Danger Deception Devotion The Firsts

by Lorhainne Eckhart

  “Joe, it’s too dark out. Wait until morning, until it’s light,” she said.

  “No,” he snapped, and he gave her only a passing glance as he shook his head, pulling open the hall closet, where he kept his backpack and some gear for when he went into the bush. He froze and took in the neat and tidy shelves. The towels, sheets, and blankets that had been shoved in there were now folded neatly and sorted in an orderly fashion. He started rummaging. “Where’s my backpack? I had a tarp folded in here, too, and my pocket saw…”

  “Joe, stop. I just organized and moved all that junk out. I put it in a box in your garage. I can’t believe you would have stuff like that inside,” she said.

  Right now, Joe wanted to wrap his hands around her neck and give her a shake. “I don’t have time for this!” he snapped, striding to the attached garage, which was filled with junk and an old 75 Chevelle he planned to restore one day. “Bag up some food for me,” he told her. “I don’t know how long it will take me to find Ryan.”

  As he strode to the garage, he didn’t miss the hiss of something, whether it was irritation or annoyance, from Sara as she stomped into the kitchen, hopefully to do what he’d asked.

  It took Joe twenty minutes to grab his backpack, tarp, flashlight, pocket knife, and some rope. He tossed everything, including some blankets, into the horse trailer, loading his palomino, Mercedes, in. Sara came out as he closed up the gate and handed him a bag.

  “There’s a couple sandwiches, a bottle of water, and some snacks,” she said. She touched his arm. “Joe, I hope you find Ryan. Hurry home.”

  “Thank you,” he muttered. He set the bag on the front seat and climbed in, driving away without another word.

  Chapter Thirteen

  It was pitch black when he drove back down Margaret’s driveway over the ruts, hauling the trailer in, and his headlights flashed on her horse, saddled with what looked like gear or a tarp tied behind it. There was a light on outside the barn.

  He shoved the truck in park and went around to open the trailer, leading out Mercedes and tying him to the post close to Margaret’s horse.

  “What are you doing?” he said as Margaret went around her horse, tightening the cinch.

  “I’m going with you,” she said.

  “Woman, I don’t have time to be babysitting you out there. I’m going to be moving fast,” he snapped as he stomped away, opening the side trailer door, carting out the blanket and saddle for his horse. He just about stepped on Margaret when he turned around.

  “I’m still going with you. For one, I’m the last person you’d have to babysit. Neither you or Ryan should be around Storm. I still can’t believe Ryan took him and saddled him all by himself. He must have been desperate as all hell, Joe, to stoop to that. He’s still terrified of that horse, and that tells me a lot about his state of mind. No, Joe, I know these backwoods very well.” She reached inside the trailer and snatched the bridle for the palomino. Neither said a word as they saddled his horse.

  When he climbed into the saddle, his backpack on his back and his gear wrapped in a tarp tied behind him, he faced Margaret in the dark as she walked her horse forward. “You want to take the lead? It’s pretty dark still,” he said.

  She extended the large beam flashlight, and he took it.

  “Stay close,” he said. Then he turned his horse and guided it to the trail, the light bouncing on the ground as he looked for any sign of tracks. The pouring rain was quickly washing away any traces of where his son had gone.

  ****

  Margaret followed Joe for what felt like hours. She could sense his frustration, his worry, and could hear the hoarseness in his voice as he called out to Ryan hundreds of times.

  His horse slipped in the mud a couple times when they went up the slope of one of the trails that headed higher into the hills. Light had just begun to tip over the horizon, and shades of red cut through the clouds as the rain started to taper off. Margaret could feel the mist from all the wet, and she listened to the early morning sounds of life in the forest.

  “Joe, there’s a stream up ahead. We need to give the horses some water and a break.”

  “No, we need to keep moving,” he snapped. She could see that he’d easily run that horse into the ground unless someone reasoned with him.

  “Joe, that horse is going to drop unless you give him a break, and then where will you be? Let them graze for a bit, and we can figure out where to go from here. I haven’t seen any tracks for a while.”

