*
TWENTY-FIVE minutes after beginning her climb, Afton hoisted herself up and over the lip of the cliff. She lay there in the snow, panting, trying to collect her wits, willing her chilled, overtaxed muscles to stop shaking. It had been touch and go near the top. And touch and go was never good, especially when you were free climbing all by your lonesome in the middle of a raging blizzard.
She lifted her head tiredly and stared straight ahead. Saw the faint outline of an old farmhouse shimmering like a mirage through sifting snow.
Okay, Afton told herself, here comes the real test. This is where the game turns deadly serious.
Crouching low to the ground, Afton plunged toward the house, battling her way through thigh-high snow. When she was ten feet from the farmhouse, she stopped and gave it a quick perusal. The place looked weary and desolate. And not just because of the blizzard that raged around it. If a house could have a presence, this one reeked of desperation and unhappiness. As she moved toward the front porch, Afton tried to imagine this place in summer. Would there be wild roses twining up the columns? Monarch butterflies sipping nectar in the fields? She thought not.
When Afton still didn’t see any movement inside, she covered the rest of the distance fast and clambered up onto the front porch. Slowly, carefully, she peered through a frosted window.
She saw a kitchen. Pots and pans sitting on the stove, a refrigerator, lights blazing overhead. But nobody there.
But wait. Something was there. She tilted her head sideways and saw a playpen. A baby’s mesh-sided playpen had been set up right next to the stove.
Afton sidled away from the window until she was facing the front door. She drew a deep breath, and then touched a hand to the doorknob and turned it slowly. When the door swung open, she stepped tentatively over the sill, nerves fizzing like mad, but grateful for the wall of warmth that suddenly enveloped her.
Now what? Find the baby. But do it fast.
Moving quietly through the kitchen, Afton glanced into the playpen as she went past it. A flash of pink caught her eye, causing her to hesitate. There, puddled in the bottom, was a pink blanket.
Afton bent down and gathered it up. The blanket felt soft to the touch. Exquisitely soft. She fumbled with the piece of fabric, turning it over until she found a label. One hundred percent cashmere. The Darden baby had been wrapped in a pink cashmere blanket.
Was the Darden baby being hidden away in this farmhouse? Or had some lucky person who lived here hit the jackpot at their baby shower?
Afton folded the blanket and tucked it under her arm along with her ice ax. Then she stepped out into a hallway. Way down at the far end of the house, probably in another room—the living room?—a television set blared loudly. It was an afternoon soap opera from the sound of the dialogue. Some woman with a high, chirpy voice haranguing a guy named Jeff. Calling him a lousy two-timer.
Good. Hopefully, all that noise would cover the sounds of her footsteps.
There was a narrow doorway directly to Afton’s left. Slowly, carefully, she pushed the door open with the tips of her fingers and peered in. Her first impression was that of a Greek chorus of dead-eyed babies. But as she continued to stare in, she knew they were dolls, dozens of dolls, all posed on shelves. There were dolls with luxurious flaxen hair, dolls dressed in tiny little onesies, and dolls with arms and legs so pink and plump you almost wanted to reach out and pinch them. At the same time, the sheer number of them was eerie. One doll, okay. Four dozen of the strange little things, definitely disturbing.
Afton pulled the door closed and moved on to the narrow staircase that loomed just to her left. Were there bedrooms upstairs? Probably. And if there were bedrooms, there just might be a crib with a baby tucked into it.
Very slowly, very deliberately, Afton began to climb the stairs. The staircase was narrow—she could almost touch the walls with both elbows—and the treads were shallow. It was as if the house had been constructed in a much earlier era for smaller, more utilitarian people.
Afton hesitated when she reached the top of the stairs and looked around. There was a bedroom off to her right, the door standing wide open. She could see two more doors down the dim hallway ahead.
Was there a surprise behind door number one?
Afton chose the bedroom to her right. Tiptoed up to the doorway and poked her head in.
There was a girl sleeping in the bed, her face gone slack as she snored softly. From the looks of her, she was probably no more than eighteen or nineteen years old. But what made Afton catch her breath was the baby nestled in a homemade wooden crib right next to the girl’s bed.