“Don’t try to shield me,” Endicott said. “If Jackson was buried and you haven’t found him by now, he’s dead, isn’t he?”
Scott nodded. “I’m sorry,” he whispered.
Endicott stared out across the snow again, blinking rapidly. “We might not find him until spring,” he muttered.
“We’re going to bring heavy equipment out here to dig starting tomorrow,” the sheriff said. “We need to uncover all the evidence we can, and if your boy is here, we’ll find him.”
The sheriff led Endicott away. Scott started toward the parking area, then stopped and scanned the scene for Lily and Shelby. Lines of volunteers continued to probe the snow, but Adam had agreed there was no need to exhaust the dogs further, now that the chance of finding anyone alive was virtually zero. Yet there were Lily and Shelby, on the far side of the slide, the dog’s plumed tail waving like a signal flag.
Scott trudged over to them. “What do you think you’re doing?” he demanded. “Are you trying to kill your dog?”
She stared at him, wide-eyed. “I’ve been trying to get Shelby to come back to the car for the last hour,” she said. “But she keeps searching this same section of the slide. She actually tried to lead me into the woods three times, but when I follow her, she loses the trail after about a dozen yards.”
“You’re the one in charge, not your dog.”
“But why is she acting this way?” Lily asked. “She’s never done anything like this before.”
“She’s frustrated because she didn’t find a person, only a pack. And it’s obvious to anyone she’s exhausted.”
Shelby lay on the snow, tongue lolling, though her head remained up, ears alert.
Lily shifted the leash to her other hand. “Come on, girl,” she said. “We have to call it a day.”
The dog rose, but looked back toward the edge of the snowfield, not moving. “Come!” Lily commanded.
Shelby’s ears twitched, but she didn’t move, not even when Lily yanked on her leash. Clearly, Lily hadn’t taught the dog who was in charge. “You’re wasting my time,” Scott said, and bent and scooped the dog up. Then he stalked back across the snow, Lily trailing behind him.
The dog was small for a Malinois, but she still weighed at least fifty pounds. Scott, worn out from the day’s activities, struggled to carry her over the rough terrain. “Put her down,” Lily said. “I can carry her.”
Scott could hardly manage. There was no way Lily, who looked ready to drop where she stood, was going to be able to carry the dog. As for Shelby, she had become an inert mass in Scott’s arms, like a dog cast in lead.
When they exited the avalanche field he did set the dog down. Lily grabbed the leash and stalked ahead, pulling the dog after her. She might be tired, but clearly she was angry, too. She was waiting beside the car when he reached it. “I would never do anything to harm my dog,” she said.
“I don’t believe you would, intentionally,” he said. “But the thing about dogs is that they are so devoted and tenacious that they will literally work until they drop. It’s up to us to see that that doesn’t happen.”
She loaded Shelby into the car, then slid into the driver’s seat. “I’m sorry,” she said as she started the engine. “I was too focused on finding Jackson, and not enough on Shelby. I won’t let that happen again.”
He nodded and fastened his seat belt. She backed the car out of the parking spot. “Nobody feels good about days like today,” he said.
“How could we find Jackson’s pack and not find Jackson?” she asked. “If he was skinning up that ridge, he would have had it on.”
“Maybe he stopped to get something out of it and took it off right before the slide triggered,” Scott said. He could picture it. Skinning was hard work. Maybe Jackson wanted to shed a layer of clothing, or put away his gloves, or check the water level in his hydration bladder. “When the slide released, it would have been torn from his hand.”
“Then where is Jackson?”
“He could be anywhere in that debris field,” Scott said. “Under feet of snow.”
“What if he’s not there?” she asked. “What if he got pushed out of the way to the side? That’s why I kept following Shelby into the woods. I thought Jackson might have run in that direction.”
“If that happened, why didn’t he come back when he saw all the searchers?” Scott asked. “Even if he didn’t know his kidnapper was dead, he should have known there were people in that crowd who would help him.”
“I don’t know,” she said. “And I don’t know why Shelby lost the scent trail every time after only a few feet.”
She stared straight ahead, and he wondered if she was crying. “I’m sorry about Jackson,” he said. “Knowing him the way you do makes this harder.”
She sniffed, but still didn’t look at him.
“I saw his father a few minutes before I found you,” he said. “He identified the pack as Jackson’s. He said he didn’t recognize the man. The sheriff said he hopes they can match the man’s fingerprints to a known person.”
