The Secrets We Keep Buried

• Chapter 1: Ghosts in the Rearview
• Chapter 2: The Ashes of Blackwood Creek
• Chapter 3: Badge and Memory
• Chapter 4: Whispering Pines
• Chapter 5: The Broken Promise
• Chapter 6: Unearthing the Past
• Chapter 7: Eyes on the Edge
• Chapter 8: Tainted Loyalties
• Chapter 9: What the River Took
• Chapter 10: Shadows at Dusk
• Chapter 11: The Bloodline
• Chapter 12: Sparks in the Dark
• Chapter 13: The Old Mill's Secrets
• Chapter 14: A Town United
• Chapter 15: Cracks in the Alibi
• Chapter 16: Cold Coffee and Warm Memories
• Chapter 17: The Letter Under the Floorboards
• Chapter 18: Sins of the Fathers
• Chapter 19: A Dangerous Proximity
• Chapter 20: The Storm Begins
• Chapter 21: Fractured Ties
• Chapter 22: Point of No Return
• Chapter 23: The Truth Unburied
• Chapter 24: Fire and Reckoning
• Chapter 25: After the Dust Settles
• Chapter 26: Where the Wildflowers Grow

The welcome sign for Blackwood Creek had been shot up so many times that the "k" in "Creek" looked like a rusted jagged tooth.

Detective Maya Vance pulled her battered sedan onto the shoulder, letting the engine idle while the air conditioner sputtered out a final breath of lukewarm dust. Through the cracked windshield, the pine-smothered mountains of Oregon pressed down against the horizon, dense and suffocatingly green. She hadn't breathed this air in twelve years, but the moment her tires hit the gravel, her lungs remembered the heavy scent of pine needle sap, damp loam, and old regrets.

She reached over to the passenger seat and tapped the thick manila folder resting there. Inside were the cold case files for Sarah Miller—her best friend’s older sister, who had vanished into the woods behind the old sawmills during the summer of 2012. Back then, the local sheriff's department had chalked it up to a teenage runaway, despite the bloodstain on the riverbank and the bicycle found crumpled in the ravine. They had let the case freeze over, letting time and timber dust bury the truth.

Now, a newly appointed state cold-case task force—and Maya's relentless badgering of her captain in Portland—had brought her back. Official jurisdiction was a blurry grey line, but Maya had a badge, a assignment order, and a personal debt she had been trying to pay off for over a decade.

Maya shifted into drive, rolling past the town limits. Blackwood Creek hadn't changed, except for the subtle, rot-at-the-edges decay that claimed small lumber towns when the mills closed down. Main Street was a strip of faded brick facades, scuffed pickup trucks, and neon beer signs that hummed even in the bright afternoon light. She passed the diner, the hardware store, and the old barber shop where her father used to take her before he sold off their house and moved south to die in a retirement park.

Her Destination wasn't the local precinct just yet. First, she needed a room, and second, she needed a coffee strong enough to wake the dead.

She pulled up to the Blackwood Inn, a two-story timber structure with a sagging porch and window boxes overflowed with dead geraniums. The bell above the door chimed a hollow flat note as she stepped inside. The air was thick with the smell of floor wax and stale coffee.

Behind the counter sat a woman in her late fifties, her hair dyed an optimistic shade of auburn, peering over a pair of reading glasses attached to a beaded chain. She looked up, her gaze lingering on Maya's sharp tailored blazer and the leather holster subtly tucked against her hip.

"Help you?" the woman asked, her voice like gravel tossed in a blender.

"Key for Vance," Maya said, sliding her ID across the counter. "State Police."

The woman—whose name tag read Brenda—froze. She looked at the ID, then slowly looked up into Maya's face. The squint vanished, replaced by a sudden, jarring recognition.

"Maya?" Brenda's voice softened, losing its transactional edge. "Little Maya Vance? My God, girl. Look at you. You grew up and got yourself a gun."

"Hi, Brenda," Maya offered a tight, polite smile. "It's been a while."

"Twelve years," Brenda supplied instantly. Small towns were human tally marks. "Your dad... well, we heard when he passed. I'm sorry."

"Thank you." Maya didn't want to dig into the ghost of her father. "I'm in town on official business for a few weeks."

