Read Online Winter of the Wolf Moon by Steve Hamilton - Free Book Online

think so,” I said. “Even if he did, howwould he know which cabin she was in?”
    “Could he have been following you?”
    I tried to remember, tried to put myself back in my truck that previous night. Were there lights behind me? “I’m sorry,” I said. “I can’t say for sure. I didn’t notice anybody following me, but I can’t swear that it didn’t happen.”
    “Could it have been somebody else?” he said. “Maybe she called somebody.”
    “There’s no phone here,” I said. “And she couldn’t have called anyone from the bar before I got there. She hadn’t even met me yet. Although …”
    “What is it?”
    “At the bar,” I said. “I remember having this funny feeling. Like we were being watched.”
    “Bruckman?”
    “No. I would have noticed him. But maybe somebody else was there. One of his hockey goons maybe.”
    “Well, let’s call in what we’ve got,” he said. “Whatever little that may be.”
    The brief window of sunlight had disappeared. The sky was clouding over again and it suddenly felt twenty degrees colder. From behind the cabin we could hear the whine of a snowmobile. It grew louder and louder as the machine came closer.
    “A snowmobile,” I said. “That’s how he could have gotten here.”
    “How do you know?”
    “There’s a trail that runs right behind these cabins,” I said. “On the state land. That’s why there were no tire tracks this morning.”
    “Makes sense,” he said. “Let’s see that trail.”
    I walked them around the cabin, deep into the pine trees. We had to work hard at it. In spots where the snow had drifted it was almost up to our waists.
    “Here,” I said, fighting to catch my breath. The trail ran parallel to my road. As long as he had a general idea where I lived, he could have done it this way. Maybe he didn’t even know which cabin she was in. Maybe he just skipped mine, started with hers, and got lucky.
    The deputies looked up and down the trail. “Lot of tracks out here,” the woman said. “We’d never know which one was his.”
    At that moment a snowmobile came through the trees. I winced at the noise. The driver slowed down when he saw us. Both of the deputies raised their hands for him to stop.
    “What’s the problem, guys?” he said after flipping his visor open. “I wasn’t going too fast, was I?” I recognized the man. He was staying in the farthest cabin with a few other guys from Saginaw.
    “Were you on this trail last night?” the male deputy asked him.
    “Yes,” the man said. I could hear the apprehension in his voice. “But I was taking it easy, I swear. I know there are cabins nearby.”
    “There’s no problem,” he said. “We’re just wondering if you saw any other snowmobiles. Like around …” He looked over at me.
    “Any time between, say, one A.M . and this morning,” I said.
    “We got back a little after one,” he said. “I don’t remember seeing any other machines on this trail. Besides the guys I’m with, I mean.”
    “We should probably talk to the rest of your party,” the deputy said. “Are they in the cabin right now?”
    “Most of them, probably,” the man said. “We’re supposed to be leaving today. Some of them might still be out on the trails.”
    We made our way back to the car, wading through the snow again. We spent the next hour going to each of the cabins, asking the renters if they had seen anything suspicious.
    Nothing. No leads, no information at all. I started to feel tired and hungry, sitting in the back of the car. And now that we had done everything we could possibly do, I could feel the despair gathering inside me. It was hopeless. Dorothy asked me to help her get away from him. And I let Bruckman or his buddies or whoever it was just come and take her away. They could be anywhere now. I knew the sheriff was looking for her, but what could he do? Find out where Bruckman’s living, go check it out. If he’s gone, then what? Put it on the wires. Keep working on