Page 68 of Smokescreen

It was grassier here, but she could see some strands had been smashed.

Knowing Tevin, he’d launched the drone here and then gone back to the van and sat on the bumper as he navigated it.

He had a lot of ground to cover, but he’d probably used a grid system to map everything out and a spreadsheet to track each movement. He believed there was a system in place for everything, and spreadsheets were his system.

Olive’s heart pinged with a moment of grief.

No, it was too soon for grief. She still needed to hold onto hope that he was okay despite the dangerous situation.

“Well?” Reid asked behind her.

“I’m still trying to form the total picture, but you can join me if you want.”

Knowing someone was watching her back made Olive feel better. Even if there wasn’t someone else out here, wild animals were always a possibility.

The last thing she needed was to walk up on a grizzly or a mama moose.

She continued to aim her flashlight at the ground. Then she squinted.

“What is it?” Reid asked.

She leaned down and picked up something, a sinking feeling in her stomach. “This is Tevin’s phone. He would never go anywhere without it. Something must have happened to him.”

Reid’s hand came down on her shoulder. “I’m sorry, Olive.”

The compassionate tone in his voice made her heart twist with some kind of unknown emotion—an emotion she couldn’t deal with right now.

Instead, Olive swallowed hard and continued to observe the area, determined to focus on finding Tevin instead of worst-case scenarios.

She pointed at the ground. “The footsteps . . . they lead away from this area and toward the woods in the distance.”

“And that’s strange?”

“I don’t know why Tevin would feel the need to walk into the woods. He usually stays close to the van and makes note of everything as he records it.”

“Maybe he saw something,” Reid suggested. “Or his drone went down.”

Olive’s jaw tightened. “Or maybe he sawsomeone.”

What if Tevin had happened upon the person behind these dangerous events at the ranch? If he’d seen something he shouldn’t have . . . then someone would be desperate to keep him quiet.

Maybe even desperate enough to kill.

CHAPTER 29

Reid stood in the field, his hands on his hips and turned to Olive. “What’s your call? We can search the woods here if you want.”

Olive glanced at her watch. She had an hour and a half until Rex would send out backup agents—unless they found Tevin first. And she desperately wanted to find Tevin first.

“Let’s follow these footprints,” Olive finally said. “Anything I should know before we go into the woods?”

“Always keep your eyes wide open.” Reid locked his gaze with her as if to drive home his point. “You never know what you’re going to come up on. Probably about a half mile farther down that way there’s another stream.” He pointed in the distance. “But that one is deeper than the one I drove through. I don’t think your friend would have tried to cross it, not if he has any type of common sense.”

“He’s pretty practical.” Olive gripped her flashlight. “Anything else?”

“On the other side of the stream, it gets more mountainous. Again, I can’t see your friend heading that direction because the sheer incline would be a tough mountain to scale. Otherwise, he’d need to walk along the stream.”

“And streams are usually where animals hang out, right?” Olive knew the answer, but she asked anyway.