by Jessica Loft
"What are you doing?" Lily demanded.
"We can't use the trail now. We have to use our heads. If she's there, if she's alive, then he will be back."
Lily paled at the thought that her daughter might not be alive, but she nodded. "There's a place we can camp if you have a few miles left in you."
"Would Sam know about it?"
"No."
"Then lead the way," Brinson commanded.
Lily set off, covering ground quickly. The climb was steep but not impossible. Lily pushed through the brush, directing him to the side of a tall cliff. Brinson stared at the high rock wall but said nothing.
"Not much farther," Lily assured him. "There's a little cave. We can camp there and get some rest. We can be at the cabin by three tomorrow if we cut across the ridge to the east. It's a hard hike with no trail but we can do it."
Brinson nodded and followed her along the face of a small cliff. He searched in the half light but couldn't see a cave. Agile as a deer, Lily suddenly went behind some rocks and took out a flashlight. He saw a tiny opening in the rocks, barely big enough to crawl through.
"I'll just check for any visitors," she said.
“Visitors?" Brinson asked, his hand going to the SIG on his belt.
"Snakes, coyotes, the normal riffraff," she explained, shooting him a grin.
Brinson watched as she ducked into the small opening and disappeared into the rock wall. He looked around in the growing darkness, smelling the tree, decaying leaves and fallen branches. There was a whiff of something like honeysuckle that sweetened the air.
She emerged in moments, without her pack."It's clear, but you'll have to crawl. It narrows down a little more in the middle," Lily said, watching him for a reaction.
Brinson shrugged and entered behind her, dropping to his hands and knees to crawl through the tiny passage. The rock dug into his hands and scraped at his legs as they navigated the tunnel.
The narrow tunnel wound back nearly twenty feet before it gave way to an irregular shaped room that was big enough to hold them comfortably. He estimated that it was twenty feet wide at the widest point, maybe twelve feet long, with small openings too small for humans to fit in along the bottom that led farther back through the cliff. Brinson turned the flashlight beam to study the smooth rock that made the walls.
On one wall was a heart, drawn in black, with block letters in the center.
Todd+Lily Forever
Brinson didn't comment, just finished his examination of the cave before he went to help Lily spread out their sleeping bags.
"I can build a fire," Lily offered. "The smoke goes through all the little shafts in the rock."
"If that's what you want," Brinson said, keeping his voice as light as possible.
"I want coffee," Lily said, taking a percolator out of her pack. "I'll get some wood."
"I'll do it," Brinson said, heading out before she could protest.
The darkness had fallen fully when he stepped out. He gathered up branches and piled them near the entrance. He needed to be away from her for a moment.
She had a child with him. They were in love.
If she was in love with him, what did we have?
He told himself to stop being stupid and started pulling wood into the cave. This was about Tory, a scared seven year old. This wasn't about him.
She called you to help because you're good at what you do.
She said she trusted you.
Brinson couldn't explain what that heart on the cave wall did to him. He knew that she had been married, but somehow that stupid, childish declaration of love had driven it home to him.
Lily had loved someone else. While Brinson had been in that overseas hell, she was camping in caves and having a baby with someone else.
It somehow made him sad and angry at the same time.
He couldn't say he'd been a monk in his time away from her. There had been other relationships, but none came close to what he had thought he had with her.
Now he was confused about everything.
Lily appeared to help him pull the branches into the tunnel. In moments she had a blaze going in a small circle of rocks that was set up in the corner of the widest wall.
It occurred to him that she had camped here before, more than once. She moved in the small space with confidence, as comfortable as a woman in her own home. He noticed a few things in the firelight.
There were a few charred sticks propped up against the wall, like someone had roasted marshmallows here. The fire circle was well used.
"You've camped here often?" Brinson asked, casually.
"Not in years," she answered. "We used to come up here a lot, in the beginning. Then the business got real busy and we didn't make it back up here before Tory was born."
"I guess it would be hard to get a baby in here."
"Yes. Besides, this was sort of our place," Lily said.
"Your place," he repeated.
"We were married, Brin. Yes, it was our place."
Her voice was soft, but he couldn't help feeling like she had stabbed him. He couldn't stop himself from asking the question that was haunting him.
"Was what we had even real?"
"Brin," Lily said, coming over to him with a cup of coffee. "It was very real. I was in love with you. I thought we would be together forever. Then you joined the army and I met Todd. It doesn't make what we had less real."
"I thought about you every single day for the past twelve years. Every. Single. Day."
She smiled. "Me, too. Every day. There were moments that I wished you were here, that you could have been a part of things."
