Home to Whiskey Creek

“I—I’m mobile.”

That made a difference. It meant she wasn’t so badly off that he couldn’t sit her on his bike and run alongside. If he could get to her.

He was pretty sure he had a flashlight and a length of rope in his truck. He might even have food or something else that would come in handy. A sweatshirt would keep her warm, at least. He could use it if she didn’t need it. It’d been a nice day, hence his lightweight bike shorts and T-shirt, but it was growing colder by the minute.

“Sit tight,” he called down. “I have to go to my truck but I’ll be back. I promise.”

“Don’t leave me!”

Panic fueled those words. “I’ll be back,” he repeated.

Tension tied his stomach into knots as he ignored her protests and clipped his feet into the pedals of his bike. The uneven ground and rocks and roots that offered the challenges he so enjoyed suddenly became unwelcome obstacles, jarring him despite the expensive shock absorbers on his bike. He was moving faster than ever before, especially through this stretch, where the riding was so technical, but he had no choice. If he didn’t...

He couldn’t even think about what might happen if he didn’t. He’d seen his brother’s crushed head. They’d made the decision as a family not to have an open casket.

Small pebbles scattered, churned up by his tires as he charged through patches of gravel. Hoping to shave off a few minutes, he climbed a steep embankment he typically tried only when he wanted maximum difficulty.

He made it up and over the ridge, and down the other side without mishap, but it felt as if it were taking forever to reach the highway.

By the time the trail leveled out, his lungs burned and his quads shook, but he knew that had more to do with fear than physical exertion. He owned Crank It Up, a bike shop in Whiskey Creek, and raced mountain bikes professionally. Thanks to endless hours of training, his body could handle twenty minutes of balls-to-the-wall riding. It was the memories of the day he’d learned his brother was dead and the frightened sound of Addy’s voice that made what he was doing so difficult.

In case her life depended on his performance, he forced himself to redline it, but daylight was waning much faster than he expected. What if he couldn’t see well enough to return? Considering how narrow the trail was in places, and the sharp dropoff on one side, his tire could hit a rock or a groove in the hard-packed dirt, causing him to veer off and plummet into the freezing-cold river—an accident he wasn’t likely to survive. The road, though wider, would take twice as long.

You won’t fall. He knew this trail far too well. This was where he felt closest to his brother—and not because Cody had died here. They’d started mountain biking when they were only thirteen, used to explore these mountains all the time. That was how they’d found the mine in the first place. It was Cody who’d turned it into a popular hangout during the final weeks of high school. Kids could bring booze or weed up there without being noticed or interrupted by the police, so a core group from the baseball team had thrown parties that had occasionally gotten out of hand. Toward the end, Noah had stopped going. He hadn’t liked watching his brother snort coke, didn’t appreciate the way Cody behaved when he was stoned. Noah had also been afraid Cody would get Shania pregnant before they had the chance to leave for college and he didn’t want to attend San Diego State without him. They’d done almost everything together since birth.

He’d mentioned the risks to Cody many times, but no amount of warning seemed to faze him. Although Shania hadn’t been at the party—her parents had whisked her away to Europe as soon as she had her diploma in hand—his brother had gone a little crazy that night with all the drinking and drugs, and he paid the ultimate price. From what Noah had heard, the party Cody had thrown graduation night had been as wild as they came.

Maybe if his brother had been thinking straight, he would’ve made it home safely, like everyone else....

After navigating a few final twists and turns, Noah spotted the gravel lot next to the two-lane highway where he’d parked, and raced down the straightaway.

Sweat rolled off him the second he stopped, despite the cold, but he barely noticed as he searched his truck. He found the towrope in his toolbox, a sweatshirt shoved under his seat not far from the flashlight and a stash of energy bars. He already carried all the water he had in a bladderlike contraption on his back. Unfortunately, he’d drunk most of it, but he found a first-aid kit in his jockey box, which was some consolation.

He had what he needed, but in case things didn’t go as smoothly as he hoped, he wanted to call for help so there’d be a rescue team waiting.

He’d put his cell phone under his floor mat to keep it out of sight. There’d been a rash of car burglaries several months ago, courtesy of a group of teenagers who smoked pot and hung out at the river all summer—“river rats” they were called.

He fished his phone out to check for service. Coverage was spotty in these mountains. But obtaining a signal didn’t turn out to be the problem. His battery was dead.

“Shit!” He wasn’t one of those people who kept his phone attached to his ear 24/7. It was more of an afterthought—obviously, since he didn’t carry a charger.

He gazed up and down the road, hoping a vehicle would come by, but after a few seconds, he realized he couldn’t keep standing there. He had to make a decision. Should he drive to Jackson, which was closer than Whiskey Creek, or go back for the woman as he’d originally intended?

Jackson would take too much time. He’d promised he wouldn’t be long and for some reason it was important to him to make good on that.

