chapter Nine
She saw the pitch near the rendezvous and approached with caution. Unable to sense Adrian, her stomach twisted. Something was amiss. She sniffed the air and detected a hint of cigarette smoke. Maybe he had taken up the habit.
Sasquatch teenagers weren’t much different from human ones, other than the obvious, and they all went through phases of rebellion. Smoking was sometimes a part of it, but because her daughter prided herself on appearances, Liberty didn’t believe she would try it. A wishful thought, but at that point she’d have given up her pardon to see Sage hunkered down behind some log puffing away.
She took another few steps toward the rendezvous, felt a buzz in the air as it penetrated every hair follicle. She sent out a feeler but sensed no humans. Some type of electronic device was nearby, though. A mild current. Maybe a dropped cell phone. A mounted trail camera.
She needed to keep her guard up, to bustle, until she figured out exactly what it was. She eyed the hatch of the tiny cavern about ten yards away. The spot was matted. It had been disturbed recently. She moved forward cautiously, one foot at a time.
Step, stop, sense, repeat.
As she got closer, the disruption around the entrance became clearer, but the buzz faded. So she retraced the path she’d taken and moved east, toward the road. The sensation got stronger.
She got down on all fours and crawled forward, then laid flat. The device hadn’t been dropped, she knew that much. At ground level she lost the signal entirely. She stood up and it resumed. A few more paces and there it was. Mounted at eye level, seven feet high, was a tiny black camera, aimed toward the ground. She reached around from the side of it to keep her arm out of the lens, snapped the camera off the branch, put it on the ground, and stomped on it.
She gathered up the pieces and hauled them away. Rolling a rather large mossy log, she dug a hole, and buried the evidence, rolling the log back on top.
She’d wasted too much time. Hopefully Adrian had not arrived early and left thinking she wasn’t going to show. Liberty hurried to the hatch, lifted it, sat down on the edge, and slipped in.
A quick, shallow drop and she stood there as human. Painless, with hardly a wobble.
As soon as she developed her voice, she called out in a whisper, “Adrian? It’s me, Liberty.”
No response.
A sliver of moonlight filtered down, not much and not far into the room, but enough to see the space was empty. She looked around and saw no sign he’d even been there. Confused, Liberty fetched the zipper baggie out of the recess at the base of the hatch. She pulled out a candle and lit it with one of the lighters inside the bag, then stepped further in and pulled the vine to shut the hatch.
She swept the light low to the ground, made sure no creature larger than a chipmunk had made itself a home there. When she felt certain she wasn’t in danger of coming face to face with a feisty raccoon, she grabbed a second candle from the bag, dipped its wick into the first, and when it caught fire she walked around and looked for a note. Maybe Adrian had been and gone. Nothing. Maybe he’d never been in the first place. Had he run behind? Had he been unable to sneak away?
Everything felt off, though she couldn’t put her finger on it. She stood in the middle and turned in a slow circle, eyed every inch of the space, tried to determine what wasn’t sitting right. She peered into the shadows, turned until she’d come fully around.
Right there, something nudged her brain, but she couldn’t grasp it. She started the search again, and as the light passed beneath the hatch, it clicked. The limb. It was empty.
“What the nuts?” she whispered. The sound of her own voice caused her to jump and she scolded herself.
Frowning, she walked toward the limb. Nathaniel had mounted a hickory branch near the entrance. A place to hang their clothes. A few broken cobwebs dangled from it, but that was it. The pajama bottoms and sweatshirt Liberty kept there were gone. Her skin prickled as if it finally registered the chill and knew there was no promise of coverage. And the way the spider’s silk hung in uneven strands, it had been recently disturbed.
Her eyes darted to every nook and cranny, hoped a shadow wouldn’t magically come to life. The idea of someone she didn’t know invading their private space frightened her. She felt an urge to hide.
