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I nodded, gritting my teeth hard enough to crack enamel if I wasn’t careful.

“What was that all about?” Riss pestered from the back seat.

Ben wasted no time turning the Jeep around and heading back down the drive. We passed a beat-up old car with more paint patch jobs than the original dark maroon color, but what caught my eye and made me do a double take was the driver.

“Wait! Did you guys see that? That was Fox.” White knuckled, wide eyed, staring back at us like he was disturbed to see me again.

“Fox from the creek?” Angie chirped.

The one and only.

“Pull over.”

Ben did a double take. “What?”

“Pull over! Pull over! Pull over!” I beat his arm incessantly until he nearly put us in a ditch to stop the car.

“What are you—”

“I’m gonna sneak back and listen to what this family meeting is about tonight. I think Arthur is only giving us half of the truth to seem compliant, but he’s definitely hiding something. I’m not getting the whole picture from him or anyone in his family.”

“They could just be a family that keeps to themselves,” Ben offered, a helpful hint in his words.

I didn’t have time for assumptions though.

“No stone unturned,” I muttered as I glanced to the backseat for support from the girls.

Angie looked petrified, chewing on her fern-painted nails, her caramel hair a curtain around her face.

Riss nodded resolutely. “No stone unturned,” she echoed. “Let me know if you need back up.”

“You guys stay here. I don’t want to get caught, and more people will make more noise in the woods.”

“Alright,” Ben said on a drawn-out sigh. “We’ll be right here keeping the car warm.”

He probably thought it was a waste of time, and maybe he was right, but I would rather waste time going over every possibility rather than risk missing something important.

I darted off the road and into the woods, ignoring the scream of pain from my stiffened ankle. It would just have to get used to the constant movement. There was no time to rest.

Not until I found my sister.

Chapter 11

Crouched in a thicket of bull thistles around the side of the cabin, I tugged the knit cap further down my ears, only covering the red, raw tips, and pushed locks of waist-length hair back to incline my ear to the front porch.

“I don’t want to see your little girlfriend around here again. You hear me, Fox?”

Standing three steps below Arthur, Fox argued, “She’s not my girlfriend. I told you, I don’t know her.”

“If I see her around here again—”

“I have nothing to do with her,” Fox growled, his pitch deepening with livid ire.

Movement caught my eye to the left of the cabin. Shadows played on the snow, coming from the forest, and the crunch of boots breaking through the ice sheet approached. Only Fox’s car stalled in the driveway, but there were a few sets of footfalls all around us.

Fox’s head jerked, eyes snagging on the same shadows I noticed a half beat earlier. A waft of musk and animal scent prickled my nose, so much stronger than it had been the first day I arrived on the Winter property.

He staggered down the last step, backing up on the gravel drive, nearing his car that he’d left running, door open, as if he expected to get back in and drive off at a moment’s notice. “Arthur... No. Don’t do this,” he pleaded, voice rasping.