Part 2
The tip of Evelyn’s stick scraped the ground as she lowered it. She kept her hands low and her body still.
The adult stopped. Farther uphill, another animal crossed a narrow gap in the trees.
The youngster tried to get up. Its wrapped paw failed, and it fell against Evelyn’s leg with a yelp. The larger wolf shifted sideways, seeking an unobstructed view beneath the roots.
“I found her like this,” Evelyn said.
Her voice sounded unfamiliar in the open air. The animal wasn’t listening for an explanation. It watched her hands, smelled the smoke, and held its distance.
Firelight revealed a nick in one ear. Ice had collected beneath its jaw. It stood roughly thirty feet away while the youngster made another, quieter sound.
The adult answered with no sound Evelyn could hear. After several seconds it backed away.
She could still see it at intervals: pale fur where a branch moved, a dark back passing behind a trunk. A second, darker wolf appeared beside it once, then disappeared. Neither approached the fire.
Evelyn reached for another twig and dropped it.
That annoyed her until she tried to pick it up. Her fingers weren’t merely cold. They were clumsy. Standing to collect more fuel seemed to require a series of decisions she couldn’t quite arrange.
She had warned patients about that feeling.
“Go on,” she muttered. “Tell me I’m just tired.”
The wolf’s shivering had eased. Evelyn couldn’t decide how much comfort to take from that. She opened the foil farther, drew it over both of them, and slipped her bare hand beneath the scarf. A quick heartbeat met her palm.
From the trees came a low call. It lengthened, carrying beyond the hollow. An answer rose from the opposite slope, followed by another somewhere farther along the ridge.
The youngster pushed against her arm and attempted a reply, a series of short sounds that never became a full howl. Evelyn steadied its shoulders before it could struggle onto the damaged foot.
“They’ve located you,” she whispered. “That’s one family accounted for.”
She remembered the phone.
It had gone cold in her pocket. She held it beneath her shirt for several minutes, then tried the power button. The screen appeared briefly.
Her message bore a sent mark.
She saw it clearly before the phone shut down again.
Dana would know the draw. She would know which route Evelyn had taken. She would also know that her mother had declined three calls and then required a search party.
Evelyn tucked the useless phone away. If she got home, there were things she would have to hear without interrupting.
A gust drove smoke into the shelter. The wolf coughed. Using the cracked stick, Evelyn spread the burning twigs apart until less smoke gathered beneath the roots. Sparks lifted; the adult wolf recoiled out among the trees.
Later she couldn’t have said how often she fed the little fire or whether she slept. Hugh appeared beside the spring box in his brown chore jacket, reaching for a tool. She knew he was dead. That knowledge didn’t make the sight go away.
Then Owen was there, younger than he had been in the hospital, crouched in a patch of sunlight. At seven he had considered it his responsibility to keep people from stepping on ants.
Evelyn pressed the broken end of the stick into her palm. The sting brought the roots back into focus.
At some point the wolves vanished.
She noticed the empty spaces where she had been seeing them, and fear sharpened her hearing. Beneath the wind came an engine, faint at first, then unmistakable.
A snowmobile.
She tried to rise. Her leg wouldn’t take her.
The youngster tensed. Evelyn loosened the scarf so it couldn’t snag if the animal fled, then knocked her stick against a root.
“Down here!”
The first attempt scarcely carried. She tried again, harder.
Light moved between the trees. Another beam appeared below it. Someone called her name.
The pale-chested wolf returned to the edge of the opening and looked toward the lights.
“No,” Evelyn said.
She could picture someone seeing it beside an injured woman and making the wrong decision. She dragged herself onto one knee and struck the ground with her stick.
“Out. Go on.”
The wolf stayed.
Evelyn pulled the foil free and snapped it outward. The sudden movement flashed in the firelight.
“Get!”
The adult wheeled uphill. It paused near the abandoned trap, then disappeared. The darker wolf followed.
Wade Kessler came through the trees moments later. Snow covered the shoulders of his search jacket, and his beard was stiff with ice. In nearly four decades of being Hugh’s neighbor, hunting companion, and occasional adversary, he had usually found something to say.
This time he dropped beside her and took her face between his gloves.
“Eyes open, Evie. Stay with me.”
“The youngster,” she managed.
He glanced under the blanket. “Naturally.” His fingers moved to her neck. “Your daughter’s been calling every number in the county.”
Two search volunteers arrived with a sled. Deputy Pruitt followed, along with a woman carrying veterinary equipment.
Evelyn knew Dr. Beth Salcedo by sight. She ran the licensed wildlife rehabilitation facility outside Darsen and volunteered with the county search team. Hugh had kept her number on the kitchen wall among the emergency contacts Dana had called.
When the trapped wolf was mentioned over dispatch, Beth had joined the search.
The youngster panicked as people crowded the opening. Beth immediately sent everyone back.
“Give her room. I need to see her breathing.”
She watched from a crouch, studying how the animal followed her movements and what happened when it tried to stand. Only then did she prepare a sedative.
“Female. Around five months, I’d say.” She examined the paw without pulling it straight. “Blood supply’s still there. We’ll need X-rays for the rest.”
Evelyn kept her hand against the scarf until the animal’s head sank. Beth and a volunteer moved her into a padded carrier.
“You’ll return her here?” Evelyn asked.
Beth secured the carrier before answering. “We have to get her well enough first. Then we have to find the pack again.”
“They were here.”
“I know. We’ll look.”
The volunteers put heated wraps around Evelyn and fastened her onto the sled. She objected to the straps. Wade ignored her and checked the buckle himself.
On the climb out, he walked beside her with one hand on the rail.
Deputy Pruitt stopped at the trap. He brushed away enough snow to expose the chain and the bait above it.
“Untagged,” he said. “Set recently, too.”
His light moved uphill and caught another irregular patch in the snow. He marked the spot, then called to the searchers.
“Stay on our track. Nobody cuts across.”
Evelyn turned her head toward Wade.
He had stopped moving. The headlamp’s beam crossed his face, but he wasn’t looking at the second disturbed patch. He was staring at the first trap’s chain.
Near its anchor, the metal had been joined with Wade’s unmistakable repair: a crude, three-sided reinforcement he used on gates and tow chains. Hugh used to complain about the appearance and then ask Wade to mend something else.
Wade pulled off a glove. His bare hand hovered above the sled rail before gripping it.
“Evie,” he said. “I put those traps out…”
To read the rest of the story – CLICK the NEXT button 👇👇👇