What We Find (Sullivan's Crossing, #1)(91)

It was more complicated than just a money issue—it was that whirlwind a woman can get sucked into, trying to deserve a man just because he’s nice sometimes. She’d rather be the woman he had to live up to. Or better still, meet him on equal ground.

Two days later he asked her if she was in such a grumpy mood because he offered to pay her credit card bill. “No, I’m in a mood because it’s the end of summer. Labor Day weekend is our last hurrah.”

He pulled her into his arms and kissed her neck. “Don’t panic. We’re not seasonal.”

That last holiday weekend of the summer was a full house, only two campsites left empty and the cabins in use. Just keeping up with the most mundane maintenance—from stocking toilet paper in the bathrooms to sandwiches in the cooler—had them hopping. Campers had started showing up for the long weekend on Thursday and all the camps across the lake were full to capacity, including the Christian church camp and Boy Scouts.

On Sunday in the early afternoon, Tom came driving up to the crossing from the south road, blowing his horn as he approached. By the time he stopped in front of the store, Maggie, Cal and Sully were already out on the porch.

“We got a missing ten-year-old back in the Patternix Mountain area. His parents lost track of him on the trail around there about three or four hours ago. They notified the ranger. Search and rescue has been activated—we have to get him before dark. I’m going to drive up to the ridge about five miles past the site and start down from there. Some of our crew has already started up that way. We’re setting up a perimeter.”

“Let me get together some stuff,” Maggie said. “Three minutes, tops. I’ll go with you.”

“I’ll go, too,” Cal said. “What do we need?”

“Let me gather things here. Run over to the house and get us each clean, dry socks, our hiking boots, backpacks, light jackets in case we’re out there late. And one blanket,” Maggie said.

He ran to the house while Maggie grabbed bottled water and bandages—more for possible blisters than injuries. She added a cold pack, compresses, antibacterial ointment, a small bottle of rubbing alcohol, aspirin, rolled gauze, thin tape and duct tape. She added a Swiss Army knife and binoculars.

Cal came back and they quickly loaded the packs. She put the blanket in Cal’s pack. “In case we find him and he’s cold or hurt,” she said. Then she grabbed her hiking boots and ran for Tom’s truck. They changed out their shoes in his truck as Tom drove. He told them the boy’s name was Justin Blaisdale, ten years old, kind of small for his age, blond, freckled, wearing a green shirt and khaki shorts.

“Green,” Maggie scoffed. “Why not just camouflage, for Pete’s sake.”

“Be better if he had a red shirt, right?” Tom said. “Weekenders.”

Tom took the access road that wended north of Sully’s and up the mountain, one of the few roads with several lookout points and wide enough to park the truck in some places. He went beyond the last sighting spot and pulled off to the side of the road to check his map and coordinates. He had a radio. The team was armed with walkie-talkies. “This should do it.” He radioed his team their location, gave Maggie a radio and told them to take it nice and easy, be alert and cautious. “We don’t want to be rescuing or hunting members of the search group,” he cautioned.

Maggie and Cal had been on this trail before and it was buried in trees and shrubs. In fact this was one of their favorite trails because of all the trees and the shade. But it was hot and steamy today, and if there was a little boy lost out there in the woods, he would have a hard time finding his way. He could stay on this particular trail for dozens of miles without seeing a campground, ranger’s station or road. They used the binoculars to scan the area beneath whenever there was a break in the trail and they saw other searchers at a distance, across the deep chasm. Tom and Cal were both looking in and around bushes and tall grass. The sun was blinding when it broke through the trees and there was chatter on the walkie-talkies but nothing of substance. The sun was high overhead as they continued on the downward route.

“We’re going to hate life when we’re headed up again,” Maggie said. “We usually start down there at the crossing, come all the way around this hill until we meet the road.”

“If you’re feeling like a real candy-ass, you can take the long way back to Sully’s,” Tom said. “It’s not uphill at least.”

As the trails were beginning to come together around the site where the boy was last seen, they spied more and more of the search team on trails in the distance. They all went up and down and around the hills, but the searchers had to veer off the paths to check behind trees and shrubs. The trail they were on was close to the edge in places and Cal, being a little worried about heights, hugged the hillside as the path curved around.

“He wouldn’t have wandered off the trail, would he?” Maggie asked Tom.

“He might’ve wandered off the trail before he realized he was lost. He’s ten. He could’ve seen a fawn or a squirrel or something. Maybe he wanted to pee. Then he could’ve turned around to go back to the trail and couldn’t find it. Half the time they wander around in circles.”

They’d been out about an hour and a half, logged maybe three miles of trail when the radio sputtered. We got him. Everybody come in.