Fallen

She bobbed her head, swallowing, her face awash in misery. Fuck fuck fuck! He felt sick with worry, desperate to find that little girl. “I went out to the woods. She’s always been so cautious. I couldn’t imagine that she went farther than the tree line. I called and called . . .” A small sob came up her throat but she quickly gained control of herself. “I didn’t dare go any deeper into the woods and get lost myself.”

“Okay. Listen, we’re going to have to form a search party.”

“My God, Cam, this is exactly what happened to Kandace. She walked out into those woods and was never seen again.”

“That’s not going to happen.” And yet even as he said it, a ball of lead formed in his gut. Don’t go there. Chances are she just wandered away and lost her bearings. She’s out there right now, curled up under a tree, waiting to be rescued.

Cam brought his phone from his pocket, but Scarlett grabbed his forearm, halting him. “Can we trust them, Cam? They might be behind Kandace’s disappearance. What if—”

He ground his jaw. “We have no choice. We need lights, equipment. We need as many hands on deck as possible if we have any chance of finding her.”

She bobbed her head again, her eyes filled with terror. He wanted to yell, to claw at something, to run out into the woods right this second and start screaming bloody murder for Haddie to please, please come home. And he knew what he was feeling was nothing compared to what Scarlett was experiencing.

He’d only dialed three digits when the door swung open. They both whipped around to see Haddie, disheveled and covered in dirt, the hem of her dress mostly detached and hanging down around her dusty calves, standing in the doorway.

Scarlett let out a strangled yelp, flying to where Haddie stood and going down on her knees in front of her. For a moment, Camden watched as Scarlett ran her hands over Haddie’s face, over her head, down her shoulders and over her hips, her hands visibly shaking as she checked her child for injury.

“Mommy,” the little girl said, and her voice was surprisingly strong and clear.

“Haddie, Haddie,” Scarlett repeated over and over. She drew her into her arms, clinging to her for a moment before pulling back. “Where were you, baby? What happened? Did you get lost?”

Haddie glanced up at Camden, her gaze lingering on him for several beats, a wariness coming into her eyes before she looked back to her mother. “Bones, Mommy,” she said breathlessly. “I found bones.”**********The sky was smudged with shades of pink and amber, the sun a pale ring in the morning sky when Camden pushed the vegetation aside, startled to see, not the rocky side of the cliff as he expected, but instead the opening of a cave. He leaned away, looking up to where Scarlett lay at the edge, peering over to where he’d carefully lowered himself, and then slowly, painstakingly made his way down the very narrow path to the ledge below.

Haddie sat several feet safely behind her mother, having directed them through the forest and to the hidden opening where she’d seen the bones. She’d been insistent on leading them back to this spot, but Scarlett had been even more insistent that they get her cleaned up and wait until daybreak to make the long trip through the woods. “There’s an opening here,” he called up to Scarlett. “Just like she said.” How had she known? From the top, it looked just like any number of other small ledges on the basin of this deep canyon, bristly brush growing from a crack in the rock.

Scarlett nodded, her eyes wide. “Can you see them?” she called. “The bones?”

A noise distracted him and Cam turned, gazing in the opposite direction, the soft sound of what he thought was a drumbeat coming from nearby. He’d heard that sound before, remembered it from his childhood. He felt watched. His head turned in the other direction, and then slowly returned to Scarlett. “I’m going inside,” he said.

“Please be careful.”

He nodded once, and then moved the brush aside again, crawling into the cliffside cave. He saw the bones immediately, just as Haddie must have, dark red fabric, rotted and falling apart, only partially covering the skeleton. Camden swallowed, sadness welling up inside of him. It was a Lilith school uniform. She had been one of its girls.

Kandace, it had to be Kandace.

He crawled forward, kneeling next to her for a moment, bowing his head. He didn’t know what to say, though he had this sense she was listening. “Thank you,” was all he could manage. For noticing us. For caring. For trying so hard to do the right thing.

How had she died? He’d heard the staff whispering later. They’d said she escaped. Were they lying? Had her body been hidden here? Or had she somehow managed to find this opening as Haddie had? Did she crawl inside this space to hide? To die?