“That’s not fair.” She climbed down and resignedly went off to play with Penguin in the other room.
After paying Nicole for babysitting—and giving her way more than she expected, actually—Mrs. Goessel thanked her. “Michelle always loves to see you. I’m glad you could come over. I just wish I knew why Kyle wasn’t answering his phone.”
“If he texts me, I’ll let him know you want him to check in.”
“Thanks.”
“Merry Christmas.
“You too.”
On the kitchen table back home, Nicole found a note that her parents had left for her: they’d gone to a Christmas Eve party at the Newtons’ house and would be back around eight.
She’d forgotten about that. The Newtons. Totally spaced on that one.
She was frying up a falafel burger when her phone rang.
Though she didn’t recognize the incoming number, she still hadn’t heard from Kyle or Daniel and thought it might possibly be one of them using someone else’s phone. She picked up. “Hello?”
“Nicole. It’s me.”
“Daniel? Where are you guys?”
“We’re on our way back. The trip up here was, well . . . interesting.”
“Define ‘interesting.’”
“It has to do with a little sightseeing in Lake Superior.”
“Did you say in Lake Superior?”
“Yeah, but things are good. We should be back in just over an hour, so I’m thinking six thirty or so. Can we meet and regroup at your place?”
“Sure, I’m here now. Why didn’t you reply earlier? I texted Kyle a bunch of times—and whose phone are you calling from anyway?”
“Kyle’s was lost in the fire. This is Larry’s.”
“Wait—fire?”
“Yeah, when the guy tried to kill me in the lighthouse.”
“Kill you!”
“Didn’t quite succeed though.”
“Yeah, well, I think I caught hold of that much. Who tried to kill you?”
“Don’t know. We’re still trying to figure that out.”
“Was this before or after the sightseeing in the lake?”
“Before.”
She listened as Daniel recounted barely making it out of the lighthouse in time and then falling through the ice on his way back to the rowboat. When he was done she said, “That’s insane. Did you learn anything about where your dad might be?”
“I had a blur of Jarvis Delacroix. He told me ‘two thousand six hundred and seventy-five days.’ That’s the last time I was in the barn, that many days ago, back when I was nine. I’m still trying to figure out how that ties in with all this. Oh, and as far as Betty goes—let’s just say, I’m pretty sure she was buried out on Madeline Island. I’ll explain when we get there. See you soon.”
“Two state troopers stopped by at Kyle’s house looking for you. Keep an eye out.”
“Thanks.”
“Oh, and tell Kyle his mom is worried about him. She wants him to call her.”
“I’ll let him know.”
Hearing Daniel’s voice was reassuring to Nicole, but also a little stressful, especially when she heard what he’d been through.
Man, a lot had happened since Friday when his blurs started coming back.
She thought back to finding that dying wolf with him. She’d knelt beside its body, had promised to find out who was doing this, had vowed to stop him.
A lot of progress you’ve made there—
She checked the time.
5:26 p.m.
Okay, Daniel had said six thirty, so that gave her just over an hour to look into things, maybe see if she could pull up anything that would help lead to the poacher, or to finding Daniel’s dad, which was by far the bigger priority anyway.
The two things are tied together.
Maybe.
Maybe not.
As long as she was moving forward on one front, that was at least something.
Carrying her purse in one hand, she brought a plate with her falafel burger, some sour cream potato chips, and apple slices up to her room with the other. She laid her purse beside her bed and set the food on her desk.
During the afternoon she’d only found out when the wolves had been discovered, not when they’d been shot.
But Ty had found that second one, and she couldn’t ignore that. Of all the people who might have stumbled across the wolf, it seemed like an awfully big coincidence that it just happened to be him.
Going online, she checked to see if the Bells lived anywhere near the Traybor Institute, where the majority of the wolves had been killed, but found that they lived on the other side of town.
She reconsidered things.
After shooting the wolf on Saturday, the poacher had made it through the forest without being seen, even though she and Daniel had been close by. Logically, he’d either walked through those woods or had a snowmobile or car waiting to get out of the area. But there weren’t that many roads around there.
You and Daniel would have seen a car—or at least heard one.
Same with a snowmobile.
Maybe he had a place nearby within walking distance where he could hide, or keep his gun, or whatever.
Or, he could have been cross-country skiing.
Hmm. That was true.
With a gun?
Sure on a sling, carry it across your back. No problem. There’s even an Olympic sport where they do that.
When she and Daniel were out near the institute they’d passed a snowmobile trail to a lake with some cabins surrounding it.
So, one of those cabins out there?
That would make sense.
Or somewhere along the network of cross-country ski trails.
You need to find out who lives out there.
