“The wedding?” I choked out, my voice barely audible over the roar of the wind and the approaching sirens. “You’re taking me to him?”
“I’m taking you to the only place you won’t die before the ceremony starts,” Julian growled. He shoved me toward the passenger door of his truck, his grip on my arm bruisingly tight.
Behind us, the playground was a kaleidoscope of chaos. Sheriff Miller was screaming orders that the wind tore right out of his mouth. Deputies were scrambling into the woods, their flashlights cutting frantic, useless beams into the fog where Elias had vanished. They were chasing a ghost in a labyrinth he had built himself.
“Thorne!” Miller bellowed, stomping toward us through the mud. His face was a mask of purple rage, illuminated by the strobing light bar of his cruiser. “Don’t you move that truck! She’s a material witness! She’s a suspect!”
Julian didn’t flinch. He opened the door and practically threw me into the cab. “Stay down,” he commanded.
He slammed the door and rounded the hood, meeting Miller in the middle of the access road.
I huddled in the seat, shivering violently. The heater was blasting, but the cold was inside my marrow now. I watched them through the rain-slicked glass—two men screaming at each other in the dark.
Miller jabbed a finger into Julian’s chest. Julian knocked it away. It wasn’t the deferential gesture of a suspended detective; it was the backhand of a man who owned the land the Sheriff was standing on.
I couldn’t hear the words, but I saw the body language. Miller was blustering, terrified by what he had just seen—a giant, scarred monster rising from the dead. Julian was stone. He leaned in, his face inches from Miller’s, and said something low and sharp.
Miller froze. He looked at the truck, then back at the woods where his men were flailing. He looked like a man realizing his pension was on the line.
He spat on the ground and stepped back, waving a hand in a gesture of disgusted dismissal.
Julian turned and climbed into the driver’s seat. He slammed the door, locking it instantly.
“What did you say to him?” I asked, my teeth chattering.
“I told him that if he arrests you tonight, I’ll give the press the autopsy photos of the girl he let die while he was busy harassing you,” Julian said, his voice devoid of emotion. He threw the truck into gear. “And I reminded him that my name is on the deed to the station house.”
He stomped on the gas. The truck lurched forward, spraying gravel, and we peeled away from the playground, leaving the red and blue lights to fade into the mist behind us.
The drive was silent for a long time.
We weren’t heading back to town. Julian took a hard left onto a fire road I didn’t recognize, the tires crunching over packed dirt and pine needles. We were climbing. The air pressure changed, popping in my ears. The fog grew thicker, swirling against the windshield like white smoke.
My adrenaline was crashing. The terror of the swing set, the sight of Elias’s face—ruined, hopeful, and enraged—was settling into a heavy, leaden exhaustion.
“You called them,” I whispered. I stared out at the passing trees, vague shapes in the headlights. “You promised me time. And you called them.”
“He had a knife, Elara,” Julian said tightly. “I saw the glint when he came out of the fog. You think I was going to let you hug him?”
“He brought me a ring.”
“He brought you a severed finger.”
I looked down at my hands. They were empty, but I could still feel the phantom weight of the stone Elias had asked for. The token.
“He trusted me,” I said. The guilt was a physical pain in my chest. “He came out because he thought I was alone. And now… now he thinks I betrayed him. Again.”
“You didn’t betray him,” Julian snapped. He hit the steering wheel with the heel of his hand. “He’s a killer. He surrendered his right to trust when he glued a woman to a table.”
“He thinks he’s saving them.”
“I don’t care what he thinks. I care that he’s hunting you.”
“He’s not hunting me,” I said softly. “He’s courting me.”
Julian didn’t answer. He just drove faster, the truck groaning as the incline steepened.
“Where are we going?” I asked after a few minutes. The road had narrowed to a single track, bordered by a sheer drop on one side and a wall of rock on the other.
“The cabin,” Julian said. “My grandfather’s place. High ridge. It’s off the grid. No landline, no address on the GPS. Miller won’t look for us there, and Elias… Elias won’t expect it.”
“Elias knows these woods better than you do.”
“Not this part,” Julian said. “This was the one place my father never let him go. The one place that was ‘Thorne territory’ only.” He glanced at me, his expression softening slightly. “It’s the only place I could think of where we can fortify.”
Fortify. A war term.
