Page 9

Standing on solid ground was one thing, but trying to stand in deep snow was another.

“My back hurts all the time. After I’ve rescued the kidnapped woman, I’m taking some time off work to recuperate. Hopefully, it won’t take long for this to heal.”

“I know. I was thinking the same with my ankle.”

“Right. Seriously, can you make it all right? If you can’t make it, I’ll have to leave you behind and rescue the woman. I don’t want to leave you in the snow to freeze to death.”

“Yeah, I can make it.” If she could do it the way she was feeling, he could do it. Even if it killed him, he wasn’t letting her do this on her own. “Besides, if I can’t make it, I can always shiftinto my bear coat, so you don’t have to worry about me freezing to death.”

“As long as no one catches you like that.”

The wind, snow, and his injury wouldn’t keep him from being there for her and for the kidnapped victim.

She slipped his other boot into his backpack and helped him get his pack straps over his shoulders. He secured it in front.

“Let’s go.” She trudged through the deep snow, her feet sinking deeply with each step.

He followed close behind, his own footsteps muffled by the layers of white covering the ground while he tried to keep his balance and not step on his injured ankle. She was a small figure in her dark jacket against the vast, snow-covered forest, and he was a shadow following in her wake.

After the first mile, he struggled to lift his legs through the deep snow, and his feet had become numb. She had also begun to slow down and was trying to lift her feet through the deep snow, packing it down as much as she could for him.

He watched her, admiring her determination and strength. She was like a force of nature, determined to conquer whatever obstacles lay in her path. Even in the face of such harsh conditions, she never faltered. He, on the other hand, kept stumbling.

The path she created was narrow, and he struggled to follow in her footsteps. But he was determined to keep up with and support her despite their challenges. After another two miles, her shoulders tensed, and her steps quickened as they neared their destination.

She kept looking back to see that he was still with her, and he appreciated that she was worried about him. He was concerned about her, too. He’d had whiplash from a car accident a couple of years ago and knew how painful it could be.

Knowing how dangerous this situation could be for the kidnapped victim, he tried to keep up with Monica. "So, what's the story about the woman and her kidnapper?"

"Helen Wright was with her new boyfriend, Pierre Johnson, at his place in White Bear. Her ex-boyfriend, Denny Wilson, went to the house, knocked Pierre out, then took off with Helen. She had a restraining order against him because of stalking and prior abuse.”

“Sounds like Denny is bad news.”

“Exactly.” Monica explained that the little girl kidnapped in the nearby town was why she was close enough to take on this job.

"I sure didn’t hear about that. I was trying to locate stranded motorists and thought I saw a car stuck in the snow down the embankment ahead of me. I parked, got out, and took a closer look. The snow had buried most of the roof even. When I dug out enough to look through the window, I found no one inside the vehicle. So the driver must have gotten out before the car was buried."

"Oh, good, two or more people might have needed rescuing. Though you could have kept them company in my car."

Andy realized just how stubborn Monica was. "I began walking back to my patrol car when I saw your headlights through the screen of snow. You were driving at a high rate of speed, headed straight for me."

"For your car, you mean. If you hadn't stood before it, I wouldn't have been headed straight for you." She struggled through the snowdrifts in the woods, just like he was.

He was getting out of breath when he thought he was in great shape. His heart was beating hard from the exertion, adrenaline surge, and pain in his ankle. He figured she was having as much or more pain than he was with her back and hand injuries.

"I thought you didn't see the car because when I looked for any occupants of the buried vehicle and returned to my cruiser, my car was half buried in snow. Not to mention how difficult it was to see because of the low visibility with the heavily blowing snow."

"And you thought"—she paused and then began to climb over a fallen western hemlock that had been partially buried—"that I could see you any better?"

She got to the other side, then held out her good hand to help him over it.

"I thought so, sure, or I wouldn't have done that.” He sat on the hemlock and moved his legs over it, careful of his ankle. Taking hold of her hand, he climbed down on the other side of the tree. “Okay, so what's the plan of action?"

She started trudging through the snow again. "We get as close to the cabin as possible and then see if we can look inside. We need to locate Denny and Helen. I'll do that. You'll walk too slowly to reach the cabin if Denny is looking out the windows. A small clearing surrounds the front of the cabin, and a long drive goes to another road, which is not the one we were on."

"Have you been there before?"

"In the vicinity. I rented a cabin, about a quarter of a mile from there. The place they're at is a one-story log cabin built in the '70s. I looked at aerial photographs of it before I drove here, and it shows a woodpile a hundred feet from the cabin. I'll head for that. One black pickup truck is sitting near the cabin's front door, but it’s probably half buried by snow now. The license plate showed it was Denny’s."