges of the lane, at the red Virginia creeper vines outlining tree limbs, threaded among the canopy of green leaves. “Come to think of it, we sound like a couple of nutcases ourselves. If anyone were to overhear us talking—”
“They won’t. We’ll be careful.”
“Good. So that means you’re not going to go blabbing this to anyone?”
He raised a brow of affected disdain. “You can’t possibly believe I would do something so audacious as to sully my own good name among the locals. My livelihood depends on my reputation.”
She grinned, flooded with relief at this glimpse of her old friend. “Okay, fine. You don’t tell them I’m psychic—”
“You’re not psychic, you’re gifted. They’re two totally different—”
“—and I won’t tell them about the stray marbles you’ve apparently been losing because you believe me. Has Cecil fired someone at the mill or the ranch recently?”
“Not in over six months, and the last man wanted to get fired so he could draw unemployment insurance.”
“No motive for a kidnapping, then. Could Carissa have gotten lost?”
“That’s very possible. Cecil found her flashlight in the mud last night. He’s thinking that she might have gotten turned around and panicked.”
“But Carissa doesn’t panic easily,” Noelle said.
“And besides, you have a definite impression that someone is a threat…”
“I’m not willing to put my faith in some stupid impression,” Noelle said.
“Not stupid,” he insisted. “Let’s not dismiss any possibility.”
Nathan pulled up to the sawmill. The paved parking lot surrounding the huge, barnlike building was crammed with cars, trucks, SUVs and trailers, which had apparently carried all-terrain vehicles.
Ordinarily, Cecil wouldn’t thank anyone for tearing up his pastureland and traumatizing more than a thousand head of cattle and horses, but if the volunteer searchers found his little girl, he would most likely be willing to give them permanent rights to the land—if those rights were his to give. Though he managed all of the Cooper enterprises, he hadn’t yet inherited.
Nathan parked between a van and another truck, then turned to Noelle again. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
“I told you, I’m fine. A little rattled, but what would you expect? I want to focus on finding Carissa.”
“We’ll do that.”
Noelle stared at the corrugated aluminum siding on the huge building. Even after ten years, the sawmill brought back the memories of the accident that had killed Dad and Grandma and Grandpa. Carissa’s disappearance only resurrected those memories more distinctly.
“We might as well walk from here,” she said. “We’ve got to start looking somewhere.”
They climbed from the truck to be greeted by the music of the crickets and the scent of moist earth. Noelle took a deep breath, her gaze traveling over the mossy green of the cedar trees, the splashes of orange and apricot on the tips of maple trees and the rippling green of the hay field, punctuated by huge, silver-gold bales stacked side by side in the field to the right of the lane.
This lane led around the side of the building to the Cooper settlement about a quarter of a mile away. Noelle’s ancestors had lived and farmed here for generations, expanding this property into a valuable asset that, combined with the successful sawmill, generously supported family members and dozens of employees. As a Cooper family member, Noelle received a sizable check every six months, even though she didn’t work on the property.
Noelle avoided looking at the sawmill, allowing her memories to carry her back to a safer time. She loved country life, especially the privacy and peace of this hollow in the hills. Though she also loved living in Springfield, every time she came home to Hideaway she felt a distinct tug of the heart. She loved the town of Hideaway. Even though she wouldn’t admit it to Nathan, the idea of working at the clinic appealed to something inside her that she thought had dried up and died when she’d lost her last nursing position.
Still, too many memories attacked her here on Cooper land.
“Did anyone search the mill for signs of a possible problem?” she asked. “Maybe a struggle of some kind?”
“They checked, but all they found was the ledger alongside the lane, covered in mud. Carissa obviously had been to the mill and gone, and if there’d been a problem at the mill, she certainly wouldn’t have bothered with the ledger.”
“Could Cecil and Melva have heard a car engine from the house?”
“Not necessarily, but the dogs are usually pretty quick to pick up on the scent or sounds of a stranger, and they never sounded an alarm.”
Noelle reached into the back of Nathan’s truck, where she’d placed water flasks and a backpack with supplies, including a first-aid kit. “Want to hike from here?”
“I’d love to,” he said. “But let me carry the backpack. It looks heavy.”
She strapped herself into her pack. “Think I can’t carry my own load?”
“No,” he said dryly. “I just thought, after all these years, that competitive streak of yours might have mellowed a little.”
“I’m not competitive.” She shifted the shoulder straps. “You should know that by now.”
She gazed along the lane. She wasn’t in the mood to talk to anyone in her family right now, especially since no one had called her about Carissa. Still, the lane was the quickest and safest route into the rest of the hollow, with connecting lanes and cattle trails beyond Cecil’s place. “Maybe we’ll get lucky and make it past the houses without anyone noticing us,” she said as they set off.
Nathan sniffed the tealike scent of early autumn leaves and listened to the crickets chirping from the forest on either side of the lane. Cedar Hollow—two thousand acres of fertile farm valley settled deep in the tree-lined hills—had changed little since he’d grown up here. His family’s dairy cows had grazed just across the road from the Cooper beef cattle. He and Noelle had played along Willow Creek, which followed the curve of the land until it reached Table Rock Lake, a little over two miles away.
Noelle turned and glanced over her shoulder at the field to the south as the sound of an all-terrain vehicle reached them. “That’s Carissa’s favorite place to ride Gypsy,” she said.
“It’s where we loved to ride, too,” he reminded her. “The field is level with amazingly few rocks to trip the horses.” He and Noelle had often played in the field and along the creek when they were growing up.
“Why do some things stay the same, when other things change so drastically?” Noelle murmured.
“I’ve asked that enough times myself,” Nathan said. “Remember how many times we walked down this lane when we were kids?”
“Or rode our bikes.”
“And tried to hide from my little sisters.”
“And my big sister.” Noelle chuckled. “I felt so secure, so protected then. I mean, I had family all around me, and my best friend lived right down the road.” She glanced sideways at Nathan.
He nodded. How many times in the past few years he had thought about those days, wondering if he would have done things differently, given the chance.
“Two thousand acres of Cooper property, joined by Trask property,” Noelle said. “The searchers couldn’t have covered everything yet, could they?”
“Not every inch, of course, but—”
“But Carissa knows this hollow so well. All she has to do is find Willow Creek and follow it down.”
Nathan glanced at Noelle. “Maybe Carissa’s done just that. She might be home by the time we get to the house.”
“You don’t sound convinced.” Noelle pulled the cell phone from her pocket, punched numbers again, asked whoever answered about the status of the search without identifying herself, and then expressed thanks. “Not yet,” she reported to Nathan, kicking a rock to the side of the track. “Carissa knows this land as well as we did at her age.”
“That’s true, but everything looks different in the dark. My friend Taylor Jackson thinks it’s possible she got lost, and he’s working on that premise while others are searching farther afield.”
“Taylor’s the ranger who’s dating Karah Lee Fletcher at the clinic?”
“Yes. He’s been helping coordinate the search. The sheriff suggested Carissa might have run away for some reason.”
“Ridiculous. Greg should know better.”
“That’s what Cecil and Melva keep insisting,” Nathan said. “But you know Carissa can be headstrong, and she and her parents did have a little confrontation yesterday.”
“What about?”
“Gladys.”
Noelle’s steps slowed. “What about her?” she asked quietly.
“She wants to see Justin and Carissa again.” Gladys had given up any right to see her children when she had abandoned them and their father. Her lack of concern for their suffering had outraged the whole community. “Carissa wants to see her, and Melva’s pitching a major fit.”
Noelle stepped around a mud puddle and ducked beneath a tree limb. “Does Gladys think she can just suddenly walk back into their lives and stir everything up again? When she left, Carissa was devastated. For at least a year, I think she continued to hope her mother would come back to them.”
“As you said, Carissa’s strong-willed,” Nathan said. “So it could be possible that she’s in hiding somewhere, maybe protesting.”
“No.”
“But if she were hiding, where do you think she’d hide?” He gestured around him, indicating the expanse of ground they would have to cover. “Where would you hide?”
“Not around here, and no, I’m not feeling any kind of leading.”
“But just for the sake of a place to look, where would you hide?”
“Does that old dirt track still wind through the woods to the national forest a couple of miles back?” she asked.
“I think so. I heard Pearl complaining about people trespassing on Cooper land from the logging trail in national forest land. Why? Do you—”
She turned and looked up at him, and he glimpsed an interested quickening in those intelligent eyes. “Where did we go when we were kids? You know, when we got in trouble.”
“The caves?” he asked. There were at least four in the vicinity that ranged from mere indentations in the rock to caverns that cut deeply into the hillside.
She gave him a look of approval. “Exactly. Is Bobcat Cave still sealed?”
“I think it is. At least, I hope it is.”
She bent over and tucked the cuffs of her jeans into her socks. “We may be beating some brush. Still ticks and chiggers here, I suppose.”
“Not in this section, there ain’t.” A deep, strong female voice suddenly spoke from the trees a few yards ahead.
Chapter Six
Pearl Cooper’s tall, rawboned figure emerged from the woods along one of the wildlife trails that intersected the lane. Her hand patted her chest in a long-familiar gesture—Aunt Pearl had claimed heart palpitations for as long as Noelle could remember. The family affectionately accused her of using sympathy to get what she wanted. She never denied it. Aunt Pearl could always charm people into giving in to her, and when she couldn’t charm them, she pulled rank—though Cecil and Jill had incorporated the business to save on taxes, Pearl owned the property and everything on it. It had passed to her through the Cooper family trust.
Pearl’s iron-gray hair stuck out in haphazard tufts, straggling over her forehead to frame deep-blue eyes—Cooper eyes that saw more, sometimes, than one wanted them to see. She seldom wore anything other than jeans and old plaid flannel shirts, even in summer, and now she had the legs of her jeans tucked into a pair of well-used hiking shoes—she’d been the one to teach Noelle this practical trick for warding off tiny, biting varmints.
“Can’t swear to it,” she said as she neared them, “but I think the geese running free and the pennyroyal I planted did the trick. No ticks in the yard or this part of the woods all summer. Of course, you’ve gotta watch close or you’ll be ankle-deep in goose poop, but it’s better than ticks, to my notion. The backwoods are another problem, though. That where you’re headed?” Without pausing, she grabbed Noelle in a fierce hug, wrapping her in the pungent aroma of rosemary that always clung to Pearl from her herb garden.
Noelle’s great-aunt Pearl lived in the same house she’d been born in, a sturdy, sprawling rock dwelling that had changed little since it had been built in the early nineteen-hundreds. For as long as anyone in the area could remember, Pearl Cooper had gathered herbs and made her old-time medicines, distributing them to anyone who needed them. She’d protested loudly when the general store in Hideaway had opened a pharmacy, and she’d been only slightly mollified when she discovered Nathan would be the pharmacist.
“Good to see you, girl,” she said to Noelle now. “I’ve been expecting you. Come to search for Carissa?”
“Yes, but I don’t know what I’ll find that others haven’t.” Noelle gave Nathan a look of caution over Pearl’s shoulder, and was reassured by his small nod of understanding.
“I thought since Carissa and Noelle are such good friends,” Nathan said, “that Noelle might have some fresh insight.”
Pearl was frowning when she stepped back from Noelle’s embrace. “All those searchers probably turned up the same rocks and looked behind the same trees two or three times. Seems this holler’s been scoured from top to bottom and end to end. If she’s any where near here, a feller’d think we’d’ve found something.”
“It seems that way, Aunt Pearl,” Noelle said. “You haven’t seen any strangers hanging around out on the property lately, have you?”
Pearl shook her head. “There’s strangers and tourists swelling the town to three or four times its normal size, but nobody ever wanders this far from the fun.”
Noelle nodded. It was unlikely that any stranger would have ventured this far into the wilderness on the off chance of happening across a twelve-year-old girl to abduct in the dead of night—if Carissa had been abducted. Noelle prayed it wasn’t so, but she couldn’t dismiss the conviction—Nathan might call it a message from God—that someone with sinister motives was involved in Carissa’s disappearance.
Pearl gestured with a loose-jointed shrug. “Seems like the loggers, mill workers and farmhands are here all the time.” She hesitated, her eyes narrowing at Noelle. “Did you hear about poor Harvey Sand? Died from that fall he took last week. I heard tell Greg’s investigating foul play there.”
Noelle shifted impatiently. Pearl could be a talker when she was in the mood, and this wasn’t the time to stand around making idle conversation.
“I don’t know what’s come of Hideaway lately,” Pearl continued, “what with all the new folks moving in and taking over. Mind you, there was no love lost between Harvey and me—heaven knows we went round and round about the price he charged for a couple hours of work every month—but the guy was just a kid, still in his forties. Such a tragic loss.” She shook her head. “That new secretary of his had all our files delivered to the shop at the sawmill on Monday. Can you believe it? Fifteen years’ worth of tax records she just dumped on us, without even offering to help us find another accountant.”
Noelle rubbed her tightening neck muscles and rolled her shoulders.
Pearl noticed at last. She patted Noelle on the shoulder and nodded at Nathan. “You two can look as far and as long as you want. I’m going back out myself after I rest up a bit and give my heart some time to catch up with the rest of me. Melva should be back to the house by now after her latest foray into the woods.” She grunted. “Surprised me to see her scrambling through brush so much. She’s not exactly the outdoorsy type, if you know what I mean.”
“Aunt Pearl, give Melva a break.” Noelle kept her chiding voice gentle. Sparks had flown between Pearl and Melva in the past—Melva had taken over the bookkeeping for Cooper Enterprises from Pearl several years ago, and Pearl was not an easy person to please when it came to the family business. “She loves Carissa. I hope you’ve been nice to her.”
“I’ve been nice as I had to be,” Pearl replied grumpily. “Guess you know Jill’s here, too. She’s been searchin’ all night. We all have. I told her to take a break.”
“Thanks, Pearl.” Nathan took Noelle’s arm and stepped along the road. “We’re headed in that direction, so we might see them.”
