Page 45 of The Aster Valley Collection, Vol. 2

Tess heard Shawn’s voice and immediately reached for my phone, I handed it over and left the room again in search of much-needed coffee after my sleepless night.

I took a few minutes to sit by myself in the hospital cafeteria and think of what an incredible experience it had been holding Tessa’s hand during the delivery and what a fool Nick was for giving all of it up so easily.

“You fucking idiot,” I murmured under my breath. “You had everything anyone could have wanted, and you fucked it all up.”

It made me double down in my decision to lay my feelings on the line for Finn. As soon as Shawn arrived, I was going to head back to Aster Valley and tell that man I had strong feelings for him.

When I returned to the room and Tess handed me back my phone, I noticed a missed call and a text from Finn. I glanced at Tess. “You could have answered the call from Finn. He probably wants to congratulate you. I sent him some pictures.”

She crinkled her brows. “The phone didn’t ring.”

The damned ringer. I toggled the mute switch back and forth and made sure the volume was all the way up. Then I checked the text.

Finn

Congrats Uncle Sheriff! I’m so glad you were there for the delivery.

That’s pretty amazing, and you’re right about him looking like a fat raisin lol.

I’m at work. Night climb went well last night, but Nolan’s trying to rework some things.

Don’t worry, though. Nothing I can’t handle.

I’ll tell you about it when I see you. Go enjoy the baby, okay?

I miss you. I can’t wait to see you. I have some things I want to talk to you about. All good stuff, I promise.

I tried calling him back, but it went straight to voicemail. I texted him back.

I miss you too. Have a good day at work, and good luck with whatever is going on.

I know you can handle it, baby. I’m going to head back to Aster Valley as soon as Shawn gets here to hang out with Tessa.

I don’t know what time, but if you want to meet me at the house after work, the keypad code is the way Penny would relay confidential information ;-)

“You’re so gooey over that guy,” Tessa gloated as she cuddled the baby. “You’re texting with a big grin on your face, and you don’t even realize it.”

“Am I?”

“Mmhmm. And it’s hella satisfying to see. I’m just glad to know there’s someone else in the world who recognizes how special you are. You deserve that, Dec.”

“He’s the special one.” I shook my head. “He came in like a shot out of the blue and shook my whole life up. I’m not sure I could go back to the way it was before.”

And I knew for sure I didn’t want to.

Finn Heller was a dream come to life.

But when Shawn arrived a couple of hours later, wide-eyed and white as a ghost, that dream quickly turned into a nightmare.

“Sheriff!” Shawn panted like he’d run the whole distance from the campground to the hospital, and I instantly jumped out of my chair. “Penny’s been trying to get in touch with you for half an hour. There’s been an explosion. Up on the mountain. By the film set.”

I blinked, and my blood instantly ran cold. On the film set? The film set where Finn had an early call?

I had to work to keep my hands steady as I called Penny back, vowing to replace my broken phone as soon as possible. “What’s going on?” I demanded. “Shawn said there was an accident on the set?”

I couldn’t bring myself to say the word explosion. I couldn’t bring myself to ask about Finn.

“Sheriff, thank god. It’s a 10-80. There’s a report of an explosion on the mountain that triggered a rockslide.” She sounded harried, and I heard several phones ringing in the background. “Multiple 911 calls for medical and fire response. I called in Janine for backup and all hands on deck.”

My brain couldn’t even process what she was saying.

I met Shawn’s eyes. “The film crew wasn’t supposed to set off their pyrotechnics until late next week, and the structure they were demo-ing shouldn’t have been close enough to the side of the mountain to trigger a slide. How the hell did this happen?”

“Initial reports are saying it’s not the temporary structure that exploded. It was the cave.” Penny’s no-nonsense voice quavered. “And it caused… hold on…”

I could hear her talking quickly, and I recognized the voices of Deputies Farmer and Kenton in the background.

When she came back, she said, “Witnesses are reporting a rockslide and a cave-in. Missing persons from the cast and crew. Not sure who or how many. The director was hit with flying debris, and no one’s able to tell us if there are any other charges set. We might need a bomb squad.”

“I’ll get back there as soon as possible.

