Chapter 3 - Footprints in the Mud
The rain returned at noon, colder and fiercer than before.
Deep within the wilderness of Blackwood Ridge, where thick stands of Douglas fir blocked out the gray sky, the air smelled of wet earth and pine resin. The terrain was treacherous, steep rocky bluffs cut through by roaring mountain runoff streams.
Officer Natalie Miller walked alongside Sergeant James Holt, the lead handler for the County K-9 Search and Rescue team. Between them trotted Buster, a massive German Shepherd wearing a orange high-visibility search vest, his nose pressed firmly to the muddy ground.
"He’s moving north-northwest," Holt said, pointing to a faint impression in the wet moss near a fallen log. "Look here. See how the impression is heavy on the left side and light on the right? He’s dragging his right leg. His ankle or knee is severely fractured."
Natalie bent down, inspecting the mark. Four days. Andrew had been dragging his shattered body through freezing rain, mud, and jagged rocks for four days without food, warmth, or medical aid.
"Why north?" Natalie asked, checking her topographic map. "His house is four miles to the south. If he crawled out of the ravine, why didn't he go toward the highway?"
"He was disoriented from a head concussion," Holt explained, adjusting his heavy backpack. "When you hit your head in the dark during a violent crash, your inner ear loses sense of direction. He probably thought he was crawling back toward the road, but he walked right deeper into the ridge wilderness."
Arf! Arf!
Buster let out a sharp, resonant bark, lunging forward against his leather leash.
"He found something!" Holt called out, sprinting through the thick brush behind the dog.
Natalie followed close behind, her hand resting on her sidearm. They broke into a small clearing beneath a shelf of granite rock.
Sitting beneath the rock ledge was a makeshift shelter constructed from fallen evergreen branches and strips of torn bark. Inside lay a discard object: a plastic prescription bag from Crestview Pharmacy, soaked with rain and blood. Beside it was an empty, crushed bottle of water that Andrew had filled from a stream.
Natalie dropped to her knees inside the small shelter. On the smooth face of the granite rock behind the leaves, someone had scratched words into the stone using the sharp edge of a pocket knife.
The handwriting was shaky, uneven, but unmistakable:
Day 2. Ashley, daddy is trying. My leg is broken. The rain won't stop. I have your medicine in my jacket pocket. Don't be scared, sweetie. Daddy says it's love... keep walking. I'm coming home.
Tears stung Natalie’s eyes as she traced the carved letters with her fingers. "He was conscious here on day two. He was writing to her."
"Officer Miller! Over here!"
Natalie scrambled out of the shelter. Fifty yards ahead, where the trail dipped into a narrow ravine, Holt was standing beside a deep puddle.
Print in the soft mud showed two distinct sets of boot tracks. One set was the uneven, dragging impression left by Andrew’s single boot and bare foot.
The second set was entirely different: crisp, deep tread marks from heavy combat-style tactical boots, moving in the exact same direction.
"Someone else is out here," Natalie whispered, her blood running cold. "Someone is tracking him."
Holt knelt down, touching the fresh boot print. "These tracks were made less than an hour ago. The rain hasn't filled in the tread pattern yet. Whoever this guy is, he’s moving fast, and he’s hunting Andrew."
Natalie unholstered her Glock 17, racking the slide to chamber a round. "Dispatch, this is Unit 4! We have fresh tracks at grid coordinates Echo-7! A second party is on the mountain, actively tracking the victim! I need armed backup and medical support at the north trail head immediately!"
"Unit 4, backup units are twenty minutes away due to mudslides blocking Route 9," Dispatch replied over the static-heavy radio. "Exercise extreme caution."
"We don't have twenty minutes," Natalie said to Holt. "If that hunter finds Andrew first, Andrew won't make it off this mountain."
They pressed forward at a double-time pace, Buster pulling hard against his harness. The trail led higher up the ridge, where the trees grew denser and the fog hung like a thick white curtain, reducing visibility to less than thirty feet.
As they crested a steep rise overlooking an abandoned logging camp, the sharp, distinct sound of a gun shot echoed through the trees!
BANG!
The shot rang out from the valley floor below, followed by the sound of heavy metal crashing against stone.
"Andrew!" Natalie screamed, plunging down the slippery slope without regard for her own safety.
She vaulted over fallen trees, sliding through patches of slick gravel, her heart hammering against her ribs like a trapped bird.
At the bottom of the slope sat an abandoned wooden logging cabin, its roof collapsed inward from years of snow and neglect. Standing in front of the rotting cabin door was a tall, heavily built man dressed in dark waterproof tactical gear, holding a suppressed hunting rifle pointed into the doorway.
"Police! Drop the weapon!" Natalie shouted, coming out from behind a massive pine tree with her gun raised, aiming straight at the man's chest!
The gunman spun around with terrifying speed, raising his rifle toward Natalie!
BANG! BANG!
Natalie fired twice! Her rounds struck the gunman’s shoulder and chest armor, knocking him backward off his feet into the mud! He dropped his rifle, groaning in pain, clutching his arm as blood seeped through his tactical jacket.
Holt rushed forward with Buster, pinning the gunman to the ground, pulling his arms behind his back, and snapping heavy steel handcuffs over his wrists.
Natalie didn't wait. She leaped over the gunman’s dropped rifle and kicked open the rotting wooden door of the logging cabin.
"Andrew!" she called out, stepping into the dark, dusty interior.
In the corner of the room, collapsed against a stack of moldy burlap sacks, lay a man.
He was terribly thin, his clothes shredded and soaked with mud and blood. His right leg was visibly broken, bent at an unnatural angle beneath his torn jeans. His face was pale as chalk, his lips blue from advanced hypothermia, his eyes closed.
Clutched tightly against his chest, held in a grip so fierce his knuckles were white, was the sealed plastic bottle of liquid antibiotics.
Natalie dropped her gun and dropped to her knees beside him, pressing two fingers against his neck.
The pulse was faint, fluttering like a dying moth's wing, but it was there.
"Andrew," Natalie sobbed, pulling off her thermal slicker and wrapping it around his freezing shoulders. "Andrew, wake up! I'm Officer Natalie. Ashley is safe. Ashley is in the hospital and she’s getting better!"
At the sound of his daughter’s name, Andrew’s eyelids fluttered open. His dark, bloodshot eyes focused slowly on Natalie’s face.
His blue, shivering lips moved, trying to form words through the pain.
"Is... is Ashley... okay?" he croaked, his voice nothing more than a dry, broken whisper.
"She’s alive, Andrew," Natalie cried, tears streaming down her face as she squeezed his hand. "She called 911. She saved herself, and she told us to find you. You did it, Andrew. You made it."
Andrew let out a long, ragged breath. A single tear cut a clean path through the dirt on his pale cheek.
May you like
He slowly raised his hand, opening his fingers to reveal the bottle of medicine.
"Take... take it to her..." Andrew whispered, his eyes rolling back as he slipped into unconsciousness. "Tell her... daddy loves her..."
