I’m on my way,” I say. “Just stay put. Don’t move. I’ll be there as fast as I can.”

Schmidt got the kids. At least that’s what Dillon believes. He’s frantic. He was hardly making any sense. He was late getting home, missed them at the bus. Now he says the kids are nowhere to be found. He called the police, then he called me.

When I arrive at the house, there are two Abingdon PD cruisers parked outside, with four cops inside, two of whom are interviewing Dillon. He’s wrecked. He’s shaking, crying. He’s wound up so tight he’s about to pop.

“Jack!” he shouts, leaping up from his chair as soon as he sees me. “God, it’s all my fault!” he cries. “I was just five minutes late. I couldn’t get up with Gretchen or Carrie or anyone. There was no one here, and the neighbor said she saw Schmidt before the school bus came and then he was gone!”

“Calm down,” I urge him. “Take a breath. Sit.”

“Dillon, do you have any idea where he might have taken them?” one of the cops asks. “The sheriff’s department is out at Schmidt’s place now, but nobody’s there. They went inside. Looks like he packed some things.”

“No!” Dillon shouts at the cop. “If I had a clue I wouldn’t be standing here!”

The police have issued Amber Alerts on the kids and put out a statewide bulletin on Schmidt’s pick-up.

“Chief says to tell you he’s on his way,” another cop says, stepping into the living room. “He also said to tell you he’s called the State Police for assistance. A detective is on his way in from Roanoke. Should be here in about twenty minutes.”

“Tell Gil not to come here!” Dillon fires back, angry. “Tell him to go find my kids!”

Dillon is pale. His skin is clammy to the touch. I reach up to his neck, pressing fingers to his carotid artery, feeling for his pulse. He instantly recoils, glaring at me.

“What are you doing?” he barks.

“Checking your pulse,” I say. It’s rapid, much too fast. “You’re in shock, Dillon. You need to sit down, put your feet up, and try to breathe.

“Fuck that!” he shouts, moving past me, “I need to find the kids.”

He goes to the table in the foyer where we always drop our car keys when we come in. I watch him fish his keys out of the bowl, as if he’s about to get in his car and drive away.

“You’re not going anywhere,” I say, plucking the keys from his hand. “You need to be here in case the kids—or Schmidt, or anyone—calls. Get ahold of yourself. Come back into the living room and let’s see what we can do to help the police.”

Dillon regards me with question, his breathing shallow and fast. The look in his eyes is downright wild. I’ve never seen him like this. He’s teetering on the brink of a panic attack.

I return him to his chair in the living room, sitting him down while he fidgets with his hands, grinding his teeth, flexing his jaw.

“Make him stay put,” I tell the cop. “I’ll be right back.”

I run to my car, retrieving my medic bag from the trunk. I’m not sure all EMTs carry around an emergency kit, but since a few bad incidents in Afghanistan, I’ve never wanted to find myself in a situation where my skills were needed, but I lacked the tools to put them to use.

Back inside the house, Dillon is nowhere to be seen.

“He’s in the bathroom,” the cop says, giving me a look. “He turned green as soon as you turned your back. I think he’s throwing up.”

There’s no point in taking his blood pressure. It’s bound to be through the roof. I hold Dillon’s head while he hurls, emptying his guts of everything he’s eaten, with a lot of dry heaving and retching afterwards. When he finally stops, he slumps to the floor crying, hands shaking, still hyperventilating.

“Are you allergic to anything?” I ask him, pulling a vile and syringe from my bag.

“Huh?” Dillon asks, watching me prep a dose of the magic elixir that’s going to make him feel better.

“Allergies?” I ask, all business now. “Do you have any?”

He shakes his head. His pupils are tiny and fixed. The veins at his neck and temples are blue, popped out, and pumping. He’s in full-on shock.

I take his arm, finding a nice plump vein. After cleansing it with an alcohol wipe, I gently slide the needle in. “It’s going to burn a little,” I say. “But in a minute, you’ll feel a lot better.”

“What?” Dillon asks, watching me passively like he’s watching a movie, his eyes wide, bloodshot and glassy. “What is it?”

“Ativan,” I say, “Just enough to calm you down. Not enough to put you out.”

A few moments later, Dillon’s breathing eases. His clenched fists relax. He stops grinding his teeth and biting his jaw. He closes his eyes, just sitting on the cool tile on the bathroom floor. I watch his muscles gradually lose their tension.

