“He works overnights at the Walmart in Lacey. It’s possible he’s staying with a co-worker if he’s not at his house, but I don't know who he hangs out with there.”
“That’s fine. We can check. Thank you for your cooperation, Mr. Phillips.”
“House is clear, Lieutenant,” the male K-9 officer said as the two reappeared in the living room. He was much older than his female partner with salt and pepper hair and leathery skin.
“If you see him, here’s my card,” the lieutenant said, holding out a white business card. “You should call.”
Calvin took the card and nodded. He politely ushered the cops to the door, but as soon as the door closed behind them, he turned the lock and headed for the hall closet. After a little digging, he found his duffle bag and hurried to the bedroom to pack.
After tossing the bag on the bed, he flicked on the television to check the local weather. A storm was coming, and he needed to know how much time remained before the snow arrived and increased the chances of getting stranded in the cabin for a few days.
“The storm is expected to hit late tonight with the heaviest snow hitting the Cascade foothills. Five to seven inches of snow is predicted in the foothills with one to three inches in the surrounding areas closer to the sound.”
Though the woman continued, Calvin stopped listening. If five to seven inches were expected tonight, he better plan to be there for a few days. Sometimes the cabin didn’t get as much snow as predicted, but as it lay near Evergreen ridge in a heavily wooded area, it sometimes suffered from “silver thaws.” These were dangerous ice storms that sometimes caused tree branches to fall and block the roads.
After packing his clothes and toiletries, he powered up his laptop to send a message to his employer. Calvin had enough vacation days saved up he could afford to take a few days off. He just hoped it wouldn’t be any longer than that. He tapped out the email, hit send, and then grabbed the bags.
Calvin was about to start the truck when he realized he would need food. He hadn’t been at the cabin in ages and he had no idea what might be there. After locking the truck, he hurried back inside to grab some food from the fridge along with a few canned items. With haste, he tossed them into another bag and returned to the truck.
“Lord, please let me get there before the snow,” he prayed as he shoved the key in the ignition and turned. The truck roared to life and Calvin backed it out of the space. He just needed four hours.
4
“How does that happen?” Dani asked Aaron as they loaded into the SUV.
“What?” Aaron asked as he started the rig.
“How does one brother go so wrong and the other appear stable?”
“Yeah, that’s a good question, but I don’t have an answer,” he replied.
“Do you think he was hiding something?” Dani asked, switching the subject.
“We searched the house, DP. We didn’t find anything else.”
“I know, but there was this moment when the lieutenant asked if he knew where Chris was, I noticed him tense. Like he had an idea but didn’t want to share it.”
Aaron glanced away from the road long enough to flash her an incredulous look. “You’ve been watching too much Criminal Minds, DP.”
“Maybe,” Dani said, but she knew what she had seen.
Her attention to detail was one of the things that made her a great cop. Having always loved puzzles, she excelled at the kind where you looked at a scene and then when something moved or disappeared you figured out what. Aaron was more old school.
He wasn’t a bad cop, and Dani would never do anything to propagate stereotypes, but if cops really did sit in donut shops, she always felt Aaron would be the one. He enjoyed his coffee and breakfast every morning, and while top-notch when at work, Dani knew he didn’t take work home with him. But he had a wife and kids, and Dani had…. Sydney.
Dani wanted more: the husband, the house, the two point five kids - she already owned the dog. But she was picky. After watching her own mother marry and divorce three times, Dani didn’t want to go through that. She wanted her marriage to be right, to be to “the one” if such a thing existed. She thought she had found it with James, but shortly after he proposed, she found out he was also dating his secretary. And so, even though she was nearing twenty-seven, she remained single.
When they returned to the station, Dani gathered her stuff, said goodnight to Aaron, and headed home with Sydney.
Her dark, quiet house greeted her. She favored the quiet most days as it allowed her to think, but every once in a while, the quiet pressed down on her. Those were the times she wished she had someone to come home to, to share her day with. Someone who could talk, unlike her furry companion. James had carried on conversations, but everything else had been a lie, and she’d rather be alone than live a lie.
“What do you think, Sydney?” she asked, petting the dog’s head. “Am I wrong? Or was Calvin hiding something?”
Sydney simply stared at her with soulful brown eyes.
Dani sighed. “Yeah, maybe you’re right. Maybe I’m reading too much into it.” She reached up to the cabinet and pulled out a treat for Sydney.
With a careful bite, the dog grabbed the treat and took it to her favorite spot beside the faded leather couch. Dani poured herself a glass of red wine and brought it into the living room as well.
She turned on the television and curled up under a blanket, but she couldn’t focus on the show. Instead, she kept replaying the scene over and over in her head. Something just didn’t sit right with her, but it wasn’t her case any longer. She needed to just let it go.
5
Calvin pulled up to the cabin just as the first flakes of snow began to fall. He saw no other car, but Chris might have hitched a ride or taken the bus. The nearest stop lay a few miles away, but he could have walked the distance. Calvin parked the truck in front and grabbed his bags.
The front porch creaked and groaned under his weight, and Calvin made a mental note to fix it soon. He couldn’t remember the last time he visited the cabin, definitely some time ago. Lots of little repairs probably needed to be done.
