Page 8 of Wilderness Search (Eagle Mountain: Unsolved Mysteries #2)

Aaron stood with Deputies Shane Ellis, Jake Gwynn, Jamie Douglas, Ryker Vernon and Sheriff Travis Walker in a tight circle in an L formed by the cabin where Scott Sprague lived and a maintenance shed.

Search and rescue volunteer Anna Trent was also there, holding tightly to the leash of a black standard poodle who wore a blue Search Dog vest. They were all staring at a ripped and muddy green T-shirt, splotched with a rusty red Aaron thought looked like blood.

“The dog located it at the corner of the foundation,” the sheriff said. “That kept the worst of the rain off of it.”

“And we’re sure it belongs to Olivia?” Jamie asked. Her long hair had partially come loose from its bun, and hung in sodden strands around her face.

“Jacqui alerted on this, based on the scent she got from the sock the counselor retrieved from Olivia’s dirty laundry bag,” Anna said.

“We’ll know for certain once we get results from the lab,” the sheriff said. He nodded to Jake. “You can bag it now.”

Wearing gloves, Jake picked up one edge of the shirt between thumb and forefinger and lifted it. “That looks like it was slashed with a knife or a razor or something,” Shane said.

No one else said anything as Jake placed the garment in an evidence bag. Aaron wondered if they, like him, were focused on the blood.

“What’s that on the ground?” Jamie asked. She pointed to what looked to Aaron like colored string, pressed into the mud where the torn shirt had lain.

The sheriff used a pen to tease the item from the mud. “It looks like colored string, woven into a pattern,” he said.

“It’s a friendship bracelet,” Jamie said. When they all looked at her, she shrugged. “My sister, Donna, is into making them. Girls trade them with each other.”

“Olivia’s friend Stella was wearing a bracelet like that,” Aaron said.

The sheriff placed the bracelet into an evidence bag. “We’ll find out if Olivia had a bracelet like this.”

“Was there anything else?” Aaron asked. “Any footprints or sign of a struggle?”

“Nothing,” Ryker said. “I was with Anna when Jacqui found it and the ground isn’t really disturbed at all. It’s almost like someone just dropped it there.”

“We’ll keep searching, keeping in mind that we may be looking for a wounded girl,” Travis said, his expression grim.

He was a hard man to read, but Aaron knew he had children of his own.

Was he thinking of them? He looked at each of them in turn.

“We need to talk to everyone who had contact with Olivia in the last twenty-four hours—campers, counselors, other staff at the camp. Anyone who might have seen her with someone or heard her say something that might be relevant.” He turned to Aaron.

“Did you learn anything from her cabin mate?”

“Olivia had a relationship with a sixteen-year-old boy at home. Her parents didn’t approve.

They forbade her to see him again and sent her here for the summer to get her away from him.

The friend, Stella, says Olivia told her she was mad at the boy and didn’t want to see him again, but she may have been lying to cover up a planned meeting.

Stella said this wasn’t the first time Olivia sneaked out of the cabin after lights out.

She thinks Olivia was meeting someone, but doesn’t know who, or even if it was a boy or a girl.

She did say she had never seen Olivia interact with the boys at camp, or with male staff, outside of the incidental contact you would expect. ”

“I’ll talk to the parents, get the name of this boy and follow up on his whereabouts,” Travis said.

He turned and started walking away, but Aaron followed. “There’s something else you should know,” he said.

Travis stopped and waited. “There’s a man on staff here, Gary Reynolds,” Aaron said. “He’s a maintenance man. A relatively new hire, from what I can gather. I know him. He’s from Vermont.”

Again, Travis said nothing, waiting for Aaron to elaborate.

“I knew him as Gareth Delaney. He worked at a youth camp there, also. He was a counselor. A little girl disappeared there and she was later found in the woods nearby. She’d been strangled.

At least two people said they saw her with Gareth shortly before she disappeared.

He was arrested and questioned, but there was never any further evidence to link him to the crime. The murder is still unsolved.”

“Do you know if he had any connection to Olivia?” Travis asked.

“No, sir. But I thought you should know.”

Travis nodded. “Let’s find this man and talk to him.”

Word had spread that something of Olivia’s had been found near one of the cabins, some bit of evidence that hinted at violence.