Brenda leaned forward, lower jaw shifting as she chewed on invisible gum. "Official business? Word travels around here, Maya. People were saying the state was reopening Sarah's file. Is that why you're here?"

"I'm just taking a fresh look at some old paperwork," Maya said evasively. "Is room four ready?"

"It's ready," Brenda said, though her demeanor had cooled several degrees. She retrieved a brass key with a red plastic tag and laid it on the counter, releasing it only when Maya's fingers made contact. "Just... be careful where you dig, Maya. Blackwood Creek isn't the kind of place that likes its dirt turned over. People settled into their lives. They buried things for a reason."

"Dirt doesn't stay buried forever," Maya said gently, taking the key. "Sometimes rain washes it away."

"And sometimes it buries the person holding the shovel," Brenda replied.

Maya carried her single duffel bag up the creaky wooden stairs to room four. The room was simple: a quilt-covered double bed, a wooden desk, and a window overlooking the alleyway behind the diner. She dumped her bag on the mattress, unclipped her badge from her belt, and stared at it.

She knew Brenda wasn't just speaking for herself. Blackwood Creek was a town bound by invisible ties. When Sarah disappeared, everyone had a theory, but nobody had answers. Or rather, those who had answers kept them tucked safely behind closed doors, protected by a network of lifelong friendships, family loyalty, and mutual self-preservation.

Maya grabbed her jacket and headed downstairs. She needed to make her presence known at the local precinct before Sheriff Brody heard she was in town from the local gossip mill.

The Blackwood Creek Sheriff's Department was housed in a squat cinderblock building next to the fire station. Maya pushed open the heavy glass door, greeted by the low hum of a police scanner and the sharp scent of industrial pine cleaner.

Behind the front desk sat a deputy in his mid-twenties, his uniform shirt so crisp it looked stiff enough to cut paper. He was busy flicking paperclips into a plastic coffee cup.

"Can I help you, ma'am?" he asked without looking up.

"I need to see Sheriff Brody," Maya said.

"Sheriff's out on a call down by the county line," the deputy said, finally lifting his head. His eyes dropped to the gold shield pinned to Maya’s belt. He straightened up immediately, his feet snapping off the desk. "Oh. You're the state investigator."

"Detective Vance," she corrected gently. "And you are?"

"Deputy Miller," he said.

Maya froze. The name hit her like a bucket of ice water. She looked closely at the kid's face. He had the same wide, blue eyes, the same slight dusting of freckles across his nose.

"Leo?" she breathed. "Little Leo?"

The deputy blushed, shifting uncomfortably in his boots. "I go by Deputy Miller now, Vance. But yeah. It's me."

Maya felt a sudden, sharp ache in her chest. The last time she had seen Leo Miller, he was ten years old, sitting on his porch steps in muddy sneakers, crying because his big sister hadn't come home for dinner. Now he was sitting behind a law enforcement desk, wearing a star on his chest.

"You grew up," she said stupidly.

"That tends to happen after twelve years," Leo said, his voice dropping its stiff authority, revealing a hint of the vulnerable kid beneath. "My mom told me you were coming back. She didn't believe it at first."

"How is she?" Maya asked quietly.

"She survives," Leo said plainly. "She spends a lot of time at the church. Reads a lot. Doesn't talk about Sarah much anymore. What's the point? Nothing ever changes."

"I'm here to try and change that, Leo."

"Yeah, well," Leo leaned against the counter, looking down at his paperclips. "Good luck with that. Sheriff Brody isn't too thrilled about Portland playing hero in his backyard. He thinks it makes us look like bumpkins who couldn't handle our own trash."

"I don't care about Brody's ego," Maya said. "I care about finding out what happened to your sister."

Before Leo could respond, the heavy wooden door to the inner offices swung open. A tall, broad-shouldered man walked out, carrying a stack of beige manila folders. He wore dark blue jeans, a worn leather jacket, and boots that looked like they had logged a thousand miles through heavy brush.

He didn't look like a standard small-town deputy. He looked like the woods had spat him out and dressed him in law enforcement gear.

Maya’s breath caught in her throat.

It was Eli.

Eli Thorne.

