Fletch
“Did you ever get in touch with the woman?”
Fuck. Two minutes later and I would’ve been gone.
I turn to face Ama, who snuck up on me.
“I did. She blew me off.”
It’s not a complete lie, she was the one to hang up, but I hadn’t really tried that hard. The truth is she’s been on my mind and yesterday when I tried a few times to get in touch with her, I got bumped straight to voicemail.
Ama rolls her eyes.
“I saw Tiva last night. She says no one is actively looking for the sister. The general consensus is she changed her mind about going home and left the area.”
“Who’s to say that’s not the case?” I note.
“Antonella Freling,” Ama fires back. “And the fact her sister’s voicemail appears to be full and no one answers. Tiva has been trying.”
“We’re in the mountains, she could be out of range.”
It sounds weak, even to my own ears.
“An experienced camper going to the trouble of carrying a satellite phone with her?” Ama points out with a healthy dose of sarcasm.
And now neither of the sisters can be reached. Dammit.
I rub my face with my hands. She’s never going to let it go.
“What do you want me to do?”
“Find Antonella. She has to be staying somewhere. Can’t be too hard to find that van around town.”
She’s right. Don’t think there are too many folks here driving a van. Mostly pickups or SUVs, something with a decent suspension and, more often than not, four-wheel drive.
“Fine. I’ll have a look around town.”
Ama looks way too pleased with herself as she heads for the main house.
I’ll have a quick look around, see if I can spot her van parked at any of the hotels in town before I head up the mountain.
Forty-five minutes of my day wasted driving around six damn parking lots. I even tried calling her phone number a few times, but with the same result as yesterday.
I’m sitting in the parking lot of the last place, the Sandman Motel, trying to figure out my next move. Hotels won’t give out personal information on their guests unless you’re law enforcement, but Martha Crandall runs the Sandman. I know her son, Wyatt. He helped out at the ranch one summer a couple of years ago.
The small bell attached to the top of the door announces me. Martha is sitting behind her computer, but her face lights up when she sees me.
“I remember you. You’re from the High Meadow Ranch.”
I tip my hat. “Fletch Boone, ma’am.”
“Well, what can I do for you, Mr. Boone?”
“I’m looking for Antonella Freling. I believe she may be staying here, but I don’t see her van and she’s not answering her phone.”
I try for a smile. I’m a bit rusty, I don’t use it much, but it seems to do the trick on Martha.
“She’s probably out of range,” she volunteers. “Left here yesterday, aiming to head up the mountain to look for her sister.”
“And she didn’t come back last night?”
“Wasn’t supposed to. She was aiming to spend the night up there, save herself the time driving back and forth, I reckon. My boy, Wyatt, helped her get the van ready. She mentioned something about Scenery Mountain.”
Five minutes later I hit the turnoff, cursing the stupid woman. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out she has zero experience camping, or she wouldn’t be driving that damn van or wearing those ridiculous shoes. Yet she heads out here entirely unprepared, putting herself in harm’s way. Now we have two fucking women missing.
To add insult to injury, I spot a few bighorn on a ridge to my right as I make my way up the mountain.
Bighorn, but no van. Not in any of the clearings I’ve passed this far. There is a network of logging roads up here and she could’ve taken any one of these. I stop at a split in the dirt road, with one branch heading farther north, and the other directly west.
Getting out of the truck, I look for tire tracks. Most folks venturing up here would be driving a four-wheel-drive vehicle and the truck tires would have a wider, heavier tread. The woman I’m looking for is driving a van not built for off-road travel and it shouldn’t be too hard to find the fresher, narrower tread.
It takes me a couple of minutes to find the tracks heading west.
I shake my head when I think of her coming up this road with some pretty narrow drop-offs and steep inclines. The woman has more guts than sense. Apparently, she made it all the way up though, because I find her van on a rock plateau at the end of the trail and park behind her.
No sign of Antonella Freling though.
A camping chair is left by the firepit and I’m surprised to see some firewood stacked on the other side. I’m having a hard time envisioning the prim and proper woman wielding an axe. The ashes are warm, but not hot. She had a fire last night, but not this morning.
Peeking into the back of her van, I spot an air mattress, a sleeping bag neatly straightened, a cooler, a few jugs of water, and a propane burner. At least she isn’t entirely unprepared.
I try the door, but the van is locked. My stomach clenches at the thought of her stumbling through the wilderness in her gray slacks and sensible shoes.
Christ.
I flip off my hat and scratch my head as I scan the clearing and the tree line. Where would she have gone?