  She could see the way he tensed and then spurred his horse toward the stream that was bubbling ahead of them. He said nothing as he dismounted, letting his horse drink, and Margaret joined him. She took in the tightness in his expression. He wiped some water over his face and cupped some in his hands, taking a drink. His face was dripping when he glanced over at her. Margaret reached into her saddle bag, which was filled with some bottled water, dried nuts, and fruit, and pulled out two granola bars. “Here,” she said, reaching over Angel’s saddle to extend the bar to him.

  “No, you keep it.” He waved it away.

  “Joe, eat something. We need to stay sharp if we’re going to find Ryan. If you let your blood sugar fall, it’s going to slow us down.”

  He let out an exasperated laugh. “Always the doctor, are you?” he said. His words felt more like a sharp slap, and maybe that was mirrored on her face, because he took the bar, ripped it open, and shoved it in his mouth in two bites. “I’m not going to apologize to you every time you misread what I say, Margaret,” he said, gazing across the stream and then around him. “Any idea which way to go?” he asked.

  She took some comfort in what he had said, realizing she was being too sensitive. He was prickly, too, which wasn’t helping the situation any. “I don’t know if Ryan would cross the stream. Storm is…I never tried him around water. When you and Ryan would go out on the horses, where would you go?” she asked.

  Angel finished drinking from the stream and brought her head around to Margaret, who led her over to the edge of the bank, where there were greens and small shrubs she could graze on. Joe followed.

  “Haven’t gone out with Ryan for a long time. It’s been a few years, but I took him camping one time. We rode up on the horses to a small lake, pitched a tent, fished and spent the night. It was the same lake me and my brothers used to go to as kids.” He was staring off into the hills with a wistful look.

  “How many brothers do you have, again?” she asked. She remembered the Wilde brothers. The holy terrors of the county, all damn good looking, too.

  “Four: Logan, Ben, Samuel, and baby Jake.” He glanced back at her. “Didn’t think you remembered them. Logan enlisted in the Army the day he turned eighteen. I was twelve then. That was the year you showed up here.”

  She flushed, because she remembered too well being dumped by her mother, who was too interested in fast-tracking her corporate career and dating her boss to take care of a daughter. Margaret wondered whether her mother knew how much she had figured out before that fateful afternoon. Her mother had come storming through the door and made Margaret pack everything she owned all because a teacher had called her at work to talk about Margaret’s surly attitude and use of “the F word” in class. “I didn’t exactly fit in,” she said, trying to make light of her awkward years. “What about your other brothers? They were younger,” she said. She needed to get the light off her, get him talking.

  “Ben is one of them swanky oil execs. Jake and Samuel all took off to the big city, Seattle. Jake was always into football, and I know he was coaching for a while. Samuel is finishing up law school down in Boise. I’m pretty sure we were responsible for turning Mom gray long before her time. Man, I miss them,” he said wistfully.

  “I envy you,” she said, and he gave her an odd look that had her stammering. “I mean, having brothers, growing up together. It was just me and Grandpa, kind of lonely.”

  “It wasn’t always great. There wasn’t enough room, with five boys bunked into a sma
ll three-bedroom house. We were crammed in pretty tight, no privacy. It led to lots of fights, bloody noses.” He chirped and pulled his horse from the long grass. “Let’s go. That spot I was talking about is about a three-hour ride north.” He mounted his horse, and the leather of the saddle squeaked.

  “Come on, Angel. Thatta girl,” Margaret said. She led her horse over beside Joe and climbed up into the saddle, resting her hand on the saddle horn and taking the reins. When she looked up at Joe, he was watching her in a way that was far too familiar.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Every time Joe looked behind him as they wound their way deeper into the forest, Margaret was right there. Her horse picked its way through the slick, overgrown brush. The trail was starting to widen, and the trees weren’t as thick. The light from the clear sky was starting to filter through.

  “Ryan!” he shouted again. He kept calling every five minutes. His throat was dry, and he coughed.