Her childhood best friend. The boy who had taught her how to skip stones across the river, who had shared a treehouse with her, and who had stood beside her at Sarah’s tear-soaked memorial service twelve years ago. The boy she had ghosted the day she left town, cutting all ties because staying connected to Blackwood Creek hurt too much.

Eli stopped dead in his tracks. His dark eyes locked onto hers, cold and unreadable. He had filled out; his shoulders were wider, his jawline shadowed by a stubble that gave him a dangerous, hardened edge. A faint scar cut through his left eyebrow, a souvenir she didn't recognize.

For a long, agonizing moment, neither of them moved. The room felt suddenly too small, the air too thick to draw into her lungs.

"Vance," Eli said. His voice was deeper than she remembered, a low baritone that rasped over her skin like fine sandpaper.

"Eli," Maya managed to say, her professional composure threatening to fray at the edges. "You're... working here?"

"Chief Deputy," Leo chimed in, looking between the two of them with sudden interest. "Eli’s running the department while Brody is dealing with county politics."

Eli stepped forward, setting the folders down on the counter with a heavy thud. He didn't offer a hand. He just looked at her, his dark eyes analyzing every inch of her face, her stance, her badge.

"Sheriff Brody got the memo from your captain," Eli said coldly. "We were told you'd be arriving next week."

"I came early," Maya said, lifting her chin. "I wanted to get the lay of the land before the paperwork started piling up."

"The land hasn't changed, Maya," Eli said, using her first name like an accusation. "The woods are still deep, the river's still cold, and people still don't like outsiders digging up their backyards."

"I'm not an outsider," she countered, though the words felt hollow even to her own ears.

Eli let out a short, humorless laugh. He leaned against the counter, crossing his arms over his broad chest. "You left twelve years ago and never called, never wrote, never looked back. You're as much an outsider as anyone from Salem or Portland, Vance. Maybe more, because you ought to know better."

The jab hit its mark, sharp and precise. Maya felt the blood rush to her cheeks, but she forced herself to maintain eye contact. She couldn't afford to play emotional tag with Eli Thorne. Not now.

"I have a job to do, Deputy Thorne," she said, leaning heavily on his title. "I have authorization from the State Attorney General's office to re-examine the evidence, re-interview witnesses, and access all original files regarding the disappearance of Sarah Miller."

"Files are in the back," Eli said flatly. "Most of them are dry-rotted or water-damaged from when the basement flooded four years ago. You're welcome to sift through the mold."

"I intend to," Maya said. "And I'll need a guide. Someone who knows the current layout of the old mill property."

Eli stared at her for three long seconds. Maya could see the gears turning behind his dark eyes—the resentment fighting against his sense of duty. Finally, he straightened up and pulled a set of keys from his belt.

"Leo," Eli grunted. "Take the desk for the rest of the afternoon."

Leo looked up, surprised. "Where are you going?"

"Showing the State Detective around," Eli said, his tone dripping with sarcasm. "Wouldn't want her to get lost in her own hometown."

Eli turned and headed for the heavy front door, pulling it open and waiting for her. He didn't look at her as she walked past him into the bright, crisp afternoon air.

Outside, a black precinct SUV was parked in the designated spot. Eli unlocked the doors with a remote click, sliding into the driver's seat without waiting to see if she was following.

Maya climbed into the passenger side, pulling the door shut. The interior smelled like coffee, old pine leather, and Eli's subtle, woodsy cologne—a smell that instantly pulled her back to late-night drives in his rust-bucket pickup truck when they were seventeen.

"Where to first?" Maya asked, pulling her notebook from her pocket.

Eli turned the key, the engine roaring to life. He shifted into gear and pulled out onto Main Street.

"If you want to unbury secrets, Vance," Eli said softly, staring straight ahead at the long, winding road leading into the dark timber, "you start where the light stopped shining."

The road to the old Blackwood Sawmill followed the jagged curves of the river, snaking under a canopy of Douglas firs so thick the afternoon sun was reduced to weak, greenish beams. Leaves and fallen needles blanketed the pavement, muffling the rumble of the SUV's heavy tires.

