Each empty place tightened the fear, not because empty meant safe, but because empty meant we were behind.
Holt didn’t talk much; every so often, he’d point at a track, and we’d both lean out to study it, debating whether it was fresh enough to matter.
Late in the afternoon, we stopped at a turnout overlooking a shallow valley. From up there, the land rolled in soft lines, patches of trees breaking the fields, coulees cutting scars into the ground. The kind of view that usually makes people feel small in a good way.
Today, it made me furious.
“She’s out there,” I said, voice low, and it wasn’t a guess. It was a fact that lived in my bones.
Holt’s gaze stayed on the horizon. “Yeah.”
“I should’ve pushed harder for her to keep someone with her,” I said before I could stop myself. “I should’ve taken her seriously when she looked like she was about to crack.”
Holt finally looked at me. “You can’t rewind. You can only move forward.”
I nodded, because he was right and because it didn’t help. We got back on the horses and kept going.
Dusk started to creep in when Travis called.
“I’ve got something,” he said, and the words hit like a jolt of electricity. “Not her, but something.”
“Where?” I demanded.
“Old logging road off the south loop,” he said. “There’s a set of fresh tracks going in. Deep. Like a heavier vehicle. Looks recent.”
My grip tightened on the wheel. “Any sign of her truck?”
“No,” Travis said. “Just the tracks and a spot where someone pulled off into the trees.”
“Stay there,” I said. “Don’t go in alone.”
“I’m not stupid,” Travis replied, but his voice was tight. “Get here.”
I kicked the sides of my gelding and took off like a bee stung the horse.
Holt kept pace beside me, silent, braced, eyes scanning everything we passed. The light turned gold, then amber, then thin.
When we reached Travis, he was standing at the edge of the logging road, arms crossed, jaw set. Evan was there too, standing beside him, dust still settling like he’d ridden in fast.
Travis pointed. “There,” he said.
I got off and crouched, studying the tracks. They were fresh. The edges were crisp. The gravel was disturbed in a way that hadn’t had time to settle.
A vehicle had gone in.
Not long ago.
My pulse hammered. “How far does the road go?”
“Couple kilometers,” Travis said. “Then it dead ends near an old line shack. Been empty for years.”
Holt’s gaze flicked to mine. “We go in together.”
I nodded once. “Together.”
We moved slowly down the logging road, staying on the grass so we made minimal noise. The trees thickened, the light dimmed, and the world felt like it was closing in, even though the prairie wasn’t supposed to close around anything.
The road ended where Travis said it would, at a clearing that held the remains of a small structure. Not a cabin, not really. A shack with a sagging roof and grey boards, the kind of place built for temporary work and then forgotten when the work moved on.
