CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“Holy fuck.”
Dex’s voice rang out from behind the cabin just as I was heading outside to use the outhouse. Mitch was at the llama corral, feeding them their daily dose of hay and grains.
I quickly shut the door and stomped my way through the snow. It was about ten in the morning and the sun was high in the sky, making the snow that had fallen during the night sparkle like diamonds, and feel just as hard beneath my boots.
I rounded the corner, pulling my knit cap down over my forehead and stopped when I saw Dex standing beneath our bedroom window looking at the ground, then up at the window and back down again.
“What is it?” I asked, my pulse quickening.
“Tell me about the sound you heard last night,” he said, his voice trailing off.
I bit my lip anxiously and came over to join him.
Dex was standing right in front of a set of footprints that lay right beneath the window. Footprints that looked eerily like the one Rigby had shown us. And on closer inspection, I realized that it wasn’t just one set of prints but many. They were messy and blurry with snow having blown down their ridges, looking like they were left in a hurry.
Dex pointed off to the otherside of the cabin.
“They disappear into the forest over there,” he said. He finally brought his eyes over to look at me and they looked startlingly brown and clear in the harsh, snow-blind white of morning.
I held his gaze for a minute, surprised at the sudden way my heart was tingling at the sight of him. Memories of what he said last night, his tattoo, that I was his light, surfaced in my head. Then I broke away. I crouched down to the snow and lightly touched the print. It wasn’t quite as clear as the cast but it was definitely the same shape. About a foot and a half long with a deep, narrow indent at the heel. Whoever – or whatever – left these seemed to have stood in the one place for a long time, then perhaps circled the area before taking off for the woods. Considering the place was right below the window, it probably meant it was the source of the sound.
“I told you,” I said, my eyes focusing and un-focusing on the glittering snow, “it was a scratching sound.”
“Huh,” Dex said. He had stepped forward and was running his hand down the side of the building. I got up and peered at it. There were five grooves made into the rough cabin wall, fresh splinters sticking out of it. They weren’t that deep but they was there. And that was enough.
I suddenly felt sick to my stomach and turned away from the sight, walking a few feet away until I was at the base of a tree. I leaned against it and breathed in sharply through my nose, trying to keep the nausea at bay.
“Perry,” Dex said in quiet alarm and came beside me. I felt his hand on my shoulder, giving me strength.
I closed my eyes. “There was something there last night. While we were sleeping.”
“It could be anything,” he said, though his voice wavered with lack of confidence.
“Anything is still something.” I swallowed back the bitter taste in my mouth and stood up. I don’t know why I was having such a physical reaction to the fear but I suppose fear wasn’t something I handled very well anymore. This was the first time I was met with something terrifying since the whole possession game.
“Maybe this was a mistake,” Dex whispered. His gloved hand went from my shoulder down to my hand and he squeezed it hard, hard enough that I had to look up at him. He couldn’t have looked more worried. “I knew I shouldn’t have brought you out here.”
I cleared my throat. “Once again, it was my idea to do this. I didn’t believe in a Sasquatch.”
“Do you now?”
I shook my head in confusion. “I don’t know what I believe. Something was here though. Something big with sharp claws and it was right beneath our window.”
Dex looked over my shoulder at the cabin and his gaze trailed beyond that. “Maybe it’s Rigby. Or Christina.”
“Or Mitch,” I supplied.
He fixed his eyes on mine. “Maybe.”
“But why?”
“Publicity.”
The wheels started turning in my head. “Publicity. But this would be bad publicity.”
Dex took a step closer and lowered his voice in confidence. “But it’s better than no publicity. And in this economy, it’s worth as much as gold.”
He scratched at his nose and looked around him again. “Look, Rigby and Christina could be telling the truth. Or they could all be big fat liars who brought us out here so their business would get featured on the show.”
“What about Mitch?”
“I’m sure Mitch would benefit too. But I’m not too sure about him yet. He seems like the type who would go around bagging Labrador puppies, but he doesn’t strike me as smart or someone who would keep his mouth shut about this kind of thing.”
“So you think there is no Beast here at all?”
His eyes narrowed in thought. “I honestly don’t know. But before we both start freaking out over this, maybe we need to take things with a grain of salt.”
I nodded and eyed the prints again. “So what now? Do we tell Mitch what we found?”
He bit his lip for a few moments. “Tell you what, I’ll go back inside and get the camera. We’ll record it and then destroy the evidence. I don’t think we need to say anything to him right now.”
He took off and a minute later he was quickly filming the prints, whispering commentary into the camera. I felt momentarily ousted as cameraperson but decided to ignore it. And when he switched it off, checking around to see if Mitch had witnessed any of it, I went over and snatched it out of his hands.
The corner of his mouth lifted in amusement. “Worried I’m stepping on your toes?”
“A little bit,” I admitted, cradling the camera in my arms like a baby.
He studied me for a beat before turning his attention to the ground and quickly rubbing his black army boots through the snow, covering up the prints so all that was left was a messy disturbance.
He stepped back to admire his footwork and shook his head. “No. Doesn’t look right. Too much snow.”
With glinting eyes he turned to me and smiled. Then, as quick as a flash, he bent down, scooped up snow into his hand, balling it up.
I had no time to react. I saw white, then the snowball connected with my head with a thump, sending snow flying everywhere, including down into my eyes.
I blew the snow away from my face and tried to glare at him through watery eyes.
“I was wondering how long it would take you to-”
Whoomp.
Another snowball, this time it impacted on my shoulder.
I dusted the snow off my coat with my free hand and gave him the biggest stinkeye I could muster.
“How old are you again? Twelve?”
He grinned, teeth white as the snow he had freshly gathered.
“Old enough to make you come, young enough to make you hate me for it.”
“Oh jeez,” I muttered, shaking my head, and turned around.
Bam.
Snowball to the back of my head.
I didn’t bother turning around and just walked straight to the outhouse, hearing him call behind me.
“Aww, spoilsport.”