Just then, another Dorsey cousin, Ethan, looked in. “Jeff just called. They’re looking for volunteers. A hiker reported gunshots near where Ryder Donovan was working. Now they can’t get ahold of him.”
“Let’s go.” Will fired out of his office with Ethan following. “Where? When?”
Elizabeth stared after them as their voices faded down the hall. Was Ryder shot? Who would shoot a WMA officer?
She jerked into motion and ran after her cousins, but they’d already disappeared down the steps and out the loading dock door. Back in her office, she texted Jeff, who never responded.
What should she do? She couldn’t just stand here, waiting. But the Cheatham Wildlife Management Area was twenty thousand acres. Ryder could be anywhere. Bleeding. Dying. Alone.
She suddenly felt cold and reached for her sweater. He couldn’t be out there alone. Dying. It wouldn’t be fair after living most of his life alone, his parents off doing whatever they wanted, leaving him behind. Elizabeth may have had her issues with her parents over the years, but she’d never come home to an empty, dark house.
After a moment, she gathered herself and called Will. His voicemail answered.
“What’s going on? Is Ryder all right? What happened? Where are you? Call me!” She tossed her phone onto her desk.
Ryder exited her life the summer she left for college. She rarely thought of him. Even when she was sick and dramatically wondered if her life was over. Now she worried about him, sensing something wild and strange. As if losing him would cost her something very dear.
Like…her future.
Elizabeth launched to her feet and paced around her desk, then down the hall to the soda machine, where she punched the button for a root beer. Dorsey provided free sodas, teas, and bottled water to employees. She popped the top and took a long drink. Calm down. He’ll be fine. Ryder is a smart guy.
Back at her desk, she tried to work but kept picturing him from Sunday afternoon, sitting at Granny’s long picnic table under the giant oak, everyone talking at once, passing plates, asking “Scoop me some green beans, will you?” or “Can you ladle on some gravy? More than that—I want my food to swim.”
Ryder talked about hunting season with Ethan, Jeff, and Uncle Mac, debating the superiority of the bow hunter over one with a gun. He looked so handsome in his white button-down shirt and jeans, vintage Pumas, and his dark hair somehow accenting his bright brown eyes and high cheekbones. She’d been staring at him when he suddenly looked up, locked eyes with her, and smiled. She instantly looked away.
She startled when her phone pinged. Jeff. Answering her text.
Jeff
Don’t know anything yet. Pray.
Pray? She had no grid for prayer, but this was for Ryder. “Help. Please.” That was a prayer, right?
Okay, she had work to do. A girl aiming to work for a Fortune 100 company could not be so easily distracted. In the middle of reconciling accounts, she came across a late payment flag for the Cheatham WMA. Ryder’s name was on the order.
Elizabeth scanned the invoice, glancing at the balance. Eight thousand four hundred eighty-four dollars for one hundred seventy-five board feet of cherrywood from the Dorsey Mill side of the company.
That was a lot of money. What was Cheatham WMA doing with cherrywood? What was Ryder doing? Just last week, he paid for chicken boxes out of his own pocket because his office canceled the order. But they approved this? Then didn’t pay?
Never mind that this seemed like a lot of wood for Dorsey to produce. In her five weeks on the job, Elizabeth had learned Dorsey—a furniture company—also provided lumber to select customers, holdovers from the Dorsey Lumberyard days. Then Great-Grandpa had a vision for fine furniture and changed the family’s destiny.
Clicking through Cheatham invoices—there weren’t many until a few months ago—then suddenly, orders for cherry. All with Ryder’s name. Elizabeth reached for the in-house phone to buzz Grant Hansen, the production floor manager.
“Grant, it’s Elizabeth.” The motors of the machinery filled the background. “Do we mill lumber for Cheatham WMA?”
“On occasion. Maybe for a special repair or small construction project.”
“Cherry?”
He laughed. “Not unless they’re building a forest castle. They usually order basic pine or spruce. We reserve all our cherry for furniture.”
“But recently we fulfilled a cherry order for Cheatham. To the tune of eight thousand dollars.”
“Can’t be.”
“Yeah, three months ago. Eight thousand four hundred eighty-four dollars.”
Grant let out a low whistle. “I’d have to sign off on that much going out. That’s about a hundred seventy-five board feet. Is someone fixing up a floor? That’d be one nice floor. Who fulfilled the order?”
