Nick
He stood in the dust cloud Jessica’s car left behind long enough for the dust to settle and erase any traces of the car that had just taken his little girl away. Never in his life, in all the times he’d been on his own, had Nick ever felt so completely alone. In one afternoon, he’d lost both Charlotte and Amelia.
There was nothing left.
“Fuck!”
Anger washed through him with such a force, it took him completely off guard and left him dizzy with rage. He strode toward a pine tree, pulled back, and punched it as hard as he could. The pain screamed through his fist, but he ignored it and hit the tree again.
“Nick!”
Damon grabbed him by the shoulders and pulled him back, away from the tree, but the anger wasn’t yet satisfied. He spun to throw a punch at Damon. Cocked his fist and froze at his best friend’s undefended face.
He was about to punch his best friend and Damon wasn’t even going to stop him because he knew he needed the release. The reality of the entire situation hit him. He dropped his arm as his shoulders slumped and a sob ripped from deep in his chest.
Without missing a beat, Damon pulled him in and hugged him hard.
It didn’t take long for the anger and anguish to subside enough for Nick to allow Damon to lead him into the main house, where he set a glass of water in front of him and sat across from him at the kitchen island. Katie had appeared with a wet towel and gently, without asking, took Nick’s hand and started cleaning the cuts.
“What can we do?”
Nick dropped his chin to his chest. “Nothing.”
“I don’t believe that, Nick.” Damon shook his head. “It’s not like you to just give up. You never give up. There’s a problem, you solve it. So let’s—”
“We can’t.” He jerked his hand away from Katie and immediately felt bad. “Sorry.”
“It’s fine.” She smiled kindly, and took it back and resumed washing the cuts.
“We can’t solve this,” Nick said to Damon. “I’ve been talking to Chris, and he says we have to play by the rules on this one. She’s not biologically my daughter and that means I have no rights. It’s so fucked up.”
“That is fucked up. There has to be something they’re missing. You can’t just give a child back to the parent who abandoned her like she was nothing.”
Damon’s words hit him like fresh punches in the gut.
“It’s not right. What did the caseworker say?”
“Chris is waiting to hear back, and I left a message, too. But Jessica has a clean drug test and…” The visit with Susan Johnson had gone so well, she had to be on their side as far as custody went. It was her job to do what was in the best interest of the child. Surely she’d see that what was in Amelia’s best interest was him and Charlotte. They were what was best. And—Charlotte. She’d left. She was so hurt. So angry. And… Nick looked at Katie. “Charlotte left.”
Katie nodded. “I know.”
“Do you know where she went?”
Katie shook her head and, finished with his hand, which was now throbbing, released it with a gentle pat.
“She hates me.”
“I’m sure she doesn’t hate you,” Katie said. “She’s hurt and confused.”
“I’ve screwed everything up so badly.” He wanted to hit something again but the pain in his fist reminded him why that wasn’t likely a good idea. He was lucky it wasn’t broken. Even if it was, he didn’t care. He didn’t care about anything without Amelia and Charlotte.
“I’m going to call Remington.” Damon pushed away from the counter with sudden force. “He’s an old friend from school,” he explained as he pulled his cell phone out. “He’s a cop in town and…well, I don’t know what he can do. But maybe he can at least keep an eye out for Jessica’s car and…”
Nick nodded. It was something. “Call him.”
A few minutes later, Damon was off the phone. “Okay. Remi is going to keep an eye out for the car. He’ll let us know if he sees anything, and as soon as he locates her, he’ll keep a tail on her as much as he can. It’s not much, but...”
“It’s better than nothing.” Nick nodded. “And it’s a whole lot better than what I’m doing.” He couldn’t sit any longer. “I need to go after her.”
“Who?”
He stopped. His hands might be tied when it came to Amelia. He’d take Chris’s advice because he didn’t want to screw it up. He’d play by the rules, even if it went against everything he thought was right. But he’d do it for Amelia. He had to.
But Charlotte…there was something he could do to fix that. Hopefully. She’d been hurt before. Badly. And she’d trusted him. He’d betrayed that trust and he’d spend the rest of his life making amends for that if she’d let him. But first…he needed to find her.