In the meantime, do the best you can. Tell Farmer to take the lead until I get there.

I’ll call the bomb squad here in Denver County, then I’ll call Cort and get Routt County to give us a hand.

Tell Kenton to call in mountain rescue if needed. Give me updates as often as you can.”

I felt my training kick in—observe, assess, delegate, execute—and I was grateful for it. It held me together despite the fear gripping my chest.

I called the state folks and arranged for a bomb crew. They had access to a helicopter and told me to be ready on the hospital’s helipad in ten minutes for departure.

I declined Shawn’s offer to come with me and said a quick goodbye before making my way to the helipad and dealing with hospital security.

While I waited, I made all the necessary calls to arrange extra support from the neighboring county and continued to touch base with Penny and the deputies onsite.

When I finally had a minute on the helicopter to try and get Finn on the phone, the call went straight to voicemail.

I tried again and again with no success.

I told myself it didn’t mean anything. In an emergency like this, cell signals were jammed. For all I knew, a tower had come down in the explosion.

As much as I tried to focus on helping organize the emergency response, my thoughts kept spinning with thoughts of Finn missing, maybe trapped in that cave-in. I knew he was on set today, but I didn’t know where he was supposed to be filming. Was it at the cave?

When we finally touched down on a meadow near the scene, I saw right away the response was still in chaos.

Cast and crew wandered around in a daze, some with injuries and debris on their hair and clothes.

I was desperate to find Finn, but I had to keep my focus on the job.

Doing my job was the best way to get to Finn as fast as possible.

I found Deputy Farmer. “Do we know how many people are trapped?”

He was the most experienced deputy in the department.

As a father of four and grandfather of fifteen, the man had no interest in the responsibility of being sheriff, but he certainly had the personality and know-how for the job.

I’d felt confident putting him in charge, but I hated seeing any small-town deputy have to handle something of this magnitude. We simply didn’t have the resources.

“No. The closest we can guess is at least six people. We’ve sent two buses to the hospital with fairly minor injuries so far and have one waiting here in case of a more serious injury.

The rest are scrapes and bruises from what we can tell.

One of the EMT crews is setting up a station to treat those over there.

” He indicated a nearby tent that had probably been used for some of the film crew during the shoot.

“The good news is it wasn’t a bomb. One of the crew members mentioned pyrotechnics for a scene they were filming.

It was supposed to happen late next week, I guess, but they moved it up. ”

Rage churned in my gut, and I tried to hold it down.

That was the scene Finn was supposed to be in with Crystobell and Logan.

Where Finn’s character comes to save Crystobell’s character from Logan’s clutches and Logan dies in the explosion.

But all of it was supposed to happen in the structure, not the cave.

The shack structure that was still standing nearby, completely untouched, when everything around it seemed covered in rock dust.

I finally got close enough to see the mouth of the cave behind the temporary shack. Only it was no longer the mouth of a cave; it was a pile of boulders. My stomach dropped. Clearing an opening in that was going to take hours, and meanwhile, the people inside would be…

Do not imagine Finn trapped under those rocks.

A man I vaguely recognized shouted commands to a work crew nearby. I blinked and asked Deputy Farmer who it was.

“Coleman Harrow. He runs an excavation company used by the mining companies mostly. He lives over on Thistledown, so he was one of the first on the scene. The man’s an expert at earth moving and managing big rocks. We’re lucky to have him and his crews.”

The street name reminded me how I knew Coleman. He’d been attacked by the squirrel while trying to feed the raccoon. Finn’s life was in the hands of someone who thought it was brilliant to try stealing food out of a squirrel’s mouth.

If I hadn’t trusted Deputy Farmer’s assessment, I would have thought we were screwed.

“Sheriff, we found Mr. Trainor,” Deputy Kenton said, pulling the director along by the elbow. He was covered in just as much debris, but he also looked very confused.

“Sir, who was in the cave when the explosion happened?” I asked.

“What explosion?”

I wanted to throttle him. Right now I had to keep reminding myself to stay professional. Do what it took to get answers.

“The explosion that collapsed the cave. Which of your cast and crew were inside when it happened? How many people are missing?”