Something’s wrong the second I open the door.
It’s not subtle, not the kind of feeling I have to stop and question. It hits fast and hard, a clean instinct that settles into my bones before my mind can catch up, the same instinct that’s kept me alive on this mountain longer than most men last.
The cabin’s too quiet.
I step inside and close the door behind me slower than usual, my gaze sweeping the room in one controlled pass. “Maddie.”
No answer.
My jaw tightens. She was here. She should still be here.
I move deeper into the cabin, my boots silent against the floor as my eyes track every detail automatically, the couch, the table, the kitchen counter, each space registering in a fraction of a second. The glass I gave her earlier is still there, half full, untouched.
“Maddie.”
Still nothing.
The air shifts, something cold sliding down my spine, and then I see it. The note. Folded once and placed in the center of the table like she knew I’d find it immediately, like she wanted me to.
I don’t reach for it right away because I already know I’m not going to like what it says, but I pick it up anyway because there isn’t a version of this where I don’t.
I won’t be the reason you get hurt.
That’s it. No explanation, no plan, no indication of where she went or how far. Just that.
My hand tightens on the paper, crumpling it slightly before I force it flat again, dragging in a slow breath and holding it there until the edge of anger settles into something colder, something more useful.
“She ran,” I mutter.
I turn and scan the room again, sharper this time, looking for anything else out of place. Her bag is gone. Her camera too.
She didn’t panic. She planned this.
That makes it worse.
“You don’t get to decide that,” I say under my breath, already moving.
I grab my jacket, my keys, my rifle, and head for the door. The cold hits hard the second I step outside, biting through the heat already building under my skin, but I barely register it. All I feel is the shift, the way this has changed.
This isn’t protection anymore. This is a hunt.
And she just made herself the easiest target on the mountain.
“Damn it, Maddie.”
I drop low immediately, scanning the ground, reading the dirt, the thin layer of snow, the slight impressions left behind. Her tracks are easy to find, too easy. She didn’t even try to hide them, which tells me everything I need to know about her state of mind.
“She’s scared,” I mutter.
And scared people make mistakes. Big ones.
I follow the tracks into the tree line, my focus narrowing until the rest of the world fades out, every broken branch, everydisturbed patch of ground, every shift in the terrain feeding me exactly what I need.
She’s moving too fast. She’s not pacing herself. She’s running.
“Slow down,” I mutter, even though I know she can’t hear me, and even if she could, she wouldn’t listen.
That’s the problem.