“I need to find Charlotte,” he told his friends. “I need to tell her everything.”
“Nick?” Katie stopped him, confusion on her face. “Isn’t that why she left?” she asked. “Because she knows everything now?”
“No.” He shook his head. “She doesn’t know how much I love her.”
Charlotte
Charlotte backed up into the cabin. Her pulse thundered in her ears, making it hard to think straight.
Billy?
Her brain just couldn’t wrap around the fact that she was looking at her ex-boyfriend, the one she’d left on the other side of the country in a stealth-like mission, sneaking away and leaving everything behind.
And he was here.
Here.
If anyone asked, she told them she had never been afraid of Billy. Not really. He’d only gotten physical with her a few times, but only when he’d been drinking and even then, she wasn’t scared. Not really.
But she’d been scared enough that Jeremy had helped her get away from him. Distance had made her complacent. She’d forgotten how imposing he could be. How threatening he could be without even saying a word.
It was all coming back. Quickly.
“What are you doing here?”
“I’m here for you.” He stepped inside the cabin and shut the door behind him as he leaned back against it. “I’ve been watching and waiting, Char. It’s hard to get you alone.”
Alone.
She was alone.
But had he been watching her…
“How did you know where to find me?”
He laughed.
It was a chilling noise that made her stomach turn.
“You didn’t think I’d know where you went?” He shook his head. “You never could stop talking about your stupid hometown and once I got here...well, it’s not like you’ve been hiding. Hanging all over that guy. Playing house with his baby.”
He snorted in disgust, but Char was focused on what he’d just said. He’d been watching her. He’d seen her. With Amelia. What if…
No. She couldn’t let herself think about what would have happened if he’d gotten her alone with the baby. She needed to focus.
“It was a long drive, that’s for sure.” Billy was still talking. “But you’re worth it, Char. I wasn’t going to let you go that easy.”
The hair on the back of her neck stood up. Let you go that easy. Char refused to let him see her panic.
“I drove a long way to see you, Charlotte. That’s how much I love you.”
No no no no. She couldn’t let him trap her inside the cabin. She needed to get away.
“I miss you,” he continued. “You left without even saying good-bye, Charlotte. Do you know how that made me feel?”
No. And she didn’t care.
“But you came…why are you…” She needed to calm down. She couldn’t hold a thought, let alone think about what she was going to do.
“Charlotte. I asked you a question.” His eyes darkened as he stepped closer.
That was the controlling, intimidating man she remembered. An involuntary shiver ran through her.
No.
She would not let him do this again. She would not so quickly fall into the trap of feeling like a small, useless person just because he needed a power trip.
No.
But there was something else in his eyes. Her eyes shot over to the counter where the Prosecco bottle and the paper cup sat. He’d been drinking. He almost never drank. He had no tolerance and it never ended well.
“Charlotte?” He stepped closer and that’s when she saw it. The gleam of metal tucked into his waistband.
A gun.
Billy didn’t own a gun. He wasn’t the type. But then again, she didn’t think he was the type to drive across the country to find her, either. She’d terribly underestimated him.
“I asked you a question.”
She needed to think. But the only thing that came to mind was playing his game. Reverting to the scared, weak woman she’d been. The woman she’d hated. “I’m sorry, Billy.” She lowered her eyes, the way she knew he’d prefer. Don’t look directly in his eye. Don’t challenge him. Be submissive. “I should have thought about how that would make you feel. It was a last-minute trip,” she lied. “I needed to see my family and then I was going to—”
“Don’t lie to me.”
Her eyelids fluttered and she looked up. He wasn’t buying it. He was drunk. He was close enough now to see the glassiness in his eyes.
Shit.
Quickly, she scanned the little cabin, and her eyes landed on the antique ax she’d bought to hang on the wall. She looked away before he could notice. If she could make it past him to the ax, she could—what? Hit him with it? It was heavy. Really heavy. But not impossibly so. She’d swung it the other day. Maybe she could knock him out, or at least stun him long enough to get away. She’d left her phone in the car. If she could get to it, she could call for help. But that would only work if she could get to the ax.