“When all this craziness settles down,” Pearl called after them, once more tapping her fingers against her chest, as if the rhythm of her heart would regulate better that way, “you come by my house for some iced sassafras tea. Been too long since we visited last, Noelle.”
“I know, Aunt Pearl. I will.” Noelle fell into step beside Nathan. Pearl returned to the trail through the trees, taking the shortcut to her own house nestled at the foot of the hills that formed Cedar Hollow.
“I should get down here more often,” Noelle said. “Last time I saw Aunt Pearl was at Jill’s a few months ago. I haven’t been to the hollow for a couple of years.”
“Why is that?” Nathan asked.
“Too busy, I guess.” She broke off a twig from a nearby branch and rubbed it between her fingers, deep in thought.
“Or still avoiding it for some reason?”
“Could be. Pearl implied she thought I was still stuck in the past.”
“I disagree,” Nathan said. “You wallow in guilt over the past, but I don’t think you’re stuck there.”
Noelle gave him a look of aggravation.
“So what did she say?” he asked.
“She said, ‘Noelle, you’ve got a lot goin’ for you now, kiddo. Just keep on lookin’ forward, and don’t look back so much. The past can’t hurt us if we stay away from it.’”
Nathan walked beside her in silence. The crunch of their boots against gravel matched, as if they were marching in cadence toward the house where Cecil and Melva lived with Cecil’s children, seventeen-year-old Justin and twelve-year-old Carissa.
Whenever Noelle returned to this hollow, she felt as if she were stepping back in time. She also felt as if she were returning to old, dysfunctional family dynamics. Maybe, deep down, she feared she would once again become the rebellious teenager who’d made so many wrong choices. She knew better, of course. She had a tendency to be oversensitive.
Pearl was right. The past couldn’t hurt her if she stayed away from it.
She navigated around a puddle the circumference of a small car, in which the mud had been churned up into a slick mess with tire tracks. Obviously, there had been dozens of cars in and out of this place since last night, and Noelle glimpsed several vehicles still parked out in the cleared hayfield behind the house.
In addition to the number of automobiles that she and Nathan had seen parked at the sawmill, she judged there might be as many as sixty or eighty people currently searching the place. In the field she counted three pale-green Jeeps with ranger insignias, and seven white police cruisers, all splattered with mud.
“I don’t suppose there was a chance to check for strange footprints before the searchers arrived?” she asked, gesturing toward the mud puddle.
“The police looked, but they found nothing out of the ordinary.” Nathan skirted the puddle on the other side. “Cecil needs to get some gravel in here before someone loses a car.”
Noelle’s steps slowed as they drew near the white picket fence that encircled the house and yard. There was a rumble of growls, and two black and white Australian sheepdogs came running from the backyard, barking as if a herd of cattle had suddenly descended on them.
Noelle groaned. “Just great. I’d hoped to slip past the house without stopping.”
“Not with Butch and Sundance on high alert. You haven’t been around often enough for them to be familiar with your scent or the sound of your voice. They only bark at strangers.”
“We can visit later, after we’ve found Carissa.”
Nathan tapped her on the shoulder and she looked up at him. “Relax, grumpy. It’ll only take a few minutes. Your family needs you.”
“Sorry,” she muttered.
The racket of the dogs set off the geese at the pond below the house, and the honking commenced.
Noelle gave Nathan a look of exasperation. “And I thought we’d sneak in? What could I have been thinking?”
He grinned at her.
“Speaking of dogs, is the search-and-rescue unit bringing any search dogs in?” she asked.
“They’ve got three already out in the field, more on the way, but the ones they’ve got are new, not very experienced.”
They reached the white fence that circled the yard around a big, two-story white house. The dogs finally recognized her, and their barking turned to excited whines of welcome. Noelle reached through the slats of fence to pet the animals and quiet them.
The front screen door opened, and Jill, eight years older than Noelle, stepped out onto the broad concrete porch. Jill was a couple of inches taller than Noelle, with stronger features and a more voluptuous figure—and a familiar, piercing blue gaze.
“Noelle Cooper, what on earth?”
“Hi, sis.”
Jill glanced at Nathan, disapproval—annoyance? irritation?—sharpening her gaze.
“I came to help search.” Noelle followed Nathan through the front gate and braced herself for the rambunctious dogs as they leapt forward in welcome. “Any more word about Carissa?”
Jill shook her head, shading her eyes from the warm October sun. Her thick brown brows almost met in the middle as she squinted, and Noelle noticed the shadows of fatigue around Jill’s eyes as she stepped into her sister’s tight embrace.
Jill held her for a long moment. “This is like a nightmare, sis. I didn’t want to drag you down here. You’ve already got so much on your plate right now.”
“I didn’t come down here to cause you worry, I came to help with the search.”
Unfamiliar voices spilled from the house as Jill released Noelle. The aroma of frying bacon drifted through the screen door. Apparently some of the weary searchers were taking a much-needed break.
“So tell me,” Noelle said, “what have they found?”
“One of the sheriff’s deputies found fresh horseshoe prints in the mud at the edge of the lane,” Jill said.
“Maybe one of the horses jumped the fence,” Nathan said.
“None of the horses are even on the front forty right now,” Jill said. “They’re pastured half a mile in the other direction. That means someone may have come onto the property last night, because we had a lot of rain yesterday, and the print would’ve been washed away if they’d come earlier.”
“Surely they can’t think someone carried Carissa away by horse,” Nathan exclaimed.
“Can you think of a better way to carry someone through miles of wilderness trails without making a lot of noise?” Jill asked. “The fact that the dogs haven’t found Carissa yet probably means she was taken elsewhere, and it’s unlikely she walked there herself. They could have followed her scent.”
“What else did the searchers find?” Noelle asked.
Jill closed her eyes for half a second, then opened them and held Noelle’s gaze. Sorrowful. Suddenly gentle. “Taylor Jackson, one of the rangers, he found blood on the sawmill floor. Looks like someone was injured.”
“Maybe one of the employees was injured yesterday,” Noelle said.
“Taylor asked all of them, and no one was.”
“Okay, but that doesn’t automatically mean it was Carissa,” Noelle said.
“We’ll find out before long.” Jill lifted her hair from her neck and stretched her muscles. “I know we can’t go jumping to conclusions.” She said the words quickly, as if she’d been repeating them over and over to the others. “We can’t let ourselves get discouraged and stop searching.”
“Speaking of which,” Noelle said, “that’s what I came here to do. I’d better get to it.”
“Okay, but first will you let Melva know you’re here?” Jill asked. “She’s been wanting to call you since last night—as if one more person searching would make any difference.” The lines around Jill’s shadowed blue eyes deepened with concern. She touched Noelle’s shoulder. “You okay?”
“I’m fine. I just wish you’d called me last night.”
“We kept thinking we’d find her quickly. I didn’t want to upset you over nothing.” Jill frowned and pushed at her short brown hair—which had grown out a couple of inches, and no longer resembled a hard hat as much as it did a lion’s mane. “Cecil’s still blaming himself for sending her out for the ledger. Silly, I know, but I’ve struggled with the same problem. We let her go out there after dark.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Noelle said. “Nathan told me she was going out there anyway. She’s twelve years old, not a little child. Where were you when she disappeared?”
“I’d gone up to our old house to find some other ledgers upstairs.” Jill glanced over her shoulder through the screen door, lowering her voice. “We’ve been entering this year’s records on computer and trying to justify them with the records from the accountant—you knew he died, didn’t you? Anyway, there’s a discrepancy of fifteen thousand dollars, and we can’t seem to find it. That’s why we asked Carissa to get the ledger from the office at the sawmill. Turns out she had the wrong one, anyway. It was from ten years ago.”
“I’ll go have a word with Melva, then hit the trail.” Noelle gave her sister’s shoulder another squeeze, then opened the screen door and stepped inside.
Nathan leaned against the porch railing, arms folded across his chest in an automatic gesture of self-protection as he watched Jill pace the length of the porch. The chilled morning air hung heavy and thick in the sunlight that gleamed on her dark hair.
“You didn’t tell me you were going to get Noelle,” she said at last.
He glanced toward the Coopers’ open front door. “I wasn’t sure she could get away from the store, but I felt she needed to know about Carissa.”
Jill’s boots made little noise on the concrete porch. She turned to face Nathan across the half width of the house. “I had reasons for not wanting her here. She had a bad time right after the accident.”
“Of course she did. The whole family did. Why single out Noelle?” Nathan had to struggle to keep his voice low. “She’s a grown woman, and she needs to be treated like one.”
“Oh, for pity’s sake, I know that, but why should she have to trudge all the way down here when half of Hideaway’s already out looking for the child?”
“Noelle is family. She needs to be treated like family, or you’ll be wasting your time trying to get her to move back here and work at the clinic.”
Jill paused, gazing down the lane again. “Maybe she shouldn’t come back here,” she said slowly.
This was a drastic about-face. “But I thought you were trying to—”
“Never mind what I was trying to do.” Jill stepped to the end of the porch, away from the screen door, and gestured, with a jerk of her head for him to join her.
He obeyed.
“After the sawmill accident, the grief almost killed her,” Jill said softly.
“Of course it did. We were all stricken.”
“But it was worse for Noelle. She went into a deep depression, had awful nightmares, told me she woke up screaming every night for the first month after the funerals.”
“She had a lot of other things on her mind at the time, and besides, she’s not the same person she was ten years ago.” He hesitated. “Did she say what the dreams were about?”
“She kept reliving the accident, as if she were one of the victims watching the logs tumble onto her. She had to quit her job, which really threw that ex-husband of hers into a tizzy, because at the time they were dependent on her income to support them—and his drug habit.” Jill’s voice dripped with disdain.
“Did she get professional help?”
“Oh, she went to her family doctor, and he prescribed an antidepressant. She took it for three weeks, then flushed the rest down the toilet. She said it made her ears ring. You know how independent she can be.”
“She takes after her sister.”
Jill gave him a half-hearted scowl.
“Did the antidepressant help her at all?” he asked.
“Are you kidding? After just three weeks?” Jill snorted. “I even got some of that herbal stuff Pearl’s always trying to push off on everyone. Noelle still had the nightmares for a long time afterward.”
“She told me a little about that time,” Nathan said.
“Now it’ll start all over. What’s she going to do when she wakes up in the middle of the night and finds herself alone?”
“Jill, Noelle is a big girl. She can take care of herself.” He studied Jill’s expression for a moment. She didn’t look at him, but kept her gaze focused on the trees across the road.
There was something about her behavior that caught his attention. She stood with her shoulders hunched forward, arms crossed, head bowed slightly. What wasn’t she telling him? He knew better than to ask.
“You can’t shield her from pain by building a wall around her,” he said.
“I’m not building a wall, I’m just—”
“You’re still trying to be her mother. Stop it, or you’ll smother her completely. Let her handle her own problems.”
She sighed and shook her head, then turned away from him. “Fine, then you be there for her when her nightmares return.”
“She’s told me a little about Joel and her marriage.”
“Yes, but how much did she tell you? She has a tendency to downplay certain aspects of her life so no one will worry.”
“Maybe that’s because she knows we tend to worry too much,” he said gently. “Jill, you knew Joel a lot better than I did. Do you think his return could in any way be connected to Carissa’s disappearance?”
She didn’t react, which meant she’d already considered the possibility. “I don’t know. As crazy as he got sometimes, I wouldn’t put it past him.” She turned and looked up at Nathan, arms still folded over her chest. “Maybe we should tell the sheriff to check him out.”
“Maybe we should.”
Chapter Seven
Noelle felt suddenly overwhelmed. Neighbors and people from the search-and-rescue team filled the Cooper living room and kitchen, occupying every available chair. Most of them had obviously been out all night, searching through the mud and brush.
Noelle waved at several familiar faces as she passed through the living room to the kitchen in the back of the house. She recognized Dane Gideon, the mayor of Hideaway, who also owned the general store and ran a boy’s ranch across the lake from town. He sat on the sofa beside some teenaged boys, who looked grimy and disheartened. Perched across from them on a love seat was Taylor Jackson, a tall man with rusty-brown hair, wearing a mud-spattered ranger uniform. Beside him
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Hannah Alexander
IT WAS A STORY TO PUT HIDEAWAY, MISSOURI, IN THE NATIONAL HEADLINES…A MISSING CHILD: Carissa Cooper, twelve, vanishes near her home–abducted, possibly by someone close to her.A WOMAN IN CRISIS : Noelle Cooper races back to her hometown to help in the search for her cousin and steps into a web of secrets that has haunted her family for generations.A MAN OF FAITH : Nathan Trask will do anything to protect Noelle from danger. Noelle's childhood friend, he might be much more…if she dares turn to him.
Last Resort
Hannah Alexander
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
In loving memory of Ray Overall,
February 2, 1913 to August 9, 2004,
stepdad extraordinaire, whose kindness
and gentle support gave hope and renewed life to
his wife and stepsons.
Contents
Acknowledgments
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
As with every book we write, we depend heavily upon others to help us reach our deadline with integrity. We very much appreciate our editor, Joan Marlow Golan, for enthusiastic support, patience and kindness. She and her excellent staff make our job so much easier.
Our agent, Karen Solem, guides us with expertise and wisdom when we stumble through the often confusing world of publishing.
Cheryl’s mom, Lorene Cook, keeps us going when deadlines loom and the world threatens to fly apart around us. What would we do without you, Mom?
Thanks to Vera Overall, Mel’s mom, who never stops spreading the word about the books she loves to read.
Thanks to Marty Frost, who has always believed in us, always served as a sounding board and inspiration.
Thanks to Barbara Warren, who rubs her hands in glee, red pen in hand, eager to attack and critique our latest work until it shines.
Thanks also to Jackie Bolton, for serving as an expert into the mysterious mind of the teenager.
Thanks to brainstorm buddies, Nancy Moser, Steph Whitson Higgins, Deborah Raney, Colleen and Dave Coble and Doris Elaine Fell, for helping us plot late into the night.
