It was Mark’s weekend to work, and he’d intended to go by Mae’s before he started his patrol, but a 7:00 a.m. call from dispatch about a missing five-year-old sent him and Gem on the other side of the county. It was now almost ten.
Kids. Mark couldn’t keep from chuckling as he pointed his SUV toward Eagle Ridge. The boy claimed that he didn’t know how he ended up in a closet sometime in the night, and since his parents said he was a sleepwalker, Mark believed that part. He wasn’t so sure about the boy’s claim that he’d slept so soundly, he’d missed his parents’ frantic voices. Mark figured he’d heard them and assumed he was in trouble and stayed hidden.
He was halfway to Eagle Ridge when his cell rang. Alex.
“Where are you?”
Alex never wasted words, but the urgency in her voice sent a cold chill through him. He gave his location. “What’s going on?”
“Mae placed a 911 call at 9:28 and then didn’t respond to the dispatcher’s questions. When Hayes got there at 9:40, the back door was open, but she was nowhere to be found.”
Mae had made the call almost thirty minutes ago. “How did Hayes get there so fast?”
“He said he was in the area.”
The young deputy was a go-getter, usually patrolling one end of the county to the other on his shift. “Did he check her pottery studio?”
“He did. She wasn’t there either.”
“Something’s bound to be wrong, then. She wouldn’t go off and leave her door open, not even if she was just going up on the ridge.” He floored the gas pedal. “We’ll be at her house in fifteen minutes or less.”
Mark tried his neighbor’s number as he raced toward home. Still no answer, and he left a voicemail. Mae was at least seventy-five and independent as all get-out, often hiking the ridge alone looking for her special herbs and mushrooms.
He didn’t know how many times he’d asked her to let him know when she was going so he could make sure she’d gotten back safely. It would be all too easy for her to step in a hole and break an ankle. But did she listen? No.
Ten minutes later, Mark passed his house on Eagle Ridge. Mae’s was a good three miles beyond it and up a steep incline. When he rolled into her drive, everything looked normal except for Hayes’s vehicle.
Mark climbed out of his SUV and popped the door for Gem. She bounded out and looked toward the house as his fellow deputy approached. “Any sign of Mae?”
Hayes Smithfield shook his head. “Could she be off looking for some of those mushrooms she sells?”
Mark sighed. Hayes was new, fresh out of junior college, and was scheduled to attend the Tennessee Law Enforcement Training Academy in July. Training he sorely needed, but that was three months away. “She wouldn’t have called 911 and then left.”
“What if she’s not far from the house, maybe unconscious?”
“Good point. Let’s let Gem find out. We’ll start with the house.”
“But I checked—”
“Let’s check again.” With the German shepherd at his side, Mark marched to the front porch and climbed the sturdy steps and entered the front door. He scanned the room. It looked normal enough . . . except something he couldn’t put his finger on seemed different.
He walked through the house to the kitchen, and it came to him. Mark had never seen the photo of her daughter on the end of the mantel. It was always in the middle. He grabbed one of Mae’s sweaters from a peg by the door and let Gem sniff it. “Search.”
She ran sniffing through the house, and then out the front door and bounded away toward the ridge, running a zigzag pattern with her nose in the air. Mark jogged after her with Hayes trailing. Gem swung to the right and plunged through a path in the undergrowth.
Mark followed. Briars tore at his clothes as he got down on his hands and knees on a path made by a much smaller, four-legged animal. Suddenly Gem lay down and barked.
She’d found something. Don’t let it be Mae’s body. Mark crawled through the brush, stopping at the sight of a pair of Redwing boots laced tight against thin legs. Mae lay on her side, like maybe she’d been crawling and just keeled over. Gem barked again.
Mark moved around the boots and rewarded Gem with a head rub. “Good girl.”
So far Mae hadn’t moved or responded to the dog’s barks. He felt for a pulse and released a tight breath when he found a weak but steady beat. But with the side of her mouth turned down like it was—
“Did you find her?” Hayes called from the outside of the brambles.