While she ate, she used her laptop to pull up the county courthouse land deeds at the website she’d been looking into on Saturday, and began to scroll through them.
After Daniel had finished talking with Nicole, he’d handed the phone to his friend and Kyle called his mom and told her that he was fine and was on his way home.
Faintly, Daniel could hear Mrs. Goessel on the other end of the line: “I thought you were going to be home hours ago to take over watching Michelle.”
“It’s complicated.”
“My phone says this call is from my brother—but Bayfield is the opposite direction from Duluth. What’s going on here, Kyle?”
“I’ll explain it all when I get home. I promise.”
Daniel couldn’t imagine what his friend was going to say.
It was going to take some major explaining.
After the call, Daniel tried to make sense of what had happened during the day, but he just kept coming back to one simple, undeniable fact: someone had tried to kill him.
And he had no idea who it was or why they would want him dead.
CHAPTER
FIFTY
5:31 P.M.
60 MINUTES LEFT
Sheriff Byers heard a key in the lock of the door to his room.
Closing his eyes, he lay still and pretended to be unconscious, but even with his eyes shut he could sense light from the other room sweep in and surround him as the door opened.
Footsteps approached the cot and stopped when they were right beside him.
He doesn’t know you’re awake. You have the element of surprise.
But you’re cuffed to this cot. How are you supposed to take him out?
The sheriff still had his right hand free. If the guy came close enough, he could go for his throat—either a strike with the edge of his hand or maybe grab his neck to try to choke him out.
He could hear the man’s coarse breathing.
What is he doing? What is he waiting for?
He didn’t want to assume too muc
h, but if this was the same man who’d attacked him at his house, then it was Hollister, and he was not going to be an easy guy to take down.
He was a medical student. He bandaged your side. He doesn’t want you dead.
But then why did he stab you?
The breathing got closer.
Yeah, the guy was definitely leaning down toward him.
Deciding to take advantage of the moment, the sheriff snapped his eyes open while at the same time cocking his arm back.
A look of surprise shot across the man’s face.
Yes.
It was him.
Brandon Hollister.
And he was close enough.
Sheriff Byers slashed his hand forward, driving the side of it into the front of Hollister’s throat.
It was a solid hit, but a little too low, and it only stunned him for a moment. As he clutched his throat, the sheriff grabbed his shirt, yanked him close and, while Hollister was still catching his breath, threw his arm around his neck, hoping to choke him out.
Cut off oxygen to the brain, give it ten seconds, maybe fifteen, and he would go unconscious.
That’s what you need.
Just a few more seconds.
Then you can search him for the handcuff key and—
Wrestling against the sheriff’s grasp, Hollister punched him in his wounded side.
A crippling wave of pain rocked him and his grip loosened.
Hollister pulled free.
Grimacing deeply, the sheriff collapsed back onto the cot.
“You shouldn’t have done that.” Hollister’s voice was forced and harsh. He’d moved backward, out of reach, and was rubbing his throat. Sheriff Byers saw he had a syringe case and fresh bandages with him.
Maybe he came to change the dressing—that or drug you.
Or both.
“You don’t even understand what’s going on,” Hollister said.
“Tell me what’s going on.”
But instead of answering, Hollister just stared at the fresh blood soaking through the bandages on the sheriff’s side. “Put some pressure on that. I can’t have you dying on me before he comes back.”
“Before who comes back?”
He coughed and rubbed his neck again, but didn’t reply.
“My son’s car was at the house when you attacked me Saturday night. Is he okay? I swear to God, if you hurt him—”
“He’s fine. Maybe a little bump on the head, but that’s all.”
“What is it you want?”
“I want the world to know what happens at that institute and I want you to help me get the word out.”
What?
He went to the door and closed it.
The sheriff did not hear it lock.
Once he was alone, Sheriff Byers let out a long, painful breath.
Institute? What institute?
The only one he could think of in the area was the Traybor Institute, but they did fish management studies there and what that might have to do with Hollister was beyond him.
But he knew one thing he hadn’t known before: Hollister was not working alone.
No.
He’d mentioned someone was coming back.
And the sheriff didn’t like that prospect.
Despite the nearly debilitating pain, he managed to press his right hand against the stab wound to quell the bleeding. If Hollister’s partner was on his way, he really needed to get out of here and get to a hospital as quickly as possible.
As he repositioned himself, trying to get more comfortable, one of the springs from the cot dug into his back. He slid to the left so it wouldn’t jab him.
But then he had a thought, and turned to study the spring.
Yes. The tip looked narrow enough. If he could just uncoil it he could use it to pick the handcuffs.
Or at least, try to.
After a quick glance at the door to make sure Hollister wasn’t on his way back in, Sheriff Byers began working on removing the spring from the cot’s frame.