There were whispers of blood, even talk that the search had morphed from one for a live girl to a hunt for a body.

Over the course of the day, the search teams had shifted and re-formed, some people taking breaks to warm up inside and change into dry clothes, then heading out with different partners to look in different areas.

Some areas had already been searched and were being gone over again, while other groups moved out farther away from camp to comb through the forest and rocky cliffs beyond the grounds of the camp.

Willa joined one of these groups, accompanying Carrie Andrews, Caleb Garrison and Harper Stanick on a hike through dense forest. They scrambled over fallen trees and around massive boulders, and stopped to shout Olivia’s name and listen to their own voices echo back to them.

They moved slowly, scanning the ground for disturbed leaf litter, shoe prints in the mud, broken branches or blood.

None of them were trained trackers, but they tried to notice anything in the dripping landscape that might be out of place.

Anything to show that a young girl, possibly frightened, possibly injured, had passed this way.

The rain had stopped an hour before, but everything still dripped moisture. They were quickly as soaked as if they had walked through a downpour, simply from brushing against foliage and walking under sodden branches.

Caleb stopped and prodded at a mound of dirt and leaves.

“Did you see something?” Willa asked.

“Bears hide their kills by partially burying them,” he said. “I figure a human killer might do the same.”

Willa shuddered, but nodded. Statistics weren’t on their side here.

If Olivia hadn’t run away with a boy or other friend, and if she had been injured by something or someone, the more time that passed, the less likely they would find her alive.

No one was saying that out loud—yet—but she was sure they were all thinking it.

She remembered when Rachel Sherman had been found.

Willa hadn’t been involved in looking for the girl, but everyone she knew was keeping track of the search efforts, constantly scrolling for updates on social media.

Willa was at work when a paramedic came in and told them Rachel’s body had been found.

“I heard she was strangled and thrown in the creek,” he said.

“One of the cops said she probably died within hours of her disappearance.” He made a fist. “They ought to find whoever did that to a kid and give him a taste of his own medicine.”

Willa had nodded and agreed with the paramedic.

That was before Gary had been arrested. Before she had had to listen to people call for the return of the death penalty for “people like him.” So many people had assumed that because he had been arrested, Gary must have done those horrible things to an innocent child.

No one seemed to believe her when she protested that her brother was innocent. Not even the man she loved.

Caleb’s radio chirped with a message from Danny to return to the lodge. “We’re calling the search for the night,” he said. “It’s too hazardous to keep going in the dark when everyone is exhausted. Go home. The sheriff will decide if he needs us tomorrow.”

Willa was crossing the lobby when Bethany caught up with her. “Are you riding back with us?” she asked.

“No,” Willa said. “My brother is here. I’m going to catch a ride with him.”

“My brother is here, too,” Bethany said. “But he’s one of the sheriff’s deputies, so I’ll skip riding with him.”

She waved and hurried off. Willa went in search of Gary.

She approached several clusters of camp employees, but he wasn’t among them.

She tried texting him, but got no reply.

She was standing in the light from a cluster of cabins when Scott Sprague approached.

The events of the day had reduced the owner of the camp to a gray and wilted version of his burly self, his clothes disheveled, color drained by fatigue and the unflattering overhead light.

“Can I help you with something?” he asked.

“I’m looking for my brother,” she said. “Gary Reynolds?”

His brows drew together. “You’re Gary’s sister?”

“Yes. Do you know where he is?”

“The sheriff took him away about half an hour ago.”

She swayed—or felt as if she had, though perhaps the only thing that shifted was her perception. “They arrested him?”

“I believe they took him for questioning,” he said. “Of course, I guess that amounts to the same thing, doesn’t it?”

Aaron stood at the door to the interview room and studied the man at the table across the room.

Gary Reynolds hadn’t changed much since the last time Aaron had seen him.

He had the same pale blond hair and boyish features.

The papers in Vermont had played up the contrast of his cherubic appearance with the horrible crime he was accused of committing.

But Gary didn’t look particularly cherubic at the moment.

He was sweating and fidgeting in the hard chair across the table from Sheriff Walker.

It was the kind of behavior Aaron had been taught indicated guilt.

But could this also be the behavior of a man who had been wrongly accused once before, and was reliving his worst nightmare?