Gage

If I hadn’t been fucking around with Clover, my daughter wouldn’t be missing. That thought keeps repeating over and over in my mind as I trudge through the snow yelling Adley’s name.

This is all my fucking fault. I should have been more focused on her and less on getting laid. That’s why I came to Blue Mountain in the first place—to dedicate my life to raising my daughter in a completely nonpublic way.

The snow is blinding, even if she’s out here, which I hope she isn’t because I probably couldn’t see or hear her. What the hell am I doing? I approach the spot Clover pointed out when we were coming back from the cabin, and it looks the same. Maybe a little more snow covered it, but I don’t think anyone has been here.

“Adley!” I yell again frustration exploding from my lungs. I turn and walk with the wind to my back toward the clearing where I chop wood. When my stump is in sight, I think I see a flash of color and begin running. I drop to my knees when I reach it and push up my goggles to see better.

“It’s a hot pink glove. Adley’s glove. It’s half buried in the snow, but it’s absolutely hers. I stand up and start screaming her name again. I yell over and over until I’m hoarse and search behind every tree, every rock, and every piece of wood in the vicinity.

Nothing. But still, her glove, that’s a sign. I know it is. She’s been an outdoorsy kind of kid since birth, and she would never drop a glove outside, especially in weather like this. She did it on purpose to show me the way to her.

A clue, exactly. I stop looking around the area and begin looking at the ground, dusting the top layer of snow off of things and making my way into the woods a few steps at a time looking for something else she may have dropped.

It’s difficult because I’ve already tromped around disturbing the area, but when I make my third spoke into the tree line, I see a yellow ponytail holder on the snowy branch of a tree.

Yes, good girl, show me where you are, baby. Keep leaving daddy clues, my smart girl.

I remove the hair tie and scan the area for more clues but find nothing. She could have gone in any direction except where I just came from. There’s no way to know unless she left another breadcrumb, and if I don’t find it now, I never will with the blowing snow.

I stand quietly, the only sound in my ears is the wind and my panting breath. Where would someone take her? They can’t get down the fucking mountain in this storm. This is the stupidest plan ever for a kidnapping. They have to be out here.

What’s nearby? What could provide shelter?

Cutler Cave. It’s a thirty-minute hike in good conditions, and it could be reached from this vantage, maybe a little out of the way but not much. I need supplies if I’m going to try to get there. No sense in trying if I’m going to freeze to death doing it.

I make my way back to the house frustrated to be heading in the wrong direction but knowing it’s necessary.

I open the door, my mind consumed by thoughts of Adley out in this storm and what I’m going to need in my pack to make the hike and find Clover sobbing at the computer desk.

She’s probably blaming herself because she wanted to go running just like I’m blaming myself for wanting to be alone with her. I don’t have time to deal with all of that right now. I need to get out of here, and she’s going to have to come with me.

She looks up at me with her tear-stained startled face. “Anything?” she asks.

“I found a couple of clues she left me. She dropped her glove by the stump and a little way into the woods I found her hair tie. I think I might know where she is, but we have to go now, though.”

She doesn’t move. I thought she would jump at the chance to get out of here and look for Adley, but she looks like she has something to say. “What? Out with it,” I snap not meaning to be so cruel. This isn’t her fault after all.

She bites her lip and stands wringing her hands. “The police can’t come up until the storm is over, the roads are blocked.”

“Yeah, I know, let’s go.”

“And… I just got a text,” she says her voice wavering.

“From who?”

“I don’t know who it is, but you need to read it.”

I rush to her and take her phone from her outstretched hand. The screen is open to a very long message from someone named Lenny.

“Who’s Lenny?”

“I don’t have any friends named Lenny. He says he knows you. Read it.”

“Clover, we need to go…”

“No, you have to read this first.” I look down at the tiny words and try to concentrate on their meaning when my brain is screaming get going!

Clover – Your new boyfriend ruined my life. He left me high and dry with bills to pay and no fucking career with no explanation. I never thought I would find him but thanks to you and your classmates, I did. I am taking the only thing important to him until he agrees to expose himself to the world as a fucking fraud. I want him to pay for what he’s done to me. When he does, he can have his little brat back. Lenny

“Fuck.”

“Who’s Lenny?”

“He was my drummer. I told you, people are going to be pissed at me for what I did. I never expected this, though. Lenny was always a little off. He did a lot of drugs, probably gave him brain damage. And now he has my baby.”

