Elizabeth Goddard - Submerged

Standing next to Cobie, Adam half expected her to lash out at him.

“I wanted to close this awful chapter of my life,” she said. “That was my whole purpose in coming to the cave. And then after this, I’d planned to build something new and fresh for myself.”

Adam understood that sentiment. He was shooting for the same thing. Rain started up again, sprinkling her exposed skin, clinging to her long lashes. He took off his jacket and gently hung it across her shoulders. That she didn’t object surprised him.

“What do you think happened to your father?” he finally came to his reason for being here.

“I don’t know. The police opened an investigation into his whereabouts. His work travel could have taken him anywhere. Sometimes I would believe he was one place only to find out he’d been a thousand miles away. I wasn’t the one to call the police, of course. How could I know he was missing? I only talked to him on birthdays and Christmas.”

Emotion grew thick in his throat, and he cleared it. “Who called the police then?”

“Barbara Stemmons. A woman he stayed with in Seattle. An address he called home. I’ve never met her. She said he hadn’t come home in weeks, and she hadn’t been able to contact him.” Her voice sounded teary, but she stared ahead, her features hard. “The police said given his pattern, he didn’t want to be found, and that was that. They’re overworked and had nothing else to go on, but they would keep him listed as missing on their website, if anyone else had a lead. I can’t blame them for not doing more. And I can’t help but believe that I contributed to their attitude. Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything. Maybe they would still be searching for him if I hadn’t been so negative about the way he traveled and lived.”

Adam was taken aback at her words. Clearly she was being too hard on herself. Blaming herself when she shouldn’t. And her desperate need for her father’s love and approval—something she might never get—rang through her words, loud and clear.

Adam said the only thing he could say. “He loved you, Cobie. You have to believe that. He just couldn’t handle—”

“I know he loved me, okay? Or loves me. I can’t stand to think he’s gone, really gone.” She swiped at another tear. “At Christmas, he told me that he wanted to make up for lost time. That he was coming back to Mountain Cove to see me, but that he had something to take care of first. I resented him for that—it was the same mantra I had heard all my life. There was always one more thing he had to do before he could make time for me. But then Barbara sent his journal to me. Said she’d found it in his things with a note from him asking her to send it to me.

“I could hear that he loved me in the words in his journal, even though he had a terrible way of showing it. He wrote that he couldn’t take the pain of losing my mother when I was born, so he threw himself into his work. After Brad died, well, that was one more reason to stay away. Seeing me only reminded him of all he’d lost. I came to see the cave because he wrote about it. It was my way of being somewhere he’d been. My only way to get close to him and say goodbye. If he’s dead. And maybe even if he isn’t. And somehow I hope to find answers in the cave. He wrote about it as though it held some secret he wanted me to find.”

For Cobie’s sake, Adam hoped her father was still alive, but a sick feeling swirled inside that made him think otherwise. “Cobie, your father is missing. Maybe he wanted you to have the journal because he believed he was in danger and that he wouldn’t have a chance to tell you in person how much he loved you in case something happened to him. Maybe he never meant for you to actually come to the cave, to find it. Or he could have been warning you away.”

She turned to face him. The cold in her blue eyes stabbed him. “Are you suggesting that my attack today had something to do with my father, a man I haven’t seen in years?”

“Maybe there’s something hidden in the cave, and that’s why you were attacked.”

FIVE

Cobie wore some old running shoes and layered her clothes under fleece and her rain gear. She put on gloves to protect not only her hands but the cave formations from the oils in her skin that could stop stalagmite growth. She wore a headlamp attached to a helmet and carried an extra flashlight.

They waited at the slim entrance to the cave while Ray and Mel took the lead as a safety measure. After searching the island, they had concluded that her assailant had fled. Ray had taken as evidence the rock she’d used to hit the man. Thankfully, it had fallen in a sheltered spot and the rain hadn’t washed it free of the blood. The slightest chance that the man had hidden in the cave remained, so Ray’s reasons for going along served more than one purpose—keeping him on the job as part of his investigation, protecting them and exploring the cave with his friends the way he’d already wanted to. He hadn’t asked more questions, only assured Cobie they would find her attacker.

Right. The man could have been anyone at all, out for a joy kill instead of a joyride. He could be anywhere by now.

Including right behind her again.

After Ray and Mel, Adam’s friends, Nate, Jared and Gary, went next, readying their tape, ropes, compass, a clinometer to map the cave and a first aid kit, just in case. They seemed genuinely excited to be part of mapping the cave for the Forest Service.

But Adam hung back, studying the place where she’d run from her attacker. Since Ray and Mel had already searched that area, she wasn’t sure what Adam thought he would find there. Still, it warmed her heart that he was searching. He seemed determined to keep her safe and to figure this out.

She leaned against the mossy limestone and thought back to when he and Brad had gone along with a more experienced team as novice surveyors. She hadn’t realized how much donning the gear would affect her. How the memories would rush back just by seeing Adam wearing the headlamp and helmet. Only this time, Brad wasn’t at his side.

The memories hurt and reminded her of the pain and anger she’d felt toward Adam all these years. But Adam—his heroic effort to save her today, his protectiveness afterward, and, yes, maybe even his sturdy form and thick hair framing his rugged, handsome face, made it hard to hold on to her resentment. Being with him seemed to soften all the hardness around her heart, and her grip on her negative attitude was slowly slipping. And with that, part of her wished her friends wouldn’t give him such a hard time.

Just then—as if Adam had heard her thoughts—he turned and glanced at her, then started back to them.

“Back off of Adam, okay?” she whispered to Laura.

Jared called from the cave. “Come on in, guys. Get out of the rain.”

“Go ahead, Cobie,” Laura said. “Jen and I will go next—then Adam can be last.”

Cobie feared what her friends might say to Adam if she left them alone. Maybe she should let them have their say, but Adam had saved her life. That couldn’t make up for the past—no way—but the least she could do in return was save him from her friends.

“No, you go ahead,” she said. “Then Jen.”

“What are you doing?” Laura angled her head, her silent question ringing loudly in Cobie’s ears. Why are you staying behind with Adam?

“I need to talk to him alone, okay?” It was the only answer Laura would accept.

Her friend frowned. Shrugging, she slipped into the cave. Jen followed. Cobie had forgotten how overbearing Laura could be.

When Laura and Jen had disappeared inside, Adam approached. He studied her. What was he thinking? Okay, maybe she made a mistake. Maybe she didn’t exactly want to be left alone with him.