The coals are still smoking from the night before and adding to the aroma of the early morning dewy air.
I look at my watch and notice it’s only about five thirty; the sun is just beginning to peak over the horizon and all the furry woodland creatures are waking up and stretching with their little chirps and clicks and whatever other noises the freaking things make.
As I said, I don’t hate early mornings.
It’s actually so beautiful and peaceful. Especially here in Iowa.
Okay, yes, I don’t have a lot of experience with early mornings in other states, but I’d say that Iowa is just about perfect when it comes to an early summer morning.
The air is just so clean and peaceful.
And the wildlife just seems so happy to get their day going.
Squirrels and birds and the like totally invented the phrase ‘Carpe Diem’. They don’t have to plan fifty years into their future. At the most they just plan a few months.
It must be nice…
I get up and decide to take a short walk on the path through the woods until everyone else gets up.
You know, become more acquainted with nature.
I take my coffee with me because I may want to get to know the four legged inhabitants of Saylorville Lake, but I still need to wake the hell up.
After walking down the path for approximately fifteen minutes, I decide to turn around (mostly because I’m almost out of coffee and I need roughly three more cups before I wake up).
I step down onto something that doesn’t feel quite right. It crunches under my feet.
I look down and see a fresh pile of potato chips.
“What the hell?” I say bending over. I didn’t notice those before… “Aaaahhhh!” I scream when I’m grabbed from behind, but my scream is muffled by the piece of cloth over my mouth and nose.
I begin to thrash around, trying desperately to calm my mind to remember some self-defense moves. I recognize the scent on the cloth as chloroform and hold my breath.
My dad made me learn the smell before I went off to college. He spent a lot of time going over every worst case scenario that could happen to me in the city.
Hell, he should have prepared me for what would happen in the freaking woods!
I jam my elbow into my attackers rib cage, but he only lets out a grunt without losing his grip on me. I kick my legs back hoping to make contact with his family jewels.
I’m quickly losing consciousness so I just try to punch and kick him any way I can.
But it doesn’t matter…
Because I have to breathe…
Which means I have to breathe in the chloroform…
I take a deep breath and try to scream for Grayson through the cloth as loud as I can before I collapse…
***
Grayson bolts awake in the bed.
Something woke him up…
He looks around and notices Ree is not in bed with him.
He jumps up and throws his jeans and boots on, then steps out of the camper. He looks to the right and sees the coffee pot on. Okay, so she got up and made coffee. No big deal, he thinks, hoping to calm himself down. But his gut instincts aren’t satisfied and they won’t settle.
On the other side of the fire ring he sees Ryder stepping out of his tent and stretching.
“Smelled the coffee,” Ryder says in lieu of ‘Good morning’, making his way toward Grayson when he stops dead in his tracks at the look on his friend’s face. “What?” he growls, his eyes alert and scanning the area. “Where’s Ree?”
“I don’t know,” Grayson says looking around.
“Okay,” Ryder says, “Let’s break it down. Where would she go? Bathroom? Shower?”
“We have that in the camper,” Grayson says impatiently.
Ryder steps closer to his friend, “Calm down, Cole and think.”
“What time is it?” he asks.
“Six thirty,” Ryder answers after looking at his phone and putting it back in his jeans.
Grayson closes his eyes and takes a deep breath.
Ree would want coffee first thing, especially this early in the morning.
Hell, what was she even doing up at this hour?
He opens his eyes and looks around the fire, noticing one chair set up in front of the ring. They had folded them up last night before they went to bed and placed them under the awning of the camper, in case it rained.
So, she had her coffee and sat down.
He looks around for her coffee mug, but doesn’t see it.
So she would have gotten up on her own accord…
“Tell me what you’re thinking?” Ryder asks him.
Grayson looks around for a few minutes longer before he notices the trail to the left of their campsite.
“I think she went for a walk,” he says pointing toward the trail.
“Okay,” Ryder says and they head off down the trail.
They walk for about ten minutes, noticing shoe prints the entire way before they see what they’ve been looking for.
Grayson’s blood turns cold and the air in his lungs turns to acid.
“Ryder,” he growls out.
“I see it, Chief,” he whispers.
On the ground… just in front of them… is Ree’s coffee mug and… evidence of a struggle…
Ryder pulls his phone out of his pocket and dials, “Trail. Left of the campsite. Now,” he says into it.
Grayson begins to look around without disturbing anything, squatting down to get a better look, surveying the area and trying to figure out what happened and which direction Ree might be in.
He sees drag marks heading South just as he hears Blaine, Koby, Colt, Chance, Declan and Jerald jogging up to their location.
“What’s going on?” Blaine asks them.
Ryder fills the guys in quickly so that they can start searching.
Blaine comes up to Grayson and places his hand on the Chief’s bare shoulder, “We’ll find her, Cole. She’s fine.”
Grayson nods, but doesn’t feel reassured in the slightest.
