Page 112 of Love Me Dangerous

It must be the SAR team. Where are Henry and Barb?

Rowdy clicks the mike in affirmation, then barks at us. “Sofie and Zach. Turn back. Now.”

We reach the trees. The wind rages in the crowns high above us. There isn’t as much snow in here yet, but the carpet of dead needles and detritus is dry and frozen.

I lift the binoculars to my eyes and scan. What I saw here makes no sense, yet why can’t I forget it? The tree trunks fill the lenses—disorienting until I slow down and refocus on the ground.

Then I see it—so faint that in another hour of snowfall, it would be gone. I race up, using the trunks to help, the bark cutting into my palms.

“Zach!” Sofie calls from behind me. “Wait! What is it?”

The trees thin as I ascend, my heart hammering in my chest. Snow swirls like a kaleidoscope of icy white—more is getting through the higher we climb, and it’s getting colder. The front of my jacket is coated with a frozen layer of snow where my body heat melted the blasts.

When I get to the crest, I study the ground, panting. It’s a tire track crossing a thick deposit of snow, the tread visible because of the mud still in the tires. I follow it to the base of a giant aspen tree, where an area of the ground has been compressed. Like someone stood here. Doing what, though?

Sofie squats down. “This can’t be Linnie. The tread is too narrow.”

“I know,” I say, breathing hard. “It’s from a mountain bike.”

Sofie squints up at me. “Why would someone be out here mountain biking in the snow?”

Several details fall into place at once.

I close my eyes and try to breathe.

My god.

That awkward interaction with Kai that day in the bike shop makes sense now. Had he just come in from a pickup, and I surprised him?

Another gust thunders through the trees, sending a wall of snow at us. I turn my shoulder away for shelter.

How easily Kai can come and go on a mountain bike. He could probably sneak out anytime during his shift. Does he keep the drugs in the rental shop? Fuck, does hedealfrom the shop?

Was Kai the one who held me at gunpoint by that boulder? I replay those terrifying moments. The man’s voice was rough. A big man’s voice. Kai is tall and lean. The back door of the shop was open, so he could have just come in… but maybe he was heading out.

What about his voice, though? Wouldn’t I have recognized it?

Then, it clicks.

Outside The Limelight that night, I was attacked by two guys. Kai is only one of them.

If he’s the one inside the ranch, who is his partner?

The gust subsides, and I open my eyes. Standing ten feet away is a man.

Sofie cries out in surprise.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

ZACH

“Dustin,jeez, you scared the crap out of me.” Sofie clutches her chest. “What are you doing out here?”

Dustin’s dressed in a brown camouflage coat, brown watch cap, work jeans and thick boots. A day pack patched with duct tape hugs his shoulders.

“I was out surveying,” Dustin says before another gust blasts through the trees. Above us, the branches whip around, raining down needles and tiny cones with the snow. “I heard the radio and came down to help.”

Something about this tickles my neck hairs. Out surveying? Wasn’t that work party the last one of the season? And didn’t Rowdy and Sofie talk about this area being already cleared?

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