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An hour later, Meredith paused. “I think we’re close.”

Gray looked around them. The trees, the river, the forest—it all looked exactly the same as it had for the last hour. The only thing keeping them going was that they were still moving. But he was soaked. Meredith shivered and stumbled. The last time they spoke, she repeated the story of their long-ago hike. He hadn’t stopped her, and he hadn’t told her she was repeating herself. It wouldn’t help to panic her further.

Her eyes were wide, and her breathing was ragged. If they didn’t get dry and warm soon...

What if they’d gotten in his car? It might have been okay.

Was he dragging the woman he loved through horrific conditions out of fear? Was it all for nothing? She’d fallen four times. He’d fallen twice. One time, she’d slid almost ten feet down a small incline before she got enough traction to stop. It was a miracle she’d stayed on her feet. What if she was injured? What if she suffered something permanent because of him?

What kind of protector was he, anyway? If it hadn’t been for her, they’d be wandering around in circles. He was a city boy. He’d learned navigation in the Marines, but he wasn’t an outdoorsman. He didn’t know these mountains the way she did.

He’d been all but useless up to this point, but when—he refused to think if —they reached this so-called hut, he could put a few skills to use. He might not know how to navigate through a forest the way she did, but he did know how to clear empty buildings in hostile territory. Starting with one simple rule: Never assume the building is empty.

“Why do you think we’re close?”

She pointed across the river. “See those trees?”

He almost said something about how they were surrounded by trees and that she might need to be more specific. But one glance explained it all. Someone had painted the trunks of the trees in multiple neon shades.

Meredith stopped moving and leaned into him. “That is exactly the way I remember it. The pattern is the same: yellow, green, orange, green, orange, yellow, orange, yellow, green.”

The fact that she remembered the pattern made his brain hurt.

“We always figured that it was some kind of signal. The hut is nearby.”

“Okay.”

“Not okay!” He hadn’t realized it was possible to whisper and yell at the same time, but she’d managed it. “It shouldn’t look the same. It should be faded and most of the paint should have peeled off by now. It’s been at least fifteen years. This paint looks like someone did it last week.”

“Agreed.”

“Or it could mean that someone painted the same pattern in a different place and I’m completely wrong.” She put her hands on her temples and squeezed her eyes closed. “I’m sorry, Gray. I’m trying to think, but everything is getting muddled in my brain.”

“It’s okay. You’re doing great. Is there anything besides the trees that makes you think we’re close?”

She pointed to the river. “The main thing I remember about the hut was that it was in a place where the river made a sharp turn. Not quite a right angle, but close.”

He squinted through the rain and the trees and saw what she meant. Instead of the river stretching out before him, it appeared to stop at a point in the distance. If the riverbed made a sharp turn, that would make sense.

Meredith shivered against him.

“I know you’re freezing, but this is close enough. Let’s see if we can find a place to stop for a few minutes.”

Her teeth chattered. “I don’t think I can stop. If I stop, I might not go again. Ever.”

He pulled his phone from his pocket. Still no signal. “I think we should back away from the river and see if we can make a big enough circle that we don’t run into anything near the hut.”

“Okay.” Her eyes were huge in her pale face.

“You’re amazing. You got us to the river. And you got us to the right spot. Will you let me take over from here?”

She nodded. “Please. I’m so afraid I’m going to get us killed.”

He pressed a kiss to her wet forehead. “You’ve done great. Now it’s my turn to keep us alive.”

She dropped her head to his chest. “Okay.”

Her trust in him nearly broke him. He had no idea if he could keep her alive or not. All he knew for sure was that he would die trying.

They’d been walking roughly downhill for a while now, and the ground was oversaturated. It took several minutes to make the wide loop he wanted to make. He caught one glimpse of the hut. Eight months of the year, it would have been completely hidden. You could walk within fifty yards and miss it.

How had the Quinn cousins ever found it?

And why was it so weirdly marked but hidden?

Questions he might never get answers to.

A rush of sound filtered through the rain and the river. A motor. No. Several motors. Not car engines. Motorcycles? ATVs? How could anyone drive either of those through this mess?

