Page 23 of Stranded with the SEAL

An hour later, the dust in the cabin remained untouched as Olivia searched for memories. With Trevor gone, she was free to explore without him suspecting she was familiar with the cabin. Drawer after drawer, she rifled through generic clothing and possessions, nothing giving a clue as to its owner.

Exhausted and frustrated, she flopped face-up on the queen-sized bed and stared at the ceiling. There, in the corner of the room, was a framed-out rectangle that could only be the access to the attic.

“How did I miss this?” she mumbled, pulling down a slender handle and exposing a compact ladder. She eagerly reached up to extend it, and froze.

An image appeared in her mind, her own hand on this ladder, tucking it and the access door away. A tremendous sadness filled her spirit at the memory. What was up here that could make her feel so empty inside? She searched her mind for the answer, just as she’d done with the kitchen cupboards.

Everything.

A chill went up her spine. It was dark, and she grabbed a flashlight she’d found before venturing up the ladder with cautious footsteps. Poking her head into the attic, she shined the light in a circle. The space was small and half the height of a normal room, with a stack of boxes on one end, the smell of old newspapers and stale air making her wrinkle her nose.

Settling next to the pile, she pulled down the first box. “Pictures” was scribbled in marker across the top, and she felt her stomach tighten as she opened the box and pulled away the newspaper wrapped around a frame.

A middle-aged man had his arms around two smiling girls in their graduation caps and gowns. One of those girls was her.

She covered her mouth.

Her eyes glazed over as she remembered…

She was in a car, driving in that too-fast reckless way you always had to drive to get up Warsaw Mountain in the snow, when she suddenly feared she’d missed her turn and slowed down the slightest bit — just enough to lose momentum and the traction of her tires on the road.

Then she was stuck, cursing as she tried to push the car on the snow-covered roadway, the wind from the storm howling in her ears. That must have been when Trevor hit her. She never would have heard him coming in that storm.

He’d been telling the truth.

She picked up the graduation picture again, touching the face of the man and the girl, feeling her throat tighten. Ellie and Frank. She held the picture to her chest.

This place didn’t just happen to be close to the accident scene. This had been her destination all along. Her breathing got faster as the realization sliced through her new reality. “I was coming here. I had to get something…to find something…”

Her head began to ache as she concentrated. She could remember the urgency, the importance of her journey, but could not for the life of her remember what it was. “Damn it, Olivia,” she said out loud. “What were you looking for, and why was it so important that you had to drive through a blizzard to find it?”

14

Trevor put on the snowshoes, grabbed a shovel he’d found in the garage, and took off down the driveway. It was snowing as if it would never stop, and he pulled his hood over his head as he limped through the snow. He took his time, babying his knee, testing to see which positions could hold weight as his mind replayed his kiss with Olivia in one continuous, torturous loop.

The walk was punishing, and he was a man who needed punishment. He had no right to take the kisses she offered, not when he was keeping the most basic information about her life a secret. Worse yet, he knew he’d be hard-pressed to deny himself if and when she offered him more.

You’re a fucking bastard.

With every step, his thoughts of Olivia grew more inappropriate. Fantasy stepped in where reality left off, the race of his imagination a welcome distraction from his physical discomfort.

When he rounded the corner onto the main road, the mailbox was nowhere in sight. It had been completely covered in snow. He looked around him at the woods, noting two distinctive trees to mark the turn, and headed for the accident scene, the downward slope of the road causing his knee to catch and grind.

A noise echoed in the distance and he froze, his eyes narrowing. It sounded mechanical, possibly an engine of some sort. He stood still, his ears carefully listening for several minutes. Could it be a snowplow, come to free them from their isolation? Or a helicopter in the sky, searching for the missing Olivia? Surely her fiancé was aware of her location and that she didn’t get wherever she’d been heading, which could pose one hell of a problem for Trevor if that fiancé of hers came looking for her here.

Hawk couldn’t afford to be seen on Warsaw Mountain.

Olivia already knows you’re here.

He cursed out loud.

Steele’s death was bound to make headlines. How would he keep Olivia from turning him in? He shook his head. He’d deal with that when he had to.

He stopped walking and listened hard for the sound for several seconds. It seemed to have stopped.

Rounding the wide corner before the accident scene, it felt as if he was going further back in time than twenty-four hours, as if the accident had been days or weeks earlier, as if he’d known Olivia longer and been sidetracked from his mission far longer than he really had.

Several small drifts of snow remained close to the crash site, and Trevor began digging with the shovel. Drift after drift proved to be exactly that—a formation of snow caused by the wind.