“Gage, I’m so sorry, this is all my fault. Not just Adley being taken, but he says right there he found you because of me. I feel so bad.” She starts to cry, and I can’t deal with any more emotions, any more drama, or bad news.

“It’s not your fault there was a fucking snowstorm, and I saved your life. It’s not your fault I bailed on my band and my record label and left a lot of people in financial trouble, and it’s not your fault some psycho kidnapped my kid.”

I didn’t believe it until I said the words out loud. It isn’t her fault, it’s mine.

“We have to go to Cutler Cave. I think that’s where he has her. The clues she left me were in that direction. There’s nothing else out that way, and I know that fool doesn’t know how to get off a mountain in a blizzard.”

“What if he has someone else doing his dirty work? That man who took your picture last night could have done this. Maybe he didn’t want your picture at all. He could have been scoping out the house waiting for a chance to snatch Adley.”

“You might be right. Either way, we have to look for her, nobody can get up here to help us until the storm stops, and by then, it might be too late.”

“What do you want me to do?”

“Grab our packs, and I’ll get some food and supplies. Put on as many layers as you can and get some warm clothes for Adley for when we find her and blankets.”

“Okay.” She stands up straightening her spine with purpose and a job to do wiping her tears away.

I’m getting our packs from the hall closet when I wonder how she got a text in this weather when we haven’t had cell since we went to the cabin. “Clover, how’d you get that text? I thought cell service was down,” I yell upstairs from the living room.

She comes out of Adley’s room holding a bundle of clothes. “I have mesh network app.”

“Don’t you have to be close to the other to use those? Like one hundred feet?”

“I’m not sure, Freda put it on my phone. I’ve never used it before.”

“He must have sent the message before he got too far away. When did you get it?”

She slides her phone from her back pocket and looks at the screen. “About twenty minutes ago.”

“They can’t be too far ahead of us then. Hurry, we need to go now.”

She runs down the stairs and stuffs Adley’s clothes into her pack while I finish loading mine. “Still want me to put on more clothes?” she asks.

“No, we have to go. Hopefully, they aren’t as far ahead of us as I thought. If we can get to them fast, we won’t need all this stuff. I just wanted to be prepared in case we have to be out there for a long time.”

We finish getting ready and head back out into the storm. The wind is louder now if that’s possible, and the wind is blowing so hard it’s propelling us along, something I consider to be a good omen. Maybe mother nature is feeling guilty for being such a bitch, and she’s trying to help me get my baby back?

Clover points at the tree line near my stump, and I nod. She’s tethered to me but she’s having trouble with her footing in the snow, and she’s trying to focus on her destination.

We pass where I found the glove, and I point down. She nods in understanding and I lead her to where the hair tie was hanging and point at that, too. She nods again, and we walk further into the woods. Clover is right behind me now as the trees get closer and closer together.

There’s a trail here, but it’s not visible. I know my way after six years of hiking on it. After five or ten minutes, Clover yanks on the tether. I look where she is pointing and Ollie’s collar hanging low on a bush almost hidden by the snow. Another clue. I want to pump my fist in the air and yell “Yes!” but we don’t have time to celebrate this small victory. We need to keep moving.

I’m so glad I taught her survival training, not to mention all the episodes of Man, Woman, Wild that she’s watched on Netflix. If there ever were a little kid who could outsmart the asshole who took her, it’s Adley.

I’m glad she has Ollie with her. Even though he might be the kidnapper’s dog, Ollie wasn’t being well cared for, and animals have good instincts about people. He knows she’s a child, and that she was kind to him. Maybe he will keep her safe from Lenny.

Lenny, of all my band members, he is the one who would pull something shitty like this. I never trusted him when he was drugged up or drunk. One time he did something to one of our groupies when he was high. She left and never came to another concert again.

She wouldn’t say what happened, but it shook her up enough that she went back to the states and her wealthy, controlling parents. She was a long-term groupie, she’d been with us for over a year, every concert, every after party, and suddenly, she up and left.

A chill runs up my spine at that thought. What is he doing to my baby? If he touches her, I’ll fucking cut him in half. We push on until we come to the end of the trees where the mountain becomes unforgiving, and nothing can grow. Across a large field of rocks from us is a hidden cave only known to the natives of Blue Mountain.