We owe a debt of gratitude to some wise individuals who helped us mold this book with insight into the spiritual gift of discernment. Sylvia Bambola, Till Fell, Brandilyn Collins, Janet Benrey, Carol Cox, Brenda Minton, Sharon Gillenwater, Barbara Warren, Colleen Coble and Kris Billerbeck, thank you for your patience as we pestered you with questions. Dr. Bill Cox and Jerry Ragsdale, thank you for additional input as you took time out of your church duties to give us direction.
We are always blessed by an online group of writers called ChiLibris and by the combined wisdom, Christian love, support and troubleshooting that is always available just a keyboard away.
Another group of prayer warriors, WritingChambers, constantly blesses us with their writing—the thing they do the best.
Praise and thanks go, most of all, to our Lord, without whom we would have no reason to write.
Chapter One
Not again. I can’t let it all start over again. I’ve got to stop this madness, even if it costs me everything. I can’t live if I take another life…and now Carissa.
She’s the light that fills Cedar Hollow. She brings sunshine from the gloom that seems to haunt Cooper land. I’ll take my own life before I lay a hand on—
But she knows too much about me. She’s been searching for secrets that have to stay hidden, telling everybody she’s gathering information for her school report. What if she’s lying? Maybe the report is a cover-up….
Now that I think about it, she’s been looking at me differently.
The kid is too smart for a twelve-year-old. She has other ways of knowing about me. I can’t trust her. I trusted before and look what happened. I can’t ever let my guard down or I’ll lose everything.
I can’t let Carissa tell what she knows.
Carissa Cooper stepped carefully along the muddy lane that led from the sawmill to the house, hugging the old business ledger that Dad had asked her to fetch. Aiming her flashlight at the tire tracks in front of her, she glanced into the darkness. Fear crept up and down her spine like spiders on patrol.
She wasn’t usually scared of the dark anymore, but something about the movement of shadows bugged her. They shifted, changing shapes, skittering along the forested roadside with the movement of her flashlight, like the monsters that had waited for her in her closet and under the bed when she was six. She’d been scared of everything then, right after Mom left.
Now she knew better. Still, tonight she couldn’t help imagining that eyes were watching her from those waiting clumps of brush and weeds.
If only her big brother Justin had come with her. If only he weren’t still so mad at her.
“Should’ve kept my mouth shut,” she muttered under her breath.
The sound of a quiet thud reached her from somewhere deep in the forest to her right. Horse’s hooves? She stopped and listened, but all she heard was the whisper of leaves brushing against each other in a puff of wind. The branches made shadows leap across the trunk of the old walnut tree in the glow of her flashlight…like bony arms reaching out for her….
The breeze died and the movement stopped.
Carissa swallowed hard, sweeping the light around her. She had less than an eighth of a mile to go, and here she was acting like a ’fraidy cat. She brought the small circle of light back to the muddy track as she stepped forward again.
What was all the fuss about with Justin anyway? So he was weird. Nothing new. He wasn’t the only weird person in their family; he was just acting a little weirder lately. His habits were always making them late to church, late to school. It was embarrassing. This morning she’d counted the number of times he’d checked the front door to make sure it was locked before they left for school. Seven. Same as yesterday. Monday it had been fourteen. Probably to make up for missing his counting process Sunday morning, since they hadn’t gone to church.
And she was getting sick of him turning out all the lights in the house at night before everyone went to bed. Last night she was in the bathroom brushing her teeth when he turned out the light on her, and when Carissa shouted at him, Dad got onto her. It wasn’t fair.
She shifted the business ledger under her arm. If she dropped it in this mud, Dad would freak. He didn’t like his stuff dirty. He and her cousin Jill were probably already wondering what was taking her so long, even though the whole family knew she was doing research on the history of the Cooper sawmill and the deaths ten years ago that nobody would talk about. She could get a good grade on this report if she could dig up enough information, but did they care? No. What she wanted never mattered.
This morning had been the worst thing yet, when Mom had called and Dad wouldn’t let her talk to Carissa or Justin. Then Dad had freaked when Carissa picked up the extension. How could he pretend Mom never existed? Sure, Mom had been a jerk, but she was their mother. How could kids be kept from seeing their own mother?
That sound again—that thump of something heavy hitting wet earth in a slow rhythm. Horsewalk.
“Gypsy, is that you?” Her mare wasn’t supposed to be in the front pasture, but sometimes she jumped the fence.
Carissa shuffled the ledger beneath her arm to keep it from sliding out of her sweaty hand. It continued to slide. She grabbed for it and dropped the flashlight straight into a gooey puddle. The splatter of mud startled her. The darkness seemed to attack her with glee.
“Stop it, stupid,” she muttered to herself, reaching into the puddle.
She came up with a handful of mud, and heard the splash of water mingled with a rustle of brush somewhere behind her. Heart banging in her chest, Carissa tried again, feeling through the slick goo for the flashlight. She searched with both hands, forgetting the book until it slipped from under her arm and fell, splashing her with more mud.
Oh no! Dad would freak. He’d warned her not to—
More rustling, closer.
Carissa froze, still stooped over, grasping the mud-slicked book. Had she really heard something? Was her mind playing tricks on her? She waited, holding her breath, listening.
Nothing.
“Justin? That you? You’d better stop it or I’ll tell Melva.” Reporting him to their stepmother was a threat that sometimes worked.
Still no answer.
“Justin, I mean it. Stop it right now.”
It had to be Justin playing a trick on her. She listened for his soft snicker. Nothing.
“Never mind Melva, I’m telling Dad.”
She continued to search for the flashlight, but her movements grew slower and slower. She frowned.
Usually Justin would be making weird noises by now, just to scare her….
Was that breathing she heard?
“Justin Cooper! Dad’ll skin you alive when he finds out you made me drop the ledger.”
No answer. This wasn’t like her brother.
But then, Justin hadn’t been acting all that brotherly lately.
There was another rustle of brush, followed by another thud that sounded like a horse hoof.
Noelle Cooper’s fingers stiffened in the process of making change for a customer. She caught her breath at the sudden unreasoning concern that gripped her.
“You okay?” the bearded man asked as he stared at the coins Noelle held poised over his outstretched hand.
She breathed again. Forcing a smile to her lips, she relinquished his change. “Sorry, Jack.” She closed the cash drawer. “Guess it’s past my bedtime. Hope you like that yogurt. If you want to cut your fat intake, you can skim the cream off the top, but for better taste stir it all together.”
She waved him out the door, casting a glance around Noelle’s Naturals, her health-food and supplement store. No other customers had slipped in while she was waiting on Jack, so she reached for the keys to lock up.
It was eight o’clock, straight up. Everyone else had gone home. Mariah, Noelle’s silent business partner, kept encouraging her to keep the doors open a few minutes past closing on Thursday nights for a customer who had to drive clear across Springfield after work, but that man hadn’t been here in three weeks, and there were hardly any cars parked in the shopping center lot.
Besides, Noelle felt strange…enervated…weak. Understandable enough, since she’d slept only a total of ten hours or so the past three nights. The insomnia was probably brought on by Joel’s return. It had been too much to hope that her ex-husband would disappear from Springfield, Missouri, forever.
On top of everything, Mariah was away on a buying trip to Kansas City, and Noelle had been at the store since seven o’clock this morning. Why was it every time her partner left town all the grouches and complainers descended? For the past three hours, Noelle’s face had ached from forcing a smile. If one more crank walked through that door…
She locked it and returned to the cash register to balance her money with receipts, but then she paused and leaned against the counter. “Okay, Lord, what’s happening here?” she whispered.
A ripple of unease brushed her nerve ends, as it had several times the past few days. But why? Usually, when she felt this kind of spontaneous sensation, she could take a few minutes to focus and she would calm down. This time it felt stronger. Different. She closed her eyes and breathed deeply, picturing her favorite hiking trail, down by Hideaway. She would go hiking again soon. Very soon, she promised herself.
The constant bustle of Springfield tended to get on her nerves, and she tried to escape from the city at least two or three times a month. Although the nearby nature center offered a good occasional respite, she also needed a quieter trail now and then, with lots of trees and without anyone race-walking past her, chattering on a cell phone. Noelle loved people, but the public could overwhelm her. When she was hypersensitive, as she was now, she craved solitude.
She stretched her arms over her head to ease the tightness in her shoulder muscles. Everything in the store looked in place. She straightened a package of pumpkin seeds on the sale rack and returned to the counter, still unable to shake her anxiety.
There was something different about the way she felt tonight. Noelle knew it wasn’t simply stress. Not this time.
The last time she had felt this way a loved one had died.
Carissa didn’t move. Her heart was pounding so fast she could hardly breathe, and her throat felt so stiff she could barely swallow. She prayed silently, the way her favorite cousin, Noelle, had taught her to do when she was afraid. Keep me safe, Jesus. Keep me safe.
Something rustled the bushes at the side of the lane, and Carissa felt a low whimper sliding up her throat.
What if it wasn’t Justin? Maybe it really wasn’t anybody she knew. But who else would be down here in Cedar Hollow at night?
More rustling…
Carissa stopped breathing.
A footstep. Between her and the house.
Forgetting about the flashlight in the puddle, Carissa swung around and raced back through the darkness toward the sawmill. She clutched the muddy ledger to her chest like a shield as she stumbled over weeds along the lane.
She heard more rustling behind her, a splash of mud, the sound of labored breathing…and a soft whisper that blended so closely to the rustle of brush, Carissa couldn’t be sure it was human…. It sounded like the wind in the trees, except the whisper kept time with the rhythm of footsteps, and she thought she heard her name…Carissssssaa…
She let the ledger fall to the ground as she raced through the darkness toward the sawmill, stumbling into branches that seemed to reach out from the black line of trees on both sides of the lane. As she emerged into the lumberyard, the moon peered out from the clouds. She pivoted to her right and sprinted toward the side door of the huge building that housed the sawmill.
The footsteps behind her grew fainter, and when she reached the door, she risked a glance over her shoulder. A shadow broke loose from the hovering trees, but she couldn’t tell who it was.
She yanked open the door and ran inside. She cracked her shins on something solid and tripped, falling hard on her left side. Her temple smacked the floor, stunning her. She’d left out a box when she’d been searching the sawmill earlier. Stupid!
The footsteps came closer, slowed and stopped. She sensed her pursuer was poised in the doorway, listening to her harsh, shallow breathing.
She scrambled to her feet, stumbled again, dizzy and confused.
A hand touched her shoulder. She screamed and skittered backward. Something caught her at the ankles. She fell back, slamming against the cement floor. Total darkness engulfed her.
Noelle dropped the bills back into their slot and shoved the cash drawer shut. Time to go home and go to bed.
She looked up to see a customer reaching for the handle of the front door—the door she’d locked a few moments ago. Groaning inwardly, she motioned for the man to wait, then retrieved the keys from the drawer.
She could feel her neck muscles tightening as she walked toward the front of the store. She glanced outside at the dark sky, then at the pale impatient face of the waiting customer. She wasn’t up to this, really she wasn’t. She needed to get away sometime soon, away from the demanding customers, the complaints and traffic. She couldn’t take—
Again, that feeling of focused concern struck her, more powerfully intense this time. And even more focused.
She caught her breath. It had been so long since she’d experienced this…this response. She closed her eyes, ignoring the man at the door.
“Oh dear Jesus.” It was a prayer not a curse. “Is this—” She opened her eyes, startled. “Carissa!”
Chapter Two
Nathan Trask gritted his teeth and braked his black Chevrolet pickup to avoid hitting a flop-eared hound darting out in front of him, the dog’s black nose following a scent.
“Sorry, fella, but that raccoon’s probably long gone,” Nathan muttered as the dog plunged into the brush on the other side of the road. “Could be we’re both following a false trail.”
A car honked behind him, and he increased his speed. Traffic in Springfield could rival the congestion of St. Louis or Kansas City during rush hours, but at 6:30 a.m. on Friday, Highway 160, south of Missouri’s third largest metropolis, held some of the attractions of a country lane. Touches of yellow and burnt orange decorated the trees along the road this autumn morning, hinting at more color to come.
But today, the beauty didn’t ease Nathan’s tension. He knew, from a lifetime of experience, that Noelle Cooper had a formidable understanding of logic, and the idea that Nathan had been considering these past few hours was not logical. His best friend from childhood might think he’d gone nuts.
He forced his hands to relax on the steering wheel and unclenched his jaw. Maybe his desperation to find Carissa, along with a night without sleep, had addled his brain. But his memories of Noelle’s particular gift were vivid, more so in the past few months, as the friendship that he and Noelle had shared long ago reestablished itself after years of life’s intrusions.
He wasn’t romanticizing the past, was he? Jumping to wild conclusions about Noelle’s ability to find Carissa when the rest of them had failed?
Noelle adored Carissa, and she needed to know what was happening. He was doing the right thing, if for no other reason than to inform Noelle about something she deserved to know, since she and the girl were family.
He turned right before he reached the city-limits sign, then drove six blocks and turned right again, admiring the picture-postcard attractiveness of this increasingly familiar neighborhood. Since running into Noelle in downtown Hideaway earlier this summer, Nathan had started finding more and more excuses to visit Springfield, despite the three-hour round trip.
As he pulled into her driveway—second house on the left, the gray brick with black trim—he spotted her red Ford Escort through the tiny square panes of the garage window, which meant Noelle hadn’t gone to work yet. Good. Maybe her partner could carry the load today, so Noelle could be free to come back to Hideaway with him immediately. After a cup of coffee; he really needed a strong dose of caffeine first.
Less than three seconds after Nathan rang the doorbell, Noelle opened the door. She focused on him slowly, pushing back a wave of tousled brown hair. Her brow cleared, and that familiar, affectionate smile lit the sleepy lines of her face.
“Nathan?”
“Morning,” he said, casting a glance at her long, teddy-bear nightshirt and terry-cloth robe. “Just get up?”
“Mmm-hmm.” She rubbed her eyes. “Thought I’d see if I had a paper yet.” She peered out at the empty sidewalk and front yard and shrugged. “Optimistic, I know. Come on in. Did you just get into Springfield? How about a cup of coffee? What are you doing here so early? Another meeting with those rural pharmacy suppliers?” She turned, leading the way back inside.
