Derek caught up to Artie, running just behind her and to her right. She threw him a grin that glowed with anticipation and relief. It was impossible not to smile back, although he wasn’t counting his missing chicks until they were back in their dad’s arms.
Sure enough, Puck lost the trail at the first line of trees. After a few aborted attempts at picking it up again, he started spinning in circles.
“Sorry, guys,” Janelle said with an apologetic grimace as she reeled in the extra line until he was next to her. “He’s done.”
“He gave us a direction,” Rob told her. “That reduces our search area by about seventy-five percent. Not bad for a puppy in training. George? Any sign?”
While Puck had been trying to find the lost trail, George had been hunting for footprints or broken twigs—any indication of which way the girls had gone. Without pausing in his search, the big man shook his head.
“Shoot,” Artie muttered. “I’d already been picturing the magical reunion scene with the girls, Steve, and the dog.”
Derek squeezed her shoulder and then reluctantly let his hand drop. He couldn’t help touching her whenever an opportunity presented itself. “Nothing’s ever easy, is it?”
“Since we don’t have a trail, let’s start a grid search.” As the sheriff unfolded a map, the wind snapped at it, almost ripping it from his fingers. He looked up, taking in the descending clouds that were swallowing the tops of the evergreens. “Pair up. With this weather coming, I don’t want anyone out there alone.”
Taking a half step closer to Artie, Derek bumped her with his shoulder. “Partners?” he mouthed, feeling like a junior high kid teaming up in gym class. He felt a surge of pleasure when Artie nodded.
Rob divided the search area on the map into four squares.
“How does he know how big to make it?” Artie whispered.
“He estimated how fast the girls could travel and multiplied that by how long they’ve been missing.”
She made a face. “Oh. Sorry for the stupid question.”
Although Derek had a joke about being used to her stupid questions hovering at the tip of his tongue, he swallowed it back and just smiled at her. It felt too soon to start teasing her like that again, especially in the current situation.
When Janelle returned after putting Puck in her SUV, she had four more people with her.
“Chief and the rest of the guys’ll be here as soon as they can,” one of them said, giving Steve a sympathetic clap on the upper arm. “Another arson.”
The rest of the firefighters groaned.
“That little shit, whoever he is, picked a hell of a day to play with matches again,” Ian grumbled.
“The chief’s wife went to your house,” the first firefighter told Steve. “She’ll watch the boys and be there in case the girls circled around and managed to get home.”
“Good.” Steve’s voice was rusty, and he couldn’t quite manage a smile of thanks.
The sheriff cleared his throat, drawing everyone’s attention back to him. “Let’s get started. We’ll divide into four groups, each one led by a Search and Rescue member. I’ll be staying at base camp, heading up command.”
Derek and Artie ended up in group three, along with Callum and Lou—an odd couple pairing that Derek made a mental note to mock as soon as the crisis was over. Judging by the frequent bewildered glances Cal was shooting the newest dive-team member, he was well on his way to being smitten. Steve and Ian rounded out their group, with George in the lead.
“Shouldn’t you have a partner?” Artie asked George as the seven of them headed to the start point of their quadrant. The burly man just gave her a look and walked between two trees, forcing her to drop behind him or run face-first into a trunk. Derek held back a laugh at her expression.
“I don’t think George Holloway does the whole partner thing,” he whispered once he caught up with her.
“Or the whole talking thing,” she muttered back, making it even harder not to snicker.
“Zoe!” Steve called. “Maya!” The crack in his voice erased any desire to laugh. Derek focused on looking around him as he walked, trying to pick up any movement or color that was out of place, which might possibly belong to one of the missing girls. There was a dusting of snow, although not enough to hold a boot print, and the ground was more rocks than dirt. It felt as if they were on a slight upward incline as they made their way between the thickening trees.
At George’s grunt, they stopped. Derek assumed that they were at the eastern border of their quadrant. Between billows of wind, he could hear the other groups calling the girls’ names.
George lined them up by pointing at each pair and then at the spot where he wanted them. The big guy acted like every word cost him a million bucks. The three couples were spread far enough apart that Derek could see only an occasional flash of purple from Lou’s coat, and he couldn’t make out Steve and Ian at all. The clouds had fully descended, draping them in a gray fog, and Derek suddenly felt isolated. He took a step closer to Artie.
“You okay?” she asked without looking at him. She was concentrating on the compass in her hand.
“Fine.” His voice sounded tense even to his own ears as he looked around at their rapidly decreasing circle of visibility. “Just don’t like this weather.”