For the first two miles, neither of them said a word. The silence between Maya and Eli wasn't peaceful; it was a tight, vibrating thing, stretched to its absolute limit like an old guitar string ready to snap under the slightest pressure.

Maya kept her gaze fixed on the passenger side window, watching the familiar landscape blur past. She remembered every curve of this road. She remembered the turnout near Mile Marker 4 where they used to park during high school summers, drinking lukewarm beer stolen from Eli’s uncle's garage and listening to the radio static bounce off the mountain ridge. Back then, Eli had felt like an anchor—the one stable thing in a town that seemed constantly on the verge of slipping down the mountainside.

She chanced a glance at him from the side of her eye. His grip on the steering wheel was firm, knuckles slightly white. He was staring straight ahead, his jaw locked in a rigid line that suggested he was actively trying not to look at her.

"You look different," Maya said softly, breaking the tension just enough to test its strength.

"People change in twelve years," Eli replied, his tone clipped and even. "Usually when they get left behind to deal with the wreckage."

"Eli, I—"

"Save it, Vance," he interrupted, switching off the radio before she could offer whatever rehearsed apology she had carried from Portland. "We're working. You brought a badge and a thick file, so let me give you the summary before you waste two weeks asking questions everyone's already answered a hundred times."

Maya swallowed the lump in her throat, shifting her focus back to her notebook. "Fine. The official report says Sarah Miller was last seen on July 14th, 2012, at approximately 9:30 PM, leaving the bonfire down by the gravel bar. Witnesses said she walked toward the mill path."

"That's what the record says," Eli agreed, turning the SUV onto a cracked asphalt lane marked with a rusted NO TRESPASSING sign that hung from a single chain. "What the record doesn't say is that half the kids at that bonfire were high on weed or dead drunk on moonshine brewed up in the ridge huts. Memories were sloppy that night. Some people swear she walked off alone. Others said they saw a red pickup truck idled near the treeline with its lights off."

"Whose truck?"

"Take your pick," Eli shrugged, his shoulders square under his leather jacket. "In 2012, every third guy in this county drove a beat-up red Ford or Chevy. Sheriff Brody looked into three local boys—the Miller family's neighbors, mostly. None of them had grease on their shirts or blood on their hands. No evidence, no probable cause, no search warrants issued."

"Convenient," Maya muttered.

"Not convenient. Just small-town police work before the state started sending fancy cold-case units with big budgets," Eli said, a sharp edge entering his voice. "Brody didn't have a forensic team on speed dial. He had three deputies, a county territory bigger than Rhode Island, and a town panicking because its primary employer had shut its doors six months earlier."

The SUV bumped over a series of deep potholes and came to a stop in a massive, gravel-cleared clearing.

Before them lay the carcass of the Blackwood Lumber Mill.

Once the beating heart of the town’s economy, the facility was now a sprawling expanse of rusting corrugated iron, broken glass, and collapsed timber frames. Nature had already begun its aggressive reclamation project; blackberry vines choked the massive steel conveyor belts, and young saplings sprouted straight through the cracked concrete floors of the main processing floor. Five years ago, a mysterious fire had gutted the central office building, leaving behind a scorched skeleton of blackened beams and ash that still gave the air a faint, acrid bite whenever the wind shifted.

Maya unbuckled her seatbelt and stepped out into the damp pine air. The sheer scale of the ruins made her feel small, vulnerable.

Eli climbed out from his side, slamming the door with a loud thud that echoed off the hollow metal structures. He stood by the hood, hands tucked into his jacket pockets, watching her carefully as she walked toward the perimeter fence.

"The fire in 2017," Maya said, turning to look at him over her shoulder. "The report blamed faulty wiring in the old generator room."

"That was the official verdict," Eli said.

"And the unofficial one?"

"The mill had been abandoned for years. Squatters used it. Kids used it to party. Somebody probably dropped a lit cigarette into a pile of dry sawdust, got scared when it caught, and ran like hell." Eli walked over to stand near her, though he maintained a careful two feet of distance between them. "Or maybe somebody wanted to make sure whatever was left in those old offices stayed burned."

Maya turned her head sharply to look at him. "Are you saying the fire was arson?"

