Page 11 of Beneath the Mountain Sky (McBride Brother Lumberjacks #1)

I turn and slam it into the nearest trunk, driving the blade in hard and deep, working out some of the rage and growing frustration on the poor, unsuspecting pine.

Each swing sends woodchips flying.

Over and over.

I slam the head into the tree as if it were responsible for all this instead of myself.

Only the sounds of hurried footsteps and voices floating down the trail finally stop my violent outburst.

Liam, Connor, and Sheriff Briggs emerge from the treeline, all eyes immediately landing on me and the gouge I made in the trunk beside me.

Liam raises a brow. “You good?”

My chest heaves from the exertion. All my muscles twitch. My palm flexes around the axe handle, tightening my grip. “Fucking wonderful.”

Connor steps out farther into the meadow and turns, scanning three-sixty around us. “Where the hell was she coming from?”

I shake my head. “I don’t know. There’s nothing up here.”

Tony nods—if anyone knows the mountain as well as us, it’s him. It’s literally his job to know it and all the people on it. “There isn’t.”

But there has to be…

Otherwise, there wouldn’t have been any reason for Willow to be this high on the mountain.

Running the back of my hand across my sweaty forehead, I scan the clearing. “Can we get dogs up here?”

Dark brows rise under his sheriff’s hat. “Why?”

I pull the scrap of fabric from my pocket and hold it up. “Maybe they can scent her. Follow the trail deeper into the mountain, figure out where the hell she came from.”

He scrubs his hand along his stubbled cheek. “I can try to get a few up from Asheville, but?—”

“Do it.”

“It could be expensive.”

I tighten my hand around the axe again. “You think I give a fuck about the money? You know I’m good for it.”

One thing the McBrides are never short of is money—though, we don’t let it control our lives.

Don’t go around spending it the way the tourists do when they come through town, as if their entire worth somehow depends on what car they drive, what phone they have in their hand, and what other material possessions they can accumulate.

That’s not what this has ever been about.The money we’ve made through McBride Timber over the generations came from the place of wanting to help everyone find a place to call home, the way we did here.

Establishing a town, a safe place. It was born of necessity, not of greed, and we got lucky to have expanded over the generations to supply lumber to a large swath of the East Coast.

“I’ll pay for whatever we need, just get someone up here. You still have the clothes she was wearing when she was brought into the hospital?”

Sheriff Briggs nods. “In the evidence locker.”

“And we have this.” I hold up the scrap. “It wasn’t in the water, so that should help, right?”

“I guess.” He offers a slight shrug, rubbing his jaw again. “But I’ll be honest, I don’t know a whole lot about using the search dogs.”

“Me, neither. But at least it’s a clue.”

Liam looks to the sky. “Sun’s about to go down, and we’ve got at least five hours to get back to the homestead.”

“Fuck.”

I scan the meadow, seeing the true vastness of what we’re facing as the sun starts to settle behind the treetops, drawing long shadows. Frustration twists deep in my gut, and I turn to meet Connor’s gaze.

Without even having to say it, I know he understands.

He inclines his head. “You want to stay.”

I nod. “Just another hour or so. Check the perimeter of the meadow to see if she came across it from another direction and left any visible evidence.”

Sheriff Briggs gives me an annoyed look. “I don’t want to have to send rescue up here for you, too.”

I scowl at Tony. “I’ve headed every search and rescue team you’ve ever had on the mountain, so I hope you’re fucking joking.”

He snorts and holds up his hands. “I know better than to joke with someone who doesn’t have a sense of humor, Killian.”

Liam inclines his head to Sheriff Briggs. “I’ll head back with him so he can make the calls tonight and hopefully get the dogs up tomorrow. You two be careful.”

“Always.”

For anyone else, staying up here in the dark would be a surefire way to get lost—or worse. But for Connor and me, it won’t be a problem.

What will be is turning away and returning without answers.

Tony and Liam set off using the game trail to backtrack to the river, while I join Connor deeper into the meadow.

He watches me out of the corner of his eye, a question there.

“Not you, too.”

One of his black brows rises. “What?”

“Liam was giving me shit on the way up here…about Willow being back.”

“And?”

Asshole.

I scowl at him. “I don’t need it from you, too.”

He shrugs, trying to appear innocent—a look that absolutely does not fit him. “I didn’t say a word.”

“You don’t have to. I know that look.”