He tried the knob, but the front door was locked. After flipping through his keys, he secured the right one and unlocked the door. It opened with a stiff creak, and a musty odor wafted out.
“Chris?” Calvin hollered as he stepped inside. Only silence returned his greeting. So, he wasn’t here. Or perhaps he was out getting firewood. The cold would definitely set in tonight.
Calvin shut the door behind him and placed his bag of clothes down on the couch. A few logs lay near the fireplace, enough to provide heat through the night, but he would need to gather more in the morning when the sun provided more light.
He wandered into the kitchen, but no sign of Chris existed there. A layer of dust coated the counter and the small wooden table. Calvin set the bag with the food down on the table before turning to the hallway to check the bedrooms. The cabin contained only two - a master bedroom his parents had shared and the smaller second one he and Chris roomed in when staying here.
The master lay on the left, and Calvin pushed open the door. A wave of nostalgia hit him as a memory from one family adventure washed over him.
“What are you doing out of bed, Calvin?” his mother asked. She wore a red and black flannel shirt and a ski cap. The heat hadn’t filtered throughout the cabin yet, and the air held a chill.
“I’m cold, Mom. Can I sleep with you? For a little bit?”
Her kind smile reached her eyes, and she patted the bed next to her. “Sure, but only till it warms up.”
Calvin charged into the room and climbed in bed next to his mother, snuggling into her side. She smelled of campfire and cookies, and as he closed his eyes, he couldn’t remember a nicer smell.
Calvin chuckled at the memory. The heat never filled the room that night and the four of them ended up in his parent’s bed together. Though a tight squeeze, Calvin couldn’t remember a happier time.
He turned and opened the other room, but it too lay empty. Just the queen bed he and Chris had shared and a small dresser and lamp.
So, Chris hadn’t been here. Had Calvin been wrong? Or perhaps Chris just hadn’t arrived yet. He decided to wait a day or so and see if Chris showed up. Calvin knew of nowhere else Chris would go, and he could wait.
He made his way back into the living room and piled up some logs in the fireplace to start a fire. It took a few matches, but after a few minutes, a gentle warmth emanated from the area.
With that taken care of, he decided to scrounge up some dinner. He unloaded the food he had brought first, but as he opened the fridge, he realized no electricity powered it. The snow must have knocked out a power line. He’d have to improvise. After a little bit of digging, he found an old cooler under a cabinet. He loaded the cooler with snow from the back porch and placed the eggs and milk inside.
The canned foods he added to the cupboards which weren’t stocked but did yield a few cans of chili and corn. He wiped off the counters with a few paper towels and then rummaged in the drawers until he found a can opener and a spoon. Another bit of searching yielded him a few pots and a couple of bowls. The stove was a gas stove, a small miracle, and the burner flamed to life with the help of another match.
As he sat down at the table with his dinner, he pulled out his phone and made a list of supplies he should get to restock the cabin. Then he turned the phone off. If there was no electricity, he didn’t want to run his battery down in case he needed it. Hopefully, Chris would show up soon and they could head back in the morning.
The snow continued to fall outside, and as Calvin watched the gentle flakes, he realized he had forgotten the peace this place exuded. His life wasn’t super hectic with his work from home job, but even so, it would be nice to come out here some days and just unplug. No laptop, no phone, no stress.
Well, other than his worry over Chris. “Lord,” he said looking up at the ceiling as if he could see God staring down at him from heaven. “I don’t know what trouble Chris is in this time, but please protect him. Keep him safe with whatever’s going on. He needs your help. We only have each other left. Help me find him before the police do. Amen.”
He wasn’t sure when he began praying looking up at God instead of closing his eyes - maybe after his parent’s deaths when he felt he needed more consolation, but he found he liked it now. It made it feel as if God were in the room with him.
When the chili and corn were gone, Calvin washed the pots and the bowls in the sink and set them in the dish rack to dry. Thankfully, the water was provided from the nearby town and not from a well, so the lack of electricity didn’t affect it. Calvin glanced out the window as he wiped his hands on a nearby towel. The outside was now completely white and the snow was falling much harder than when he had arrived. Big fat flakes fell one after the other in a steady stream of white.
As he shivered, he realized the temperature inside had dropped as well. He hadn’t noticed it while eating as the warmth from the stove had heated the kitchen for a bit, but now the cold seeped in with icy talons and scraped across his skin.
He threw another few logs on the fire and wrapped the blanket from the back of the couch around him. As he watched the flames dance to and fro, he wondered if this cabin would ever see the happiness of a family again. Would he find a wife and bring her and his children here? Would Chris?
Calvin hadn’t thought he was ready for love again but coming here reminded him how nice it was to have family - how happy his parents had been. Maybe, if he could get Chris’s life back on track, he could focus on his own.
6
Dani trudged through the snow in the parking lot, muttering under her breath. She hated snow, and she hated being cold. Thankfully, Olympia didn’t often get snow, but when it did, everything slowed down. No one knew how to drive in it, and there weren’t enough snow plows to keep the roads as clear as she would like.
