Page 5 of Protector of Talon Mountain

Mentally, I make a note of that. A studio apartment over a café. That might be just the ticket, especially if I can negotiate meals being included in my rent.

He hesitates again, then adds, “Look, I know this town’s not much, and it’s not perfect. But we’ve been without a sheriff going on three months now. Just having you here—well, it’ll help.”

“Help what?”

Another smile that doesn’t match the eyes. “Keep folks calm.”

Calm. Right. I nod once and step out. The keys are cold in my palm. Hal doesn’t follow me inside and hurries down the sidewalk, presumably to the mayor’s office.

The office smells like pine cleaner and old secrets. It’s dark, dusty, with a desk that’s seen better decades and a filing cabinet that lists to one side like it’s drunk. There’s a bulletin board on the wall with faded wanted posters, a town map, and a note written in shaky handwriting.

Check the ridge. Again.

It’s not signed.

I check the drawers—nothing useful. No laptop, no comms gear. Just a half-used notebook and a rusted-out Smith & Wesson that looks more decorative than functional. I set it aside and unlock the hard case holding my Glock, the one I had to check with my duffel for the flight. Pulling it free, I slide it into the holster clipped to my waistband. It fits like it belongs there—and it'll be a hell of a lot more useful on my hip than locked in some airline-approved box.

There’s a thermos of something under the desk. I unscrew the lid and sniff. Bad coffee.

I check the back room. Cot, blanket, old locker, no signs of a struggle—just a silence that feels too deliberate. I stand still, let the quiet settle around me. There’s something off about this place. I don’t know what yet, but I will.

* * *

The office is a relic. A time capsule with grit under its nails. Nothing digital—no terminals, no server, not even a printer that looks like it’s seen life this decade. Just filing cabinets, yellowed maps, a rotary phone that might still work, and that familiar smell of dust clinging to silence.

I start at the desk. Loose forms and sticky notes which have lost their stickiness fill the drawers. No system. No logic. I sift through the mess—wildlife reports, noise complaints, a handful of domestic disturbances all cleaned up nicely on paper.

But it’s what’s missing that makes my neck prickle. No body cam records. No incident logs for the past sixty days. And no autopsy report for Sheriff Tom Davies, who supposedly died out on a hunt, but you'd think someone would've bothered to file the damn paperwork.

The empty file folders and dust-coated cabinets sit like they’re supposed to mean something. They don’t. No death report. No missing persons. No comms with the state. It appears as if someone deliberately erased Davies’s records to hide more than just his death.

I think about picking up the phone. Filing a formal request. Kicking this upstairs. But if the town’s been scared this long, making noise will just let someone know I’m sniffing around where I shouldn’t be. Not yet. I don’t stir the water till I’m ready to drag something out of it.

In the cabinet behind the desk, shoved behind a box of cheap latex gloves, I find something better—a folded topo map of Talon Mountain. Looks blank at first. But when I hold it up to the thin afternoon light leaking through the blinds, something shifts.

Pencil lines. Faint. Trails that don’t match the ones I studied on the park service map I picked up at the airport. There are paths that seem to lead to nowhere and a few circled spots of nothingness. Someone’s been tracking something—routes, maybe. Drop points. Or graves.

I dig back into the desk and find a leather-bound notebook wedged behind the cabinet. The notes inside are in some kind of shorthand and are inconsistent in their handwriting. Someone was chasing a thread—then dropped off the map.

Tucked in the back is a torn scrap of paper. Coordinates. And a name:J. Doyle. My gut tightens. I don’t know who J. Doyle is, but someone thought that name mattered enough to write it down and hide it. Not file it. Not share it. Hide it.

The deeper I go, the more wrong this feels. My hand brushes the grip of the Glock on my hip. I glance at the coffee on the desk. Still gross.

I move through the office, cleaning out the stuff that’s clearly trash—moldy folders, anything growing a new species. I start a pile of what’s worth going through later.

Eventually, I need air. And food. I lock the door behind me and step outside.

The wind bites harder now. Sharper. Like the weather’s caught the town’s mood. I walk slow, deliberate, eyes scanning the main strip. Five blocks, tops. Not enough to be a real downtown. Just a gas station, a post office, a bait shop, a hardware store, and a handful of windows long since boarded up.

People move in quick jolts—in and out of stores, trucks, across the street. No one lingers. Everyone watches from shadows.

A woman walking her dog crosses the street the second she sees me. A guy pumping gas doesn’t look up until I pass.

Paranoia hangs thick here. Not fresh panic—this is the slow-burn kind. Worn in. Trained, not taught.

Davies might’ve been dirty. Or maybe he got close to something he shouldn’t have. Either way, fear has Glacier Hollow in a chokehold.

Then I see it.

---