It’s a difficult walk across the rocks on a good day, but today, with all the snow, it’s going to be treacherous. We can’t see where the sharp edges and ankle-twisting valleys of the rocks are at under the snow. And we will have to go in at an angle so no one will see us which will take even longer than making a beeline for the mouth of the cave.

I hear a bark and hope springs to life in my chest. I look at Clover, and she nods her head. She heard it, too. I point to our left letting her know that we will go in that direction. We creep along slowly, and I begin to bargain with a god I never fully believed in. I tell him or her or it that I will come down off this mountain and face my past if I can just have my daughter back unharmed.

When we are just outside the cave, we press our backs against the rock and try to listen. The opening is wide but mostly covered by vines making it impossible to see unless you know it’s there. I close my eyes and listen hard, and that’s when I hear Ollie whimper.

I glance at Clover, and she looks worried. I have no idea what’s going on in there. Does Lenny have a gun or a knife? Is Ollie okay? Is Adley restrained? There’s no other way into the cave, a front surprise attack is the only option.

I hold up my fingers one at a time ending with three, and Clover understands that we are going on three. The wind is still too strong to try talking. Even when we are standing right next to each other, it would be impossible to hear with all of our layers of clothing.

I count down to three, and we rush into the cave. I’m expecting it to be dark, but the space is lit up with several lanterns. Lenny is standing off to the side, and he jumps when he sees us. Adley screams, “Daddy!” and Ollie barks like a rabid animal but not at us, at Lenny.

“Baby, are you okay?” I shout to Adley who is seated on a rock just high enough that it would be difficult for her to jump down without help.

“Yes, I’m okay,” she says, and relief floods my soul.

Lenny crosses the floor of the cave to Adley holding a knife in one hand, but it’s not the knife that has me shaking with fear. He has a semiautomatic rifle slung over his back.

Lenny is more disturbed than I thought.

“Get the fuck away from her. I told you to fix my life, and I’d give her back. Turn around and walk outta here right now and text me when my shit is straight.”

“Lenny, listen, you can’t stay here, it’s too cold. This is the worst storm I’ve seen in years up here, and there’s no way you two will survive in this cave.”

“She ain’t gonna survive anyway if you don’t get me some money and tell the world what you did to us. You don’t getta say in this, you ruined my life. You don’t fix it, I’m a ruin yours.”

“I didn’t mean to hurt you, Lenny. Constance died. I was in shock. I needed time.”

“You abandoned us. We had bills and families to support, but all you could think about was you and your kid. Cal killed himself last year. Betcha didn’t even know that, huh? He was so far in debt, his wife left him and took their kid. He offed himself with a gun to the head.”

I glance up at Adley. She’s scared, her bottom lip is quivering. Listening to Lenny talk about Cal blowing his head off isn’t making this any easier on her.

Cal was our bass player. He was a good kid when he first started with the band, but the rock star life was too much for him. I had a feeling it wouldn’t end well even then.

“I’m sorry, Len. Cal was a good kid. He didn’t deserve that.”

“No! He didn’t! None of us deserved the shit we got because of you!” Lenny yells pacing back and forth fiddling with the knife in his hand. “That’s why you gotta pay, you gotta pay with money or you gotta pay with blood!” Ollie is barking again, and Adley has tears streaming down her face.

I hold up my hands. “Okay, Lenny let’s try to stay calm. Come back to the house with us. When the storm is over, and the internet and cell service is back on, we can straighten things out. I don’t have any connections in the music world, but I’ll help you financially as best I can. Being out here in this storm is risking all of our lives. I’m no good to you dead.”

“You should be dead!” he screams. “Not Cal, you!”

I back up a step and give a reassuring nod to Adley when Clover speaks up.

“Lenny? How about you take me and let Adley go back to the house with Gage? She’s just an innocent little girl. She doesn’t have anything to do with this.”

“No,” both Lenny and I yell at the same time. We are all leaving together. Period. I will not let either of them out of my sight until Lenny is gone or dead. Ollie runs around to stand next to Clover fidgeting on the ground in an attempt to sit and behave. It’s like he senses Lenny is dangerous and knows not to make any sudden moves.

“You’re just a fuck to him. But that one,” he says pointing his knife at Adley. “She’s the reason he left the band hanging. I don’t want you,” Lenny yells taking a step toward Clover. I stand in front of her torn between defending my relationship with Clover and letting Lenny think I don’t care about her. If he knows how much I love her, he might try to hurt her, too.

