The Christmas Target

The back door yawned open, the porch beyond it covered with a thin layer of snow. She thought she could see footprints pressed into the vivid white, and she shoved her feet into old galoshes, ran outside.

There! Just like she’d thought. Footprints tracking across the porch and down into the yard. She should have called for help. The practical part of her—the part that was trained as a trauma nurse, who knew protocol and statistics and the necessity of using the brain instead of the heart during stressful times—understood that. The other part, the part that only cared about finding Beatrice as quickly as possible, was calculating just how far an eighty-one-year-old with Alzheimer’s could go in the time it took to make a phone call and get the police involved.

Pretty far.

Especially when going just a couple of hundred yards would mean entering thousands of acres of forest.

“Nana!” Stella screamed, sure that she saw a shadow moving at the back edge of the yard. The woods began there—deep and thick, butting up against the state forest, crisscrossed with tributaries of the Patuxent. An easy place to get lost and hurt. Especially if a person was elderly and frail, and probably not dressed for the weather.

Stella ran toward the trees, hoping the shadow she’d seen had been her grandmother. Praying, because that’s what Beatrice would have wanted her to do. It’s what Henry would have expected her to do. Granddad had been a retired preacher. After watching his son take over the pulpit, he’d planned to spend time going on mission trips, traveling with his wife, enjoying the fruit of a life well lived. He’d ended up raising Stella instead.

He’d never complained about that.

He’d never accused God of unfairness, never said he’d been given a rough shake.

He’d believed that everything happened for a reason, and that good could be found in the most trying circumstance if a person took the time to look for it. He’d been an eternal optimist, because he’d believed that God’s will trumped all else.

Stella was a pessimist. Mostly because she believed the same thing.

She reached the edge of the yard and found footprints in the snow there, nearly covered by a fresh dusting of white. She should have grabbed her cell phone on the way out. She should have grabbed a coat. A flashlight. Warmer clothes.

Rookie mistakes, but she was committed now. She couldn’t let Beatrice get any farther ahead. She plunged into the thick foliage, branches catching on her hair and tugging at her skin. She thought she heard a car engine, was sure she heard voices coming from the front yard.

No one should be anywhere near the house. They were too far from town for random strangers to show up and none of Beatrice’s friends would be out at this time of morning.

Stella would have checked things out, but she had one goal—finding her grandmother.

“Nana!” she shouted.

To her left, branches snapped, and she turned, certain Beatrice would be there.

“What are you doing out—”

Someone lunged from the darkness. Not an eighty-one-year-old; this person moved fast, flying toward Stella, swinging something at her head.

She had a second to react, one heartbeat to duck. The blow glanced off her temple, sent her reeling. She fell into a tree, slid to the ground, but all she could think about was Beatrice. Out in the woods. Near the creek.

She scrambled up, blocked another blow. Dizzy from the first, disoriented, fighting because she’d been trained to do it. Blood in her eyes, sliding down her cheeks, blinding her in the swirling snow. Nana, Nana, Nana, chanting through her head.

She landed one blow, then another. She felt something behind her—someone. No time to duck, just searing pain, and she was falling into darkness.

* * *

Something was wrong. Chance Miller felt it the way he felt the frigid air and the falling snow. He rounded the side of the huge old house, Simon Welsh at his side, Boone Anderson still at the front door, ringing the bell. For the tenth time.

There was no way Stella had slept through the noise.

She didn’t sleep. Not much. When she did, she slept lightly, every noise waking her. He’d learned that during long flights across the Pacific Ocean and long journeys in foreign countries. She also didn’t like being surprised. Ever.

And his early morning visit?

It was a surprise.

Stella was expecting him later in the day, but he’d been worried about the coming snowstorm. If it hit the way the meteorologists were predicting, driving later in the morning might have been a problem. He’d decided to leave DC before the snow began to fall. If he got stuck in Boonsboro, no problem. But he’d been worried enough about Stella that he didn’t want to postpone seeing her.

She’d been too quiet lately, and quiet wasn’t her style. Usually she was loud and decisive, more than willing to explain exactly how she thought things should go.

As a matter of fact, he’d expected her to yank open the door as soon as the bell rang and ream him out for arriving before he was scheduled.

She hadn’t, and he figured that could only mean one thing.

Trouble.

It whispered on the cold wind, splashing down in the heavy flakes that fell on his cheeks and neck. Light streamed out from a door that yawned open, the yellowy glow splashing across the back porch. He could see the interior of the house, the bright kitchen, the white cupboards and old wood floor.

He didn’t bother walking inside.

No way had Stella left the door open. Not intentionally. Not unless there’d been an emergency that had sent her running from the house.

He eyed the snow-coated ground, crouching to study what looked like boot prints. Not large, and he’d guess a woman had been wearing them. There was another print a few inches away, a different type of shoe. Something without tread and nearly covered by a fresh layer of snow.

“What’d you find?” Simon asked.

“Footprints. Two sets. Heading toward the woods.”

“Stella’s?”

“I think so, and maybe her grandmother’s.”

“Looks like she might have left this way,” Simon said, moving up the porch stairs and peering inside. “You want me to check things out, or do you want to split up and search the yard and woods?”

The newest member of the team, Simon had worked for SWAT in Houston before joining HEART. He had keen instincts and the kind of work ethic Chance appreciated. He also had the same driving need to reunite families that everyone on the team possessed.

He didn’t know Stella, though.

Not well, and he couldn’t know just how serious this situation was becoming. Stella didn’t leave doors open. She didn’t take chances. She played by the rules, and she expected other people to do the same. Something had sent her running, and he was pretty sure he knew what it was.

Who it was.

Her grandmother.

“If Stella were inside, she’d be out on the porch giving us a piece of her mind. She’s left for some reason, and I’m worried that reason might be her grandmother.”

“She’s prone to wandering?”

“She has Alzheimer’s, so it’s a good possibility.” Chance took a penlight from his pocket, flashing it into the yard. Snow fell in sheets now, layering the ground in a thick blanket of white. Soon it would cover whatever tracks the women had left. Once that happened, finding them would be nearly impossible.

Please, God, help us find them before then, he prayed silently as he moved across the yard, his light bouncing over white snow and sprigs of winter-dry grass.