“Let’s go lay you down,” I say, taking his big hands in mine. “Come on, baby. Stand up.”

I help him to his feet, supporting his solidly muscled body with my own, walking him back to the living room, easing him onto the couch, settling him down.

“He’s going to be a little woozy for a while,” I say to the cop. “Can you keep an eye on him until Gil gets here?”

The officer points out the window. “Chief’s here,” he says. “He’s outside, talking to the neighbor who saw Schmidt earlier.”

Perfect. I lean over Dillon, kissing his cheek, pressing his hand inside mine. “Gil’s here,” I whisper to him. “I’m going to go see if I can find our kids. I love you, baby.”

Dillon is lost in the ozone, but he manages to squeeze my hand in response.

I return my attention to the cop. “He’s down for maybe half an hour, then he’ll start to wake up, but he’s going to be really loopy for a while. I gave him Ativan. Don’t let him drive or do anything dangerous.”

“What?” The cop asks. “This is above my pay grade—”

“Yes, you are,” I say. “He’s all yours. I’m holding you personally accountable. I’ve got to go help find the kids.”

Outside, I tell Gil about Dillon, begging him to keep an eye on him—and on the wide-eyed cop I left behind in the house.

“Where are you going?” Gil asks, confused.

“I have an idea where he might have taken them,” I say. “It’s a long shot, but I’m gonna check it out.”

Gil shakes his head. “No,” he says. “This is police business. Tell me where?”

“I don’t know yet,” I say, checking my watch. It’s four thirty and I need to go. “I’ve got to go to the property records office to see if I can find the address. Jordan mentioned his grandfather had a cabin. I don’t know where.”

“Okay,” Gil says. “If you find the address, you call me ASAP. Understood?”

I nod, dropping my bag in the trunk, climbing into my car.

“Keep a close eye on Dillon,” I say again. “I’ll call you if I get anything.”

The ladies at the register of deed’s office are already closing shop when I walk in the door. They eye me with displeasure.

“Do you have an appointment?” one of them asks, smacking chewing gum. “We stop doing searches at four-thirty.”

“I don’t have an appointment,” I say. “It’s an emergency.” I show her the Amber Alert on my phone. “Three kids are missing and the man who took them might own a hunting cabin or a piece of rural property in the county. If he does, I need to find it as soon as possible. I need an address.”

She looks at me like I’m crazy.

“I’m serious,” I say. “Can you please help me? The guy is dangerous, and he’s kidnapped three kids.”

“What’s his name?” she asks with a heavy sigh, turning her computer monitor back on.

“Schmidt,” I say. “Henry Schmidt.”

She punches a few keys, then looks up at me. “I have three Henry Schmidt’s in the system. A junior, a senior, and a Henry Archibald Schmidt who lives in that fancy gated subdivision by the lake.”

“Not him,” I say. “Junior?”

“I have an old record for a house near Damascus, but he’s no longer a registered owner. Looks like the bank took it back.”

That’s probably him.

“Anything else in his name?”

She shakes her head. “Sorry. No.”

“What about senior?” I ask.

“Unlikely,” she says. “This property last changed hands in 1957. It’s just woodland up in the hills near the Tennessee line. It’s go no improvements. Not even a paved access road. The only way in is a fire road.”

That’s it. That’s got to be it.

“How do I get there?” I ask her. “Can you print me a map?”

GPS won’t work way out there. I know this from previous experience with EMS, trying to find people living in shacks up in the hollows, where cell phone service is non-existent.

She sighs again. “Give me a minute.”

Five minutes later, as her co-workers are turning out the lights, the young woman directs me to a big topographic map of the county, framed and hanging on the wall. She’s printed out a corner of the map, highlighting the fire road and the property boundaries where I’m going.

“You’ll need a four-wheel drive to get in there,” she says. “And I’d carry a gun too. Those folks up in the hills don’t take so warmly to strangers trespassing.”

I thank her profusely for staying late to help, then hurry back to my car.

I need a four-wheel drive vehicle, and I only know of one place where I can get one without a lot of delay. I drive to the fire station where Dillon works, looking for his boss. I pop into the captain’s office, quickly telling him what’s up, asking if I can borrow one of the department’s vehicles.

“Is Dillon okay?” his captain asks me.

