At the top of the hill, she finally sees something new. Something besides bark or leaves or moss or grass.
Railway tracks.
Shiny in the sun.
The girl knows tracks mean trains, and trains mean people.
She scrambles up the bank.
She starts to walk.
Following them home.
Every step, wondering if the monster will follow here there.
If the monster will follow her forever.
I ripped violently out of the vision. I was lying on the kitchen floor, cold tile seeping into my skin. Socks was standing over me, his glossy eyes on my face. As soon as I blinked awake, his pink tongue swiped my cheek, leaving a trail of drool up the entire left side.
“Gah!” I raised my arms to shield my head. “Socks! Quit it!”
He scampered over my prone form without apology, paws pounding into my stomach. I rolled out of his path before he could flatten me completely.
When I’d recovered slightly (from both puppy paws and the visions) I pushed myself up into a sitting position. My fatigued mind was spinning. But beneath the exhaustion, there was an undeniable current of excitement. Annie’s memories had finally yielded some answers about the mysteries of the woods.
Train tracks.
A slope.
A marsh.
A dirt road.
And an abandoned cabin, deep in the swamp.
If I could retrace Annie’s steps from that train track… Follow her trail back to the start…
I worried my bottom lip with my teeth.
It was a long shot.
I knew that.
Even if I found the cabin, there was zero guarantee Rory would be there. There was no assurance the “monster” in Annie’s memory from almost two decades ago had anything to do with this new disappearance. There was a high probability I was once again setting myself up for disappointment.
I reminded myself that Cade hadn’t seemed exceedingly enthusiastic about this particular lead. That it was foolish to get my hopes up for nothing.
And yet…
A voice deep inside me was screaming to trust my instincts, for once. To embrace this gift I’d been given instead of shutting it out, locking it down. To finally take off the proverbial gloves and embrace who the hell I was meant to be.
I figured it was time I listened to that voice.
Past time.
* * *
A half hour later, the doorbell rang.