Prologue
Three Years Ago...
I can smell the cold before I feel it. Damp pine, smoke, and something older and soured beneath the frost. My boots crunch over brittle leaves as I follow my dad's trail through the trees, shotgun in my hands and heart beating a little too fast for a morning hunt.
He's just up ahead, somewhere past the ridge. Told me to stay close, but not too close. He said I would never learn if I was always breathing down his neck. He laughed when he said it, warm and easy.
The woods are quiet now, too quiet. I keep walking, watching for antlers or movement or any sign of life. But there's nothing. I stop in my tracks, realizing just how unusually quiet it is. There's no birdsong or rustling, just still trees and silence.
Then a gunshot, sharp and sudden. Just one. I'm frozen, a slight tremor rising up in my chest.
"Dad?" I call out, my voice bounces off the trees and comes back smaller.
No answer.
I grip the shotgun tighter and slowly begin to move again, my heart drumming in my ears. Branches snap underfoot as I push through the underbrush, adrenaline starting to burn at the edges of my thoughts. Something's wrong. I feel it.
There's blood on a stone, just a little. A few drops, dark and drying. I notice a small trail of it going left and follow it, slowly, until I notice my dad's hat. It's hanging on a low branch, like someone placed it there deliberately. A smear of red on the bark is just below it. But the trail stops there. No signs of anyone or anything. As if the woods swallowed him whole.
I call out again, screaming his name this time. Only the wind answers me.
They searched for months. Dogs, helicopters, the whole town out with flashlights and prayers. They found nothing. No body, no weapon, just the silence where my father used to be.
The funeral is closed-casket. There's nothing to bury but his name and the stories people tell. I stand by the grave in my best suit, hands stuffed in my pockets, watching the treeline. That's when I see something move in the corner of my eye. I turn my head, slightly, and I could swear I see a figure hiding behind a tree far off in the distance. I blink and suddenly it's gone.
"Let's go, Jake." I hear mom say quietly, her voice strained.
I silently take her hand and hook her arm around mine, leading her to the car. My mind was playing tricks on me... That had to be it.
I never went that deep into the woods again.
Not until I found her.
