Ignoring the tendrils of concern trying to wrap around his heart, Trace checked every room on the second floor. Kip was not there. Finally, he jogged back downstairs and entered the kitchen again. “Kip isn’t in our room. I didn’t see anything to make methink she’d been there since this morning. I’ve checked the second floor. Does anyone know where she might be?”
As the girls exchanged glances, Ruby stepped away from the sink, drying her hands on her apron. “She didn't come back in here. Girls, did you see her?”
One by one, the girls shook their heads.
Trace’s heart slammed once, hard, against his ribs like a warning shot. “None of you saw her?”
“I didn't see her come down the stairs. But then again, I didn't see her go up them either,” Kenzie said.
Tildi nodded, concern evident in her eyes. “We were too busy stringing the popcorn and cranberries. We should have paid more attention.”
Great, now Tildi felt guilty. Boone was going to kill him, but Trace wasn’t sure what else to do. He needed to find Kip. Now. “I just wondered if you’d seen anything. It isn’t your fault, little one.”
“That's true,” Joy agreed. “But we can help you look now. It is a really big house.”
Twenty minutes later, Trace knew two things without a shadow of a doubt. Kip was not in the lodge. Visibility was almost zero with all the snow coming down. Even though he knew he wouldn't see her, he looked out the back windows again. He was wasting time. His little fox would never go out in a snowstorm. Not willingly anyway.
Ruby wrung her hands, eyes shining with unshed tears. “She said she had a headache. I’m so sorry, Trace. I thought she went up to lie down.”
“It’s not your fault, Ruby. I know how much you love Kip and all of us. Can you tell me how long ago she went upstairs?”
Ruby’s hands twisted in her apron until her knuckles turned white. “I-I don’t know. She said she was going upstairs after she walked Silas to the door. I was taking cookies out of the oven.”
Trace’s spine snapped straight, and that uneasy feeling in the pit of his stomach intensified. “Silas? Silas Holt?”
Ruby nodded. “That’s right. He stopped by with a wedding present from Jack. It was cold out, so he came in and had a cup of coffee. He left, I don’t know, maybe twenty minutes later. Kip walked him to the door since she was going upstairs to rest?—”
Trace’s blood turned to ice in his veins. Sev’s earlier words echoed in his mind: Your spy will be someone ordinary. Someone who wouldn’t stand out. Trace clenched his fists. Someone like Silas Holt. “Silas was the only person who stopped by?”
Ruby’s face paled. “You don’t think— Silas? We’ve known him since he moved here. He’s a neighbor. A… a friend?—”
Trace was already moving. He hit the mudroom at a run. Shoving the door open, he stepped into the storm's fury. The wind slammed him sideways, and the snow stung his face like buckshot. The snow had already covered any tracks from the porch to the driveway, but just past the overhang, a small, dark object lay buried in the snow.
He dropped to his knees, his breath fogging hard and fast. Kip’s cedar box. The carved fox on the lid gazed up at him. He flipped it open with fingers that no longer felt the cold. He felt empty, just like she must feel, because her smooth river-stone promise pebble sat in its spot.
Standing, he trudged back toward the lodge. He closed his fist around the box so hard the sharp edges cut into his palm. She was out there alone. She didn’t even have her promise pebble to hold on to, to help her remember he’d always come for her. “I’m coming, little fox,” he cried out to the storm, as if the wind might carry his words to her. “I’ll find you. Just hold on.”
He ran back inside to grab his rifle, extra ammunition, and one of the ranch’s sat-phones. Reception would be patchy at best in a storm like this, but it was better than nothing.
Then something caught the corner of his eye. Kip’s coat, hat,and gloves lay in a pile with all the other girls’ things. “You are fucking kiddin’ me!”
She was out there with someone who wanted her dead, and she had no protection from the freezing cold. When he got her back home, he was going to hold her for a month, which was good, because once he finished blistering her backside, it would be at least that long before she could sit down.
Snatching up her things, he headed toward the mudroom door. Boone, Chance, and Tanner burst inside at the exact same moment. Snow crusted their coats, and their faces were granite hard.
Trace didn’t waste any time with drawn-out explanations. “Silas took Kip.”
“We know,” Boone said. “Ruby called just as we got to the barn. We just came in to grab our guns. Griff’s meeting us when we get back out there with four pairs of night vision goggles so we can spot her through the snowfall.”
Panic was slowing his thinking, but if his brothers were here to help, they had a fighting chance. “I’m glad you’re here because I got no idea where to start looking. Holt’s tracks are long gone. I know we’re gonna find her. There is no other option. The question is how.”
Tanner’s jaw clenched. “I saw taillights heading across the far side of the north pasture about twenty minutes ago. Tried to raise the lodge on the radio to find out who’d be out in this shitshow, but the storm’s messin’ with the sat phones. I thought it was one of the hands running late.”
Boone’s eyes turned deadly. “North pasture makes sense. My guess is Silas thinks he can do whatever he has planned for Kip, and then keep right on going.” Turning to the kitchen, he called out, “Ruby, keep trying the phones until you get Jack Clark. Bring him up to speed. And make sure the doors of the lodge stay lockedand the curtains stay closed. I don’t see Silas coming back this way, but we aren’t taking any chances.”
Chance was already moving, grabbing boxes of .223 and checking the AR slung across his chest. “All right. Let’s head out and get Trace’s girl. Joy, behave while I’m gone. There’s still time for Santa to find switches for all of you. Hear me?”
Kenzie appeared in the doorway, clutching several packets of hand warmers and Kip’s scarf. Tears carved clean tracks down her cheeks. “She’ll need these when you bring her home.”