  “Joe, I’ll call him. Give your voice a break,” Margaret said. Her horse stumbled. “Easy, girl.”

  “You okay?” he asked, catching the way her horse tripped and then quickly righted itself.

  “Joe, how close are we, do you think?” she asked, holding her reins in one hand and resting the other on her leg. Her dark slicker covered her jeans, and her hair was tucked under her wide-brimmed hat.

  “Can’t be much farther. I don’t understand why we haven’t seen any sign of him.” Joe squinted and couldn’t hold back his frustration. “Dammit, that kid…why?” He didn’t realize he had said it out loud until Margaret came up beside him.

  “Joe, don’t be so hard on yourself. It won’t solve anything.”

  “Why? You blamed me, and you were right. I asked Sara to marry me for selfish reasons. I just told myself she’d start to get used to Ryan and she just needs time to be a mother. It’s new to her. I knew Ryan was frustrated, but I thought it was because of all the women I’ve dated.” Joe didn’t look at her, because all the women he’d dated and met for coffee over the past few years were starting to run together in his mind. What did that say about him?

  “Wasn’t there a schoolteacher in there?” she said in such a cheeky way that he realized she knew a lot more about his love life than he was comfortable with.

  “Ryan told you, didn’t he?”

  She inclined her head and smiled. “Yeah, apparently he liked her. He told me you got scared after she spent the night.”

  “What?” He pulled up his horse. “Why, that little shit.”

  “Don’t be mad at Ryan. He told me there was something like twenty women, and you had signed up for online dating. Was that how you met Sara?”

  He tightened his jaw. He couldn’t believe Ryan thought he had that many women walking through his door. He started to deny it, thinking back to the number of women he had been emailing in the beginning. There were a couple dozen, to the point that he had been getting confused. It had been like a drug, all those women available online, like a candy store. He had started meeting them. Some hadn’t matched their profiles, listing the wrong ages. Some had been overweight, and some had been so different from their profiles that he wondered why they had bothered. Then he’d met Julie, the schoolteacher. She was pretty, sweet, and she had liked Ryan. She had scared the crap out of him with how serious they had become. He hadn’t been ready for commitment then. Margaret reminded him of Julie: smart, caring, and tall.

  “Yeah, I met Sara online,” he said. “She emailed me, and we met for coffee, started dating. She was the first one who made me laugh. So, what about you? Are you dating anyone?” he asked. He didn’t know why, because he was pretty sure she didn’t have a guy stashed off somewhere.

  She shook her head and flushed, appearing to stiffen. Maybe he had hit a sore spot.

  “Leave anyone behind in Seattle?” he said.

  “No, I didn’t leave anyone. He left me,” she said. She allowed her horse to fall back, but he didn’t miss the shadow of hurt that only a relationship ending badly could cause.

  “I’m sorry. What happened?” he asked, glancing back. He stopped his horse until Margaret looked up at him, and the sharp brown of her eyes, which usually made him feel like she was in control, showed a self-doubt he’d never seen before.

  “Keith,” she said. “He was an intern, like me. I chose neurology for my residency, and he chose general surgery. We were together for two years, roommates for the last six months. He got an offer from Boston and didn’t hesitate. He packed up and left, sent me a Dear Jane email. He wished me all the best, told me to have a great life.” Her voice caught, and he saw her swallow hard. She forced a smile to her lips. “Ryan!” she called out.

  Joe listened but heard nothing: not a horse, not a rustle, not a sound.

  ****

  They rode in silence, taking turns calling out for Ryan. Margaret still couldn’t believe how Joe had pulled the story of Keith out of her. It had happened right before the surgery, and she had spent days hurt over his desertion of her, as if she were nothing but someone to warm his bed at night and share the rent with. Obviously, the two years they had been together meant nothing to him. She had felt worthless, unlovable, and then her grandfather had died, all at the lowest time in her life. After the botched surgery, she had emailed Keith, believing he’d at least provide support as a friend. Instead, he had emailed back to tell her he was getting married and his fiancé wouldn’t appreciate him keeping in contact with her. It had been cold, heartless, and he had seemed disinterested in her plight. That had been the final nail in her decision to hole up alone at her grandfather’s.

