Page 3 of Searching for Bristol
He had no ideawhatenticed people off the hiking trail. If he was a superstitious man, he’d say there were creatures lurking in the trees, luring humans to the edge. But because he’d seen and experienced too much to believe in such things as Bigfoot or Mothman—or worse, the being some people in Appalachia called Sheepsquatch—Rocky felt no fear as he followed the clear-as-day path someone had taken in the last few days.
He swore under his breath as the trail ended where he expected it to, right at the edge of the small cliff face. Worse, he saw scuff marks in the rocky dirt next to the edge and a chunk of earth had clearly broken off. Someone had been here—and had slipped over the edge.
He cautiously looked down, relieved when he didn’t see a broken and bruised body at the bottom of the precipice. But that didn’t mean someone wasn’t down there, hurt and needing assistance.
“Hello?” he bellowed, listening as the word echoed off the trees around him. The loud noise scared a few birds nearby, and they took off from their perches on the branches overhead with loud complaining squawks.
Listening hard, Rocky didn’t hear anything, just the sound of his own heart beating.
He swallowed hard. Most people would simply shrug and continue on their way, but the hair on his arms was standing up. His intuition told him that he’d located the missing woman Sandra had sent him to find. He had no proof, and it was unlikely she was here when her hiking companions clearly weren’t, but something was telling Rocky not to give up. That he’d discover what happened to Bristol Wingham.
He waited a moment and tried to think about whathe’dhave done, had he fallen over this ledge. If he wasn’t hurt, he’d probably try to climb back up at the same place he fell. But if he was injured…
Rocky looked to his right and left. If he was hurt, he’d do his best to get back up to the trail—and hopefully people—the fastest and easiest way he could.
Which meant heading east.
Walking slowly, watching where he put his own feet so he didn’t fall over the edge himself, Rocky strained to catch sight of anything unusual below. It was slow going, since the ledge wasn’t well defined and he had to dodge large boulders, trees, and thorns. Every now and then he yelled out, hoping Bristol—or whoever had gone over—was conscious and could hear him.
He’d walked just ten minutes before something caught his attention below. Most people would’ve overlooked it, but Rocky wasn’t most people.
There was a large circular patch of grass that was flattened, visible thanks to the taller weeds and grass around it. If he was a betting man, he’d guess that was where someone had set up a tent or shelter.
If he thought his adrenaline had kicked in earlier, it was nothing compared to now. The urge to get down there, to find the missing woman, was coursing through his veins, but Rocky forced himself to slow down, to think.
“Hello?” he yelled again. “Bristol Wingham, can you hear me?”
He strained to listen, but all he heard was the wind.
“Damn,” Rocky muttered. But determination swam through him. He was close. The signs were all here. Bristolwashere. Or she had been.
It was possible she’d made it back to the trail and someone had found her and gotten her out of the woods…but he didn’t think so. Finding an injured woman on a trail would be something the good people of Fallport wouldn’t be able to resist gossiping about.
Silas, Otto, and Art, the three old coots who hung around outside the post office on the square every single day, would’ve gotten word of something like that, and wouldn’t have been able to resist telling literally everyone with whom they came into contact. No, if Bristol had been the one who’d fallen off the ledge, forced to camp at the bottom of the drop-off, she was still out here. And in need of help. Rocky knew it to the bottom of his boots.
He walked along the top of the small cliff, looking for a way down as he continued to search for signs of the missing woman. It took another couple of minutes, but he finally spied a way down that didn’t look as steep as the rock face behind him. It wouldn’t be easy, but it was hard to track someone from twenty-five feet up. He needed to get down below so he could read any signs more clearly.
Moving slowly, Rocky began the descent of the cliff face. He carefully picked his handholds as he made his way down. His friends would probably call him crazy for the risk he was taking but as each minute passed, urgency pushed at him. He didn’t know why, but he felt a deep-seated need to get to the missing woman.
Admittedly, he always felt that way when he and his team were on the hunt, but this felt…different. Maybe it was because he was by himself. Maybe because Bristol had been out here for three nights already. Maybe it was the way Sandra had spoken about her, with respect and concern. The owner of the diner was sociable, yes, but as far as Rocky knew, she didn’t go out of her way to befriend strangers like she had with Bristol.
Whatever the reason, Rocky knew he needed to find her. Fast.
He made it to the bottom of the cliff face and brushed his hands off on his pants. His palms stung with small cuts from the rock he’d just climbed, but he barely felt the tiny hurts. Studying the terrain, he saw what he’d missed from his vantage point twenty-plus feet up.
Drag marks.
And immediately, fear struck.
It may not have been a legendary creature who’d lured Bristol from the trail…but it could’ve been a flesh-and-blood man. Or woman. Maybe one of the people she’d been hiking with had it out for her and had brought her to the overlook and shoved her off, then gone down to make sure she was dead. He or she could’ve dragged her body, looking for a place to conceal it.
Rocky reflectively reached for his weapon—a weapon he no longer carried because he wasn’t a SEAL any longer. He had a knife, and he was damn good with it, but if someone was out here who wanted to do harm to a hiker, he’d prefer a weapon that would allow him to keep his distance.
Swearing, he studied the area again and saw nothing else out of the ordinary. It wasn’t likely, if someone had hurt Bristol purposely, that he or she was still anywhere nearby, but he wasn’t going to take any chances.
Determination filling him, Rocky followed the marks on the ground. He wasn’t going to yell anymore, just in case someonehadhurt her and was still in the area. In that case, he’d need to sneak up on them if he was going to have the upper hand. And hewould—there was no doubt about that. He knew these woods better than most people, and he had the training to kill with his bare hands, if necessary.
The thought of having to kill anyone turned his stomach, but Rocky didn’t slow down. He’d do what was necessary to save an innocent life. He might not be a SEAL any longer, but that didn’t mean he’d look the other way when someone needed help.