"I'm saying this town has a lot of ash," Eli said, staring at the blackened timber structure. "And if you dig deep enough into ash, you usually get your hands dirty. The fire started right around the time Sarah's mother started calling the State Capitol, begging for a secondary investigation. Make of that what you will."

"Why didn't you push for an arson investigation if you suspected something?"

Eli let out a dry, bitter laugh. "I was a junior deputy back then, Vance. I was twenty-four years old, picking up drunk drivers and settling land disputes between timber families who've hated each other since the Oregon Trail. I didn't call the shots. Brody did."

Maya stepped through a gap in the rusted chain-link fence, her boots crunching on broken glass and gravel. She approached the main processing hall, looking up at the cavernous ceiling where sunbeams cut through holes in the roof like spotlights.

"Where was her bicycle found?" Maya asked, pulling a small camera from her pocket.

Eli stepped through the fence behind her, his movements fluid and quiet despite his heavy boots. He walked past her, leading the way toward the far eastern end of the complex where the land sloped steeply down toward Blackwood Creek.

"Down here," Eli said, pointing toward a deep, narrow ravine clogged with thick brush and rotting hemlock logs. "The bike was jammed into the roots of that fallen cedar. Chain was off the sprockets, front wheel was bent like a horseshoe. Looked like she came down the hill way too fast and crashed."

Maya walked to the edge of the slope, peering into the shadows of the ravine. "Or somebody threw it down here to make it look like an accident."

"That was my thought," Eli admitted quietly, his tone softening just a fraction. "If you crash a bike at high speed, you leave drag marks, clothes tear, blood splatters on the rock. We found blood on the riverbank fifty yards north of here, but not a single drop on the trail or near the bike itself."

"The DNA on the riverbank was inconclusive back then," Maya said, searching her memory of the files she'd read during her drive from Portland. "Technology has improved. We might be able to pull something if the sample preserved."

"Sample's gone," Eli said bluntly. "Lost in the precinct basement flood four years ago. Along with Sarah's blood-soaked sweater and the shoes she was wearing when she was last seen."

Maya spun around, her eyes widening in disbelief. "The entire physical evidence locker was wiped out?"

"Not entire," Eli corrected. "Just the boxes sitting on the lowest shelves in storage bay three. Coincidentally, that was where all the cold case evidence from the early 2010s was being kept. The sump pump failed during a three-day downpour. By the time anyone checked down there, the cardboard boxes were soup."

Maya felt a surge of cold fury tightening her chest. "That's not bad luck, Eli. That's gross negligence at best, and intentional destruction of evidence at worst."

"Welcome back to Blackwood Creek," Eli said, his voice dropping into a dangerous, dark register. "Where everything bad that happens is just a tragic accident or a twist of fate. You want to know why I was angry when you walked into the precinct today, Maya? It wasn't just because you ghosted me twelve years ago. It's because you're coming in here with your shiny state badge, playing detective, expecting to find a nice neat paper trail. There is no trail. People here cut the roots so deep that nothing grows back."

Maya took a step closer to him, refusing to backed down. She was inches from his chest now, close enough to feel the warmth radiating off him in the chill afternoon air.

"I didn't leave because I wanted to abandon you, Eli," she said, her voice trembling slightly before she caught herself and restored her firm tone. "I left because staying in this town was eating me alive. My father was falling apart, Sarah was gone, and everywhere I looked, people were lying to my face."

"You could have said goodbye," Eli said softly, the anger in his eyes flickering, revealing a deep, lingering pain that twelve years hadn't managed to erase. "You could have picked up a phone once. Just once, Maya. I waited on my porch for three months thinking you were just taking a break in Portland. Then your dad sold the house to a timber speculator, and I realized you were never coming back."

"I couldn't," Maya whispered. "Every time I thought about calling you, I remembered the night Sarah went missing. I remembered how we sat on the hood of your truck, promising each other we'd figure it out. And then I remembered how terrified I was that whoever took her was someone we knew. Someone we saw every day."

Eli stared down at her, his expression unreadable. For a second, the years between them seemed to dissolve, leaving only the two scared teenagers who had lost their grip on the world in the summer of 2012.

Then, a sudden sound shattered the moment—the sharp crunch of heavy boots on loose gravel coming from the far side of the burnt-out office structure.