“No,” I admit. “He’s pretty fucked up over all of it. Panic attack. I gave him something to calm his nerves. I need to see if Schmidt is up at that cabin Jordan told me about. Can I please borrow the Suburban?”

“Yeah,” he says, pulling the keys out of his desk drawer. “Who’s with Dillon now?”

“Gil,” I say backing out of his office. “And about six other cops. They’ve got Amber Alerts out and an APB on Schmidt’s truck, but this place I’m going is the only solid lead so far.”

Dillon’s captain follows me out. “Are you going alone?” he asks. “What about the police?”

“I’m calling Gil, right now,” I tell him, moving my medic bag from my car to the SUV and climbing in. “They’ll be right behind me.”

“Be careful,” he says, tapping the door. “Call me and let me know what happens?”

“Sure,” I say, turning the key in the ignition. A moment later I’m tearing out of town, headed southeast on Highway 58 toward Damascus.

I dial Gilman Steele’s number, but the call goes to voicemail. Leaving a message, I tell him the direction I’m headed and where I’m going.

“You need to call me back as soon as you can,” I say. “I’ll lose signal east of Damascus, and this place isn’t easy to find. I need to talk you through it.”

I’m three-quarters of the way to Damascus by the time my phone rings.

“Where are you?” Gil asks, his tone anxious.

I tell him, then start explaining how to get to Schmidt’s cabin.

“I know where it is,” Gil interrupts. “I sent an officer to the county lock-up to ask Kimmie. She gave us directions. Jack, you need to wait for us. Schmidt is dangerous. He’s got guns. He’s used them. He’s got a violent criminal history and very little to lose. He walked out of the hospital when he learned we were pressing charges against him.”

“Hurry up,” I reply, my hands gripping the steering wheel tight to keep them from shaking. “I’m not waiting. I can’t wait.”

“Jack, I’m telling you—”

The signal crackles then breaks. The call drops. Ten minutes later Highway 58 descends into the shady depths of the Cherokee National Forest. The road is narrow, winding, and pocked with black ice. On any other day, I’d find the austere winter landscape beautiful to observe. Today it just looks frigid and gray, loaded with foreboding.

The girl at the register of deeds office marked my turn-off with a bright pink highlighter. It’s a left onto Beech Mountain Road, located at a sharp bend. She said I’d see an old white house and a dilapidated, abandoned trailer.

I missed the trailer, but the house catches my attention as I pass the turn, going too fast to make it. I jam hard on the breaks, swearing under my breath, back up, and turn around.

Beech Mountain road is paved, but just barely. It’s never been plowed and blankets of ice and compressed snow cling in the shadows, making for a dangerous trek. I’m not long on this road, however, as the next turn, another left, is the park service fire road that should deliver me up the mountain to Schmidt’s hunting cabin. That road is unpaved, a sea of mud and ice.

I slow down, putting the Suburban into 4WD before proceeding.

It’s slow going up the steep grade, battling deep holes filled with mud, capped with a thin glaze of ice here and there. One thing becomes apparent to me the farther I drive. Someone else has been along here recently. There are fresh, melted, muddy tracks in the otherwise, frozen, undisturbed tundra of this path.

I’m not chasing a false hope. Schmidt must be up here.

The cabin appears before I expect it. It’s perched high above the fire road, approachable only via a narrow, mud-rutted driveway perhaps one-hundred yards in length. Schmidt’s rusty blue pick-up sits halfway up the drive, blocking nearer access to the place.

I park the Suburban and get out, peering up that long drive, hoping to see or hear something that will make me less anxious that I feel now.

Gil said he had guns and had used them. Gil said he had a violent criminal history. Then why is he walking around free? Why isn’t he in jail?

The air this high up in the mountains is far colder than it is in the valley below. I forgot my coat, leaving it at Kathi’s when Dillon called me to come to him. The chill slips under my collar, crawling up my sleeves. The wind, bracing and dry, nicks my ears, making them ache as I mount the drive, walking toward the cabin, my feet crunching on the frozen ground.

The place looks desolate and as dreary as the location set of a cliché slasher film. Deer skulls and antlers adorn posts and beams of the framed front porch. A metal sign nailed to a nearby tree announces, ‘Trespassers will be shot. Survivors will be fed to the dogs.’