“So we’re hiding,” I said.
“We’re regrouping. Miller is going to launch a manhunt at first light. He’ll have dogs, helicopters, the works. If we’re in town, we’re in the way. Or we’re bait.”
“I am bait, Julian. That’s the point.”
“Not tonight,” he said firmly. “Tonight, you’re just a woman who nearly got killed. You need to sleep. You need to eat. And I need to figure out how to take down my brother without getting us both thrown in prison for obstruction of justice.”
We rounded a sharp bend, and the headlights swept across a structure nestled in a clearing of ancient hemlocks.
It was a cabin, built of dark, heavy logs that looked like they had grown out of the earth. It was small, squat, and solid. A stone chimney rose from the roof. It looked less like a vacation home and more like a bunker designed by someone who didn’t like neighbors.
Julian parked the truck near the woodpile. He killed the engine.
The silence rushed back in, deeper and heavier than before. The wind howled through the trees, a lonely, desolate sound.
“We’re here,” he said.
He reached behind the seat and grabbed a duffel bag and a shotgun. The sight of the weapon made me flinch.
“Just a precaution,” he said.
We got out. The air up here was thin and biting cold. It smelled of snow, even though it was raining.
Julian unlocked the heavy front door and ushered me inside.
The interior was freezing. He moved efficiently, striking a match to light a kerosene lamp on the table, then kneeling at the fireplace to build a fire.
I stood in the middle of the room, hugging myself. The cabin was sparse. A leather couch, a rough-hewn table, a gun rack on the wall that was empty save for dust. It felt masculine and lonely.
“There’s a generator,” Julian said, blowing on the kindling until a flame caught. “But I don’t want the noise. It carries.”
He stood up, brushing ash from his hands. The firelight cast long, dancing shadows against the logs.
“There’s blankets in the chest,” he said, pointing to a wooden box at the foot of the single bed in the corner. “Canned food in the pantry. Whiskey in the cupboard.”
“What happens tomorrow?” I asked.
Julian walked to the window, peering out through the cracks in the shutters. He checked the lock, then checked it again.
“Tomorrow,” he said, his back to me, “we finish it. We figure out where he’s taking the bodies. We figure out where this ‘Wedding’ is supposed to happen.”
“The Sawmill,” I said. “I told you. He mentioned a castle.”
“Maybe,” Julian said. “Or maybe that’s what he wants you to think. Elias lays traps, Elara. You said it yourself.”
He turned to face me. In the flickering light, he looked exhausted. The lines around his eyes were deep crevices of worry.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“For what?”
“For calling them. For breaking your trust.” He took a step toward me, then stopped, as if remembering he had lost the right to be close. “I looked at you standing there in the fog… and I panicked. I thought he was going to hurt you. I forgot that you were the only one who could talk to him.”
“He wouldn’t have hurt me,” I said. “Not then.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I do.” I reached into my pocket and pulled out the burner phone. It was dead. Battery drained. “He loves me, Julian. In a way that is sick and wrong and terrifying… but he loves me. That’s his weakness. And that’s how we’re going to catch him.”
Julian looked at the dead phone in my hand.
“You’re going to use yourself as bait,” he stated.
“I’m the bride,” I said, my voice hollow. “I have to walk down the aisle.”
A heavy thud sounded on the roof.
We both jumped, eyes snapping upward.
“Pinecone,” Julian said, his hand drifting toward the shotgun on the table. “It’s just a pinecone. Or a branch.”
But we both stared at the ceiling, listening. The wind picked up, whistling through the eaves. The cabin groaned, settling into the earth.
We were safe here. That’s what Julian had said.
But as I looked at the dark logs, at the shadows stretching out from the corners, I remembered the crawlspace. I remembered the hole drilled behind the wallpaper.
Elias didn’t need an invitation. He didn’t need a key.
If we were here, it was because he let us be here.
“Get some sleep,” Julian said, though he pulled a chair in front of the door and sat down, the shotgun across his lap. “I’ll take the first watch.”
I lay down on the couch, pulling a wool blanket up to my chin. I closed my eyes, but sleep was a distant country.
All I could see was the wave. The silhouette at the edge of the woods, raising a hand in farewell.
Goodbye. Or see you soon.
Outside, the storm battered the walls, demanding to be let in.