For a moment, instead of following her, he hesitated. Crazy. Definitely, he was crazy. What in the world made him think he could face this sane woman and blurt out what he’d been thinking? They were both adults now. Was he romanticizing memories? As a child, Noelle had possessed an extra special knowledge of certain events. Could she have that knowledge now?
She stopped and turned back, the tiny lines around her blue eyes deepening. “Nathan?”
“Coming.” He followed her into the foyer. “No meeting today. I came to see you. And coffee would be wonderful. Oh, and yes, I just got into Springfield.” Classical music played in the background, and he caught a whiff of pumpkin spice mingled with freshly brewed coffee.
She pulled a mug from a cupboard near the sink. “You came to Springfield at six-thirty in the morning—which would mean you left Hideaway at five? Ick! All this just to see me?” Her movements slowed and she turned, frowning at him. “So what’s up?”
“Your sister hasn’t called, has she?”
A heightened alertness stiffened her shoulders, and her eyes narrowed with sudden apprehension. “Why would Jill call me this early in the morning? What’s happened?”
“Carissa’s missing.”
Noelle stared at him for a moment, slow to comprehend what he was saying.
“She disappeared last night, somewhere between the house and the sawmill,” he continued gently. “We haven’t found her.”
Nathan’s words seemed to strike her one by one, in a timed delay. Then her eyes widened, and she drew in a deep breath.
Nathan reached for her as she paled.
She caught his arm. “Oh, no,” she breathed. “What…what time last night?”
“It was after dark, maybe around eight. She went down the hill to the sawmill to do some research for a school paper, and she was supposed to bring back a ledger for Cecil and Jill when she returned. She never returned.”
Noelle’s grip on Nathan’s arm tightened. “I can’t believe…they must be out of their minds with worry!”
“Cecil is blaming himself. Melva’s inconsolable.” Noelle had grown up in Cedar Hollow, down the lane from her cousin Cecil, and the two of them had been like brother and sister.
“And my sister?” she asked.
“Jill’s trying to reassure all of them, but it isn’t doing much good. Jill’s just as upset as the rest. I thought you’d want to help search.”
Years ago, when Noelle was in the process of a painful divorce from her abusive husband, she had returned to Hideaway to stay with her sister, Jill. During those months, she’d spent a lot of time with Cecil’s daughter, Carissa, forming a bond that had kept them close ever since. Though Jill lived in town, and Cecil’s family in sparsely populated countryside outside Hideaway—a hollow in the hills strewn with cedars, Carissa had used every excuse to visit Hideaway and spend the night.
Noelle released her grip on Nathan’s arm. “I’ll get dressed, and then I’ll follow you back. Put our coffee in a thermos, will you? There’s one in the cabinet above the stove.” She swung toward the hall, chatter gear kicking into high, as it always did when she attempted to tone down an emotional rush. “I’ll take my cell phone and arrange for extra help—”
“I’d hoped you would ride with me,” Nathan said before she could disappear into her bedroom.
She stopped and turned back, frowning. “Why? Then you’ll just have to drive me back home as soon as we find her.”
As soon as we find her. He’d always loved her positive attitude. “We need to talk on the way down,” he said. “I thought you might know some places we haven’t looked. You seem to have a special empathy with Carissa.”
“Can’t we do all that when we get there?”
He hesitated. Why did she have to be so contrary?
“Okay, fine, I’ll ride with you,” she said, changing her mind before he could speak, then pivoting again toward her bedroom. “Let’s just get there, okay?” She shut the door behind her.
Carissa awoke to the throb of pain in her head, and the sound of her own voice—a soft whimper that she had intended, in her dream, to be a loud cry for help. Staring into the thick blackness, she couldn’t remember the dream, or even why she’d been afraid—until she reached out and felt the hard, damp slab of stone beneath her, and heard the drip-drip of water somewhere nearby.
She barely suppressed another cry. Where was she?
She squeezed her eyes shut tight against the pain in her head and tried to think. Somebody had chased her. She remembered running back to the sawmill, someone grabbing her. She remembered falling. Then nothing. Whoever was chasing her had brought her here. But where was here? If only it weren’t so dark…if only she’d found her flashlight in the mud puddle.
Her eyes strained against the blackness. She blinked. Nothing. It was as if she were encircled by air as thick as tar. But if she could see nothing, then that meant nothing could see her. That thought brought some comfort. The darkness was her friend.
Unfortunately, it seemed she had an enemy more scary than the darkness had ever been when she was a little kid.
The drip of water caught her attention again. She turned toward the sound and gasped at the sudden burst of pain in the back of her head. Had her attacker knocked her out? Or had it been the fall?
And where was he now? Or was it a he?
Fear mingled with the pain. Carissa strained to see anything at all through the darkness, but there was no light. Her heartbeat pounded like a hammer on her skull. Her shallow breaths echoed against…what?
She raised her hand and tentatively pressed it deeper and deeper into the thick blackness. About a foot away from her face she touched something hard, and jerked back. She rubbed her fingers together and felt wetness. Forced herself to reach out again, she felt damp, gritty rock, forming a wall beside her.
A wall where?
Would her attacker come back? Maybe he thought she was dead. Maybe she would be dead if she stayed here.
She tried to sit up. Shafts of pain shot from her head all the way down her back, and she slumped sideways against the wall.
The smell of fresh, damp earth was familiar, but the sound of dripping was different from the sounds of the woods where she’d been walking earlier. She touched the wall beside her once more, and again rubbed her fingers together. Gritty wetness. She heard the water dripping in the distance, with a hollow echo, as though the sound was contained.
An underground cavern of some kind? She’d been in enough caves with Justin to recognize the feel and smell of one. How long had she been here? A few minutes? Hours? She had to get out.
She leaned forward and braced herself against the wet wall, trying to breathe past the pain, the way Melva had told her to do when she’d broken her arm last year. She couldn’t let the pain stop her, or she might die here.
Slowly, she stood up. Keeping her hand on the cave wall, she inched her way forward, stumbling in the dark over rocks and pebbles. Was this the right thing to do? What if she was going in the wrong direction?
Pain spread from her head down her neck. She took shallow, quick breaths and thought about sunshine and safety.
She shuffled forward along the uneven rock for a few more minutes, keeping her right hand extended in front of her while staying in contact with the cave wall. A wrong step could plunge her to her death if there was a drop-off. Justin had warned her never to get lost in a cave. Too late now.
She felt along the surface of the mud-slick cavern floor with her toes until the pounding pain in her skull grew too harsh, then she paused to breathe away some of the throbbing.
A moment later, she continued inching forward.
But was she going the right way? Should she wait a little longer, in case someone was coming for her? Dad and Melva and Jill would be looking for her soon. People got lost in these Ozark caves. Some died. Maybe she should wait a little longer….
How had her attacker been able to carry her this way? Maybe she should—
Stone clattered against stone somewhere behind her, and she froze, listening. She almost called out, then she realized that Dad or Melva or Justin or Jill would be shouting for her. There was a shuffle of footsteps, another clatter of rock. Carissa dropped to her knees, pressing her lips together to keep from crying out at the sudden pain.
She waited.
Silence.
She crawled forward, keeping her left hand on the wall to guide her as the soles of her shoes slid across the muddy earth. She could hear her own loud breathing.
A flash of light shot over the dripping rocks, then disappeared. She froze to watch and listen.
Was that a whisper? Or just a change in rhythm of the dripping water?
The light flashed again, and Carissa caught sight of a stalagmite just ahead, with a shelf of white rock beyond it. A hiding place. If she could reach that spot and—
Another whisper, then the sound of footsteps. Someone was coming, but any other sounds of an approach disappeared in the thumping roar inside Carissa’s skull, pain growing worse as her fear mounted.
She scrambled past the fat stalagmite. Digging her fingers into tiny crevices, she pulled herself up the stone wall. A narrow space behind a slab of limestone looked like a perfect fit for her as the light flashed through the cave again. She crawled into the space, then collapsed, gritting her teeth against the sharp stabbing in her skull.
She heard the sound of rocks scattering, then footsteps below her. Light flickered across the white limestone. She cringed. Could she be seen?
There was a loud gasp. “No!” The voice was a whisper. The searcher paused, as if looking around. Then: “Carissa? Carissa…” Like the hiss of a snake.
More footsteps, as if the searcher roamed through the cave. More whispers echoed from the walls of rock, like the sound of dry leaves blowing in the wind, but Carissa couldn’t make out the words. She held her breath, trembling with terror.
That whisper…something about it was familiar. But what? Or maybe it wasn’t the voice. Maybe it was something else. She sniffed the air. A scent?
Whoever was holding that light and filling the cavern with whispers knew her name.
The footsteps shuffled past her hiding place, and the light faded in the distance. Darkness and silence floated down over her again like a shield. At last, all was dark, and all was silent once more.
Chapter Three
Noelle fastened her seatbelt and settled the thermos beside her as Nathan pulled out of her driveway. She fished her cell phone out from her purse then punched in Cecil’s home number. When a stranger answered, she asked about the status of the search and was told Carissa had not yet been found.
“Thanks.” She disconnected. “Nothing yet.”
“We can try again in a little while.”
She closed her eyes and leaned her head back. Oh, Carissa, where are you?
Nathan’s warm hand touched her arm. “You okay?”
She nodded as tears stung behind her closed lids. “I’m fine. Carissa will be, too.”
His hand tightened. “You know that for sure?”
She opened her eyes and looked at him, hearing the odd note in his voice. “I’m praying it’s true.” She hadn’t stopped praying since Nathan had broken the news to her. Actually, she’d been praying before that.
He nodded and returned his attention to the road.
She knew this drive well, all the rolling hills, stark cliffs and misty valleys that stretched from Springfield to Branson on Highway 65, and then west on 76 to the Hideaway turnoff. These wooded Ozark hills kept their secrets well.
She closed her eyes, once again picturing her young cousin’s smiling face, her mischievous blue eyes and shoulder-length ringlets of soft brown hair. Oh, Carissa.
Tears smarted Noelle’s eyes again, and she straightened in her seat. “Tell me about the search. Where have they looked? How many are helping?”
“No one has rested,” Nathan said. “Not even Aunt Pearl. They’ve combed Cedar Hollow from end to end. The police, the forest rangers, even some local guardsmen were called to help.”
“So you’re saying they called out the guards before they called me?” That stung, and yet she knew this wasn’t the time to allow her personal feelings to become involved. She’d called the Coopers last night from the store, and left a message on their machine.
“Sorry.”
“How’s Aunt Pearl holding up?” Noelle asked. Her sixty-seven-year-old great-aunt Pearl lived on the original family homestead, about a quarter mile from Cecil’s home. Cecil and his family lived in the same sprawling two-story house in which he had grown up, halfway between Pearl’s house and the sawmill. Ordinarily, a sawmill would need to be situated closer to civilization, but Cooper’s had been in operation for over fifty years, with an excellent reputation. It never lacked for business.
“I’ve hardly seen anything of her,” Nathan said. “She’s obviously upset.”
“How’s her heart?”
“She’s strong as an ox, you know that. I wouldn’t be surprised to discover she’s covered the whole property on foot herself.”
“Surely there have been places the searchers have missed,” Noelle said. “Nobody could possibly cover all two thousand acres in one night. Who, besides the guards and police, is searching?”
“Thirty people from regional search-and-rescue squads, plus the Cooper sawmill employees. Dane Gideon came over with his ranch hands before I left this morning, and as the word’s spread, the churches got involved. Everyone has combed the woods as thoroughly as possible, then started over again. When I left this morning, it looked as if there were more people than trees in that forest.”
Noelle felt a rush of gratitude for the strong community that had always been a part of Hideaway, and the surrounding countryside, and once again tears filled her eyes. “And family?”
“Cecil stays out there all the time. He won’t eat, won’t even sit down for a short rest.”
Noelle could easily believe that. The paternal instinct ran strong in her cousin. “What about Melva?” she asked. Cecil’s second wife had always adored Carissa and Justin. Indeed, the family joked that Melva had married Cecil because she’d wanted to mother his children.
“She’s not holding up well at all,” Nathan said.
Noelle closed her eyes and willed herself not to let the tears fall. Why hadn’t they returned her call last night? She stayed up late waiting and praying, until she’d finally received assurance that everything would be okay. But now? Where was all that holy assurance now?
“Your sister’s been keeping a close eye on Melva,” Nathan said. “Typical Jill.”
Noelle sighed and turned her head to stare out the passenger window, across a rare open valley. “Jill didn’t call me.”
Nathan didn’t reply.
Noelle gave him a sharp glance. “What aren’t you telling me?”
“Maybe you should have a talk with Jill when we get there.”
“Why?” She studied his expression. His attention remained on the road, hands at the ten and two position on the steering wheel, back straight, a sure sign he was covering. “Let me guess. She told everyone not to call me.”
He grimaced.
“She did!”
“She said you had a lot going on right now, and this would be too much for you.”
Noelle scowled and crossed her arms over her chest. She should have known better than to tell her sister about Joel’s return. Now Jill was all distressed, begging Noelle to scamper back home to Hideaway with her tail between her legs, like a whipped cur. Again. Jill to the rescue. Again. But Noelle didn’t need rescuing this time.
“She’s only concerned for your welfare,” he said.
“Don’t even start with that, Nathan. I’m thirty-six. She still sees me as a seven-year-old child who’s lost her mother. For Pete’s sake, that was twenty-nine years ago.” And Jill never seemed to remember that she’d lost her mother, too.
“She mentioned that you had a difficult time after the sawmill accident.”
“Sure I did. So did everyone else. It was shocking and horrible, and Jill didn’t even take time to grieve. She was too busy taking care of everyone else. Come on, Nathan, she’s pulling the big-sister act again. It isn’t healthy for her or anyone else. And besides, that accident was ten years ago. I wasn’t exactly in the best mental state at the time.”