  “See that clearing up ahead? That’s where the lake is, where we camped,” Joe said. He started his palomino at a trot. “Ryan, where are you?” he called, but there was no answer.

  They stopped in an open meadow, and a small lake stretched out before them, trees off in the distance. If this had been any other time, Margaret would have enjoyed taking a few hours to relax or pitch a tent in solitude, just sitting by the lake.

  “Joe, do you see anything, any sign of him?”

  “No, nothing, no tracks. I haven’t see any sign they came this way.” He moved his horse closer to the lake. “Dammit, where is that kid?”

  “Is there another way up here, another way he would have come?” Margaret asked. She needed him to think, to relax, to keep calm, because she was freaking out, thinking the worst. Ryan was riding Storm, an excitable horse, and he was a nervous boy, running from everything. It was a bad combination that could lead to tragedy, and she didn’t want to bring that up, not to Joe. God, losing a wife and then a son…what could be worse? Stop it, she snapped to herself. She had to stop where her thoughts were going.

  “No. Shit, shit!” he shouted out in frustration. “There are a bunch of trails off here, going God knows where.”

  Margaret got off Angel and led her down to the lake. “We need to rest these horses a bit. Come on down, Joe. You need to eat something.”

  He climbed out of the saddle and let his horse drink, pulling out a rope and tying the horses so they could graze.

  “Joe, we need to think about heading back,” Margaret said.

  He started shaking his head before she had even finished. “No, I’m not leaving until we find my son.”

  “Joe, we need help. This is a huge area. We need a search and rescue team. I should have thought of calling them in before we left.”

  “Yeah, I know, but you don’t have a phone,” he snapped. He pulled a cell phone from his coat pocket and held it up. “No service. There’re a lot of pockets without it around here.”

  “Okay. Let’s at least ride back far enough that you can get service. You do know where you can, right?” she asked. When she was a kid, riding the trails with her grandfather, cell phones had been big and bulky, a luxury only the wealthy had, not that there would have been service way out here, anyway.

  Joe shook his head. “I don’t know how far back we have to go. Here, I’ll give you my cell phone
. You ride back, call for help. I’ll keep going.”

  She could see the desperation on his face, and the last thing she wanted to do was get separated. He was tired, and so was she. They’d been up all night, running on adrenaline, and the horses needed a break. “No, we’ll stay together, but you need to rest first.”

  He started to shake his head again and took off his hat, running his fingers through his hair.

  “Joe, listen.” She touched his arm, which was a mistake, because just touching him had her yearning to throw her arms around him and hug him, wishing he’d pull her into his arms and hold her, too. She wanted it so badly. “The horses will be no good to us unless we give them a break. We’ve been on the move since last night.”

  Joe’s deep blue eyes were gritty and bloodshot, just like her own. Now that they had stopped, she wanted to rest, and her head was feeling heavy. Even just an hour would help. She reached behind her saddle and unwrapped the mat and bedroll, setting it on the ground, in a dry spot under the trees. When she glanced back at Joe and saw his worry and stress, she realized she’d made the right choice. Whatever happened, she couldn’t leave him alone.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Joe stared out at the miles of vast wilderness. This was just one of many hidden pockets, and he wondered whether Ryan would have thought to come way up here. They could be off, way off. After all, he’d had a hard time finding the path in the dark when he started out with Margaret in the rain. What had Ryan been thinking, heading out on Storm into this? Ryan had never ridden alone. Joe would never have allowed it.

  A hand touched his arm, and then Margaret stood right beside him with that ridiculous wide-brimmed hat that wasn’t made for a woman. She watched him, standing so close that he could feel her support, which was something he’d never felt from a woman before. He’d always been the support, the strong one, the one to hold everything together, and he liked that, but he found Margaret comforting at times, and he really liked being with her.