Jude shot me a look that I clearly interpreted to mean For the love of all things good and holy, do not go down to the station.

I tamped down my instincts and shot Jude a look that I hoped communicated something along the lines of Find Ness or Bales. I wanted to be out there, searching for Bella, but I also knew, deep in the pit of my stomach, that I couldn’t leave Gabriel with Sheriff Rawlins.

Gabriel’s stepfather didn’t get to control me. He didn’t get to haul Gabriel off alone. Pushing down the roar of the forest, I responded the way I thought Cady would have, if someone had tried to strong-arm her.

I held out my wrists and met the sheriff’s gaze head-on. “Do you want to cuff me, too?”

Chapter 40

When we arrived at the station, they separated us. I’d expected that. I hadn’t expected the room they put me in to be so small. The longer I sat there, waiting for the sheriff, the closer the walls on all sides seemed.

I can do this. I’d come with Gabriel because there was strength in numbers. Confined space. Stale air. Awareness of the lack of windows pulsated through me. I set my jaw and stared straight ahead. Free and Jude wouldn’t leave me—or Gabriel—here for long.

The door to the interrogation room opened. I tracked the sound of footsteps coming toward the table. The sheriff sat down across from me.

Confined space. Stale air. Predator. I thought of my encounter with the mountain lion the day before. If I could handle that, I could handle this.

“I’ll be straight with you, Kira.” The sheriff paused, waiting for a response—not a verbal one, but a shift in my position, a blink of my eyes. “We know that the person who took Bella has a high degree of familiarity with Sierra Glades National Park, particularly, though not exclusively, the mountains. Your foster mother and Mackinnon Wade were tracking Bella and her kidnapper when the trail brought them to that clearing—and those bodies. At a minimum, Bella and her kidnapper stopped there. The FBI’s profilers believe it’s more than that—they believe the person who took Bella is also the person responsible for the grave site. That person is almost certainly local, and yesterday’s discovery suggests that he or she may have been using the park as their own personal hunting grounds for four to five years.” The sheriff tilted his head to the right, his eyes sharp. “What has Gabriel told you about his brother?”

I hadn’t seen that question coming. I tried not to let that matter. “I know that Gabriel’s brother went missing four years ago.”