Ten years ago, Noelle and Jill had lost their father and grandparents in an accident at the sawmill when a load of cedar logs had fallen off a flatbed truck, crushing them. Four years later, Cecil’s wife—Justin and Carissa’s mother—had suddenly left home, abandoning her family. Two years ago, a tornado had ripped through Cedar Hollow, barely sparing the homes and sawmill. Some people said Cedar Hollow was cursed. Sometimes, Noelle agreed.
From her peripheral vision, Noelle saw Nathan give her a brief glance. “You’ve lost weight,” he said.
“Thank you for noticing.”
“Haven’t been eating?”
She shook her head. “I needed to lose the weight anyway, but I guess I’ve been a little on edge the past couple of weeks, what with Joel back in town.”
There was an expressive silence, and she could have bitten her tongue. Apparently, Jill hadn’t shared that tidbit with Nathan.
“You didn’t tell me.” There was a note of accusation in his voice.
She felt an uncomfortable nudge of guilt. She reminded herself firmly that there was no reason to feel guilty. “Now you’re beginning to sound like Jill.”
“Okay, let me make sure I’m clear on this.” His voice bit with a hint of sarcasm. “Your ex-husband—who has proven in the past to be violent—has suddenly reappeared in Springfield. You’re nervous enough about it that you’ve lost your appetite, yet you don’t think it’s reasonable for anyone to become concerned?”
“I’m simply saying I don’t need more than one person overreacting to the crises in my life. I’m capable of taking care of them myself.” Okay, maybe she was overreacting. Yes, she and Nathan had renewed their friendship, and she valued that friendship highly, but she was answerable to no one but herself. These past few years of independence had given Noelle a sweet taste of freedom. She intended to guard that freedom with everything she had.
She glanced at Nathan’s profile, the even features, the high forehead, and resisted a pang of chagrin at the concern in his expression. “I’m telling you now, okay? And yes, I’ve lost some sleep over it. I just don’t think anyone else should have to worry.” Especially since she had landed herself in this mess to begin with. She didn’t intend to drag friends and family into the ugly aftermath of her past mistakes.
“Has he tried to contact you?”
She hesitated. “Let’s just say he’s made sure I know he’s back.”
“Please don’t tell me he knows where you’re living now.”
“He could easily find out if he wanted to, but he’s been coming into the store the past couple of weeks.”
Nathan’s grip tightened on the steering wheel. “He’s been coming in? As in, more than once?”
“Twice when I was working, but he always purchased things, so it isn’t as if he’s harassing me.”
“Has he said anything to you?”
“He barely looked at me.” Okay, so it wasn’t completely objectionable to have Nathan concerned about her welfare.
“Do you think he’s up to something?”
“I can’t tell. Six years ago I was able to read him and know when to expect an outburst, but he’s been gone a long time. Now we’re strangers, and I don’t know what to expect.”
They rode in silence for a moment. During the divorce proceedings, which had been drawn out for eighteen excruciating months, Noelle had received several threats from Joel, along with a broken windshield. There had also been numerous anonymous telephone calls to her place of employment, where she’d worked as a nurse for a pediatric group, calls that ultimately had resulted in the loss of her job when the harassment had become too intense—Missouri’s status as a “right to fire” state hadn’t helped. Three of the five physicians in the group had requested her termination, with no reason needed.
Because of her past work record, she’d found it impossible to find another nursing position, which was her own fault. Testing positive for methamphetamines had cast an indelible smudge on her reputation, though she hadn’t touched drugs again. She only wished she’d never taken those pills the first time, had never fallen for Joel’s promise that they would “keep her alert.”
The situation with Joel had become so frightening that she’d requested a restraining order. She hadn’t received one, because she couldn’t prove her estranged husband was the culprit. During the final six months before the divorce hearing, she’d gone home to Hideaway and stayed with Jill. And her concerned older sister had stepped back into her “mommy” role, to the point of insisting that Noelle eat three healthy meals a day and attend church twice a week. It was then that Noelle had begun to seek God’s direction in earnest, for the first time in many years.
“You don’t think Joel’s sudden reappearance could have anything to do with Carissa’s disappearance, do you?” Nathan asked.
Noelle looked at him, startled. “Like what?”
“Would kidnapping be out of the question?”
“Kidnapping!”
“At this point I don’t know, but having met Joel a few times, and knowing what he’s done to you in the past, I wouldn’t dismiss the possibility. From all accounts, he’s a vindictive scoundrel who should be rotting behind bars.”
She blinked at him, startled by his adamancy. “But Carissa? After six years? I don’t think that’s likely.” And yet, what if…?
She glanced at Nathan’s profile again. Nathan Trask had a kind nature, which was obvious in his expression, in the laugh lines around his eyes. He was also an attractive man, with a high, broad forehead, dark-green eyes, dark-brown hair that he kept short and combed back. Right now, his usual five o’clock shadow had nearly become a beard, and his facial lines were ones of weariness. He had good reason to be cranky.
“Maybe I should be driving,” she said.
“I’m okay. The coffee helped.”
Sitting back, she tried to relax, and again thought about last night. She shivered.
“Cold?” Nathan reached toward the console for the heat dial.
“I’m…fine.” She folded her arms over her chest and tried to let the passing roadside beauty calm her—the bright yellow splashes of goldenrod against the deep red of autumn sumac, highlighted by sprays of purple asters.
It was no use. Her mind wouldn’t stop whirling with questions.
“Noelle?” Nathan said at last.
“Hmm?”
“What else is going on with you?”
“What do you mean?”
“There’s something else you’re not telling me.”
She gave him a look of aggravation. Nathan Trask had always possessed an irritating ability to read her mind. “Why would you say—”
“Just tell me, okay? I’m not in the mood to dig it out of you.”
“Okay, fine.” He really was a grump today. And she shouldn’t be saying this. It would only invite more questions and cause more worry. Could she trust him not to share too much with Jill? “It’s nothing, really. I had a little episode last night, probably from low blood sugar, since I haven’t been eating a lot, and didn’t—”
“What kind of episode?”
She had his complete attention now. “Watch the road, would you?”
“I’m watching the road. Tell me what happened.”
Rats. She knew he’d get upset. For a few more seconds she stared out at the colorful roadside. Like Jill, Nathan had the “older sibling” complex. He tended to be bossy, and from the time the first of his two younger sisters was born, he had also tried to boss Noelle even though she was his age, and a neighbor rather than a sibling. She’d established her boundaries with him when she was about five. She didn’t intend to have to do so again.
Still, it wasn’t totally disagreeable to have Nathan so concerned about her.
“Okay,” he conceded. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to snap at you. What happened? How did you feel?”
“I felt very concerned for no reason,” she said, then glanced at him to make sure he was watching the road again. “You know how it is when something occurs to you, that seems so real, as though God has spoken?”
He glanced at her again. “That’s a lot more than just nerves or blood sugar.”
“Joel’s arrival is definitely a stressor,” she said.
There was a pause, then Nathan asked, “What time, exactly, did it happen?”
She frowned at him.
He met her gaze briefly, then looked away. “This may have everything to do with Carissa.”
She thought so, too, but why would he?
He took a deep breath and exhaled, then combed his fingers through his hair. The morning sun shining in through the window showed the lines around his eyes and the evidence of his lack of sleep and his worry. “What time did you have the attack? You said it was last night—was it after dark?”
“It was just after closing time.”
“You close at eight—which means this happened about the same time Carissa disappeared.”
“Yes.” She didn’t want to go there. Not yet. It was too soon and she wasn’t ready.
“You know what I’m talking about.” He braked when a car cut in front of him. “It’s as if you somehow knew something had happened to Carissa.”
“You can’t be serious.” Hypocrisy will get you nowhere, Noelle Cooper.
He nodded. The tightness around his mouth revealed his determination. He was going to discuss the subject no matter what she said.
“Nathan, I’m not psychic. I’m surprised a former pastor like you would suggest such a thing.”
“No, not psychic. But you’ve always been able to perceive things others don’t,” he said. “I remember you had dreams several days before your mother died.”
“You remember that? We were seven.”
“You told me about it, and it stuck with me. It scared me, because every time you had a dream after that, I was afraid someone would die.”
She closed her eyes and leaned back against the headrest. Growing up as country neighbors, she and Nathan had ridden horses and bikes, hiked, explored caves, and wandered over the extensive acreage of the combined Cooper and Trask properties. They’d done homework together when they were old enough for homework. She’d shared her thoughts and dreams with him, and he’d remembered, after all this time.
“So you do know what I’m talking about,” he said.
“Just because I had dreams before Mom died doesn’t mean anything.”
“Remember that orange-and-white kitten of mine that got lost when we were ten? I told you about it, and you went right to it. I’d looked for at least two hours, and you found it in five minutes.”
She shifted uncomfortably in her seat. This was just great. She was stuck in a moving vehicle halfway to Hideaway with Nathan Trask, who seemed to be very much in the mood for an argument.
She pointed to a sign. “There’s your turn. Focus on your driving for a few minutes, will you?”
He shot her a quick glance that said, “This subject is only tabled, not closed,” but made the turn in silence.
Chapter Four
Ihave to think…have to get control! Where did she go? What if she knows it’s me? She could beat me to the house, she could tell the others that I tried to kill her!
But I didn’t kill her. I stopped myself. I can stop this if I try hard enough. I can keep the fear from controlling me.
She’s just lost in the cave somewhere, scared and alone. I need to go back and find her and take her home. Maybe if I stay with the others when this thing hits…when this slow, shifting spiral into terror strikes me…their presence might force me to control my actions.
Yes. I’ll have to find her. Everything will be okay.
Carissa won’t be able to find her way back without my help. I’m in control.
I can stay in control.
Nathan took a bypass around Branson’s busiest highway, increasingly aware that Noelle’s silent observation of the passing roadside was a sign that he’d struck a nerve. This new road had very little traffic, but he waited to speak, respecting her wish for silence, until they were on the far side of Branson.
“I wish you’d at least talk to me about it,” he said at last.
She cleared her throat but didn’t answer. A few moments later, she sighed, but still didn’t speak.
“It’s okay,” he said at last. “I understand. It’s difficult. The kind of gift that you’ve been given can’t be an easy thing to live with.”
She gave a soft snort. “Gift? You’ve got to be kidding.”
“That’s what I’d call it.”
“Do you remember where I found the kitten?”
“At my grandmother’s, up the road, in the milk barn.”
“Big surprise,” she said dryly. “Cats love milk.”
“I’d just finished looking everywhere in that barn before you led me to her.”
“So I got lucky.”
“I can’t count the number of times you’ve practically told me what I was feeling without my having to say a word.”
“That happens with friends,” she said.
Nathan drove in silence for a few more moments while Noelle returned to her study of the passing hills and hayfields. She wasn’t fooling him. He knew her too well. She couldn’t deny something they had grown up knowing—she had been blessed with an unusual amount of empathy.
No, not just empathy. Intuition, too, and more…
They’d never talked about it, when they were children, because then it hadn’t seemed like such an unusual thing to them. He suspected that for the past ten or twenty years she had even tried to deny the gift completely. Or maybe she hadn’t experienced it. Noelle’s lifestyle in her late teens and twenties had not given her much of an opening for guidance by the Holy Spirit.
He couldn’t remember when she’d first shown signs of this special sense about other people. She was right, she did have a logical thought process and a natural gift for reading body language. She also had a genuine affection for people.
But there was something extra, besides all that, and the best definition he could find was to call it “a discernment.” Some might say it was unnatural, but if anything it was supernatural, a spiritual gift from God, because, somehow Nathan was sure, Noelle had never attempted to “conjure” this gift.
He couldn’t help wondering about last night, but for now he wouldn’t push it.
“Be gentle with Jill when you see her,” he said, knowing Noelle would appreciate the change of subject, even if it did mean talking about another uncomfortable issue.
“Fine. I’ll just tenderly punch her in the nose.”
He grinned as he negotiated a sharp curve past Reeds Spring. “I think she feels partly responsible for Carissa’s disappearance. Carissa was bringing back a ledger from the office for Jill to look at. You knew Jill and Cecil formed a business partnership for Cooper’s Sawmill?”
“Yes, she told me. Sounds like Aunt Pearl’s not crazy about the idea.”
“Pearl doesn’t like losing authority, but Cecil and Jill finally managed to convince her that they need to modernize if they’re going to retain their edge in the market.”
“Meaning computers,” Noelle said. “Jill told me two weeks ago that they’d already purchased two. Also that Melva’s tackling the job of entering data for the whole year, and Jill’s learning the system with her. Aunt Pearl must be fit to be tied.”
Nathan chuckled. “She hates anything she can’t understand.”
Noelle glanced at him. “But Jill has her nursing job at the clinic. How does she have time for both?”
“Maybe you should talk to her about that.”
“I did, but Jill wouldn’t listen. Remember, I’m the baby sister without a brain in my head.”
Nathan heard the frustration in her voice. Noelle and Jill loved each other very much, but they never quite overcame the clash of wills that should have been settled between them long ago—Jill’s fierce need to nurture versus Noelle’s equally fierce need for independence. Jill nurtured not only her sister, but her extended family, the patients she worked with at the clinic and the clinic staff, as well. Consequently, she had little time to nurture herself. She was often irritable and stressed.
Nathan braked for a slow moving car in front of him. “Jill’s working a lot these days, and the clinic is still desperately searching for medical personnel willing to relocate to Hideaway.”
“I know. She’s asked me at least ten times in the past month if I’d consider a position.”
“And your reply?” Nathan resisted the urge to check out Noelle’s expression.
“I told her it shouldn’t be hard to find someone,” she said. “The town caters to tourists, including medical personnel, and surely some of them could be enticed to stay permanently.”
“It hasn’t happened yet. Jill isn’t the only one who would like to see you back home in Hideaway.”
From the corner of his eye, he saw her glance at him. “Really?” she asked softly.
“Bertie Meyer talks about you all the time. So does Carissa.”
“Oh.”
Was that disappointment in her voice? And if so, who else had she hoped would want her back in Hideaway?
