Instinct, Jason Hough [acx book reading TXT] 📗

they seem happy, I guess, but they’re not quite smiling. Not yet. The shadow of Johnny Rogers’s death still looms over Silvertown.

At the sight of my car I can see them look up, hopeful perhaps that I’ll stop and join the gossip session.

Oh, who am I kidding?

They’ll ask where Greg is. If he’s made it to Virginia safely. When he’ll be back. Can you handle things on your own, that’s what they’ll really be asking, with doubt in their eyes.

Every fiber of my being wants to stop, though. I want to win them over. I want to be part of the Silvertown community, more than anything.

But there’s the hysterical woman on Old Mine Road to think about, just now. Better to let the town know I’m on important police business. Doing the job. I pop the siren on and press a little harder on the Dodge’s gas pedal, ignoring concerned looks as I clear Silvertown proper. The huddled collection of buildings are in my rearview in less than ten seconds. The two women in front of the flower shop watch me go, and there will be rumors even before I round the bend, of that I have no doubt.

Old Mine Road splinters off Route 177 about halfway to the peak, like a loose thread from an old rope. It’s a cracked mess of pavement that worms through four miles of misty forest.

As I drive I try to remember everything Greg told me about the road—and what lies at the end of it—when we came up here a month ago to escort a state pollution inspector on his yearly visit.

Once upon a time the road extended all the way to the old silver mine, but that hasn’t been the case in years. Now it ends at a small parking lot that serves both the trail and the Masonic campground, neither of which see much use for their intended purposes.

The trail is a mile and a half of flat, muddy path with barely a twist or rise to speak of, ending in a fenced-off area where the mine entrance used to be. It’s nothing like the mines you see in an adventure film. This place is filthy and sprawling. An industrial mine, in other words, but with all the equipment gone it’s just a flat patch of cleared ground in front of a cleaved hillside and the huge, concrete-sealed tunnel.

As for the campground, well, there’re better options up by the lake, ones that you don’t have to be a Mason to legally use. Places that aren’t downwind from a polluted old mine, too. Double bonus!

I say legally because the Masonic Lodge owns the land, and anyone else camping there would technically be trespassing.

Other than that one hike up to the mine with Greg and the inspector from the state a month ago, our visits here have all been extremely brief. Nothing more than a turnaround in the parking lot once a week to look for, as Greg likes to say, anything out of the ordinary. So far, all we’ve ever found is ordinary.

But today, of course, there is something off: another vehicle parked in the small gravel lot. It’s a late-model Subaru, and grimy as hell.

I park the cruiser several car lengths away and get out.

The air is cool and thick, smelling of dirt and old growth, and there’s a tension in it I sense somewhere deep down. Without thinking I’ve loosened my Beretta in its holster. I tilt my head down and to the left, reaching up at the same time to activate the radio. But there’s no Greg to update, and I chastise myself under my breath. “Get it together, girl. Not going to convince the town you can handle things if you keep looking for Greg, too.”

My gaze sweeps the tree line, then the lone car. Oregon plates, which is not so out of the ordinary. A Big Foot sticker on the bumper, which is definitely at home here. Probably purchased back in town.

But the car’s not empty, as I’d first assessed. A small movement behind the driver-side window catches the sun. A lock of blond hair. Someone’s inside, crouched way down. Perhaps a kid.

I make a wide approach, palm still resting on my pistol. The person in the front seat is looking the other way, toward the trail. My eyes drift in that direction, but everything’s quiet. Quiet is the norm up here, so that’s not so strange.

“Hello?” I call out.

The head of blond hair moves, but only from being spooked, not to look at me. Instead of going to the driver-side door I move to the front corner. With one fist I rap twice on the hood.

Now she looks.

Blue eyes, wide with terror and red-rimmed from crying. Tears have left clean jagged lines down tanned and dusty cheeks. Her body moves in little jerking motions, fighting to get her breathing under control.

Her hands are white-knuckle tight on the steering wheel. Eight fingers all pressed together like a row of teeth.

I make a twirling motion with my free hand. Roll down the window.

She shakes her head. No fucking way.

Then she turns back to the trail and, with great effort, uncurls her right hand from the wheel and points.

My gaze follows her shaking finger to the empty trailhead. A narrow dirt path leads off into a little cleft between two low rises covered with ferns.

Not a damn noise, save for the wind. A little breeze that whispers through the foliage, coming down from the mine, carrying a smell. Faint, but there. Metallic.

I hold my palm out to her and mouth “Stay here,” as if she’ll do anything but. Her eyes flick from my face to my service weapon and back. Finding reassurance in one or both, she gives the barest of nods.

At the trailhead I radio again, barely remembering to ask for Clara instead of Greg.

“Go ahead, babe,” she says.

I keep my voice calm and low. “There’s a hiker up here and she’s pretty spooked about something on the