He climbed from the pit, the loose wall collapsing under his foot, making her wince as she spotted rib bones in the soil where he’d stepped. “I’ve got to get to the command center. We need to call off the jump. Once the SEALs are in free fall, there’s no turning back.”

“I understand, but George is seventy-two and he’s out here alone. He might’ve seen who cut the lines to the camera. He could be injured, or worse. You go back to your command center and do what you need to do to abort the training, but I need to check on George.”

Xavier closed his eyes and nodded. “You’re right. I’m sorry.” He met her gaze. “But George isn’t supposed to be here. All inholding landowners signed the contract.”

“But George wasn’t in your APE. Do you know for a fact he signed?”

Xavier’s entire body radiated with tension. He glanced toward the meadow and said, “Is there any way to get to his cabin without crossing the meadow and footbridge? It’s too exposed. The bridge is an obvious target.”

Her relief was tempered by the answer she had to give. “It’s not much better. It’s part of a loop from here to the falls. We’d have to go back downhill and take the other side of the loop. When we reach the fork we came across on the way here, we’d take the other path, the one that goes up to the falls along the cliffside trail. It’s not very wide in places and has a steep drop, and we’ll be visible from the lake on the switchbacks along the cliff. Once we reach the top, we’ll be in the forest again, where there’s another bridge, but it’s in the trees and not so exposed.”

He studied the meadow, then gave a reluctant nod. “We’ll take the cliff trail.” He ran a hand over his face. “Odds are, weapons were stored in this pit. Whoever is out there is armed and ready to mess up the training. We need to hurry.”

She stared into the pit, her gaze caught on the exposed ribs as she shivered. “Why do you think they stored weapons here?”

“The road was still open in November. It would’ve been easy to hike up here from the lodge in the middle of the night and stage supplies. Once the road closed, anyone planning to disrupt the training would have to hike in from the main road outside the park, carrying all their gear uphill, what, ten to fifteen miles without a trail?”