My eyes are drawn to an opening in the trees on the far edge of the rock shield. It looks like there’s a bit of a drop-off. When I start walking in that direction, I spot a splash of something on the ground. I crouch and rub my finger over it. Still damp. Then I sniff my finger. Coffee.
I straighten up and notice what appears to be another open area beyond the break in the trees. I can see part of a rock face reaching up. The early morning sun would’ve lit up that pale rock like a beacon.
I’m willing to bet she took her coffee to watch the sunrise.
Nella
I decided sometime last night after my heart started beating a normal rhythm again, my visitor was probably nothing more than one of those bighorns I’d seen earlier. Still not a creature I’d want to have a close encounter with in the dark, but honestly, a squirrel probably would’ve freaked me out.
I never finished my dinner before bone-deep fatigue knocked me out, so I woke up surprisingly well-rested but hungry as a horse. Cold chili is not something I’d recommend, but it served to tide me over until water for my coffee was boiling.
By the time I’m ready for a second cup, I’m hungry again and the sun is starting to peek over the horizon. I slap together a peanut butter and jam sandwich, wrap it in a napkin, and grab my travel mug.
I’m pretty sure no one is up here to steal my van, but I lock it anyway. Force of habit. Then I head toward the break in the trees I spotted, hoping for a pretty view to enjoy my second breakfast of the day.
The scenery is stunning. A narrow stream bisecting the shallow valley below and the rugged mountain side rising to an imposing peak on the far end. The sun hits my back—surprisingly warm this early—as I lower myself on the rocky outcropping and dangle my legs off the ledge.
I’ll allow myself just a few minutes to finish my breakfast and appreciate the beauty surrounding me, before I figure out what my next move is.
My gut says my sister was here, but where is she now? I haven’t really looked around the site, it got dark too fast last night, but I know I’ll need more than a firepit to convince law enforcement to take me seriously. Especially with her motorhome nowhere in sight. Still, something tells me she camped right here.
I wish she was sitting beside me, nudging my shoulder and trying to get me to crack a smile. Goading me to loosen up a little. She always tells me I’m too serious for my own good.
Someone had to be. I was twenty-five when Mom and Dad died, recently graduated, and landed the job I still hold eighteen years later as a research librarian at the College of the Rockies in Cranbrook. Pippa had just turned twenty-two and took our parents death hard.
Already a bit of a wild child, she seemed to become even more of an unguided missile after. I was the only stability she had in her life and felt I couldn’t afford to let down my guard, even for a minute. At least that’s what I told myself all these years.
If I’m honest, I’d have to admit it was probably easier to use Pippa as an excuse for my predictable and limiting lifestyle, when in reality it was my fear of living. Maybe I was too scared to put myself out there. Too afraid to take any risks.
Wow.
Who would’ve thought sitting on a rock in the wilderness by your lonesome could give you a clearer perspective?
I take a sip of my coffee and silently promise myself that if—no, when—I find Pippa, I’ll let her drag me on one of her adventures. I always thought I had all the answers, but I’m starting to wonder if perhaps my sister did.
The hair on the back of my neck suddenly stands up when I hear the snap of a branch in the trees behind me. I scramble to my feet, splash coffee over my hand, and drop my half-eaten sandwich in the process.
Swinging around, I watch in horror as a large bear breaks through the underbrush and lumbers onto the rock. Then he stops, rises on his hind legs, and snorts as he sticks his snout in the air.
Panicked, I wrack my brain to remember the rules I read up on for an encounter with a bear.
Don’t run: That one’s easy, I have nowhere to go.
Don’t go up a tree: Even if I had a hope of accomplishing that, bears are supposed to be better climbers anyway.
Make yourself as big and noisy as possible: Now that I can do. Although I’m not sure how much my five foot four is going to impress him, even with my arms waving wildly over my head.
“Shoo! Go away! Go home!”
The bear seems more puzzled than anything else and drops down on all fours.
Please go away. Please, please, please turn around and go away.
Its massive head starts bobbing from side to side and somehow, I instinctively know that can’t be good.
Bear spray!
I totally forgot about the can on my belt and scramble to get it free, only to have it slip from my coffee drenched hand. My heart sinks in my chest when I hear the distinct clang of the can hitting rock and rolling off the edge.
The noise seems to jar the big animal and suddenly he starts heading this way, picking up speed.
“Stop! Go away!” I scream at the top of my lungs when I take an inadvertent step back and feel the ground disappear from underneath my feet.
Next thing I know I’m going down, my hands fruitlessly trying to find purchase on the rock wall.