Eli's hand instantly dropped to the butt of his sidearm. Maya unholstered her own service weapon in a smooth, practiced motion, stepping sideways to put her back against a steel support beam.

"Who's there?" Eli called out, his baritone booming through the ruined hall. "This is the Sheriff's Department. Show yourself."

For a moment, there was only the sound of the wind rustling through the corrugated iron panels overhead. Then, a figure slowly stepped out from behind the charred frame of the office building.

He was a tall, lean man in his mid-sixties, wearing a scuffed canvas jacket and a grease-stained ball cap pulled low over his eyes. His beard was silver and unkempt, his face weathered into deep, leather-like furrows by decades of hard outdoor labor. He carried a heavy iron crowbar in his right hand, held loosely at his side.

Maya recognized him immediately, though the years had carved away his strength and left behind a hollow, gaunt shell.

"Hold your fire," Eli muttered to Maya, lowering his weapon slightly, though he kept his stance wide and ready. "It's just Caleb."

Caleb Miller. Sarah and Leo’s father.

The man who had once been the lead mechanic at the sawmill, the man who used to fix Maya’s bicycle when she was a kid and host neighborhood barbecues in his backyard. Now, he looked like a phantom haunting the ruins of his former life.

Caleb stopped twenty feet away, his cloudy blue eyes shifting from Eli to Maya. He blinked slowly, as if trying to clear his vision, before his gaze settled on the badge pinned to Maya's belt.

"Vance girl?" Caleb's voice was a dry, rasping whisper, like dried leaves scraping across concrete. "They said you came back."

"Hello, Mr. Miller," Maya said gently, holstering her weapon and stepping forward, keeping her hands visible. "It's good to see you."

"Good?" Caleb let out a harsh, hacking cough that sounded like a dry engine trying to turn over. "Nothing good about this place, girl. Nothing good at all. What are you doing at the mill? The mill's dead. Everything here died years ago."

"I'm re-examining Sarah's case, Mr. Miller," Maya explained softly. "The state has opened a new task force. We're looking at all the original evidence, talking to people again."

Caleb's hands tightened on the iron crowbar. His knuckles turned white, the tendons in his forearms bulging under his weather-worn skin.

"State police," Caleb spat on the ground near his boots. "Fancy clothes, fancy titles. Where were you twelve years ago when my girl was calling out for help? Where were you when Brody was telling everyone she just ran off with some boy from out of county?"

"I know the original investigation was flawed—"

"Flawed?" Caleb took a sudden, aggressive step forward, pointing the crowbar at Maya's chest. "It wasn't flawed! It was a cover-up! They protected their own! They always protect their own in this godforsaken valley!"

Eli stepped smoothly between Caleb and Maya, his massive frame shielding her. "Caleb, lower the iron. You know Maya's not the enemy here."

Caleb glared at Eli, his breathing coming in ragged, shallow gasps. "You wear that star, Eli Thorne. You work for the same man who turned his back on my Sarah. You live in the house your father built with money from the timber company. Don't you talk to me about enemies."

"Mr. Miller," Maya said, stepping around Eli's shoulder so Caleb could see her face. "If you know something—if you found something back then that wasn't included in the official reports—you need to tell me. I can take it straight to the State Attorney. Brody can't stop me."

Caleb looked at her for a long, agonizing moment. The rage in his eyes slowly faded, replaced by a profound, terrifying grief that seemed to weigh down his entire body. He lowered the crowbar until its point rested on the gravel.

"They burned the office for a reason, Maya," Caleb whispered, his eyes shifting nervously toward the blackened beams behind him. "It wasn't an accident. Sarah found something in the old log books. She showed me a page she copied two days before she disappeared. Names. Dates. Shipments that never went through the books."

Maya felt a sudden jolt of electricity run down her spine. "What kind of shipments?"

"Timber," Caleb breathed. "And other things. Things brought down from the mountains late at night when the main gates were supposed to be locked. She thought she was being clever, playing detective. I told her to drop it. I told her the people involved weren't the kind you poke with a stick."

"Who was involved, Caleb?" Eli asked, his tone suddenly sharp and focused. This was clearly information he had never heard before. "Give me names."