Sydney never seemed to mind though, and while she was a police dog, she still liked to play in the white powder and had stared longingly out Dani’s back door once the flakes began to fall.
Dani hadn’t let her outside, but now Sydney strutted proudly through the few inches as if to declare her enjoyment.
“Don’t bother unpacking,” Aaron said as he met her at the door. “We found out Chris’s family owns a cabin near the gorge. The lieutenant has ordered us out there to search for signs of him.”
“Can I at least get some coffee?” Dani asked. She had been up too late last night running things through her mind.
“On the way,” he said.
With a sigh that sent her slender shoulders heaving, Dani turned around and followed him back out into the cold. “I told you he was hiding something,” she said. “Why wouldn’t he tell us about the cabin?”
“Who?” Aaron asked as he pressed the key fob button to open the back door of the SUV.
“The guy from yesterday. The brother. I told you he was hiding something.”
“Maybe he forgot,” Aaron said, strapping his dog in place. “Or perhaps he didn’t know.”
“He didn’t know his family had a cabin a few hours from here?” Dani asked with a raised eyebrow. “Now who’s tossing out conspiracy theories? Do you think he’s in on it then?”
“I guess we’ll find out when we get there, DP. Come on, load up.”
Dani secured Sydney next to Dexter and climbed into the passenger seat. “Don’t forget, you said we could get coffee,” she said as a shiver ran down her spine.
“You know if you dressed warmer when it snowed, you might not need so much coffee,” Aaron said as he started the engine.
Dani looked down at her outfit. She had on her black BDU pants and shirt. “What do you mean? I’m in uniform.”
“Yeah, but I bet you don’t have layers underneath. You can wear thermals under your uniform when it’s cold out.”
Dani scrunched her nose in disgust. “But then I’d be all bulky and hot when inside.”
Aaron shrugged. “At least you wouldn’t freeze.”
“I grew up in Texas,” she said. “We had like three snows my whole life and we didn’t dress in layers because a day later it was all gone.” She shot him a look as she pushed the button to turn on the heated seats. Modern conveniences were made so she wouldn’t have to suffer through the cold.
With the coffee stop and a bathroom break, it took them just over four hours to get to Evergreen Ridge. The snow was thicker out here, and Dani wished she had worn insulated boots at least. She hoped this would be a quick excursion.
“Crap. We’ll have to walk in,” Aaron said, pulling the SUV over to the side of the road.
“What?” Dani asked. She hadn’t expected to be tromping through the snow.
“Yeah, the snow’s too high here. The SUV won’t make it through. Don’t worry though. The GPS says we’re only about a mile from the cabin.”
Dani’s jaw dropped, and she blinked at him. “A mile? I didn’t dress to walk a mile in the snow.”
Aaron smiled at her. “Well, then I guess you will next time.” His tone softened as he spoke again, “Look, I wasn’t expecting this much snow either, but at least our boots are waterproof. We’ll get in, look around, and then get back here. No big deal.”
She narrowed her eyes and shot him a glare as she climbed out of the car. The snow was up to the middle of her calves, and she immediately felt the cold seep into her legs. “Let’s get this done,” she said as she reached the back and unhooked Sydney.
The dogs jumped down and pranced in the snow, sending flurries of white into the air.
“This way,” Aaron said after locking the SUV.
Dani followed him, trudging through the thick snow. Not only would she be frozen after
this, but she’d be all sweaty. It was hard work moving her small frame through the drifts without snowshoes.
As they walked, the trees grew closer to them, crowding in and creating a quiet serenity.
“You have to admit,” Aaron said, checking the GPS again, “you can’t beat the scenery.”
“I guess,” Dani replied. She was actually enjoying the quiet peacefulness, but he didn’t need to know that.
The further they walked into the forest, the darker it became. Dani glanced up to see where the sun had gone, but it was obscured by the thick branches covered in snow. Some of them were bowing under the weight of the white powder.
“Um, Aaron, do you think it’s safe walking under all these trees?” she asked. Her question was punctuated by a creaking sound, a crack, and then a branch falling off to the right.
“It’s fine,” he said, “just keep your eyes open and pay attention to the sounds.”
Dani nodded, but the easy, peaceful feeling was gone. With every creak and groan around her, she glanced wildly up at the tall trees that now looked like menacing giants encircling them.
“Looks like only another quarter mile to go,” Aaron said.
Dani shivered, both from the cold and from the eerie feeling that had blanketed her. Suddenly, a loud crack sounded. Dani’s gaze shot up, but her feet froze. A large limb was hurtling down toward her.
“DP, move,” Aaron shouted, but her feet wouldn’t obey.
Dani threw her hands up to shield herself and closed her eyes. Pain like she had never felt seared through her, knocking her to the ground and stealing her breath.
“DP.” Aaron’s worried voice carried over to her.
Dani opened her eyes and blinked a few times to try to get rid of the stars blurring her vision. Sydney’s nose touched her face and then Aaron’s concerned face came into view.
Lawfully Redeemed: Inspirational Christian Contemporary: (A K-9 Lawkeeper Romance) (The Lawkeepers) Page 2