He looked up at her. She was telling the truth. He looked away, into the flames.
"That doesn't mean I loved Todd less," she explained, her voice gentle. "Or that I loved one of you more. It was just different."
"Different?"
"You and I were like a wildfire. Todd was more steady, more gentle. Yes, it was different, in ways that are hard to explain."
She thought for a moment. "There was so much heat between you and me. There still is. I think, had the circumstances been different, we would have worked out. Only then I wouldn't have had Tory."
Brinson nodded and finished his coffee. His mind was reeling. He hadn't wanted this conversation, but he had longed for it, too.
"Lily," he breathed her name. He watched the fire throw it's light over her face, putting flames in her dark eyes.
He didn't realize he had moved so close to her. He only knew that she was in his arms again.
He kissed her, gently at first, then with more passion. She didn't protest, kissing him back with equal force. His hands were in her hair, freeing it from the pins that held the dark weight of it up.
"Brin," she whispered, running her hands under his t-shirt. Her small, strong hands clutched at him, pulling him closer to her.
He tugged her shirt over her head, chuckling at the lacy red bra.
Lily always loved her lingerie.
She was pulling him down to the nest of sleeping bags, her kisses becoming more hungry.
"Touch me," she begged, her voice ragged. She gave a low moan when he obliged her, touching her through the lace that covered her breasts.
His own shirt and pants were discarded in record time. She wrapped her long legs around him, holding him tight against her.
How could he have forgotten how passionate she was? He kissed her collar bones, the tops of her breasts, her neck. He ran his fingers over the golden skin that seemed to glow in the light.
She was like a goddess. He couldn't get over the feel of her smooth body, soft where his was hard, curves and angles that took his breath away. He wanted to touch her, taste her, for days.
Lily was bucking underneath his caresses, rubbing against the hardness she had caused. She nipped his shoulder, kissed his chest, his neck. Her hands were moving over him like she could never get enough of the feel of him.
"Brinson, please," she whispered. "Now. I need yo
u now."
She reached between their bodies, her fingers circling around him as she guided him into her.
"Lily," he moaned, thrusting into her.
She raised her hips, matching her movements to his. She moaned his name, urging him to take her harder, deeper.
He already thought he was at the breaking point when she clamped her mouth to his and, in one smooth motion, rolled him over so that she was on top of him.
He could only stare in wonder as she rode him, her body a shimmering blend of sparks and shadow as the fire light played over their bodies, casting shadows on the walls.
His hands gripped her hips as she increased the rhythm, her little cries of pleasure becoming more and more frantic as she reached her climax.
With a groan of triumph, Brinson let himself pour into her, reaching to gather her to his chest. She collapsed, spent, falling to sleep almost as soon as he lay her down beside him. He held her close, burying his nose in her fragrant hair.
He felt his own eyes grow heavy, the physical strain mixing with the sweet release of Lily. He wrapped his arms more securely around her and allowed sleep to overtake him.
Chapter 5
Brinson was at a loss for what to do. He had woken before dawn, without Lily. She had freed herself from embrace and readied everything for departure. She avoided his eyes and answered with tense, polite tones.
They had shared an amazing reunion of their bodies only hours before and now she was treating him like a stranger, or one of her campers. Brinson looked at her as she readied her pack for the punishing hike.
There was no outward sign that they had spent the night in each other's arms. She had pulled her hair into a severe knot on the back of her head, then covered that with a bandanna. She was all business.
It made sense, he supposed, as they were going to find her daughter.
Or her daughter's body. It's been eleven days.
He didn't want to think that way. He wanted to believe that they would find Tory alive and unharmed.
But he knew the odds. From the way that Lily was setting out into the eerie pre-dawn darkness, she knew the odds, too. There was a grim set to her mouth that hadn't been there before.
"Tell me about Sam. The things you're holding back," Brinson specified as they walked around the cliff and began the steady climb to the top.
"I never really liked him," Lily confessed. "He was always polite, brotherly. The perfect older brother, the perfect uncle, but something was always off. Not enough to flat out avoid him, but enough to make a person cautious."
"What do you mean?"
Lily was silent a minute, trying to put in words the feeling that she had always gotten from her brother in law.
"He was jealous, I guess. I always thought his relationship with Todd was forced. Then there was the incident at the old cabin."
"The cabin we're hiking to?"
She nodded. "Sam took a girl up there. He never dated anyone seriously, which struck me as kind of odd. He's good looking, charming, almost too charming, yet there was never a girlfriend.
