He’d changed from the dark pants and white shirt to jeans and a blue denim work shirt. He had on his old boots and had pulled his hair back in a ponytail.
“I’m ready,” he said.
“Okay then,” Leigh said, and pointed into the woods behind the garden. “He went in back there. You can see his tracks until they disappear farther up into the woods. I heard shots down that way about a half hour ago. I’m going to lock up every gun in the house when I get him back home.”
Bowie grinned.
“We’ll find him, Mama. Just remember what you told me. He’s still a crack shot, and if he’s still good at tracking, too, he’s not going to get lost.”
Leigh sighed.
“I know that. I guess it’s just knowing I don’t have your daddy for backup that’s making me so anxious.”
Bowie gave her a quick kiss on the cheek.
“We’ll see you soon, and if we need any help, we’ll call.”
She patted her pocket to feel for her cell phone, and then watched them jogging across the backyard and into the trees.
*
By the time Talia had changed clothes and pulled her hair up and away from her face, she was feeling grateful for the invitation to the Youngblood house. Staying here alone right after the service would have been difficult, and there was no longer a reason not to leave the house. She’d always loved Leigh and for years had assumed one day she would belong to her family. Getting this second chance with Bowie meant getting his family back, too—except for Stanton. She still couldn’t believe he was gone.
She left the house through the utility room, exiting into the carport. She slid into the car and tossed her purse into the passenger seat, then buckled up before backing out of the drive. There was a part of her that felt guilty for being happy. Her father was gone, and Bowie’s father had been murdered. Tragedies, and yet she’d been given this wonderful second chance.
She drove toward Main Street, and she was thinking about the visit ahead when she slowed down for the stop sign at the end of the block. Within seconds a robin flew across her line of sight. It was summer in Eden, and robins were everywhere, so it wasn’t all that unusual. Except that wasn’t how she took it.
There had been a robin at her mother’s funeral, then today she’d buried her father and here was another one. She took a quick shaky breath as her eyes welled with tears. No matter what anyone else might think, it felt like a message from her dad, giving his approval that she was right to be moving on with her life.
“Thank you, Dad. Say hello to Mama for me.”
A little tearful, she drove through the intersection and then eventually out of town. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d gone anywhere without a need to hurry home. By the time she reached the road that would take her up the mountain, she was smiling. The windows were down, the radio was on. Bowie Youngblood was on her mind. Even though it had been years since she’d driven this road, it was as familiar to her as the man she loved. She knew exactly how much to accelerate as the incline grew steeper, and she knew where the easy curves were, and where the sharp ones appeared with little warning.
When she reached the first hard curve her fingers automatically tightened on the steering wheel. She tapped the brakes as she took the turn and frowned when they felt soft.
“What on earth?” she mumbled, and glanced down at the dashboard, looking for some kind of warning light, but she saw nothing.
A couple of minutes later she came up on Bowie’s truck parked off the side of the road and frowned. It looked like he’d had engine trouble, and she wondered if she would catch up to him walking home. She thought about calling him, but when she picked up her phone and saw there was no signal, she tossed it aside and kept driving.
She was still keeping an eye out for Bowie as she approached another curve. Once again she tapped the brakes, then felt sheer terror when the pedal went all the way to the floor.
“No, no, no! Oh my God!” she cried, still stomping the brakes and thinking this couldn’t be happening. She was holding on to the steering wheel with every ounce of her strength, trying to pull the car into the curve, but she was going too fast. There was a huge jolt when she hit the cable, and just when she thought it would save her, it popped. The cable was suddenly in the air, coiling and recoiling like a dying snake. From the corner of her eye she saw it flying backward into the trees and had no more than a split second to realize what was happening before everything turned into a nightmare. She was in the air and screaming, dropping, down, down, down toward the trees growing out of the side of the mountain.
She threw her arms up in front of her face just as she hit the first tree, snapping it off at the point of impact. Then the car nosed downward, sliding almost perpendicular to the slope until it caught between the trunks of three tall pines and stopped. The engine was smoking. The door on the passenger side had popped open. Except for the repetitive ding ding ding from the open door, there was nothing to be heard but wind through the trees.