One By One by Freida McFadden(35)

The footprints continue for about ten yards before something catches my eye. Something white.

“Isn’t that a piece of Michelle’s shirt?”

There’s a shard of fabric hanging off one of the tree branches. Jack runs his finger along it, and then yanks it off. “I think it’s hers,” he says.

He raises his gun, his eyes scanning the wilderness. My heart is thudding so loudly, I can’t believe everyone else doesn’t hear it. I look around the woods, expecting Michelle to jump out at any moment. But she doesn’t. And then I see…

“Look!” I cry out.

Everybody looks down at where I’m pointing. There’s a large rock behind one of the trees and it’s been drenched in something crimson. And that same color stains the grass all around it.

We creep closer. All that red. There’s only one thing it could be. And the closer we get, the more obvious it becomes.

It’s blood. And a lot of it.

“Oh, Christ.” Jack lowers the rifle. He starts to sway and eventually collapses to his knees. “Oh my God.”

“It might be blood from an animal,” Noah says, although it’s obvious he doesn’t really think so.

I try to put a hand on Jack’s shoulder, wanting to comfort him the way he comforted me after we lost Lindsay, but he roughly shrugs me off. I don’t try again.

“Do you think an animal got her?” Warner asks. He doesn’t seem particularly upset, simply curious. “Maybe she went to take a walk, and that coyote Claire heard dragged her away.”

“If she got attacked, she would’ve screamed.” Jack’s eyes are glassy. “And if she had screamed, one of us would’ve heard her.” He looks up at us. “Did anyone hear a scream during the night?”

We all shake our heads no. After I dozed off, I didn’t hear a thing. I slept like the dead.

“How could you not have heard anything?” Jack’s cheeks are pink. “It’s impossible!”

“You didn’t hear anything,” Warner points out.

Jack makes a good point though. Something traumatic happened to Michelle, and it seems unlikely she wouldn’t have made a sound. So how come none of us heard her?

And why would Michelle take a walk when she had a sprained ankle? Especially because she wasn’t very comfortable in the woods. No, she would have stayed close to the camp.

None of this makes sense.

My stomach lets out a low growl. The last thing I ate was some of Jack’s beef jerky last night, and now that we don’t have water, I can’t eat anything else salty. He also has some trail mix, but that’s not much better. It’s just salt on salt on salt.

Water—that’s what I want. I would give up an entire hand for some water right now. Just thinking about it makes me dizzy.

As if reading my thoughts, Warner says, “We need to start looking for a water source.”

Jack looks like he wants to strangle Warner with his bare hands. I know the feeling. “Michelle is missing. We have to find her.”

“There’s no point,” Warner says. “Look at how much blood there is here. It’s too late for her.”

A terrible look comes over Jack’s face. His fingers clutching the rifle turn bloodless. He stands up from the ground and points the rifle at Warner’s chest.

The color drains from Warner’s perfectly chiseled features as he takes a step back. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

“Michelle is my wife,” Jack hisses. “We are going to look for her. If she’s hurt, we’re going to find her. Do you understand me?”

I freeze, watching this impasse between the two men. I’m only peripherally aware of Noah grabbing my arm and pulling me back a few steps.

A muscle twitches in Warner’s jaw. “I don’t have a choice then, do I?”

“No.” Jack doesn’t lower the rifle. “You fucking don’t.”

Noah clears his throat. “Jack, we’ll all look for Michelle. But you’ve got to put the gun down. Okay?”

Jack slowly lowers the rifle with shaking hands. For a moment, I’m certain Warner is going to make a grab for it, but he doesn’t. Still, Jack has made an enemy. He needs to watch his back.





Chapter 19


CLAIRE



“Michelle!” I call out. “MICHELLE!”

No answer. We’ve been looking for Michelle for the last thirty minutes. My voice is hoarse from calling out her name coupled with the lack of water. Aside from that set of footprints and the blood on the ground, there are no other signs of Michelle. It’s like she just vanished into thin air.

Now that the adrenaline has worn off, I’m starting to drag. I still feel hungover from last night’s poor sleep, and I’m dizzy from lack of water. The blisters on my feet are aching. I want to stop searching for Michelle and try to find water. Or better yet, keep looking for the inn.

“Michelle!” I call again.

I try to imagine the situation if things were reversed. Would Michelle be tromping around the woods looking for me? I highly doubt it. Would Noah even have insisted that they look for me the way Jack did? I don’t even want to think about it.

I turn around and realize the others aren’t near me. Up till now, one of the three of them has always been within eyeshot. But now I realize I’m entirely alone in the woods.