“Nobody is leaving or trading places. We need to get back to the house, Lenny. It’s not safe here.” No sooner than the words are out of my mouth than a loud crash comes from outside like a sign.

“What was that?” Adley cries, and Clover steps forward instinctively to comfort her, but Lenny steps in front of my daughter preventing the interaction.

“The snow is heavy, it could have been a tree coming down which can trigger an avalanche. We need to get back. If we get snowed into this cave, it’ll be days maybe weeks before anybody finds us.”

“If we last that long. There might not be oxygen enough for us under all the snow,” Clover adds. She’s starting to understand that Lenny has no idea what he’s gotten himself into. Between the three of us, we should be able to scare Lenny into going back to the house.

“Daddy,” Adley sniffs. “Didn’t Carla Marie die in an avalanche last winter?”

Atta girl, scare the shit out of him.

“She did, and that storm wasn’t half as bad as this one,” I say.

“She was outside getting firewood, wasn’t she?” Adley asks wiping her tears on her sleeve and straightening her spine.

“Yes, the snow buried her alive. They say she died of suffocation in the snow. You see Lenny, it’s not safe here,” I try again.

His eyes dart around the cave like a wild animal trapped in a corner.

Wild animal, hmm. “Adley, baby, did you check the cave for… you know?” I ask hoping Lenny is as dumb as he used to be. Only a fool would fall for what I’m about to put out there.

“No, we got here right before you guys,” she says, glancing back into the dark cave. Bears don’t frequent this cave, it’s too big, they like smaller, tight caves, but ol Lenny doesn’t know that.

“Check for what?” Lenny says looking in the same direction as Adley.

“Bears. You should always check a cave before you go inside. It’s winter, they could be in here sleeping. Did you know bears don’t really hibernate? They go into a deep sleep called a torpor, and they can wake up really easy,” Adley explains like a wilderness specialist doing a piece on bears and hibernation for Animal Planet. I don’t even know if that stuff about hibernation is true, but it’s got Lenny scared, and that’s all that matters.

Lenny looks at me as if for confirmation, and I shrug. “All right, we’re going back to your place, but you walk ahead of me, and I’ll have my rifle pointed at you, so one funny move, and you’re dead!” he yells.

“You don’t need to do that. What if one of us falls in the snow? It’s deep, you don’t want to shoot one of us unnecessarily, do you?” I say. This is a disaster. He’s already on edge and more jittery than a barista in a coffee shop. That storm is hellish, any of us could stumble and have our head blown off along the thirty-plus-minute walk back.

“You could cause an avalanche, too,” Clover adds. He looks worried for a moment, and then his face hardens again.

“Then you better be careful and watch your step, huh?” he says swinging the gun around into his hands.

“Okay, okay, take it easy. What about you? You could stumble and shoot yourself, or one of us, you don’t wanna do that, do you?” I try a little more logic on him, but it doesn’t work.

“I know how to fucking walk in the snow, get moving!”

“Adley walks with us. She’s little, she falls a lot,” I say holding out my hand for her. I see indecision on his face for a moment, but he jerks the gun toward her indicating she should go to me. I walk to the edge of the rock, and she hops down into my arms grabbing my neck so tight it chokes me. I don’t care, I’m just relieved to have her back unharmed.

“Walk!” he yells, and Ollie barks.

Adley looks over my shoulder at him. “You shouldn’t yell, it causes avalanches,” she says matter of fact, and he doesn’t say another word. I can’t help but smile. I do it facing away from crazy Lenny, so he doesn’t see me.

I stand Adley on her feet, and Clover walks in front of her. I lied about Adley falling a lot. She’s better at snow-shoe walking than I am. She’s also clever enough not to correct me.

Outside, there is zero visibility. I wish this could be more helpful to us in escaping Lenny, but he has his gun trained on us, and he lied about knowing how to walk in the snow, too. He’s terrible at it, and I’m afraid one of us will end up with a bullet in our spine if we make a wrong move.

It takes us a full hour to get home especially when I have to stop and carry Ollie for a while because the snow is too deep for him. When we reach the house, Lenny runs up the stairs first and herds us in with his gun.

We are home where we have food, a fire, and running water, but none of that is comforting with a rifle pointed at your head.

Now what?