Back of Beyond

“I’m wondering why we’re on this trail? If we’re headed back to the trailhead this is the wrong direction, I’m pretty sure.”

“It’s the trail we’re taking,” Rachel said.

“I don’t get it,” Justin said, undeterred. “Seems like we’re going the wrong way.”

Gracie looked ahead for the first time at the trail itself. It was unmarked except for a single set of horse tracks. She was confused.

“What’s going on?” Danielle asked from behind them.

“Nothing,” Rachel said sharply. “Just please keep quiet, all of you.”

* * *

Danielle rode up beside Gracie and leaned in to her. “I’ve been thinking,” she said.

Gracie refrained from expressing surprise.

“Remember when we got to the airport in Bozeman? Dad wasn’t there.”

“I remember.”

“Where do you suppose he was?”

Gracie shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“I don’t know either. But he’s the one who made such a big deal out of this trip. Knowing him, he should have been there three hours early pacing around and getting all worried about us.”

Gracie nodded. “That does sound more like him.”

“There’s been something going on since the beginning,” Danielle said. “He’s been up to something. And why wasn’t he in camp like he was supposed to be?”

“There has to be an explanation,” Gracie said, unsure of her own words.

“Tell me when you come up with one,” Danielle said, and slipped back into line.

* * *

Ten minutes later, Rachel said, “Here he goes,” and turned her horse from the trail onto a faint game route that went west into the trees. She looked back to make sure everyone was with her. Gracie refused to meet her eyes and kept her head down. She couldn’t stop thinking of what Rachel said she saw, and the fuel Danielle had added to the fire.

“This way,” Rachel said, spurring her horse onto the new trail.

“Now I’m sure we’re headed the wrong way,” Justin said.

Gracie watched Rachel carefully. How her chest swelled with a big intake of breath, how her mouth was set, how her eyes looked like slits because the skin on her face was pulled back tight. She turned her head and glared at Justin and seemed to be holding back her words.

“Stay in line,” Rachel said to Justin. “And stop talking. I’m trying to save us all.”

“It just doesn’t make sense to me,” Justin said. “I mean, we want to go back to the vehicles and we’re heading up into the trees on the side of a mountain. I just don’t get it.”

“No,” Rachel Mina said, “you don’t.”

“Danielle?” Justin said.

“Don’t ask me,” Danielle said.

Gracie wondered exactly who was leading them and who Rachel had become. She felt sick to her stomach and wished she’d talked to her father and at least said good-bye.

And as she watched Rachel ride ahead, she noticed the bulge on her right calf where the top of her boot was. Something pushed out against the fabric of her jeans. Gracie leaned over to her left to confirm Rachel’s left calf didn’t look like that. It was as if something was protruding out of Rachel’s boot top. Like a stick.

Or, Gracie thought with sudden realization, like the handle of a knife.

* * *

“I met your father in Minneapolis,” Rachel said to Gracie. The tone of her voice was warm, like it had been until recently. Like she was trying to reestablish their friendship. “I was there on business and I was staying at the Grand Hotel. My laptop was acting up and I was frustrated I couldn’t get it to work so I went down to the bar. He was at the hotel meeting a client, he said. I told him about my computer and he offered to take a look at it. I brought it down to the bar and he fiddled with it and had it working again in no time flat. Then we started talking.”

Gracie said nothing. She felt uncomfortable thinking of her dad in any situation where she wasn’t with him. She knew he was a man, and he likely had wants and needs. But she was sorry she’d asked Rachel the question in the first place, and wasn’t sure she wanted to hear the answer. And she didn’t want to set her off again.

Rachel said, “I told him I’d lost my husband recently as well as my stepdaughter. He said he was divorced but he had two daughters he was devoted to. That’s when I first heard about you and Danielle and how much you meant to him. I was touched.”

“That’s nice,” Gracie mumbled.

“Then he told me about you two and this trip. He was so excited and passionate that I just fell for him. We kept in touch and he suggested I come along so I could meet you two. So he could introduce us. I’d always wanted to see Yellowstone Park and he seemed to have it all organized and planned, so I came along. I had no idea…” Her sentence trailed off.

Gracie said, “Rachel, he wasn’t in the camp back there. Jed was gone and Dad wasn’t there.”

Rachel nodded in a sympathetic way. Then: “It must be hard to think of your father as a coward,” Rachel said. “I can’t even imagine what’s going through your head right now, so tell me. Maybe I can help.”