Had Adrian made it or not? She envisioned Becky back at the truck and she seemed miles away. She had to leave right then, get back to Becky. And the somewhat safety of the truck. Hopefully Adrian had done the same.
She didn’t even bother to tuck in the candles after she’d extinguished them. Once word of the disturbance got out, the place would be off limits. She got a foothold in the side of the shaft and popped out of the cave on her first try, transformed as she rolled and, without another look back, ran like the wind for the truck.
The tailgate was still open when she arrived and she slid in.
Becky let out a startled, “Whoa.” Then laughed. “It better be my dainty friend, Liberty, or I’m going to spray your face off.” She pointed a can of mace toward the back, lowering it when they made eye contact.
Becky got out, shut the tailgate, and climbed back in the driver’s seat. Before she turned the engine over, she passed the phone and stylus to Liberty. “How did it go? Did you talk to him?”
She typed and handed it back.
“Not there?”
Liberty shook her head.
“You think it was someone human?”
She nodded, typed, Someone there took clothes.
“Damn. You think Adrian even made it?” Concerned furrowed Becky’s brow. “Do you think he’s okay?”
Liberty thought for a moment, then shrugged. She didn’t know his story for sure and couldn’t begin to decide what the right thing to do was. But she knew she needed to confide in Nathaniel. And soon. This was a fiasco. She was a mess. And trying to say it all with a pine-needle stylus was wearing on her.
She emitted a low growl.
“Whoa, missy.” Becky put her hands up, one still held the can of mace. “Don’t think about getting all Incredible Hulk on me.”
Liberty saw a flash of fear in Becky’s eyes and felt ashamed. She quickly nodded, motioned for the phone. I’m sorry.
Becky read it, eyed Liberty like she may be a poisonous mushroom, then smiled. “It’s okay. Guess I’m not used to you acting so salty.” Becky passed the phone back and sat for a minute, stared out the windshield lost in thought. Finally she said, “So, what do we do now? Are we still on for the Jenkins’?”
Liberty didn’t bother to type, just nodded and settled back as Becky started the engine and pulled away. She went over the events in her head. Tried to imagine what might have happened at the rendezvous.
Maybe Adrian had gotten caught when he’d tried to sneak out. Or, maybe he’d made it to the rendezvous, but hunters chased him away. She hadn’t sensed death, a body, so she didn’t play too long with the idea he’d gotten mistaken for a bear and been shot. It was possible some random person or the property owner had gotten lucky and discovered the cave. From the clothes they’d be able to tell somebody frequented the space and so set up the camera to catch the interloper. She doubted it was the property owner, seeing how they were—-according to Mitch—older than dirt and feeble as hell.
She sighed. She could play the what-if game all day long, and still never know.
Becky spoke as they passed their woods. “We’re almost there. A few more miles.”
Liberty looked out the side window and saw the farmhouse through the foliage, perched up on the hill. Idyllic, she thought, the way the willow branches swayed on either side of it, and how the moonlight shone against the roof. She never saw it this way. Her view was from the rear, and only from the kennel’s basement windows.
When Mitch and Ellie moved in, they renovated the outside. Added siding and a breezeway that connected the garage to the house. They also refinished the basement, which when he still lived there, was where Kevin spent most of his free time. Though they never hurt for money, thanks to some wise investments on, first the uncle, then on Mitch’s part, Kevin found he desired his own. To do with as he pleased. Except he made his in possession of narcotics and ended up doing time downstate. When he’d gotten out of prison, he hadn’t gone home.
Liberty turned away. Speeding past the old farmhouse on Little Church Road, no one would know a widowed old man lay dying inside. Catching a glimpse of the happy, red barn-shaped mailbox with its flag up, you wouldn’t know it acted as death’s concierge, escorting letters back and forth to oncologists, funeral directors, and hospice on the daily.
And you couldn’t tell there was a whole world just below the grassy knolls in the woods. Did the other houses they’d passed have secrets, too? She figured a better question to ask was, didn’t they all?