Chapter 13
Rachel’s face collapsed.
Ethan did not need another confession.
The man on the porch had already given him one.
“You promised me the girl would be outside longer.”
The words hung in the dark cabin while snow hissed against the windows.
Sophie pressed herself against Ethan’s side.
He could feel her shaking through the blanket.
Rachel took one step toward them.
“Ethan, I can explain.”
He raised the fireplace poker.
“Stay where you are.”
Her eyes widened.
“You think I’m going to hurt you?”
“I think my daughter nearly froze outside while a wolf circled her, and a man you lied about is standing on the porch saying you made a promise involving her.”
“Dad,” Sophie whispered.
“I’ve got you.”
The front door rattled.
Caleb tried the handle.
Then he laughed.
“Come on, Rach. Open up.”
Ethan looked toward the kitchen counter where his phone lay.
No service.
The storm had killed the already weak mountain signal hours earlier. The cabin’s internet router was dark with the power out.
He had an emergency satellite communicator in his hiking pack upstairs.
Twenty feet away.
It suddenly felt like a mile.
Caleb knocked again.
“Rachel, I’m getting cold.”
Rachel stared at the door.
Ethan watched her.
“You invited him here.”
“No.”
“He says you promised him something.”
“I didn’t invite him.”
“Then what did you promise?”
She said nothing.
Ethan’s anger sharpened.
“What did you promise?”
Rachel covered her mouth.
Sophie spoke first.
“She said five minutes.”
Ethan looked down.
“What?”
Sophie’s eyes stayed on Rachel.
“When she pushed me outside, she said, ‘Five minutes. Maybe then you’ll learn.’”
Rachel closed her eyes.
Ethan felt sick.
“You did lock her out.”
Rachel whispered, “Yes.”
Sophie started crying.
Even though she had already known, hearing Rachel admit it seemed to make the betrayal real in a new way.
Ethan put one arm around her.
“Why?”
Rachel looked at him.
“It wasn’t supposed to be dangerous.”
“You threw a seven-year-old into the snow without shoes.”
“I put her things outside.”
“That does not make it better.”
“I thought she’d put them on!”
“You locked the door!”
“I was going to let her back in.”
“After five minutes?”
“Yes.”
Caleb’s voice came through the door.
“That’s not what you told me.”
Rachel went white.
Ethan looked toward the entrance.
Caleb continued.
“You said fifteen.”
Rachel rushed to the door.
“Shut up!”
Ethan grabbed her arm before she could reach the lock.
She spun around.
“Let go of me.”
“No.”
Caleb laughed outside.
“There she is.”
Rachel’s eyes filled with tears.
“He’s trying to make this worse.”
Ethan stared at her.
“How could he?”
She flinched.
Ethan released her and backed toward Sophie.
“Tell me why.”
Rachel looked at the child.
“I wanted to scare her.”
Sophie buried her face against Ethan.
“Why?”
Rachel’s voice broke.
“Because she found something she wasn’t supposed to find.”
Ethan went still.
“What?”
Rachel’s eyes moved toward the loft.
“My laptop.”
“What was on it?”
“Bank transfers.”
“To Caleb?”
She nodded.
“How much?”
Rachel did not answer.
“How much?”
“Almost sixty thousand dollars.”
Ethan stared at her.
He had known Rachel kept a separate savings account. They had agreed to maintain some independent finances after marriage.
Sixty thousand dollars was not independent spending.
It was a secret life.
“Why were you paying him?”
Caleb called from outside.
“Tell him about Pine Creek!”
Rachel screamed at the door.
“Shut up!”
Ethan heard fear beneath the anger.
“What is Pine Creek?”
Rachel backed away.
“Nothing.”
Caleb laughed again.
“It was a house, Ethan.”
Ethan’s grip tightened around the poker.
“Stop talking to him,” Rachel whispered.
“What house?” Ethan shouted toward the door.
Rachel grabbed his sleeve.
“Don’t.”
Caleb answered anyway.
“Our mother’s boyfriend lived there. Mean son of a bitch. Liked to use his fists.”
Rachel looked like she might be sick.
Caleb continued.
“One night his house burned down.”
Sophie lifted her head.
Ethan felt Rachel’s fingers clamp around his arm.
“There was an accident,” she said.
Outside, Caleb laughed.
“No, there wasn’t.”
Ethan looked at her.
“How old were you?”
“Seventeen.”
“And Caleb?”
“Fourteen.”