His deep caramel eyes widen. “What look?”

“That judgy one you always get.”

“I’m not judgy.”

“Yeah, you are.” I point my axe at him. “And you’re judging me right now.”

“I’m not.” A long sigh falls from his lips, and he holds my gaze for a moment. “I’m just worried about you. I know what that woman did to you by leaving, and I don’t want to see you go through that again. It’s been a year, and you haven’t recovered.”

I growl low at him, taking a threatening step in his direction. “You idiot. It isn’t about what she did to me by leaving; it’s what I did to make her leave in the fucking first place.”

Turning, I walk away from him before he can continue to argue with me about it. Before he can push me to do something stupid like deck him—or worse.

He’s always taken my side.

On everything.

Including the argument that broke us up.

But he’s wrong in that, and I’ve known it since the day it happened.

I was just too proud to admit it to anyone but myself.

Until I saw her in that water.

* * *

WILLOW

Lightning flickers across the jet-black sky, the crack of thunder rolling so intensely behind it that it shakes the cabin and rattles the glass in front of me.

It’s the kind of storm that always sets every nerve in my body on edge and makes my stomach turn. The kind that sent me running into Killian’s arms for comfort and safety, even though I knew the power and awesomeness of the squall wouldn’t touch us in this place.

But I don’t move back from the window.

Not even as the sky rips open and the driving rain pounds the glass.

“Shouldn’t they be back by now?” I chew on my bottom lip, then wince at the bite of pain where it’s split, releasing it as I glance at Raven, where she sits in front of the fireplace, enjoying the fire we started when the temperature started to drop as the front moved in. “It’s really coming down out there.”

The maelstrom swirls outside, the wind buffeting the cabin, rain pounding the roof and soaking the ground.

Raven offers me a tight smile that doesn’t quite reach her eyes—well aware of my storm phobia and how uneasy I would be regardless of the current situation.

“I’m sure they’ll get back soon. The McBride brothers know better than to be out on the mountain this late, this dark, in this kind of weather.

The storm probably just slowed them down a bit. ”

That fact alone makes the small dinner I managed to eat threaten to come back up.

“Come sit down.” Raven waves me over and pats the spot beside her on the couch. “You’re going to drive yourself crazy standing there, watching for them.”

It isn’t them.

It’s him.

As much as Connor and Liam became like my brothers over the years, they aren’t the ones I’ve spent every moment thinking about since I got out of that bathtub and was very—embarrassingly so—disappointed to see my best friend in the kitchen making me tea instead of Killian.

Thunder rolls again, making me shudder.

I release a heavy sigh, then wander over and plop down next to her, wincing at the pain in my side and pressing my hand against it. “Shit, I have to stop doing that.”

Raven offers a soft smile. “You keep forgetting that it actually hurts.”

“I know…”

And as the day has worn on, the aches and pains have started to return with a vengeance.

Those blissful moments of relief the hot bath offered wore off the longer we waited for Killian. The fact that I refuse to take any more pain medication doesn’t help. But I can’t bring myself to.

I hate the way it dulls my senses, makes my brain even foggier than it already is.

It’s bad enough not having any memory of the last year of my life, but not being able to think clearly isn’t something I would be able to handle right now.

As it is, I feel like I’m teetering on a tightrope over McBride Falls, and all it would take is one swift wind to blow me right off it and back into that water that almost took my life.

Raven hands me one of the books from the stack next to her on the end table. “Here. Something to do instead of worry.”

I glance down at the title.

Wuthering Heights.

I snort. “You think reading about the tragedy of Heathcliff and Catherine is going to make me feel any better?”

Her laugh floats through the air. “Better than this one.”

She shows me the front of the book she’s had open for the last couple of hours.

Romeo and Juliet.

I roll my eyes. “Not much better.”

She grins and returns her attention to the book. I watch her for a few minutes, reclining in the corner of the couch with her feet up and eyes on the pages in front of her.

Rain continues to pelt the roof and windows, blown by the blustering wind.

Raven may appear relaxed, but being in this cabin has always put her on edge—because of the man who lives here. “Did you two argue again when you got here?”

She sputters slightly, then clears her throat. “Umm. I plead the fifth.”

Which means they did.

“Why do you two always have to be at each other’s throats?”

Even in school, as children, they were always going at it, trying to one-up the other when verbally sparring. And when Killian and I evolved from friends to something more, it only seemed to get worse.