“Yes. Call for a medevac chopper—tell them she’s had a stroke.” Mark surveyed the area. “Make sure they have a stretcher we can get in here.”
“Roger that.”
He examined as much of Mae as he could without moving her—he’d leave that to the paramedics. If it weren’t for the 911 call, he might think she’d been mushroom hunting and suffered a stroke. Except this wasn’t a place where the fungi grew.
“Mae, can you hear me?” Had her eyelids moved? Mark tried again. “Blink if you can hear me.”
Her eyelids definitely twitched. She could hear him. He squeezed her left hand, and her fingers curled tightly around his. Mark didn’t want to lose his independent and sometimes stubborn older friend. He leaned closer. “An ambulance is on the way, so just hold on.”
He didn’t mention a helicopter—that might freak her out if she was alert enough. Mark surveyed the area. With the flat ground, extraction should be fairly easy, notwithstanding the briars. While he waited, Mark sat back on his haunches and stilled, employing the training he’d learned as a sniper—stop what he was doing, look around, listen, and smell.
He’d already looked around, but now he scanned the area with a different intention. Nothing was trampled beyond where Mae lay, so that meant she hadn’t been dragged here—so she must have crawled. But why?
Mark sniffed the air, and while his nose couldn’t compare to Gem’s, he had a keen sense of smell. This time he took a deep breath and cataloged the different aromas. Wet earth from last night’s rain. Rotting leaves from the winter. And the green scent of new leaves. Not surprising since it was April.
He tried to re-create what could have happened. Perhaps Mae had been out—maybe walking the ridge since she liked to do that, and when she returned to her house, she noticed that someone had broken in. So she dialed 911.
But why not respond to the operator? Had the intruder heard her? Or had she feared being overheard and looked for a place to hide?
Mae knew every foot of the land surrounding her property and would have seen this tunnel in the briars during her walks. If she feared for her life, it would be a natural place for her to take refuge. He turned toward where the deputy waited. “Hayes!”
“Yeah?”
“Did you come in with your siren blasting, like usual?”
“Sure did.”
And alerted the possible intruder, who would have beat a hasty retreat. If that was the scenario, Hayes may have saved Mae’s life.
His cell rang. Alex. He pressed the answer button, surprised he had service. “I found her, but I think she’s had a stroke.”
“I’m on my way. The hospital called—they’ve dispatched an air ambulance. Was there any sign of an intruder?”
“I’m not sure. We won’t know anything until Mae can tell us what happened.”
“Where are you?”
“With Mae. She crawled through a tunnel in the briars where it looks like she had the stroke.”
“Stay with her. I’ll see you in a few.”
Mark pocketed his phone and looked back at Mae. Her lips moved and he leaned closer.
“D-D—”
“Don’t try to talk.” He rubbed her right hand with his thumb. “I’ll ask you a question, and you just squeeze my hand once for yes, twice for no. Can you do that?”
She nodded, but Mark felt no pressure from her fingers. “Let’s try that with your left hand,” he said and switched hands.
Nothing wrong with Mae’s strength in that hand. “Good. Did someone attack you?”
Two squeezes. “Okay. Did someone break into your house?” One squeeze. “Did you see who it was?” There was a hesitation, then two squeezes.
“Head hurts,” she whispered. Her hand loosened in his, and she closed her eyes.
“I hear the chopper coming in,” Hayes yelled.
Mark crawled out of the tunnel just as the chopper landed, and soon paramedics hiked toward him with a scoop stretcher.
“Pretty sure she’s had a stroke,” he told them. There was a short window of opportunity to bust up blood clots that caused strokes. “Do you have the clot-buster drug on the chopper?”
The lead medic shook his head. “No. Too dangerous for us to administer. Dr. Wexler will make that call if she needs it.”
Ten minutes later, the paramedics brought Mae out of the thicket strapped on the yellow board. Mark didn’t like how pale she was . . . and dazed. Mae was a friend, and he didn’t want to lose her.