There must be a trail, narrow and intentionally allowed to be somewhat overgrown. He’d seen things like that, and unless you knew exactly where they were, like this hut, they were difficult to spot.

He pulled Meredith against him. The rain made the acoustics tricky, but he thought their company was coming from their left. If he knew more about where he was and who was after them, they could run. As it was? The safest option was to hide.

He looked around them and made for a small copse of evergreens. The white pine had branches that came almost to the ground. But the pine needles were mostly on the ends of the branches. If they climbed under the branches and got up against the trunk, they could probably sit on the lower branches and be completely hidden.

It took a few minutes to find the best spot. He motioned to Meredith to go first. She wrinkled her nose but dropped to her hands and knees. He held the branches back and she crawled through them. When she was far enough in, he followed her, then allowed the branches to close around them.

Meredith’s body shook from the cold. Her lips were blue.

Panic gnawed on the edges of Gray’s mind. He had to get her warm.

Doubts flooded him again. The hut they’d been looking for was a few yards away. From what Meredith said, it was unlikely that it would have heat, but it would give them a chance to get out of the elements. Maybe even get dry. But instead, they were hiding in a tree.

Had he made the right call? He couldn’t explain why he’d been so sure it was best to take off on foot. Or why he’d been determined to avoid the hut.

But as the revving engines grew even closer, he prayed. Protect us. Show me how to protect her. I’ll die for her if I need to, but I’d much rather live with her for the rest of my life. Please don’t let us have made it this far just to lose each other.

A new sound filtered through the forest. People running. Yelling. And then the unmistakable sound of machine-gun fire.

Meredith grabbed him and held on.

He pressed into her and drew his own weapon.

Private citizens weren’t permitted to own machine guns in North Carolina. Gray wasn’t naive enough to believe that meant there weren’t any in his jurisdiction, but he also didn’t think any of the people he suspected of owning one were out here today, in the rain, shooting up the forest.

The gunfire continued sporadically for the next three minutes. From the sound of it, Gray feared that at least one shooter was nearing their position.

Then three men emerged from the left. They were dressed in camo, and each held a weapon. One had an M16. One a handgun. He could only see part of the third man’s weapon. Best guess was another handgun.

They paused near enough to the tree that Gray could hear them talking.

“It shouldn’t be that hard to track them,” the tallest man said. “They’ve been sliding all over the woods. How could we have lost them?”

Meredith’s hands tightened on him, and the way her body shook behind him ... they were running out of time. Whether her tremors were from cold, panic, or both, he had to get her out of here. Fast.

“I don’t care about the girl.” This came from a man who looked like he could bench-press a small car. “I care about those idiots on the dirt bikes. Who are they? And what are they doing here?”

“You’re gonna care when Johnstone finds out we lost her,” the third man—shorter, thinner, and with an accent that screamed “not from around here”—said. “I don’t care what’s happening as long as they don’t kill her in the crossfire.”

“She’s been out here a long time,” Bench Press said. “If we don’t find her soon, there may not be much left of her to take back.”

“The cop will protect her.” Tall Man waved a hand at the trees around them. “We’ll have to take him out.”

“Fine by me.” Skinny Dude spat out a string of curses. “We’ll bury him with the others. We’ll play it off that they took off after the wedding and never made it home.”

“No one will believe that.” Tall Man ducked as another stream of gunfire erupted to their right.

“No one will be able to prove different.” Bench Press pointed toward the river. “But we have to get out of here first.”

Gray strained to hear more, but the men moved off and disappeared from view.

Meredith’s body continued to tremble, but this time, he suspected it was more from fear than anything else.

An explosion ripped through the forest. If Meredith cried out, Gray couldn’t hear it. The tree they’d taken shelter in shook so hard Gray wondered if it would fall. He turned so he was pressing Meredith into the tree, his arms around her. She had her hands over her ears and her head tucked against his chest. The tree stopped shaking, but the ringing in his ears kept Gray from processing what was happening.

When he could hear again, the air filled with the sounds of men screaming in agony. Then shots. Two at a time. Then everything went quiet for twenty seconds before engines revved, and the dirt bikes sped away.

The silence left behind was more terrifying than the gun battle.