And there was only one way she could think to do that.
Char took a deep breath and exhaled slowly as she stepped toward Billy. “I really am sorry,” she started. “It was a mistake. I never should have left. It’s horrible here, and I miss you every day.” It was so much bullshit, but she prayed that he didn’t see through it, or remember the way she’d hung up on him when he’d called—repeatedly. She lifted a hand and reached out to touch his chest. She pressed her hand gently against his heart and looked up, just a little. “Can you ever forgive me?”
Charlotte licked her lips a little and tried to control the violent shivering that threatened to give her away. She just needed to distract him for one minute. Just long enough to—
“You’re sorry?”
She swallowed hard, and tried not to cringe as Billy grabbed her chin roughly.
“I am.” She nodded. “So sorry.”
He kissed her roughly, and Char had to swallow back the bile that rose in her throat when he jabbed his tongue into her mouth.
Focus. Focus.
She returned the kiss just enough that Billy would be distracted as she moved closer to him—and the ax. Slowly, she kept his focus on her as she moved a little more to the left, closer still.
Charlotte prayed she had the location right. She couldn’t afford to look. It would give her away, so hope was all she had.
She had to take the chance. She couldn’t wait any longer.
Without overthinking it, Charlotte wrenched away from him and lunged for the ax. She raised it up quickly over her head. Adrenaline flowed through her veins, making the ax weightless in her grip as she turned around to face him.
And the gun he had pointed at her.
She didn’t hesitate. She couldn’t. She took a step and swung.
The gunshot blasted through the air, deafening her, and a white-hot pain sliced through her abdomen.
Her arms reverberated from the contact the ax made before it fell to the ground and her entire body went numb, the pain gone as she, too, fell to the ground.
Nick
Nick had spent the last twenty minutes calling Charlotte’s phone continuously as he drove through the streets of Glacier Falls, but he couldn’t find her or her car anywhere. He’d driven past her parents’ home, before stopping at Jeremy’s apartment, and even the fire hall.
No Charlotte.
He told them the truth, that they’d had an argument and she wasn’t answering her phone, but he refused to get into any more details than that.
Where could she be?
The town wasn’t that big. She couldn’t have gone far.
Unless she went to the city?
But that didn’t feel right. Charlotte was upset with him, certainly. And he deserved it. But she wouldn’t have gone far. She would have gone somewhere where she could be alone. But—
His thoughts were interrupted by the ringing of his phone. He pulled over and reached for the phone. “Charlotte? Where are—”
“Nick? It’s Susan,” the caller interrupted him. “Susan Johnson. I’m returning your call.”
It took him a moment to refocus his thoughts. “Right. Thank you.”
“I was in a home visit, and I don’t usually have my phone on during visits.”
“I understand.” He didn’t mean to sound impatient, but there was a lot going on. “I was hoping that—”
“Right.” She cut him off. “I wouldn’t normally return your call so late, but when I got your message, I was concerned.”
“Concerned?” He sat up in his seat.
“Yes,” she continued. “Your lawyer also called and explained that Jessica had come for the baby.”
Just hearing her say the words out loud caused a fresh wave of pain to wash through him. The baby. His baby. “She did.” He could hear the defeat in his own voice. “And Chris told me that I needed to play nice and do things by the book. She’s been clean and since she is Amelia’s biological mother—”
“Right. That’s why I’m calling.”
Nick was on high alert.
“She had filed all of the appropriate information with child services, including recent drug tests and her sponsor’s information. The follow-up is…well, I’ll get to the point. There was a note in her file that her sponsor had some concerns.”
Concerns?
“What kind of concerns?” He worked hard to stay calm. But he was quickly losing the battle. “Susan, talk to me. What kind of concerns are there about Jessica? She has Amelia.”
“She does?”
Fuck.
“I would have recommended against returning the child to her biological mother at this point.”
“What the—we were told she checked out. My lawyer checked it out. How could this happen?” He inhaled sharply.
“I don’t know, Nick. Her legal aid…well, I don’t know what else to say. But when I saw the file, I was—”
“Is she in danger?”