CHAPTER
FIFTY-ONE
5:41 P.M.
50 MINUTES LEFT
Kyle hit a patch of ice and the car skidded briefly before the tires gripped the road again.
“You okay?” Daniel said.
“I’m good.”
“Listen, we really need to figure out who tried to kill me back there on that island.”
“No kidding, but no one knew about the lighthouse or where we were going.”
“Could it have been the escaped prisoner Mr. Zacharias mentioned? Maybe the wolf poacher? What about—”
“Larry,” Kyle interrupted him.
“What?”
“Larry knew we were going out there. He also had other boats available that he could’ve used and he knew where the landing was on the other side of the island.”
“That doesn’t make any sense. He wouldn’t have burned down the lighthouse. Besides, why would your Uncle Larry have tried to kill me?”
“I don’t know, but who else . . . Wait, what about Mr. Zacharias? Earlier, you said he knew we were going there too.”
“Yeah, I mentioned it to him when he was dropping me off at your place, but he wouldn’t have tried to kill me either. He’s on our side.”
Kyle drove in silence.
“Or at least I think he is,” Daniel muttered, suddenly unsure about anything.
“Either way,” Kyle said, “we need to find a way to get in touch with him. Maybe then we’ll finally be able to figure out what’s going on here.”
“Back up for a minute. On Saturday, Nicole asked me how the box got up there in the hayloft.”
“That’s backing up more than a minute.”
“Track with me. I looked through it when I was younger—at least we can assume I did, based on what I knew: the handwriting style I used in English class, everything.”
“You’re thinking that you’re the one who put it up there?”
“That would make the most sense. We know that the farm belongs to the Hollisters, right?”
“Sure. I mean—at least it does now.”
“Now?”
“It could have changed hands over the years.”
“Huh . . . good point.”
What matters most isn’t who owns the barn now, but who owned it back when the box was left up there.
“I think,” Daniel said, “we need to find out who owned that land back then, when I was nine, two thousand six hundred and seventy-five days ago.”
“Because of that blur of Jarvis Delacroix?”
“Yeah.”
“My mom’s a real estate agent. She could probably figure it out, maybe look up the records, find out the last time the land changed hands.”
Kyle was busy battling the icy roads so Daniel put the call through. When it rang, he handed the phone to Kyle, who spent a minute trying to explain what he needed without giving away everything that was going on, which was not easy.
When he hung up, he shook his head. “She said she would need to be at her office to check the files. Dead end.”
Daniel closed his eyes and searched through his memories, attempting to decipher the message that the blurs seemed to be trying to tell him: what had happened in that barn when he was nine years old on August twenty-eighth.
Why were you in the barn?
What did you see?
And why did you block out those memories?
Dr. Waxford had spent all day at the facility.
He still had no answers about how the subject had gotten away and no idea who would’ve called the police to report that the missing sheriff was there at the facility.
No, he hadn’t found anything in the security camera footage concerning inmate #176235’s escape, even after reviewing it dozens
of times—which meant that somehow the subject had evaded all the cameras.
And that was virtually impossible.
The only other explanation Dr. Waxford could come up with: someone had hacked into their system, and either altered the footage or found a way to loop the video preceding the escape, which, with their security measures and military-grade encrypted firewalls, seemed just as inconceivable.
But something had happened here and he needed to get to the bottom of it.
Though it was Christmas Eve, he had the private cell number he needed. He got on the phone with his contact at the Department of Defense to see what she could tell him about individuals or agencies that would have the capability of pulling something like that off.
CHAPTER
FIFTY-TWO
5:51 P.M.
40 MINUTES LEFT
Nicole found what she was looking for.
It didn’t answer all of her questions, but it was definitely something worth looking into.
A piece of property on Waunakee Lake, near the institute, belonged to the Bells. She called the forest service’s tip line about the poaching, but no one picked up.
Not surprising. It is Christmas Eve.
She was about to hang up when a recording invited her to leave a message and she decided she might as well—who knows? Maybe someone would be checking them later tonight or tomorrow.
“Um . . . My name is Nicole Marten. I think I might have information about who’s poaching those wolves.” She left her number and hung up.
You’re assuming a lot here, Nicole.
True.
But three things were also true: (1) Ty had found one of the wolves, (2) his family owned property right in the middle of the wolf poaching sites, and (3) he could have accessed the wolf locations through his dad’s office.
No, of course, Ty’s involvement wasn’t certain, but there was enough here to make her think something was going on.
She tried texting Daniel at the number he’d called from earlier, but the text didn’t go through.
There were a lot of dead spots out there near the national forest where you couldn’t get a cell signal, so it didn’t surprise her.
Resend it in a few minutes.