Chapter 6
Without Destiny’s energy throwing me off balance I could finally concentrate. Her life force, for lack of a better description, was stronger than anyone I’d ever met. Strange as it was, it had a familiar pull. Sweet as a caress to my skin but strong like the ghosts that have been roaming these woods since I was a kid.
No one outside my family knew, but those ghosts had helped me hone my ability to track energy. There were more now than when I’d been growing up. I’d lost count of how many had stayed, and where exactly they’d come from. Some need kept them trapped here.
Each animal in the forest had its own separate signature, just like humans did. In the beginning, all of them together had been overwhelming. After years of practice I could sort them easily. But Destiny’s energy had blunted my ability. I couldn’t explain it, but when she was with me, everything was skewed, as if her energy jostled against mine but in a delicious push and pull on my senses.
I ignored those thoughts and instead concentrated on the spirits in the surrounding woods as I headed in the direction of the coordinates, where I was getting only a faint energy signature.
That told me one of two things. Putnam was either badly hurt or no longer in that space. Once I was engrossed in the energy trail, tracking him should be as easy as catching those poachers.
I knew the woods from the ranger station to the old plantation like the back of my hand. I’d traveled the route plenty of times, checking on both properties every time I made the trip.
I doubled my pace when the signature energy started to fade. I made it to my ancestors’ vacant homestead in less than thirty minutes. For a moment, I rested, fighting for control of my labored breathing from the punishing pace I’d set. I stood outside the tree line, watching and listening for any movement, getting adjusted to the energies surrounding it.
A ghost bobbed on the opposite side of the clearing. Her white dress shimmered in the moonlight. Her brilliant eyes were watching me.
I eased up to the building. Flecks of paint had peeled off the old wood. The flowerbed was weedy and the windows dusty. Nothing looked amiss, yet there was living energy somewhere nearby.
“Walker Bennett, Forest Ranger. Show yourself,” I yelled. My voice echoed around the huge trees as my light bounced in the direction I was looking.
Dead silence. Absolutely nothing.
My finger tightened on the trigger of my shotgun as I made my way onto the porch. The boards creaked beneath as I rounded the side of the house. The curtains on the back door floated in the wind. I pushed them aside and stepped in.
“United States Forest Ranger. Come out now,” I repeated, my gaze slicing over the familiar setting.
Age had left its mark on the meager contents. Every piece left behind meant something to my family. This homestead had once been our ancestral home.
If not for the bravery of our matriarch, Maxine Bennett, her willingness to venture down the mountain, we’d all still be living in isolation, afraid the locals might discover the truth that we were all different.
The kitchen was empty, the living room too. I eased down the hall, cringing at the creaking floorboards as I checked each nook and cranny for anyone hiding in the space. I pulled open the doors of the linen closet and paused.
Empty.
Every blanket and sheet were now gone.
I spun angrily and moved down the hall. I pulled open the closet by the door where the antique winter coats had hung.
Gone.
I moved to the kitchen and opened the cabinets. Every non-perishable that we’d kept in stock was missing too.
“Son of a bitch,” I growled, wondering if one of my brothers or cousins had come up here to change or wash everything without telling me. Had it been Putnam? Was he injured? I’d hope the idiot would have been smart enough to stay put until help arrived.
I locked the backdoor and then left through the front entrance. I made my way around the house again and was staring into the woods, searching through the energies that had come this way, when the first snowflake hit my cheek.
My gaze dropped to the ground. Small footprints marred the mud. I pulled my phone and put my boot next to it and snapped a picture for reference of size.
Someone had been in the house and had come this way. I left the house and tracked the footprints as far as I could before the white stuff started to fall harder, hiding the intruder’s path.
The thought of Destiny alone in the cabin was key in deciding to wait until sunrise before continuing my search. If whomever had cherry-picked through the cabin found the ranger station, I might be returning to find an intruder with a gunshot wound, and then I’d really get fired.
I double-timed it back to the ranger station and knocked twice before walking through the door.
The kerosene lantern cast flickering shadows on the ceiling. There were regular lamps but it looked like Destiny understood the concept of conserving fuel. She was in the kitchen with a cup of coffee in hand and her cell phone pressed against her ear. Her hair was wet, and she had one of my tee shirts on with the forest ranger logo with a blanket wrapped around her body. She looked fresh, not like she’d spent the day sweating and hiking in the woods.
“Mom, I’ve got to call you back.” She smiled. “I promise. Love you.”