He suppressed a smile. “They’ll need several new staff members if Dr. Cheyenne Gideon manages to convince the city board of directors to support a hospital designation for the clinic.” He glanced at Noelle. “You’re still a nurse. Why ignore the skills you worked so hard to learn?”
“Don’t start with me. I’ve had enough of that from Jill.”
“Have you ever considered the possibility that she’s right once in a while?”
“Have you ever considered the possibility that you’re a nag?” Noelle teased. “Besides, you’re the one who can’t settle on a career. From preacher to pharmacist in four years. You never told me why you made that giant leap.”
He gave up. She wouldn’t be pinned down, and if he tried, she’d just change the subject again. “Not much of a leap. After Natalie died, I felt overwhelmed by the pastorate, so I gave the church my resignation and went back to school to follow in my mom’s footsteps.” It was an oversimplification of a very complicated and painful time in his life, and her prolonged silence told him she knew it.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “Your wife was so young to be taken like that. It must have been awful for both of you.”
“I tried to be there for her as much as I could, while still trying to shoulder all the responsibilities of the church myself.” And Hideaway Community Church had become his undoing, especially after the aggressive ovarian cancer took Natalie in such a short time. “It became too much for me during her illness. I couldn’t cope with the needs of so many, and even though the church was supportive, I guess I felt like a failure.” As always, he had an uncomfortable tendency to spill his guts to Noelle.
“I was so caught up in my own problems at the time, I wasn’t there for you,” she said.
“I brought it on myself, with my inability to delegate responsibility in the church. I had the erroneous attitude, thinking of myself as God’s anointed, who should be able to do it all. I was wrong.”
“I’m sorry,” she said softly.
“I knew what a rough time you were having then, with Joel,” Nathan said. “I’ve heard the comment that a divorce is more painful than a death. In a way, not only is divorce the announcement of the death of a relationship, but it’s also, in the eyes of many, a sign of rejection.”
“For me it was a sign of failure,” she said quietly. “By the time the judge pronounced us no longer husband and wife, I felt as though I’d been released from prison.”
He gave her a quick glance.
She shrugged. “The drugs, the abuse.” She pressed a forefinger against the small scar beside her left eye. “This is just the most visible scar he gave me. I kept thinking I could hold out and see him through all of it, that I was the one person who could rescue him from himself.” She gave a bitter snort. “I discovered I wasn’t so special, after all.”
“Then I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you, either.” Nathan risked another glance at her; she was staring out the window again. “And so you changed professions because of the experience, just as I did.”
“I didn’t have a choice. I couldn’t find a job after I was dismissed from the clinic. No one wanted to take a chance on a proven drug abuser.”
Nathan’s foot involuntarily eased from the accelerator and the truck slowed. He couldn’t keep the shock from his expression.
“I did offer to drive if you need me to,” she said dryly.
“That’s okay.” He regained his composure. “I guess there are some things I still don’t know about you.”
“There are some things you won’t want to know. Let’s just say I made a mess of things once too often, and I’ve been paying for it ever since.”
“But you shouldn’t have to keep paying for it for the rest of your life.”
“Maybe I should. Get over it, Nathan. I have.”
“But you always wanted to be a nurse.”
She returned to her brooding.
Time for yet another subject change. Amazing how they’d once been able to discuss anything together, and now they had to tiptoe around so many areas of their lives.
She pointed to the first outlying buildings of the town of Hideaway, the breathtaking view of the lake to their right and the picturesque town square to their left—a square on which the brick storefronts faced the street that encircled it on all four sides.
Nathan drove past the clinic, general store, feed store, bakery and bank, then followed the curve in the road through a charming residential district, lush with trees and shrubbery and lined with a variety of homes, from colorfully painted Victorian houses to neat brick Colonials and ranches and small lake cabins. This early in the morning, all was quiet. Nathan and Noelle passed Jill’s two-story Victorian on their way out of town.
“Nothing stirring in town yet,” Noelle said.
“Which means everyone’s probably still out at Cedar Hollow.”
“Which means they haven’t found Carissa yet.”
Nathan returned his attention to the road as he picked up speed.
The first sight to greet Noelle as Nathan sped along the paved country lane toward Cooper land was the trees—lush, green and tall, except for a narrow swath of twisted and stunted growth to the right of the lane for about a quarter of a mile that followed the curve downhill into Cedar Hollow. It was the only remaining evidence of the tornado that had torn through the hollow two years earlier. This was the Coopers’ very own tornado alley—with the tops of the trees ripped off and scattered for miles, along with the roof of the old barn behind Cecil Cooper’s house.
Turning in her seat, away from the window, Noelle watched Nathan drive. His muscles rippled in his bare forearms as he steered to miss a pothole. Due to the number of logging trucks that came this way, the county road crew had to struggle to keep this road repaired.
Nathan’s face seemed to brood in the flickering shades of light and shadow as he drove under an arching tunnel of trees.
Noelle’s gaze returned to the road. A few hundred feet ahead, she saw the sturdy cedar stand that supported four mailboxes, belonging to Cecil and Melva, Great-Aunt Pearl, the Cooper Sawmill and the last in the line to Nathan. Forever a country boy at heart, he had returned to his roots when he moved back to the farm where he’d grown up, in the house that was hidden from view to their right, behind a thick stand of lodgepole pine.
Nathan turned left into the paved driveway on Cooper land. The sawmill was a quarter of a mile along this wooded lane.
“Did you hear Harvey Sand died?” Nathan asked.
“Jill told me.” Harvey had done the monthly and annual accounting for Cooper Sawmill for the past fifteen years. His secretary had found him unconscious at the bottom of his staircase at home last Friday morning. “Did he ever regain consciousness?”
“Not that I heard.”
“So they still don’t know what happened for sure. Is the sheriff continuing to investigate?”
“Probably. You know Greg, always suspicious.”
Noelle peered around at the growing gloom as the clouds seemed to congregate over Cooper land. How appropriate today, with Carissa missing. Obviously, some rain had already fallen, judging by the dripping leaves on the trees and the damp pavement. “Nathan, Jill said you were still doing some counseling for the family.”
“She did?”
He sounded hesitant, and Noelle glanced at him. Once more, his posture was perfectly correct, his grip on the steering wheel precise, his gaze straight ahead at the road. Interesting.
“Are you trying to get to the bottom of the Cooper family psyche?” She was only half joking.
He looked away. “You know I’m not a counselor.”
“I know you’re not a psychologist, but once a pastor always a pastor.”
“Just because someone’s a pastor doesn’t mean he’s a good counselor.”
“You have a knack. Don’t be so modest.” She’d heard enough local gossip to know that his solid common sense had helped to heal more than one fragile marriage in Hideaway.
“Okay,” she said. “I understand all about confidentiality.”
“Right. I’m liable.”
“Even if it is family.”
“Exactly.”
“Okay.” She was dying of curiosity, but that had landed her in trouble before. She studied Nathan’s closed expression. Okay. For now, she’d drop the subject and focus on finding Carissa.
Nathan glanced sideways to see Noelle’s dark brows drawn together, her blue eyes narrowed in concentration. What was she thinking? He knew she wasn’t sulking over his refusal to disclose confidential information to her.
Again, he glanced at the scar beside her left eye. He’d noticed her rubbing her finger over the indentation several times, an automatic gesture that revealed more about her than she probably wanted anyone to know. What did that man do to her? When Nathan and Noelle were younger, she’d had an impulsive sense of fun, an almost constant light of humor in her eyes. She’d often poked fun at herself, but not at others. Her face had always been in motion, expressing her thoughts and feelings without words. In repose, her facial features gave the appearance of exquisite elegance—her nose almost too delicate and straight, her cheekbones almost too high, her dimpled chin too perfect. When they were growing up, it was that beauty that people had seen in her, often missing the sharp intelligence behind the radiance of her eyes, framed by long, dark lashes.
Nathan blamed Noelle’s beauty for the end of their friendship. When they entered high school, she’d become a focus of attention for the guys, and Nathan, a nerd, had faded into the background of her life to watch her flit from one relationship to the next in rapid succession. It was then that he’d painfully realized he no longer had a best friend. It was then, with the sense of sadness, that he’d discovered Whom his real best friend had always been.
From that time, the focus of his life had changed. His final interaction with Noelle—the one that had broken their friendship for several years—happened the day he’d overheard some guys in gym class comparing notes about her, shocking notes that had sickened him.
When he’d confronted her, right there in the busy main corridor at Hideaway High, there had been an ugly shouting match between them that had been talked about for weeks afterward.
Funny, until her divorce, Nathan hadn’t realized—hadn’t allowed himself to realize—how deeply Noelle had been a part of his life during their formative years. Lately, the more he saw her, the more he wanted to see her, aside from any question of romance. In fact, he’d reminded himself over and over again that a romance could put their friendship at risk, and he wanted to keep her friendship.
Nathan’s truck topped a wooded knoll and the gray-brown angles of the sawmill came into view. Several cars and pickup trucks were parked in the lot—more than usual. All the employees were beating the brush in search of Carissa.
Nathan’s truck bounced down the steep lane into the valley and over the low-water bridge that was already under at least five inches of water from the recent rains.
Noelle gave a sudden, soft gasp, and Nathan glanced at her.
“What’s wrong?”
She took a deep breath and blinked.
“Is it happening again?” he demanded.
She nodded and closed her eyes.
Chapter Five
Carissa’s eyes opened to complete blackness. All she could hear was the drip of water, and all she could feel was the hard stone floor beneath her. She sniffed the earthy, moist air, and remembered where she was. Tears filled her eyes and trickled down her cheeks. She tasted the saltiness on her lips.
“Jesus, please help me,” she prayed in a whisper. “I’m scared. Where am I? Why hasn’t anybody found me yet?”
Her soft words bounced off the rock that surrounded her…but when she stopped praying, the whispers continued, sliding past the rock wall, slithering through the blackness.
Her attacker was back! She clamped both hands over her mouth to keep from crying out.
There was a scuff of shoes on a hard surface, a flicker of light that turned the blackness to dark gray. The footsteps drew closer, the whispering voice became louder.
Carissa cringed against the wall, afraid to breathe. Could she be seen? Her head pounded once more with sudden pain, and she gasped aloud without thinking.
The footsteps stopped, and so did the whispering. Carissa squeezed her eyes shut. Make whoever it is go away, Jesus. Hide me! Please, Jesus, keep me safe!
The whispering started again, the footsteps drew closer. Then the words grew more pronounced.
“Control,” she heard, on an eerie breath of sound. “I’m in control. I can take care of this. She’s here and I can find her.”
There was a clatter of pebbles above Carissa’s head. The searcher was above her now!
She held her breath. Please Jesus please Jesus please.
Then the whispering faded, becoming less distinct. The sound of footsteps moved away. Carissa opened her eyes and peered out at the reflection of a flashlight beam against a white column several yards away. She stuck her head out of her tiny hiding place, but the light had disappeared.
She settled back into her hiding place and waited. Jesus was watching over her.
“Noelle, listen to me, please tell me what’s happening,” Nathan said quietly.
She blinked at the gloomy daylight outside the windshield, then realized Nathan was watching her intently.
“It’s okay,” he said. “You’re all right.” His voice was gentle, reassuring, as though he were speaking to a child. He caught her hands in his.
She tried to withdraw them.
He didn’t release her. “What’s this all about? Was this the same as last night?” he asked.
She nodded.
“How does that feel? What happens? What goes through your mind?”
“It isn’t anything dramatic or overflowing,” she whispered, as if speaking aloud might make this sudden knowledge disappear. “I’m sorry, I can’t explain, really. It’s too…new to me.”
“Once upon a time, you understood what it was.”
“Yeah, well, once upon a time I was an innocent child, but too many things happened to change that. It’s been many years since I’ve felt His blessing.” There. She’d admitted it to him. The faith of her childhood had failed her. Or maybe it hadn’t failed, but she had failed it…failed God…failed herself.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” he asked.
She straightened and withdrew her hands; this time he let them go. She sat back and stared out the windshield. “If this is a gift from God, as you say, then He must have made a mistake.”
“You know better.”
She raised a hand to stop his protest. “Would you just listen for a minute? You saw the way I was in high school—desperately in need of attention and love and willing to go to any lengths to find it.”
“I came to grips with that years ago,” Nathan said gently. “You’d lost your mother, and your father wasn’t home with you much. Your sister tried to make it up to you, but that was impossible. Why don’t you give yourself a break?”
“And why won’t you at least let me complete a thought without interrupting?” She kept her voice gentle, but she needed him to hear her out.
“Sorry.”
“During nursing school I dated a drug addict, and after graduation I married him. How stupid is that? I’m talking illegal street drugs, Nathan. And I used them myself. You think God wants to give a gift to someone like that?”
“I think you’re making judgments you should leave to God. Sure, you got carried away and blew it badly a few times. But you aren’t the same person you were then, so stop with the guilt complex and tell me what you were experiencing a moment ago,” he said.
“Oh, come on, Nathan, you sound like an overeager newspaper reporter. What do you think I was feeling?”
“I don’t have your gift, but you looked very concerned about something.”
“You got it.” Her voice caught. She cleared her throat. “Very concerned.”
“But about what?”
“Carissa. It’s urgent that we find her quickly. But we all know that.” She focused on the familiar features of his face, at the unusual cedar-green of his eyes. “You really think this is a message from God?”
“Yes I do. Your gift has returned.”
She watched for some break in his gaze, some hint of doubt. There was none. “I’m not some holy saint, Nathan. If this is a gift, there are many far more worthy recipients who—”
“Worthy?” he interrupted, impatiently. “A saint is simply someone who has put faith in Him. You’ve been a believer since you were six.”
“But you know I haven’t—”
“He can use anyone He pleases for whatever work He wants done, with or without that person’s help,” he interrupted again. “With you, I think He gives you special knowledge that you need to know, not something you conjure for yourself, because He’s the one in control, not you. When you dreamed about your mother before she died, I think He was preparing you.”
Noelle nodded. “Okay. So what’s He giving me now?”
“You’re here, aren’t you? Obviously you need to search for Carissa.”