I’m processing that image when I hear a noise. The front door of the cabin opens, the screen door whining on its hinges. Schmidt steps outside onto the porch. He’s got Jordan by the scruff of his sweater gripped in his left hand, and a short-barrel shotgun gripped in his right.

Jordan looks small and terrified. His eyes are locked on mine, wide as saucers.

“You take one more step and I’ll load you up,” the old man says, pointing the gun in my direction.

“Are the kids okay?” I ask him, finding my calm place, checking my breathing.

He glares at me. “Those children are none of your concern,” he says to me. “You’ve infected them for the last time. You and that faggot friend of yours. These children are going to heaven, if I have to send them there myself.”

“Chrissy and Joey are locked up inside!” Jordan calls, his voice shaken and shrill.

“Shut up!” Schmidt shouts, yanking him backwards hard before shoving him away to tumble headlong onto the porch. “Stay on your ass, where you belong!”

“You like tossing little kids around,” I call to Schmidt. “But you didn’t fare so well, going up against someone your own size.”

I take a step closer, lifting my hands half-way up.

“How about you put down that gun and come down here,” I suggest, goading him. “Fight like a man.”

Jordan scrambles to his feet, backing up, pressing himself against the wall of the cabin beside the front door.

“How about you shut the fuck up,” Schmidt growls. “How about I shut you the fuck up!”

He lifts the shotgun, now gripped in both hands. He raises it, pressing the butt into his shoulder, slipping his finger over the trigger.

“I’ll see you in hell,” he snarls.

In that instant, just as Schmidt’s finger draws back, Jordan bolts forward, his hands out, launching himself with full force toward the old man. A deafening report rings in my head as a ball of fire explodes from the barrel of the gun. Schmidt falls forward, tumbling face down the steps, still gripping the gun as he lands hard, Jordan tumbling after him.

I don’t even think before I leap. My body falls between Jordan and Schmidt, my foot stomping on the hand still gripping the shotgun. I feel bones crunch under my weight. The man screams out in pain while I wrench the thing from his shattered hand.

Jordan scrambles to his feet, backing up fast, putting distance between himself and Schmidt.

“He said he was going to kill us,” Jordan huffs, his voice raw. I catch a glance at his face. He’s been crying. “He said it was the only way to save us.”

I shake my head, never taking my eyes off Schmidt who’s prone, face down on the ground, clutching his broken hand to his neck. I put a knee into his back, pressing all my weight against him to keep him down.

“Go find something to tie him up with,” I instruct Jordan. “And let your sister and brother out.”

Schmidt struggles underneath me, his legs flailing as he struggles against my weight. I lean down and shove his face into the dirt. “Don’t give me another reason to beat you like I did before,” I sneer at him as soon as Jordan has fled. “Because I will, and this time there’s no one here to stop me from finishing the job.”

Chrissy and Joey wait, watching from the porch as Jordan and I hog-tie Henry Schmidt. As soon as it’s done, as soon as they’re convinced he’s no longer a threat, they attach themselves to me, gripping my pants at the belt loops, hanging on for dear life.

“You’re okay?” I ask, checking them from head to toe, looking for injuries. “Did he hurt you?” I ask.

“Only Jordan,” Chrissy says, her eyes brimming with tears. “He hit Jordan in the face because he talked back.”

“Come here, you,” I call Jordan, holding my hand out. He comes to me, peering up. Sure enough, he’s got a pretty good shiner forming on his cheek. Tomorrow it’ll be a black eye.

“You gave as good as you got,” I tell him, placing my hands on his shoulders. “I’m so proud of you. You saved my life. That was an epic, brave move you made, taking him down like that. He’d have shot me for sure.”

Jordan blinks, staring up into my face. “He did,” he says. “He did shoot you.”

“What?” I ask. “No, he didn’t. He missed.”

Jordan reaches up, touching a spot, high on my right shoulder. I look down. A soggy, oblong blood stain an inch wide soaks my shirt, with more blood trickling down over my chest. My shirt is marred with small holes, each one painted red and seeping.

What? I feel it now, just a little. Stinging, aching.

The shot grazed me, loading me with the outward spread of buckshot balls from the misdirected shotgun blast. A foot to the left and there would be a softball-sized hole in the center of my chest.

“It’s okay,” I say to Jordan. “They’ll stitch me up and send me home and I’ll be good as new.”

The terrified expression on his face tells me he’s not entirely convinced.