Page 30

30

Cave Clearing, GAP Mile 92.3

B odhi removed Rory’s digital camera from her messenger bag. Evan peered over his shoulder as he pressed the button to power it on. The camera came to life, illuminating their faces in the darkness.

Bodhi navigated to the image review function and began scrolling through the photos. The most recent shots showed the photos she’d uploaded earlier from the trail. Then shots of the impromptu exhibition in her living room—judging by the perspective, she’d taken them from the deck of the tapas bar. He continued to scroll back. Julie surveying the rubble of a demolished house, a series of photos document the destruction, and series of its owner standing in her kitchen one last time.

“These are from two days ago,” Evan volunteered unnecessarily.

Bodhi continued backward through the images until he found a sequence of shots taken earlier. Landscapes of the trail, close-ups of wildflowers, a dilapidated vegetable stand on the side of the road, and then?—

“What’s this?” He stopped on an image of a massive brick structure partly reclaimed by nature. Vines crawled up its walls, windows were broken or boarded, but the imposing edifice remained intact.

Evan leaned closer. “That’s the old Allen & Sons factory.”

Bodhi swiped to see more images of the building from different angles.

“It was a garment manufacturer back in the early 1900s,” Evan explained, his voice taking on the cadence of a lecturer. “Young women, mostly immigrants, made dresses for wealthy Pittsburghers. After the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in New York in 1911, the workers here organized a walkout to protest their own unsafe conditions.”

Bodhi studied a close-up image of faded lettering above the factory entrance. “She took a lot of photos of this place.”

“It’s the perfect embodiment of her displacement theme,” Evan said, growing animated. “A site of worker exploitation, resistance, and then abandonment. It sits less than half a mile from the trail but has never been renovated or recognized historically because it doesn’t have the scenic value developers like Julie are looking for.”

Bodhi swiped through more images, finding interior shots of the factory—cavernous rooms with broken sewing machines, dust-covered worktables, and shafts of light streaming through holes in the ceiling.

“These were taken the earlier in the week” Bodhi noted, checking the date on the timestamps.

Evan nodded eagerly. “We should check the factory.”

Bodhi frowned. “We need to stay here. We’ll radio the others.”

Before he could, static crackled, then Aaron’s voice came across the airwaves. “She’s not here. We’re thinking we’ll go down to the drainage ditch and check that. Follow it out toward Company Row and then turn around if we don’t find her.”

Evan grabbed for the radio. “No, don’t. Do you know the old Allen & Sons factory?”

“Yeah. Why?”

“She was just there two days ago. She took a lot of pictures. She may have gone back,” Evan explained.

There was a long pause. Then Aaron said. “It’s outside the containment area. Out of radio range.”

Evan frowned. “Barely. Maybe three miles, at most.”

Bodhi held his hand out, and Evan reluctantly placed the radio in it.

“Stand by for a minute, okay?” Bodhi told Aaron.

“Will do.”

He eyed Evan. “How sure are you that she’d go to the factory?”

Evan hedged. “It’s the logical place to look.”

“They’re closer to the ditch. If she did follow it, they’ll waste a lot of time going in the opposite direction. Time we don’t have,” Bodhi countered.

Evan opened his mouth to argue just as the radio crackled to live again. “It’s Sadie. We struck out, too. We’re closer to the factory. We’ll head that way. Aaron, you follow the ditch to Company Row.”

“You’ll be out of range,” Aaron protested.

“We won’t be able to reach Bodhi, but make sure your work cell phone is turned on. I’ll be able to contact you. Satellite phones,” she explained for Bodhi’s benefit.

“Over.”

Evan lunged for the radio and snatched it with trembling hands. “No, Aaron. Wait. Go to the history center instead. I should have thought of it sooner. She has a key. I gave it to her when we were setting up the Vanishing Coal Country exhibit. There’s water, electricity. That’s where she would have gone.”

Aaron’s voice came back, excited. “That makes sense. We’re on it. Sadie, do you copy?”

“Yes. Do it.”

Evan thumbed off the radio and blew out a breath.

Bodhi pulled out his map and unfolded it. He lowered his head to study it, curious how far Aaron was from the history center. But the light from his headlamp was insufficient. He pressed the button to change the mode. He pressed it again, cycling through the UV setting and a flash of red luminescence in the periphery of his vision caught his eye. He swung his head to focus on it. Evan’s left shoe glowed with a large red smear.

Evan looked down at it, then up at Bodhi.

“It’s … it’s not what you think.”

“You have Rory’s blood on your shoe. You were with her in the cave.”

Evan’s shoulders slumped. “It’s not what you think,” he repeated.