There was a hesitancy on the other end of the line, and it was all Nick needed to know.
“Off the record, Nick?”
He waited.
“I know what the law says, but if I were you...”
“That’s all I needed to hear.”
He ended the call and immediately dialed Damon. “We need to find her, now. Tell me Remi located them.”
“I was about to call you.” Damon sighed. “Remi said his contact reported seeing her.”
“His contact?”
“A dealer. He’s known to the cops.”
“Wait. A dealer? As in drugs?” Nick was going to throw up. “But she’s clean. She—”
“Not anymore, apparently.”
“Fuck.” What had he done?
“That was about an hour ago. Last she was spotted, she was headed through town on the road that leads up to Lynx Creek.”
“Lynx Creek?”
Charlotte. The cabins. Lynx Creek.
“I’m on my way,” he said. “I think Charlotte’s probably out there, too.”
“Char? Why would she—”
“I’m at least fifteen minutes away. Dammit. Meet me there. And call Steph. Maybe she’s out there.”
Charlotte
Open your eyes.
Open your eyes.
They were so heavy. It took all her effort to open her eyes, and when she did, she immediately wanted to close them again.
Blood. So much blood.
And Billy. He was lying on the cabin floor. Was he dead? Surely she hadn’t hit him that hard.
The gunshot.
Slowly, Charlotte brought her hand to her right side and pulled it away, covered in blood. Oh my God.
She had to move. If Billy wasn’t dead, he would wake up, and she couldn’t be there. She needed to get to her phone.
Slowly, she managed to pull herself to her feet. She used the wall for balance as she moved as quickly as she could to the door.
The fresh air felt like freedom and she almost sagged to the ground in relief, but she wasn’t safe yet.
Phone.
She needed her phone.
With laser focus, she left the porch and the railing that was supporting her, and lurched toward her car and the salvation of her phone. Her feet wouldn’t work properly. She tripped over a root, or herself—she couldn’t be sure—and she hit the ground on her hands and knees.
The pain ripped through her side and clouded her vision in white.
No.
She couldn’t pass out. She needed to stay—
A baby’s cry shattered the silence of the forest.
A baby?
Charlotte couldn’t wrap her head around it. Why would there be a baby crying in the forest? She was hallucinating. The stress of losing Amelia and the pain…she was dying. It wasn’t real.
Another cry.
Amelia.
That was real. That was Amelia’s cry.
She may not have given birth to the child but she loved her in a way that couldn’t be properly put into words, and she’d know that cry anywhere. Even when she was barely conscious.
Still in the dirt on her hands and knees, Char turned in the direction of the cry and forced herself to her feet. It didn’t make any sense that Amelia would be crying in the forest at Lynx Creek, but it didn’t have to make sense.
She needed to get to her.
That was the only thing that made sense.
It couldn’t have been more than a few minutes, but it felt like hours as Charlotte stumbled and fell and made her way through the darkness toward the cries. She tripped and fell, her knees landing hard on the wooden step of the main lodge. The cries were closer now.
“Amelia. I’m coming.” Her voice was barely a whisper. She was so weak. Even the pain in her side had subsided. She couldn’t feel anything as she crawled into the lodge.
It wasn’t until she saw Jessica, passed out next to Amelia—sitting up on a blanket next to her mother, tears running down her face—did Charlotte know for sure that she wasn’t hallucinating. With all the energy she had left, Char moved to the baby and gathered her up in her blanket and held her close to her chest.
“Shh,” she whispered. “I’ve got you.”
Unable to feel her legs, Char couldn’t stand. It wouldn’t be safe if she fell holding the baby. So instead, she dragged herself somehow with the baby in one arm, to the far side of the cabin, where she would be out of sight if Jessica woke up or if Billy came to.
She leaned back against the wall and propped herself in such a way that she wouldn’t drop Amelia. “Shh,” she murmured. “It’s going to be okay. It’s all going to be okay. I’ve got you now.”
In her arms, Amelia’s sobbing subsided, and she wrapped her chubby fist around Charlotte’s finger. It was the last thing Char remembered before losing consciousness.