Caleb looked at Eli, then back at Maya. A sudden spark of paranoia crossed his features, his gaze darting toward the treeline surrounding the property.

"The woods have ears, boy," Caleb said, backing away slowly, dragging the iron crowbar through the dirt. "If I say their names out loud, my boy Leo won't make it to his next shift at the precinct. They already took my Sarah. They took my wife's mind. They won't take my son."

"Caleb, wait!" Maya stepped forward, but Caleb was already moving with surprising speed for a man his age, slipping behind the collapsed metal framing of the storage shed.

"Let him go," Eli said, catching Maya by the arm before she could give chase. His grip was firm, but not painful. "If you push him right now, he'll lock himself in his cabin and won't speak to anyone for a month. He's fragile, Maya. He has been ever since Sarah vanished."

"He knows something concrete, Eli," Maya insisted, staring at the spot where Caleb had disappeared into the shadows. "He spoke about log books. Illegal shipments. That's a motive. If Sarah uncovered a smuggling operation running out of this mill, that gives us a completely different angle than a random abduction or a runaway story."

"You think timber workers killed a nineteen-year-old girl over stolen lumber?" Eli asked skeptically, though his eyes were narrowed in deep thought.

"I think people in desperate towns do desperate things when their money is threatened," Maya countered, turning to face him. "The mill was failing in 2012. Everyone knew it was going under. If management or local crews were using the infrastructure for illegal operations to stay afloat, they would have done anything to keep it quiet."

Eli was silent for a long moment, looking toward the riverbank. The wind whipped through the pine trees, making the rusted iron panels of the mill groan like old bones.

"If Caleb's telling the truth," Eli said slowly, "those log books would have been stored in the central office vault. The only part of the office that survived the 2017 fire."

Maya’s eyes lit up. "The vault is still intact?"

"It's a fireproof steel box buried in the concrete foundation," Eli said. "The roof collapsed over it, and Brody condemned the site before anyone could clear the rubble. As far as I know, nobody's opened it since the night of the fire."

"Then we're opening it," Maya said without hesitation.

"It's covered in three tons of charred timber and concrete, Vance," Eli pointed out. "We'd need heavy equipment, a work crew, and a warrant signed by a county judge."

"Or," Maya smiled, a tight, determined expression that Eli recognized from their youth, "we need a crowbar, two flashlights, and a few hours after dark when Brody is back at his house in the next county."

Eli stared at her, a slow, grudging smirk tugging at the corner of his lips. It was the first real sign of the old Eli she had seen all day.

"You really haven't changed at all, have you?" Eli chuckled softly, shaking his head. "Still breaking the rules fifteen minutes after arriving in town."

"I don't break rules, Deputy," Maya said smoothly, turning back toward the SUV. "I just re-interpret jurisdiction. Are you coming, or do I have to break into a county crime scene by myself?"

Eli walked up beside her, his long strides easily matching her pace. "You wouldn't last ten minutes out here without me, Vance. The mosquitoes would eat you alive before you even found the vault door."

They reached the SUV, the sun now dipping below the western mountain ridge, casting long, bruised-purple shadows across the gravel lot. The temperature was dropping fast, the air crisp with the promise of a cold Oregon night.

As Maya reached for the passenger door handle, a sudden glint of light from the tree line across the road caught her attention.

She paused, her instincts instantly on high alert. She squinted into the dense brush near Mile Marker 4. Nestled among the hemlocks was a dark, late-model pickup truck, its windows heavily tinted, its engine silent.

The moment Maya locked eyes on the vehicle, its headlights flashed on—two blinding beams of white light cutting through the dusk—before the truck reversed violently onto the main road, its tires screeching as it sped away into the gloom.

"Did you see that?" Maya asked, pointing toward the receding red taillights.

"Yeah," Eli said, his voice dropping into that dark, guarded tone again. "I saw it."

"Who was it?"

"I don't know," Eli said, unlocking the SUV. "But it looks like Caleb wasn't wrong about one thing."

Maya looked at him as she climbed into the passenger seat. "What's that?"

"We're not the only ones keeping an eye on Blackwood Creek," Eli said, shutting his door and bringing the engine to life. "And somebody definitely doesn't want those ashes swept."