Caleb corrected her from outside.
“Fifteen.”
Rachel shouted, “You were fourteen!”
“Doesn’t matter. You still bought the gasoline.”
Ethan stared at his wife.
Rachel’s lips parted.
Nothing came out.
Sophie whispered, “Dad?”
Ethan knelt immediately.
“Go upstairs.”
“No.”
“Sophie.”
“I don’t want to be alone.”
He looked toward the loft.
The satellite communicator was in his pack beside the bed.
“Okay. We’re both going.”
He took Sophie’s hand.
Rachel moved after them.
“Ethan, please.”
“Stay downstairs.”
“What if Caleb comes in?”
“Then maybe you can ask him why a wolf was outside with my daughter.”
He hated the cruelty in his voice.
He hated even more that part of him meant it.
He and Sophie climbed the stairs.
At the top, Ethan locked the loft gate—a child-safety gate they had installed years earlier at home and that the rental happened to have as well.
It would not stop an adult, but it might slow someone down.
He found the hiking pack and pulled out the satellite messenger.
Battery: 71 percent.
Thank God.
He activated the SOS function.
A message appeared:
EMERGENCY RESPONSE CENTER CONTACTED.
Ethan typed quickly.
CHILD ENDANGERED. ARMED/UNKNOWN MALE OUTSIDE CABIN. POWER CUT. ACCESS ROAD CLOSED BY SNOW. NEED SHERIFF ASAP.
He added their coordinates.
Sophie sat on the bed.
“Are police coming?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“I don’t know.”
That answer frightened her.
Ethan sat beside her.
“But they know where we are.”
Below them, Rachel and Caleb began shouting through the door.
“What did Sophie find?” Ethan asked softly.
His daughter looked down.
“Pictures.”
“What pictures?”
“Of us.”
Ethan frowned.
“What do you mean?”
“Pictures from school.”
His blood cooled.
“What school?”
“My school.”
“On Rachel’s laptop?”
Sophie nodded.
“Me at recess. Me getting in your truck. Me with Grandma.”
Ethan stared.
“Were they pictures Rachel took?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Why?”
“Because one had Rachel in it too.”
Ethan felt a new kind of fear.
Someone had been photographing his family.
“What did Rachel say when you saw them?”
“She yelled.”
“When?”
“Last week.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
Sophie’s eyes filled.
“She said you’d be mad at me for touching her computer.”
“Oh, Soph.”
“She said if I told you, you might send me to Grandma’s because I was causing problems.”
Ethan closed his eyes.
Rachel had used his daughter’s deepest fear against her.
After Sophie’s mother, Emily, died of ovarian cancer three years earlier, Sophie had become terrified that every conflict might make Ethan leave too.
He had spent years reassuring her that nothing she did could make him stop being her father.
Rachel knew that.
And had weaponized it.
A crash came from downstairs.
Sophie jumped.
Ethan stood.
“Stay here.”
“No.”
“I’ll be right there.”
“No!”
He looked at her.
She was terrified.
He changed course.
“Okay. Shoes.”
“What?”
“Put on shoes and your coat.”
Sophie obeyed immediately.
Ethan pulled on his own coat and took the heavy flashlight from the bedside drawer.
He also grabbed the bear spray he always carried hiking.
A second crash came from below.
Glass shattered.
Caleb had broken a window.
Ethan led Sophie toward the back corner of the loft where a narrow ladder led to a storage crawlspace under the roof.
“Climb.”
She stared.
“Go.”
She climbed.
Ethan followed far enough to push open the small panel at the top.
The crawlspace smelled like dust and cedar. Old blankets and boxes filled one side.
“Stay here until I come back.”
Sophie grabbed his wrist.
“Dad.”
“I’m not leaving the cabin.”
“Promise?”
“Promise.”
He closed the panel most of the way, leaving a crack.
Then he went downstairs.
The kitchen window was broken.
Snow blew through jagged glass.
Rachel stood near the hallway holding a steak knife.
Ethan stopped.
“Where is he?”
“He didn’t come in.”
“Then why is the window broken?”
“He threw something.”
“What?”
She pointed.
A fist-sized rock lay on the floor wrapped in paper.
Ethan picked it up.
The paper was a photocopy of an old newspaper article.
TEEN CHARGED IN DEADLY PINE CREEK FIRE.
Below the headline was a photograph of a fifteen-year-old boy being led into court.
Caleb.