“Then explain,” Bodhi said in a measured tone. “Rory is gravely ill. Without intervention, she could die. What happened when you met her in the cave?”

Evan paced, running his hands through his hair. “I didn’t hurt her. You have to believe that.”

“I do,” Bodhi said. “But I need to know what happened.”

Evan stopped pacing and faced Bodhi. “She contacted me this morning after her gallery show was canceled. She wanted my help creating an impactful exhibition. Something that couldn’t be shut down or compromised.”

“Go on,” Bodhi prompted when Evan hesitated.

“We came up with the idea of hanging her exhibit and then hitting the trail.” Evan swallowed hard. “We talked about her going to the factory. She thought she might spend the night there and get shots in the early morning light. At dawn, when the seamstresses would have been reporting to work way back when.”

“How’d she end up in the cave?”

“I guess she stopped to upload some of her photos. I was walking on the trail, trying to get my steps in before I headed into town for dinner. I saw her bike through the trees, the same as you and I found her in the cave. She looked unwell, unsteady on her feet. She fell and hit her head.” His voice cracked. “I panicked. I didn’t know what to do.”

“So you left her there?” Bodhi couldn’t keep the incredulity from his voice.

“She was breathing! I checked. That’s probably how I got her blood on my shoe. I thought she’d be fine. I went to town and waited for her post on social media. She did, and I thought that meant all was well, but I guess she uploaded the photos before I saw her.” Tears welled in his eyes. “Then you showed up with her bag and said she was missing. I swear I don’t know where she is now.”

Bodhi studied him. His face was slick with sweat despite the night chill, and his skin was flushed. His chest rose and fell rapidly. He tugged at his collar.

“Are you okay?”

Evan panted. “Dizzy. Chest … tight.”

Bodhi took the radio from the man’s clammy hands and eased him down to the ground, resting his back against a boulder. He crouched and unzipped Evan’s jacket, then unbuttoned the top two buttons of his shirt. Evan looked at him with panic in his eyes.

“You’re having a heart attack,” Bodhi told him in a measured voice. “I’ve got you.”

He picked up the radio. “Aaron? Sadie? I need one of you to call 911. Evan’s having a heart attack.”

Sadie responded first. “I’ll make the call. Aaron, you three are closer to the trailhead. Head over there to meet the paramedics and lead them to the cave.”

“We’ll keep looking for Rory,” a man said. Bodhi couldn’t tell whether it was Tripp or Lucas.

“No,” Sadie’s voice was firm. “You don’t know where you’re going. Stay with Aaron. We don’t need another lost hiker.”

Bodhi set the radio aside and returned his attention to Evan. “Try to stay calm. Help is on the way.”

He unzipped his pack and took out the first aid kit. “I’m going to give you an aspirin. I need you to chew and swallow it. It’ll prevent any blood clots from getting bigger. You’re not allergic are you?”

Evan didn’t answer. Bodhi looked up and dropped the aspirin. Evan’s eyes were rolled back, and his slack body was slumped to the side.

He shook Evan’s shoulder. “Evan? Can you hear me?”

No response.

He pressed two fingers to the man’s neck, searching for a carotid pulse. Nothing. His chest rose and fell with irregular, gasping breaths that quickly faded to stillness. It sounded as if he was choking and snorting.

“Agonal breathing. Cardiac arrest,” Bodhi muttered, positioning Evan flat on his back. He placed the heel of one hand on the center of Evan’s chest, covered it with his other hand, and began compressions. He counted under his breath, pushing down two inches with each compression.

As a forensic pathologist, he’d dealt with death daily. But this was different. His patients came to him dead. He didn’t lose them. And he wouldn’t lose Evan.

One minute passed. Two. Five. His shoulders burned, sweat dripping onto Evan’s still face. Bodhi paused only to check for a pulse at the carotid artery. Nothing. He resumed compressions immediately.

“Come on, Evan,” he muttered. The night swallowed his words.

After what felt like an eternity, he glanced at his watch. Eleven minutes. His arms trembled with fatigue, but he couldn’t stop. Wouldn’t stop. The trail was two miles long. Help was still at least ten minutes away.

He switched to counting aloud to maintain a consistent rhythm as exhaustion set in. “Twenty-seven, twenty-eight, twenty-nine, thirty.”

He entered a meditative state, his focus shrunk down to the movement of his tired, burning arms and the corresponding count. He acknowledged his discomfort without judging or becoming attached to it. Acceptance.

When he heard voices echoing in the distance and the thud of running feet, it took a moment for him to return to his surroundings.

“Here!” he shouted toward the beams of light bouncing toward him through the darkness. “We’re here!”