She nodded, watching the tension in his expression. “You don’t look too chipper,” she noted. “I thought you dealt with this kind of thing before in your pastoral duties.”
“This kind of thing? You’re kidding, right? This is not your normal, everyday counseling session or grief process.” He slid back behind the steering wheel, shifted into Drive and eased forward along the lane.
“Okay, then if these episodes I’m having are connected to Carissa, why can’t I see where she is? Why didn’t I receive some brilliant flash of understanding, some mental map about where to go to find her?”
“Because you aren’t writing the script. God is. He’ll guide you when it’s time.” He glanced at her briefly. “So were there any other impressions a moment ago?”
Noelle gazed at the ceiling of the truck, reluctant to accept that this was even happening. But still…“I felt she was alone in the dark and frightened of some unknown threat.”
“Something? Or someone? Or just the dark itself?”
“Someone.” That much Noelle knew, though it was still a mystery to her how she’d reached that certainty. “But that doesn’t make sense. I can’t believe anyone would kidnap Carissa.”
“Could be revenge. You know Cecil. He has a way of—”
“Making people angry,” she finished for him. “I know. He’s always been quicker to engage his mouth than his brain. But still, only a nutcase would try to take that out on Carissa.”
“Excuse me, but a ‘nutcase’ is exactly who we’re talking about here.”
“Okay. Fine.” Noelle gazed out the window at the bright-red sumac bushes along the edges of the lane, at the red Virginia creeper vines outlining tree limbs, threaded among the canopy of green leaves. “Come to think of it, we sound like a couple of nutcases ourselves. If anyone were to overhear us talking—”
“They won’t. We’ll be careful.”
“Good. So that means you’re not going to go blabbing this to anyone?”
He raised a brow of affected disdain. “You can’t possibly believe I would do something so audacious as to sully my own good name among the locals. My livelihood depends on my reputation.”
She grinned, flooded with relief at this glimpse of her old friend. “Okay, fine. You don’t tell them I’m psychic—”
“You’re not psychic, you’re gifted. They’re two totally different—”
“—and I won’t tell them about the stray marbles you’ve apparently been losing because you believe me. Has Cecil fired someone at the mill or the ranch recently?”
“Not in over six months, and the last man wanted to get fired so he could draw unemployment insurance.”
“No motive for a kidnapping, then. Could Carissa have gotten lost?”
“That’s very possible. Cecil found her flashlight in the mud last night. He’s thinking that she might have gotten turned around and panicked.”
“But Carissa doesn’t panic easily,” Noelle said.
“And besides, you have a definite impression that someone is a threat…”
“I’m not willing to put my faith in some stupid impression,” Noelle said.
“Not stupid,” he insisted. “Let’s not dismiss any possibility.”
Nathan pulled up to the sawmill. The paved parking lot surrounding the huge, barnlike building was crammed with cars, trucks, SUVs and trailers, which had apparently carried all-terrain vehicles.
Ordinarily, Cecil wouldn’t thank anyone for tearing up his pastureland and traumatizing more than a thousand head of cattle and horses, but if the volunteer searchers found his little girl, he would most likely be willing to give them permanent rights to the land—if those rights were his to give. Though he managed all of the Cooper enterprises, he hadn’t yet inherited.
Nathan parked between a van and another truck, then turned to Noelle again. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
“I told you, I’m fine. A little rattled, but what would you expect? I want to focus on finding Carissa.”
“We’ll do that.”
Noelle stared at the corrugated aluminum siding on the huge building. Even after ten years, the sawmill brought back the memories of the accident that had killed Dad and Grandma and Grandpa. Carissa’s disappearance only resurrected those memories more distinctly.
“We might as well walk from here,” she said. “We’ve got to start looking somewhere.”
They climbed from the truck to be greeted by the music of the crickets and the scent of moist earth. Noelle took a deep breath, her gaze traveling over the mossy green of the cedar trees, the splashes of orange and apricot on the tips of maple trees and the rippling green of the hay field, punctuated by huge, silver-gold bales stacked side by side in the field to the right of the lane.
This lane led around the side of the building to the Cooper settlement about a quarter of a mile away. Noelle’s ancestors had lived and farmed here for generations, expanding this property into a valuable asset that, combined with the successful sawmill, generously supported family members and dozens of employees. As a Cooper family member, Noelle received a sizable check every six months, even though she didn’t work on the property.
Noelle avoided looking at the sawmill, allowing her memories to carry her back to a safer time. She loved country life, especially the privacy and peace of this hollow in the hills. Though she also loved living in Springfield, every time she came home to Hideaway she felt a distinct tug of the heart. She loved the town of Hideaway. Even though she wouldn’t admit it to Nathan, the idea of working at the clinic appealed to something inside her that she thought had dried up and died when she’d lost her last nursing position.
Still, too many memories attacked her here on Cooper land.
“Did anyone search the mill for signs of a possible problem?” she asked. “Maybe a struggle of some kind?”
“They checked, but all they found was the ledger alongside the lane, covered in mud. Carissa obviously had been to the mill and gone, and if there’d been a problem at the mill, she certainly wouldn’t have bothered with the ledger.”
“Could Cecil and Melva have heard a car engine from the house?”
“Not necessarily, but the dogs are usually pretty quick to pick up on the scent or sounds of a stranger, and they never sounded an alarm.”
Noelle reached into the back of Nathan’s truck, where she’d placed water flasks and a backpack with supplies, including a first-aid kit. “Want to hike from here?”
“I’d love to,” he said. “But let me carry the backpack. It looks heavy.”
She strapped herself into her pack. “Think I can’t carry my own load?”
“No,” he said dryly. “I just thought, after all these years, that competitive streak of yours might have mellowed a little.”
“I’m not competitive.” She shifted the shoulder straps. “You should know that by now.”
She gazed along the lane. She wasn’t in the mood to talk to anyone in her family right now, especially since no one had called her about Carissa. Still, the lane was the quickest and safest route into the rest of the hollow, with connecting lanes and cattle trails beyond Cecil’s place. “Maybe we’ll get lucky and make it past the houses without anyone noticing us,” she said as they set off.
Nathan sniffed the tealike scent of early autumn leaves and listened to the crickets chirping from the forest on either side of the lane. Cedar Hollow—two thousand acres of fertile farm valley settled deep in the tree-lined hills—had changed little since he’d grown up here. His family’s dairy cows had grazed just across the road from the Cooper beef cattle. He and Noelle had played along Willow Creek, which followed the curve of the land until it reached Table Rock Lake, a little over two miles away.
Noelle turned and glanced over her shoulder at the field to the south as the sound of an all-terrain vehicle reached them. “That’s Carissa’s favorite place to ride Gypsy,” she said.
“It’s where we loved to ride, too,” he reminded her. “The field is level with amazingly few rocks to trip the horses.” He and Noelle had often played in the field and along the creek when they were growing up.
“Why do some things stay the same, when other things change so drastically?” Noelle murmured.
“I’ve asked that enough times myself,” Nathan said. “Remember how many times we walked down this lane when we were kids?”
“Or rode our bikes.”
“And tried to hide from my little sisters.”
“And my big sister.” Noelle chuckled. “I felt so secure, so protected then. I mean, I had family all around me, and my best friend lived right down the road.” She glanced sideways at Nathan.
He nodded. How many times in the past few years he had thought about those days, wondering if he would have done things differently, given the chance.
“Two thousand acres of Cooper property, joined by Trask property,” Noelle said. “The searchers couldn’t have covered everything yet, could they?”
“Not every inch, of course, but—”
“But Carissa knows this hollow so well. All she has to do is find Willow Creek and follow it down.”
Nathan glanced at Noelle. “Maybe Carissa’s done just that. She might be home by the time we get to the house.”
“You don’t sound convinced.” Noelle pulled the cell phone from her pocket, punched numbers again, asked whoever answered about the status of the search without identifying herself, and then expressed thanks. “Not yet,” she reported to Nathan, kicking a rock to the side of the track. “Carissa knows this land as well as we did at her age.”
“That’s true, but everything looks different in the dark. My friend Taylor Jackson thinks it’s possible she got lost, and he’s working on that premise while others are searching farther afield.”
“Taylor’s the ranger who’s dating Karah Lee Fletcher at the clinic?”
“Yes. He’s been helping coordinate the search. The sheriff suggested Carissa might have run away for some reason.”
“Ridiculous. Greg should know better.”
“That’s what Cecil and Melva keep insisting,” Nathan said. “But you know Carissa can be headstrong, and she and her parents did have a little confrontation yesterday.”
“What about?”
“Gladys.”
Noelle’s steps slowed. “What about her?” she asked quietly.
“She wants to see Justin and Carissa again.” Gladys had given up any right to see her children when she had abandoned them and their father. Her lack of concern for their suffering had outraged the whole community. “Carissa wants to see her, and Melva’s pitching a major fit.”
Noelle stepped around a mud puddle and ducked beneath a tree limb. “Does Gladys think she can just suddenly walk back into their lives and stir everything up again? When she left, Carissa was devastated. For at least a year, I think she continued to hope her mother would come back to them.”
“As you said, Carissa’s strong-willed,” Nathan said. “So it could be possible that she’s in hiding somewhere, maybe protesting.”
“No.”
“But if she were hiding, where do you think she’d hide?” He gestured around him, indicating the expanse of ground they would have to cover. “Where would you hide?”
“Not around here, and no, I’m not feeling any kind of leading.”
“But just for the sake of a place to look, where would you hide?”
“Does that old dirt track still wind through the woods to the national forest a couple of miles back?” she asked.
“I think so. I heard Pearl complaining about people trespassing on Cooper land from the logging trail in national forest land. Why? Do you—”
She turned and looked up at him, and he glimpsed an interested quickening in those intelligent eyes. “Where did we go when we were kids? You know, when we got in trouble.”
“The caves?” he asked. There were at least four in the vicinity that ranged from mere indentations in the rock to caverns that cut deeply into the hillside.
She gave him a look of approval. “Exactly. Is Bobcat Cave still sealed?”
“I think it is. At least, I hope it is.”
She bent over and tucked the cuffs of her jeans into her socks. “We may be beating some brush. Still ticks and chiggers here, I suppose.”
“Not in this section, there ain’t.” A deep, strong female voice suddenly spoke from the trees a few yards ahead.
Chapter Six
Pearl Cooper’s tall, rawboned figure emerged from the woods along one of the wildlife trails that intersected the lane. Her hand patted her chest in a long-familiar gesture—Aunt Pearl had claimed heart palpitations for as long as Noelle could remember. The family affectionately accused her of using sympathy to get what she wanted. She never denied it. Aunt Pearl could always charm people into giving in to her, and when she couldn’t charm them, she pulled rank—though Cecil and Jill had incorporated the business to save on taxes, Pearl owned the property and everything on it. It had passed to her through the Cooper family trust.
Pearl’s iron-gray hair stuck out in haphazard tufts, straggling over her forehead to frame deep-blue eyes—Cooper eyes that saw more, sometimes, than one wanted them to see. She seldom wore anything other than jeans and old plaid flannel shirts, even in summer, and now she had the legs of her jeans tucked into a pair of well-used hiking shoes—she’d been the one to teach Noelle this practical trick for warding off tiny, biting varmints.
“Can’t swear to it,” she said as she neared them, “but I think the geese running free and the pennyroyal I planted did the trick. No ticks in the yard or this part of the woods all summer. Of course, you’ve gotta watch close or you’ll be ankle-deep in goose poop, but it’s better than ticks, to my notion. The backwoods are another problem, though. That where you’re headed?” Without pausing, she grabbed Noelle in a fierce hug, wrapping her in the pungent aroma of rosemary that always clung to Pearl from her herb garden.
Noelle’s great-aunt Pearl lived in the same house she’d been born in, a sturdy, sprawling rock dwelling that had changed little since it had been built in the early nineteen-hundreds. For as long as anyone in the area could remember, Pearl Cooper had gathered herbs and made her old-time medicines, distributing them to anyone who needed them. She’d protested loudly when the general store in Hideaway had opened a pharmacy, and she’d been only slightly mollified when she discovered Nathan would be the pharmacist.
“Good to see you, girl,” she said to Noelle now. “I’ve been expecting you. Come to search for Carissa?”
“Yes, but I don’t know what I’ll find that others haven’t.” Noelle gave Nathan a look of caution over Pearl’s shoulder, and was reassured by his small nod of understanding.
“I thought since Carissa and Noelle are such good friends,” Nathan said, “that Noelle might have some fresh insight.”
Pearl was frowning when she stepped back from Noelle’s embrace. “All those searchers probably turned up the same rocks and looked behind the same trees two or three times. Seems this holler’s been scoured from top to bottom and end to end. If she’s any where near here, a feller’d think we’d’ve found something.”
“It seems that way, Aunt Pearl,” Noelle said. “You haven’t seen any strangers hanging around out on the property lately, have you?”
Pearl shook her head. “There’s strangers and tourists swelling the town to three or four times its normal size, but nobody ever wanders this far from the fun.”
Noelle nodded. It was unlikely that any stranger would have ventured this far into the wilderness on the off chance of happening across a twelve-year-old girl to abduct in the dead of night—if Carissa had been abducted. Noelle prayed it wasn’t so, but she couldn’t dismiss the conviction—Nathan might call it a message from God—that someone with sinister motives was involved in Carissa’s disappearance.
Pearl gestured with a loose-jointed shrug. “Seems like the loggers, mill workers and farmhands are here all the time.” She hesitated, her eyes narrowing at Noelle. “Did you hear about poor Harvey Sand? Died from that fall he took last week. I heard tell Greg’s investigating foul play there.”
Noelle shifted impatiently. Pearl could be a talker when she was in the mood, and this wasn’t the time to stand around making idle conversation.
“I don’t know what’s come of Hideaway lately,” Pearl continued, “what with all the new folks moving in and taking over. Mind you, there was no love lost between Harvey and me—heaven knows we went round and round about the price he charged for a couple hours of work every month—but the guy was just a kid, still in his forties. Such a tragic loss.” She shook her head. “That new secretary of his had all our files delivered to the shop at the sawmill on Monday. Can you believe it? Fifteen years’ worth of tax records she just dumped on us, without even offering to help us find another accountant.”