"So he takes this girl up to the cabin and they're gone almost two weeks. Not surprising, really, since it takes so long to get here. When they came back, the girl acted like she couldn't wait to get out of here. I thought that maybe they had argued, but she seemed afraid."
"Afraid of what?"
"Just afraid. I was ready to shrug it off because some people don't camp well. I thought that maybe they had seen a grizzly or something like that. But Todd.." her voice trailed off.
"Todd what?" Brinson asked. He wondered what Todd had known about his older half brother, what sinister secret he had kept.
"Todd pulled Sam into the office and things got pretty heated. I didn't hear everything, but I did hear Todd tell him that it had better not be happening again."
She shuddered at the memory, but she kept putting one foot in front of the other. They hiked in silence for a few miles. Brinson made no attempt to break the silence.
After awhile, Lily began to speak again, her voice flat.
"Todd told me later that there had been other incidents. That a girl had gone missing and Sam had been a suspect. He was always pushing to fix the old cabin, to make repairs and open it up. Todd suspected, though he never came right out and said it, I think that he thought the girl was buried out there."
"Then why kill Todd? Why kidnap Tory?"
"For the land. I think he wants the land. When Todd died, he was pretty shocked at the reading of the will. I think he thought that he was going to inherit. Instead, Todd left it to Tory, with me as executioner until she's twenty five. In the event that either of us died, the other inherits fully. If we both died, the land was to go to either Tory's children or, if she had no children, to be donated to a nature preserve."
"He didn't leave Sam anything?"
"Two percent of the income for ten years and five thousand dollars, plus the truck Sam drives."
"Still a decent inheritance."
"Not to Sam. He wants the whole package."
"Why? Because of the cabin?"
Brinson was trying to make sense of what was so special about a hunting lodge that a man would kill his brother and hold his niece for ransom. He met Lily's eyes and suddenly realized what she had figured out days ago.
"You think there's a grave near the cabin."
"I think there's more than one. I think the cabin is his holy place. I think Todd figured it out and Sam killed him."
"Jesus, Lily. Why didn't you tell the sheriff?"
"I left him a voice mail before we left. I hope he's held Sam up. I agree with you that there must be another route to the cabin, maybe across the neighboring land. I want to find my daughter, Brinson. I know she's alive. I'd feel it if she was dead."
"Then let's go. How much farther?"
"Two hours, tops. We're not on the trail so I can't be sure, but we're close."
Brinson nodded and followed her as they began the descent from the ridge, both of them picking up their speed. Lily was more alert now. Brinson knew she was afraid that Sam would be close by, maybe in the cabin or watching from some other vantage point.
"I trusted him," Lily said. "After Todd died, Sam really stepped up. I thought that maybe the bad feelings I had were silly, that maybe Todd had just disapproved of Sam taking a girl to the cabin. Maybe Sam hadn't done anything wrong, you know?"
"I can see that, Lily. Sometimes people get accused of things they didn't do."
She nodded. "Exactly. A girl that Sam was interested in went missing, but maybe she had run away. Maybe the girl I saw was afraid of spiders or the outdoors. Maybe Sam was into weird sex and scared her. I didn't want to believe any different."
"That's understandable, Lily. You couldn't have known. Most killers are smart enough to fool the people around them."
They went on, lost in their own thoughts. Brinson knew Lily was blaming herself and he didn't know how to convince her otherwise.
When they reached the top of a small rise, Lily pointed. Brinson saw it then, a tiny old cabin that was nestled in a clearing. The roof had been patched so many times it was like a patchwork quilt. The logs had faded to a roughened gray. The porch was missing rails and some of the windows were boarded up.
"I'm going to circle around, Lily," Brinson whispered. "You stay here. I mean it," he added. "We didn't come all this way to lose the game now."
She nodded in agreement and moved into some thick brush, crouching. Her gaze was fixed on the cabin.
"She's there, Brin. I know it."
Brinson nodded and began to circle. Something wasn't adding up. He felt the buzzing in his head, warning him that something was off.
He moved through the trees silently, studying the ground, the trees. Then he saw what he'd been looking for.
There was a path behind the cabin, cleared and obviously well used. Sam must have done this years ago. He had counted on his brother never opening the cabin, knew that no one would notice his new route in
.
If there's another way in, why was Tory's bracelet on the trail? If there's a faster way in, why drag a seven year old for three days on the trail?
Suddenly Brinson stopped. The buzzing intensified as he realized they'd been set up. He back tracked, easing back around to Lily's hiding spot. He knew, with a certainty he would have bet his life on, that Sam was waiting for them.
