Stone Cold Heart (Tracers #13)(31)

“I’ll look for Maisy.”

“There’s a bridge down the road,” he said. “Want me to show you?”

Sara shook her head. “I’m good.”

“I can show you.”

She turned to see a young man standing beside the pickup. He wore shorts and climbing shoes and had a coil of blue rope slung over his shoulder. Sara recognized the Mayan sun god tattoo on his arm.

“I’m Tristan.” He stepped forward.

“Sara Lockhart.”

“The bone lady. I know who you are.”





CHAPTER 10


Sara glanced at Nolan, and he gave a slight nod. Yes, this was the same Tristan he’d mentioned earlier.

“I’ll meet you at the wall when you finish here,” Sara told Nolan.

She and Tristan started trekking down the road. He was short but muscular, carrying a bulky coil of rope as though it weighed nothing.

“So, what’s Luke’s problem?” she asked. “He seems to have a chip on his shoulder.”

“He doesn’t like cops.”

“Why not?”

He gave her an amused look, then shook his head. “I don’t know. Maybe you should ask him.”

Sara looked around. The road had narrowed, and they seemed to have come to the end of the encampments. She heard gurgling water to her right, but scrub trees blocked the view of the creek. A massive wall of limestone rose up beside her, its top gold in the evening sun.

“Isn’t it late to start up there?” she asked Tristan.

He shrugged. “It’s a three-pitch climb. More of a sprint, really.”

They neared some tall cypress trees, and Sara spotted the bridge Nolan had mentioned. It wasn’t much, but neither was the creek beneath it due to the drought.

“Tristan, I understand you were with Kaylin on the morning she disappeared.”

“Yeah?”

Unlike Luke, he sounded low-key instead of hostile.

“I’m wondering if you remember anything unusual about Kaylin that day?”

“How do you mean?”

Tristan motioned for Sara to go ahead of him over the narrow bridge.

“Did she seem upset about anything?” Sara glanced over her shoulder. “Distracted, maybe?”

“No.”

They reached a dirt path through the trees, and Sara glanced up at the lacy canopy of cypress leaves.

“Watch your step,” Tristan said as she picked her way over some exposed tree roots.

“Do you have any idea why she decided to hike on her own that morning?”

“You mean climb? That’s what we were doing there, you know. Not hiking. We started at Rattlesnake Gorge, and then Kaylin went off exploring.”

“She went by herself?”

“Yeah.”

“Any idea why?”

“No, but I mean, that’s Kaylin for you. She was always off bouldering or checking out some wall she wanted to try. She went off on her own a lot.”

The sound of voices told Sara they were nearing their destination. The wall of rock to her right swept up sharply, and she paused to study it. It had to be three hundred feet at least. She spied a yellow rope dangling from the top, where it looked like someone had set up an anchor.

“This way.” Tristan ducked under some low-hanging limbs, and Sara followed.

A trio of people gathered at the base of Mustang Wall. Two women in climbing helmets stood off to the side swigging from water bottles. A man at the base held the yellow rope in his hand and tipped his head back.

Sara looked up at the wall to see the climber. She was petite and built like a gymnast, and she wore a white helmet along with snug black yoga pants and a purple sports bra. Long dark hair streamed down her back.

“That’s Maisy.”

Sara glanced at Tristan beside her, noting the admiration in his voice. Sara tilted her head back to watch as Maisy floated up a rock face. Her movements were fluid, effortless, and she seemed to defy gravity as she used invisible holds to pull herself up.

And she wasn’t attached to a rope. Besides the helmet, her only equipment was a pouch of chalk clipped at her waist. Sara looked at Tristan.

“She’s free soloing?”

“Yep.”

“No rope at all?”

“None.”

Sara’s stomach tensed. She watched as Maisy reached a leg up, securing her foot to a mere bump in the stone, and then moved her entire body up the wall. She was probably a hundred feet up with another two hundred to go.

“She’s tiny,” Sara said.

“Yeah.” Tristan folded his arms over his chest. “It’s not about big muscles, though. It’s about flexibility. Core strength. Keeping calm under pressure.”

And calm she was. Maisy reached behind her back and dipped her hand into the pouch of chalk. Then she reached up and wedged her fingers into a vertical crack in the stone. In one smooth motion, she hoisted her entire body up another expanse of rock. She made smooth, steady progress as her audience watched silently from below.

Sara stared at the overhang near the top, unable to imagine how anyone could get over it. They’d have to be Spider-Man.

“That Maisy?”

She turned around to see Nolan walking over.

“It is,” she told him. Sara tried to read his expression to see if his interview with Jill had yielded anything, but his face gave nothing away.