The article said the fire killed forty-two-year-old Martin Voss, Rachel’s mother’s boyfriend.
Caleb pleaded guilty to arson and juvenile manslaughter.
Rachel had testified.
Ethan read one sentence twice.
A second juvenile, an unnamed seventeen-year-old girl, was initially questioned but never charged.
He looked at Rachel.
“You.”
She nodded.
“What did you do?”
“I bought the gas.”
“Why?”
“We wanted to scare Martin.”
“With gasoline?”
“He beat our mother. He hit Caleb. He…”
She stopped.
Ethan softened for half a second.
Rachel noticed.
“He did things to me too.”
Ethan felt sick.
“I’m sorry.”
Her eyes filled.
“But that doesn’t explain Sophie.”
“I know.”
“Why is Caleb stalking us?”
“Because he thinks I owe him my life.”
“For taking the blame?”
“Yes.”
“How long has he been out?”
“Years.”
“Why now?”
Rachel looked toward the broken window.
“Because I stopped paying him.”
“What did he threaten to do?”
“Tell you everything. Send the old investigation to my employer. Go to Sophie’s school.”
“He already went to Sophie’s school.”
Rachel stared at Ethan.
“Sophie found photographs.”
Her face changed.
“You knew about them.”
Rachel looked away.
“He sent them to me.”
“As a threat?”
“Yes.”
“Then why didn’t you call police?”
“Because I was afraid.”
“You should’ve told me.”
“I thought I could handle him.”
“By involving Sophie?”
Rachel began crying again.
“I made a terrible mistake.”
“A mistake is forgetting to lock a door. You locked a child outside on purpose.”
“I wanted her to stop snooping.”
Ethan stared.
“She’s seven.”
“I know.”
“You terrified her because she found evidence your brother was stalking us.”
“I panicked.”
“And Caleb?”
“He said if Sophie was scared of the woods, maybe she’d stop going outside alone and stop seeing things she shouldn’t.”
Ethan’s face went cold.
“He planned this with you.”
“No. Not like this.”
“You gave him the meat.”
Rachel shook her head.
“I didn’t know there was a wolf nearby.”
“But you knew he was baiting them.”
She said nothing.
Ethan felt rage rise so fast he had to step away.
“You knew.”
“I knew he had been feeding one farther down the ridge.”
“And you still locked Sophie outside?”
“It was supposed to be five minutes near the porch.”
“Fifteen,” Caleb called from outside.
Rachel screamed.
“GO AWAY!”
Caleb laughed.
Then a metallic scraping sound came from the side of the cabin.
Ethan moved toward the hallway.
“What’s he doing?”
Rachel’s eyes widened.
“The propane.”
Ethan froze.
The cabin’s heating stove and kitchen range were supplied by an exterior propane tank.
If Caleb opened the line or damaged it—
“Where’s the shutoff?”
“Outside.”
Ethan swore.
A moment later, a faint chemical odor drifted through the broken kitchen window.
Rachel whispered, “Oh God.”
Ethan ran upstairs.
“Daddy?” Sophie called from the crawlspace.
“We’re leaving.”
“How?”
He opened the panel and helped her down.
The front door was blocked by Caleb.
The back yard opened toward the forest and the road beyond the shed.
The road was buried in snow, but a neighboring cabin sat three-quarters of a mile downhill.
They could walk it.
They had to.
Rachel came upstairs.
“We need to go now.”
Ethan looked at her.
“You stay in front of me.”
She nodded.
No argument.
They dressed for the cold.
Ethan strapped the satellite communicator to his chest.
He gave Sophie hand warmers and tightened her scarf.
Then they descended.
The propane smell was stronger.
Ethan opened the back door.
Snow blew inside.
No wolf.
No Caleb.
They stepped out.
Rachel first.
Sophie in the middle.
Ethan last.
They moved toward the shed, then angled for the tree line where the slope would hide them from the front porch.
They had gone maybe fifty yards when Sophie stopped.
“What?” Ethan whispered.
She pointed behind them.
On the second-floor loft window of the cabin, someone had written a message in the condensation from inside.
Three words.
I FOUND HER.
Ethan’s stomach dropped.
Rachel stared.
“That’s impossible.”
Ethan looked at the crawlspace window above it.
Open.
Someone had already been inside the cabin while they were downstairs.
May you like
And as Ethan turned toward the dark trees, Caleb’s voice came from somewhere close behind them.
“You should’ve left the kid upstairs.”