He twisted to look over his shoulder, expecting to see first responders, but Tripp and Lucas, came into view, running. When they reached him, Lucas bent over, palms on his knees, sucking down air. Tripp held out a bright red case. An automated external defibrillator.

“Here,” he panted. “Aaron sent us to a church just over the bridge to get it while he went to meet the paramedics.”

Bodhi continued compressing Evan’s chest. “Aaron just saved a life.”

Evan’s odds of survival with thirty minutes of CPR alone were grim, at best. Bodhi had known all along that saving him would be a long shot. But the addition of the AED changed everything.

“How do we use it?” Tripp asked.

Bodhi gave instructs while he administered chest compressions. “Turn it on. Lucas, while I keep working, attach one pad to his upper right chest and the other on his lower left chest. Below his armpit.”

Tripp switched on the machine while Lucas fumbled with the backing on pads. The AED began to issue audio prompts. Lucas connected the pads to the AED. When it was ready to analyze Evan’s heart rhythm, Bodhi stepped back and let his arms hang at his sides like lead.

“Clear,” he said out of habit.

They waited while the device worked. Then the mechanical voice announced: “Shock advised. Charging.”

Bodhi tore his eyes away from Evan’s pale, gray face and met Lucas’s gaze. “Be ready to push the button when it flashes.”

Lucas swallowed and nodded.

“Stay clear of patient,” the AED intoned. “Push the orange button.”

The button flashed, and Lucas pressed it.

“Shock delivered.”

They waited in tense silence. At the two-minute mark, the machine said, “Perform CPR now.”

Bodhi stepped forward, lifted his heavy arms, and resumed the chest compressions.

They repeated the entire clear, analyze, shock, wait, and chest compression sequence once more before Aaron and two EMTs raced into view.

Bodhi kept compressing Evan’s chest, while the professionals dropped their equipment and took over from Lucas and Tripp with precise, efficient movements.

“How long has he been down?” the female EMT asked.

“Almost thirty minutes,” Bodhi answered, his voice strained. “Twelve minutes of chest compressions only, until the AED arrived. He had a myocardial infarction. Before I could get him to chew and swallow an aspirin, he collapsed. No pulse, agonal breathing initially, then nothing.”

“Aaron says you’re a doc?”

“Yes.”

“This guy was lucky.” Then she commanded, “Stand clear.”

Bodhi backed away.

The machine analyzed Evan’s rhythm, then delivered a shock that made his body jerk.

The male EMT took over the compressions while his partner prepared an IV and epinephrine.

Bodhi sank to the ground and rested against a tree.

After the third shock, the male EMT announced, “We’ve got a rhythm.”

Bodhi exhaled shakily. Aaron clapped him on the back and handed him a bottle of water.

The EMTs stabilized Evan quickly—oxygen mask, IV fluids, medications—then transferred him to a portable stretcher designed for wilderness evacuation.

“He’s got a chance thanks to you,” the female EMT told Bodhi as they prepared to move out.

He shook his head. “It was a group effort. Without Aaron’s quick thinking to get an AED and Tripp and Lucas’s help, the compressions wouldn’t have been enough.”

The male EMT gave him a nod. “We called in a ‘chopper to airlift him to Pittsburgh from the trailhead.”

As the first responders disappeared into the trees, Aaron radioed Sadie to give her the update. She told him they were on their way back and had seen no signs of Rory.

Bodhi leaned his head back and closed his eyes for a moment.

When he opened them, Tripp said, “We never made it to the history center.”

Bodhi shook his head. “She’s not there.”

“How can you know?”

“Evan has Rory’s blood on his shoe. He saw her in the cave today. He collapsed before I could confirm it, but I’m pretty sure he’s been steering away from wherever he thinks she is.”

Aaron exploded. “Does he want her to die?”

“I think,” Bodhi said in a weary voice, “he wanted her to stay missing long enough to generate more attention for the plight of the displaced.”

“Christ,” Lucas muttered.

Tripp had picked up Rory’s discarded camera and was scrolling through the images. He paused on a photo of an old house—the only one remaining in a row of demolished structures.

“What’s this?” he asked.

Aaron leaned forward. “That’s Edward Kovalic’s place. It’s the last house standing on Company Row.”

Bodhi squinted at it. “Can you enlarge it?”

Tripp did.

Bodhi studied the image for a long moment then pulled out his radio. “Diana, come in.”

After a moment of static, Diana’s voice crackled through. “Go ahead, Bodhi.”

“I think I know where Rory is. Call for help. Have them send an ambulance to Company Row.”

He pulled himself to his feet and turned to Aaron, “Take me to Kovalic’s house.”