Noelle rubbed her tightening neck muscles and rolled her shoulders.
Pearl noticed at last. She patted Noelle on the shoulder and nodded at Nathan. “You two can look as far and as long as you want. I’m going back out myself after I rest up a bit and give my heart some time to catch up with the rest of me. Melva should be back to the house by now after her latest foray into the woods.” She grunted. “Surprised me to see her scrambling through brush so much. She’s not exactly the outdoorsy type, if you know what I mean.”
“Aunt Pearl, give Melva a break.” Noelle kept her chiding voice gentle. Sparks had flown between Pearl and Melva in the past—Melva had taken over the bookkeeping for Cooper Enterprises from Pearl several years ago, and Pearl was not an easy person to please when it came to the family business. “She loves Carissa. I hope you’ve been nice to her.”
“I’ve been nice as I had to be,” Pearl replied grumpily. “Guess you know Jill’s here, too. She’s been searchin’ all night. We all have. I told her to take a break.”
“Thanks, Pearl.” Nathan took Noelle’s arm and stepped along the road. “We’re headed in that direction, so we might see them.”
“When all this craziness settles down,” Pearl called after them, once more tapping her fingers against her chest, as if the rhythm of her heart would regulate better that way, “you come by my house for some iced sassafras tea. Been too long since we visited last, Noelle.”
“I know, Aunt Pearl. I will.” Noelle fell into step beside Nathan. Pearl returned to the trail through the trees, taking the shortcut to her own house nestled at the foot of the hills that formed Cedar Hollow.
“I should get down here more often,” Noelle said. “Last time I saw Aunt Pearl was at Jill’s a few months ago. I haven’t been to the hollow for a couple of years.”
“Why is that?” Nathan asked.
“Too busy, I guess.” She broke off a twig from a nearby branch and rubbed it between her fingers, deep in thought.
“Or still avoiding it for some reason?”
“Could be. Pearl implied she thought I was still stuck in the past.”
“I disagree,” Nathan said. “You wallow in guilt over the past, but I don’t think you’re stuck there.”
Noelle gave him a look of aggravation.
“So what did she say?” he asked.
“She said, ‘Noelle, you’ve got a lot goin’ for you now, kiddo. Just keep on lookin’ forward, and don’t look back so much. The past can’t hurt us if we stay away from it.’”
Nathan walked beside her in silence. The crunch of their boots against gravel matched, as if they were marching in cadence toward the house where Cecil and Melva lived with Cecil’s children, seventeen-year-old Justin and twelve-year-old Carissa.
Whenever Noelle returned to this hollow, she felt as if she were stepping back in time. She also felt as if she were returning to old, dysfunctional family dynamics. Maybe, deep down, she feared she would once again become the rebellious teenager who’d made so many wrong choices. She knew better, of course. She had a tendency to be oversensitive.
Pearl was right. The past couldn’t hurt her if she stayed away from it.
She navigated around a puddle the circumference of a small car, in which the mud had been churned up into a slick mess with tire tracks. Obviously, there had been dozens of cars in and out of this place since last night, and Noelle glimpsed several vehicles still parked out in the cleared hayfield behind the house.
In addition to the number of automobiles that she and Nathan had seen parked at the sawmill, she judged there might be as many as sixty or eighty people currently searching the place. In the field she counted three pale-green Jeeps with ranger insignias, and seven white police cruisers, all splattered with mud.
“I don’t suppose there was a chance to check for strange footprints before the searchers arrived?” she asked, gesturing toward the mud puddle.
“The police looked, but they found nothing out of the ordinary.” Nathan skirted the puddle on the other side. “Cecil needs to get some gravel in here before someone loses a car.”
Noelle’s steps slowed as they drew near the white picket fence that encircled the house and yard. There was a rumble of growls, and two black and white Australian sheepdogs came running from the backyard, barking as if a herd of cattle had suddenly descended on them.
Noelle groaned. “Just great. I’d hoped to slip past the house without stopping.”
“Not with Butch and Sundance on high alert. You haven’t been around often enough for them to be familiar with your scent or the sound of your voice. They only bark at strangers.”
“We can visit later, after we’ve found Carissa.”
Nathan tapped her on the shoulder and she looked up at him. “Relax, grumpy. It’ll only take a few minutes. Your family needs you.”
“Sorry,” she muttered.
The racket of the dogs set off the geese at the pond below the house, and the honking commenced.
Noelle gave Nathan a look of exasperation. “And I thought we’d sneak in? What could I have been thinking?”
He grinned at her.
“Speaking of dogs, is the search-and-rescue unit bringing any search dogs in?” she asked.
“They’ve got three already out in the field, more on the way, but the ones they’ve got are new, not very experienced.”
They reached the white fence that circled the yard around a big, two-story white house. The dogs finally recognized her, and their barking turned to excited whines of welcome. Noelle reached through the slats of fence to pet the animals and quiet them.
The front screen door opened, and Jill, eight years older than Noelle, stepped out onto the broad concrete porch. Jill was a couple of inches taller than Noelle, with stronger features and a more voluptuous figure—and a familiar, piercing blue gaze.
“Noelle Cooper, what on earth?”
“Hi, sis.”
Jill glanced at Nathan, disapproval—annoyance? irritation?—sharpening her gaze.
“I came to help search.” Noelle followed Nathan through the front gate and braced herself for the rambunctious dogs as they leapt forward in welcome. “Any more word about Carissa?”
Jill shook her head, shading her eyes from the warm October sun. Her thick brown brows almost met in the middle as she squinted, and Noelle noticed the shadows of fatigue around Jill’s eyes as she stepped into her sister’s tight embrace.
Jill held her for a long moment. “This is like a nightmare, sis. I didn’t want to drag you down here. You’ve already got so much on your plate right now.”
“I didn’t come down here to cause you worry, I came to help with the search.”
Unfamiliar voices spilled from the house as Jill released Noelle. The aroma of frying bacon drifted through the screen door. Apparently some of the weary searchers were taking a much-needed break.
“So tell me,” Noelle said, “what have they found?”
“One of the sheriff’s deputies found fresh horseshoe prints in the mud at the edge of the lane,” Jill said.
“Maybe one of the horses jumped the fence,” Nathan said.
“None of the horses are even on the front forty right now,” Jill said. “They’re pastured half a mile in the other direction. That means someone may have come onto the property last night, because we had a lot of rain yesterday, and the print would’ve been washed away if they’d come earlier.”
“Surely they can’t think someone carried Carissa away by horse,” Nathan exclaimed.
“Can you think of a better way to carry someone through miles of wilderness trails without making a lot of noise?” Jill asked. “The fact that the dogs haven’t found Carissa yet probably means she was taken elsewhere, and it’s unlikely she walked there herself. They could have followed her scent.”
“What else did the searchers find?” Noelle asked.
Jill closed her eyes for half a second, then opened them and held Noelle’s gaze. Sorrowful. Suddenly gentle. “Taylor Jackson, one of the rangers, he found blood on the sawmill floor. Looks like someone was injured.”
“Maybe one of the employees was injured yesterday,” Noelle said.
“Taylor asked all of them, and no one was.”
“Okay, but that doesn’t automatically mean it was Carissa,” Noelle said.
“We’ll find out before long.” Jill lifted her hair from her neck and stretched her muscles. “I know we can’t go jumping to conclusions.” She said the words quickly, as if she’d been repeating them over and over to the others. “We can’t let ourselves get discouraged and stop searching.”
“Speaking of which,” Noelle said, “that’s what I came here to do. I’d better get to it.”
“Okay, but first will you let Melva know you’re here?” Jill asked. “She’s been wanting to call you since last night—as if one more person searching would make any difference.” The lines around Jill’s shadowed blue eyes deepened with concern. She touched Noelle’s shoulder. “You okay?”
“I’m fine. I just wish you’d called me last night.”
“We kept thinking we’d find her quickly. I didn’t want to upset you over nothing.” Jill frowned and pushed at her short brown hair—which had grown out a couple of inches, and no longer resembled a hard hat as much as it did a lion’s mane. “Cecil’s still blaming himself for sending her out for the ledger. Silly, I know, but I’ve struggled with the same problem. We let her go out there after dark.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Noelle said. “Nathan told me she was going out there anyway. She’s twelve years old, not a little child. Where were you when she disappeared?”
“I’d gone up to our old house to find some other ledgers upstairs.” Jill glanced over her shoulder through the screen door, lowering her voice. “We’ve been entering this year’s records on computer and trying to justify them with the records from the accountant—you knew he died, didn’t you? Anyway, there’s a discrepancy of fifteen thousand dollars, and we can’t seem to find it. That’s why we asked Carissa to get the ledger from the office at the sawmill. Turns out she had the wrong one, anyway. It was from ten years ago.”
“I’ll go have a word with Melva, then hit the trail.” Noelle gave her sister’s shoulder another squeeze, then opened the screen door and stepped inside.
Nathan leaned against the porch railing, arms folded across his chest in an automatic gesture of self-protection as he watched Jill pace the length of the porch. The chilled morning air hung heavy and thick in the sunlight that gleamed on her dark hair.
“You didn’t tell me you were going to get Noelle,” she said at last.
He glanced toward the Coopers’ open front door. “I wasn’t sure she could get away from the store, but I felt she needed to know about Carissa.”
Jill’s boots made little noise on the concrete porch. She turned to face Nathan across the half width of the house. “I had reasons for not wanting her here. She had a bad time right after the accident.”
“Of course she did. The whole family did. Why single out Noelle?” Nathan had to struggle to keep his voice low. “She’s a grown woman, and she needs to be treated like one.”
“Oh, for pity’s sake, I know that, but why should she have to trudge all the way down here when half of Hideaway’s already out looking for the child?”
“Noelle is family. She needs to be treated like family, or you’ll be wasting your time trying to get her to move back here and work at the clinic.”
Jill paused, gazing down the lane again. “Maybe she shouldn’t come back here,” she said slowly.
This was a drastic about-face. “But I thought you were trying to—”
“Never mind what I was trying to do.” Jill stepped to the end of the porch, away from the screen door, and gestured, with a jerk of her head for him to join her.
He obeyed.
“After the sawmill accident, the grief almost killed her,” Jill said softly.
“Of course it did. We were all stricken.”
“But it was worse for Noelle. She went into a deep depression, had awful nightmares, told me she woke up screaming every night for the first month after the funerals.”
“She had a lot of other things on her mind at the time, and besides, she’s not the same person she was ten years ago.” He hesitated. “Did she say what the dreams were about?”
“She kept reliving the accident, as if she were one of the victims watching the logs tumble onto her. She had to quit her job, which really threw that ex-husband of hers into a tizzy, because at the time they were dependent on her income to support them—and his drug habit.” Jill’s voice dripped with disdain.
“Did she get professional help?”
“Oh, she went to her family doctor, and he prescribed an antidepressant. She took it for three weeks, then flushed the rest down the toilet. She said it made her ears ring. You know how independent she can be.”
“She takes after her sister.”
Jill gave him a half-hearted scowl.
“Did the antidepressant help her at all?” he asked.
“Are you kidding? After just three weeks?” Jill snorted. “I even got some of that herbal stuff Pearl’s always trying to push off on everyone. Noelle still had the nightmares for a long time afterward.”
“She told me a little about that time,” Nathan said.
“Now it’ll start all over. What’s she going to do when she wakes up in the middle of the night and finds herself alone?”
“Jill, Noelle is a big girl. She can take care of herself.” He studied Jill’s expression for a moment. She didn’t look at him, but kept her gaze focused on the trees across the road.
There was something about her behavior that caught his attention. She stood with her shoulders hunched forward, arms crossed, head bowed slightly. What wasn’t she telling him? He knew better than to ask.
“You can’t shield her from pain by building a wall around her,” he said.
“I’m not building a wall, I’m just—”
“You’re still trying to be her mother. Stop it, or you’ll smother her completely. Let her handle her own problems.”
She sighed and shook her head, then turned away from him. “Fine, then you be there for her when her nightmares return.”
“She’s told me a little about Joel and her marriage.”
“Yes, but how much did she tell you? She has a tendency to downplay certain aspects of her life so no one will worry.”
“Maybe that’s because she knows we tend to worry too much,” he said gently. “Jill, you knew Joel a lot better than I did. Do you think his return could in any way be connected to Carissa’s disappearance?”
She didn’t react, which meant she’d already considered the possibility. “I don’t know. As crazy as he got sometimes, I wouldn’t put it past him.” She turned and looked up at Nathan, arms still folded over her chest. “Maybe we should tell the sheriff to check him out.”
“Maybe we should.”
Chapter Seven
Noelle felt suddenly overwhelmed. Neighbors and people from the search-and-rescue team filled the Cooper living room and kitchen, occupying every available chair. Most of them had obviously been out all night, searching through the mud and brush.
Noelle waved at several familiar faces as she passed through the living room to the kitchen in the back of the house. She recognized Dane Gideon, the mayor of Hideaway, who also owned the general store and ran a boy’s ranch across the lake from town. He sat on the sofa beside some teenaged boys, who looked grimy and disheartened. Perched across from them on a love seat was Taylor Jackson, a tall man with rusty-brown hair, wearing a mud-spattered ranger uniform. Beside him
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Hannah Alexander
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современная зарубежная литература
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: IT WAS A STORY TO PUT HIDEAWAY, MISSOURI, IN THE NATIONAL HEADLINES…A MISSING CHILD: Carissa Cooper, twelve, vanishes near her home–abducted, possibly by someone close to her.A WOMAN IN CRISIS : Noelle Cooper races back to her hometown to help in the search for her cousin and steps into a web of secrets that has haunted her family for generations.A MAN OF FAITH : Nathan Trask will do anything to protect Noelle from danger. Noelle′s childhood friend, he might be much more…if she dares turn to him.