Draping the rope around his neck, he tied the sweatshirt to his waist and tossed out the extra tube and tire-changing equipment he had in his seat pack without even caring where it fell. He needed room to squeeze in the energy bars and the contents of the first-aid kit. Then he held the flashlight against the handlebars and took off.

He had to get back to the mine before full dark. Otherwise, he’d be forced to take the road or travel even more slowly on the trail, and he feared that whoever was stranded in the shaft couldn’t survive the delay.

2

Adelaide Davies stared at the hole above her, the only thing she could see in this dark space. Would the person who’d called to her really come back?

It didn’t look hopeful. She had no way of keeping track of the passing minutes, but it seemed as if an hour had gone by since he’d promised to help.

Maybe he was the same person who’d put her down here and he’d just returned to make sure she didn’t survive. Maybe he knew she was guilty of something even worse than what he’d done, and felt that this would be a fitting end....

No! No one knows the truth. Except me. She had to quell the fear charging through her, or she wouldn’t survive this emotionally, even if she survived it physically. It was fifteen years since she’d last been inside the mine, since she’d been anywhere close. As a matter of fact, she’d been here only once before—to attend a high school graduation party when she was a sophomore.

It’d all seemed so exciting, so hopeful when she was invited. But that party had changed her forever. Never again would she be the same shy but happy girl she’d been before. And, unlike so many other victims, she knew exactly who to blame. There’d been five of them, five of the most popular jocks, all upperclassmen.

The memories of that night made her sick. She would’ve gone to the police, would’ve seen to it that they were prosecuted as they deserved. But she couldn’t, for a lot of reasons.

It was getting too cold. She had to do something or she’d freeze to death in this damp, dark hole. After myriad attempts to climb or dig her way out, she could hardly move. Her wrists burned from the welts she’d caused by straining against the rope that had bound her hands. One whole side of her body was bruised from when she’d landed. But she had to scream, at the very least. She couldn’t let the discouragement, the heartbreak, the memories, win.

“Hello? Can someone help me? Please? I’m in the mine!”

There was no answer; calling out seemed futile. The guy who’d stopped before was gone.

Her throat too raw to continue, she got to her feet and made another attempt to climb. She had to save herself before it grew any darker. But she slipped and slid down on her aching bottom. Nothing worked. The walls were irregular and too steep, and the pile of broken and fallen beams, jutting out in all directions, gave her slivers when she tried to use it for support.

What now? she asked herself. The person who’d thrown her down here had only beaten her enough to get her to comply with his demands. He hadn’t raped her. But the moment she dropped her guard or became too distraught, the memories of what it’d been like that other time—the night of the party—washed over her, lapping higher and higher, like the incoming tide, until her mind was saturated with the past and she felt no different than the terrified girl she’d been at sixteen.

It was the smell, she decided. The smell conjured up that night as vividly as though she’d just lived it.

Sweet sixteen and never been kissed, one of them had breathed in her ear.

Hugging herself, she began to rock. She was shaking so hard she could hear her teeth chattering but couldn’t stop. Was she in shock?

Would she even think of shock if she were?

Either way, she had a black eye. There was little doubt about that. Her face throbbed where she’d been struck, full-on, by a man’s fist. She’d broken a couple of fingernails trying to fend him off. She could tell those fingers were bleeding. All the digging to create handholds or footholds or find crevices that might lead out hadn’t helped. She guessed the scratches on her arms and legs from the many tumbles she’d taken were bleeding, too, but she couldn’t see whether that was really the case. Not anymore. The light filtering through the opening was almost gone.

Would she have to spend another night in this place?

The prospect of that, of the cold and the rats and the fear of flooding, made her rock faster, back and forth, back and forth. It hurt to move, but she had to concentrate on something or she’d go crazy.

“You—you are powerful. You are...c-capable. You can overcome.” This kind of self-talk had fostered the determination that had carried her through the long hours so far, close to seventeen if her guess was accurate. It was at least 3:00 a.m. when she’d been dragged from her bed, wasn’t it?

She wasn’t sure exactly. She only knew that, after two and a half days of being “home” to take care of Gran, she’d been awakened by a man who whispered that he’d “stab the old lady” if she screamed or tried to escape; and that was all he had to say. She’d do anything to protect her grandmother Milly, even relive the nightmare of fifteen years ago. But he’d simply issued a terse warning telling her he’d kill her if she ever talked about that graduation party and then threw her down the mine shaft.

It was a miracle she hadn’t been more badly hurt. The demolition they’d done after Cody’s death had felled most of the support beams, sealing off some of the deeper crevices, or she might have fallen much farther.

“Hey, you still down there?”

Her heart lifted with hope. The man she’d heard before was back!

“I’m here!” she called. “C-can you help me? You have t-to help me. I don’t want to spend another night in here.”