They waited a few minutes on the other side for their feet to dry then pulled on socks and shoes. Then searched the shore until they found the footprints once more. The party followed the trail into the woods but, as the ground grew drier and more tangled with brush, they lost the tracks.

“The pine trees’re that way,” Jesse said. He pointed northeast. “Makes the most sense for them to go straight through there.”

Following his general guidance, they hiked for another twenty minutes, single file, scanning the ground for trip wires. Then the oak and holly and sedge gave way to juniper and hemlock. Ahead of them, a quarter mile, was a huge line of pine trees. But there was no longer any sign of the kidnapper’s or his victim’s footprints—no clue as to where they’d entered the forest.

“Too damn big,” Lucy muttered. “How’re we going to find the trail in there?”

“Let’s fan out,” Ned suggested. He too looked dismayed at the tangle of flora in front of them. “If he’s left a bomb here it’ll be the dickens to see it.”

They were about to spread out when Sachs lifted her head. “Wait. Stay here,” she ordered then started slowly through the brush, eyes on the ground, looking for traps. Only fifty feet away from the deputies, in a grove of some flowering trees, now barren and surrounded by rotting petals, she found Garrett’s and Lydia’s footprints in the dusty earth. They led to a clear path that headed into the forest.

“They came this way!” she called. “Follow my footprints. I checked it for traps.”

A moment later the three deputies joined her.

“How’d you find it?” asked infatuated Jesse Corn.

“What do you smell?” she asked.

“Skunk,” Ned said.

Sachs said, “Garrett had skunk scent on the pants I found in his house. I figured he’d come this way before. I just followed the smell here.”

Jesse laughed and said to Ned, “How’s that for a city girl?”

Ned rolled his eyes and they all started up the path, moving slowly toward the line of pine trees.

Several times along this route they passed large, barren areas—the trees and bushes were dead. Sachs felt uneasy as they trekked through these—the search party was completely exposed to attack. Halfway through the second clearing, and after another bad scare when an animal or bird rustled the brush ringing the bare dirt, she pulled out her cell phone.

“Rhyme, you there?”

“What is it? Found anything?”

“We’ve picked up the trail. But tell-me—did any of the evidence point to Garrett doing any shooting?”

“No,” he answered. “Why?”

“There’re some big barren patches in the woods here—acid rain or pollution’s killed all the plants. We have zero cover. It’s a perfect place for an ambush.”