Everything he’s been through in his life…
Every bombing…
Every soldier and friend lost overseas…
Every beating he took from his parents…
The pain of leaving behind everything he’d ever known, no matter how shitty the circumstances were…
All of this… it did nothing to prepare Grayson Cole for the day his world stopped turning…
***
It was a bright and beautiful day in Belton, Iowa.
Jimmy Phillips had never known one better. It was a perfect, cool, late-June morning. The sun shining… a light breeze blowing…
Yes. Never one better…
Just as Jimmy is about to open the door to The Grind to get his morning coffee before heading to Josie’s for the day’s gossip, a convoy catches his attention.
Not just any convoy…
Speeding through the main road of Belton is the personal vehicles of Grayson Cole, Colt Evans and Blaine Owens; followed by Azaria Gable’s car… driven by Ryder Jacobson…
“That’s odd…” Jimmy mumbles to himself before walking into the store.
“How ya doin’ Jimmy?” Sue Dunson asks him.
“I’m good, Suz,” he answers. “Any idea why BPD is speeding down main street?” he asks, jerking his thumb towards the door.
Susan leans over the counter and looks out her door, even though the vehicles are long gone, “No…” she shakes her head. “They were all supposed to be at Saylorville Lake for the weekend. Not back until Monday,” she tells him.
“Hmm…” Jimmy purses his lips and stares out the door.
“Here’s your coffee, Jimmy,” Max Dunson tells him, pushing the cup of his usual blend, that he gets at the same time every day, across the counter.
“Thanks, Max,” he says and hands over his money. “I’ll be at Josie’s if ya’ll find anything out,” he says to Susan.
“Sure thing,” she nods w
ith a small and concerned smile.
Jimmy makes his way to Josie’s, whistling along the way, enjoying the birds chirping and the squirrels coming out onto the sidewalk from the trees that line the street.
He walks up the step to Josie’s, and pulls on the door without even looking, as he always does.
Only, unlike every other day before, the door does not open. He looks up and sees a sign in Josie’s handwriting taped on the inside of the door:
CLOSED FOR THE DAY
Well… that’s odd, Jimmy thinks to himself.
He decides he needs to investigate and heads to the police station to see if he can find anything out…
***
“What happened? What do we know? What did you find?” Ryder’s mom Rapid-Fires questions at him as soon as they all come in the back door of the station.
He understands, really. Ree has always been the crazy, quirky daughter Josie Jacobson hoped to one day have.
And she has always been the crazy, quirky sister Ryder loved and protected with everything he had.
That girl always had a way about her.
People loved her no matter where she went.
Always friendly to everyone she meets in a way that makes them feel like they matter to her more than anyone else in the world.
Fuck! They have to find her.
His stomach has been in a constant knot since he stepped out of his tent this morning and saw Grayson’s face.
He can only imagine what he must be feeling…
Ryder walks up to his mother and puts his arm around her, pulling her out of Grayson’s earshot.
“There was some kind of a struggle,” he tells her with a low voice, “on the trail by our campsite.” Josie nods her head and takes a deep breath, preparing to be the strong mother and a friend to Sandra Gable, her best friend. “It looks like she walked down the trail on her own but whoever took her was waiting for her. Probably, watching us the whole time we were there.” He pauses to let his mom compose herself as she fights back the anger and tears. “They must have…” he swallows hard, “drugged her… or knocked her out,” Josie’s eyes widen with a Mother’s Fury, “because there were drag marks for a mile to the road.”
“Drag marks…?” his mother asks. “Why didn’t he carry her or something? He dragged her for a mile?”
“We think whoever it is may be physically weak,” Ryder explains. “They probably weren’t able to lift her up from the ground. So dragging her would have been easier for them.”
“Oh, my god, Ry,” Josie closes her eyes.
“I know, Mom,” he hugs her tighter. “I need you to go with Koby and Colt to tell the Gable’s now,” he says. Josie looks up at him with worry in her eyes. “I know,” Ryder closes his eyes for a moment before looking at her again, “but you need to be there. The girls will go with you guys as well, to help out with Abbey and contact Chase and Kassie.”
Josie swallows and nods, “Okay,” she continues to nod while she speaks. “Okay, let me get my keys,” she tells him and pulls away.
“Mom,” Ryder calls her attention, “You’re not driving yourself.”
She looks at him and takes a breath to argue before closing her mouth and nodding, knowing he is right.
“Smith!” Ryder calls Eric Smith over.
Eric is from Belton and has had a degree in law enforcement for ten years. Chief Herby would never hire him because he didn’t want ‘new blood’ on the force. Once Cole took over, he applied again and got the job. He’s a force to be reckoned with at six foot four and two hundred eighty pounds of all muscle.
He comes jogging over to Ryder, “What’s up?” he asks.
“Need you to take my mom and the girls to the Gable’s house,” Ryder tells him. Eric nods. “Stay with them,” Ryder expresses the seriousness of the situation and the weight with which he is about to carry with him by taking this task. “We’ll call you when we have more information. Lewis and Evans will be going, too, but they won’t be staying.”
“Got it,” Eric says.
“You may have to help physically stop Mike and Wyatt,” Ryder warns.
Eric swallows hard before nodding again, “Got it,” he repeats.
The trepidation in his voice is understandable. The Gable’s are respected highly in this community and no one in a five hundred mile radius would want to do them harm. Or stand in their way of what they want.
“Mrs. Jacobson,” Eric says, holding his arm out for Ryder’s mom to take.
“Thank you, honey,” she says to him and grabs Ryder’s hand, “Find our girl,” she tells him.
“We will, Mom,” he bends his head and kisses his mother on the cheek, then watches as Eric leads her out the door, stopping so that she can give Grayson a kiss.
Ryder walks back to the group so they can start getting his oldest and best friend back…
***
“How the fuck did this shit happen!?!?” Grayson roars at the group of officers in the Pit.
Ree has been missing for three hours (that they know of) and they haven’t learned anything knew.
They lost the trail after they hit the road, knowing the sick fuck probably had a car waiting to put her in.
“Chief,” Declan says calmly, “we’ll find her.”
“It shouldn’t have gotten this far, Reid,” Grayson growls. “We should have been able to locate him before this weekend.”
“I know,” Declan agrees.
Declan can’t believe Grayson let things slide as much as they did. All the guys put their best into it, but Grayson was distracted with winning Ree over. He doesn’t blame him. Not at all. He trusted his team to have his back and find the fucker and they didn’t…
They let him down…
If anything happens to her…
Declan shuts the thought out before it has time to take root.
“Koby and Colt are on the horn to Metro PD in Des Moines, getting the low down on anything that may have happened when she lived there,” Declan assures him. “We’ll find her.”
“Chief,” Chance calls, walking towards them with Jimmy Phillips, the town gossip.
“What’s up?” Declan asks.
“Jimmy may have some useful information,” he tells them.
“What?” Grayson snaps.
“Keep your knickers on,” Jimmy snaps back. “No reason to be rude. Shit, son. You’re not the only one concerned.”
“Jimmy…” Grayson says warningly.
“C’mon Jimmy,” Declan interjects before things get out of hand. “What information do you have?”
“Well,” the old man begins, “I saw ya’ll drive into town like a bunch of bats out of hell and wondered what the hell was going on. Then when I went to Josie’s, like I do every morning, and saw that it was closed, I knew something had to be going on. So, I came down here to see what it was.”
“Jimmy,” Grayson growls, his face a mask of thunder and fury. “You’ve got thirty seconds before I strangle the story out of you.”
“Christ, okay!” Jimmy throws his hands up in a surrendering gesture, looking rightly terrified.
Declan can’t find it in him to feel too sorry for the nice old man.
He should know that you don’t keep a man from his woman. A woman he deeply cares about.
And especially not a man like Grayson Cole.
“So, once Amanda Bishop filled me in on what was happening, I remembered something from the other day.” Grayson leans threateningly toward Jimmy, who, intimidated, begins to speed his story up, “Well, I was sitting on my bench and noticed a new guy come out of the bank. I tried to stop him and chat him up, but he was really fidgety and nervous-like. Acted like he was agitated and in a hurry.”
Grayson’s eyes widen and he sucks in a sharp, yet quiet, breath, “Tell me everything about him,” he orders Jimmy.
Then, Jimmy Phillips, the man who aspires to know every piece of information about everyone in the town of Belton, proved there was a reason God saw fit to put such a nos
y old man on this green Earth…
***
“You shouldn’t have fought me. You shouldn’t have fought me. You shouldn’t have. You shouldn’t. You-shouldn’t-You-shouldn’t-You-shouldn’t have!” he bellows, pacing back and forth across the creaky wood floor, gun in his left hand and a knife in his right.
Okay… This is so not a good situation to be in…
Why did I have to go for a freaking walk?
To be in touch with nature?
Fuck nature!
It has probably lead to my demise!
Poor Grayson.
He must be out of his mind…
I know I would be if anything happened to him…
I wish he was here…
“I saw you,” he rambles on.
Jerry, is his name.
Jerry Pint.
Once I woke up in this little one room shack, I recognized him immediately.
I slept with him about three years ago. It was the night of the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure.
I went to Joker’s (a nice little bar downtown) after and met Jerry.
He was sweet and cute. He was quite a bit taller than me with shaggy blonde hair and green eyes, shy and maybe a little insecure about himself, but I never saw this coming.
I should have known.
My fucking, fucking, coyote ugly life…
Coming back to bite me in the ass…
I woke up the morning after, at his apartment, and did my usual sneak out routine. I never heard from him again. Or saw him.
Hell, I never even gave him another thought really.
Fuck, I can be such a slut.
“I saw you with him,” he looks at me, the knife in his hand pointing in my direction.
He doesn’t say anything else.
Just stares at me, his face severe and very angry.
Am I supposed to answer him?
“You…” I cough to clear my throat, “You did?” I raise my brows.
What the hell am I supposed to say?
I know I shouldn’t do anything to upset him.
If a man has a gun and a knife pointed at you, you do what the hell he wants you to do.
But I don’t know what the hell he wants me to do…
My Coyote Ugly Life Page 22
