You Looked Down on Me Once, Now You Look Up. novel Chapter 81

Ah!

Ruby shot up with a gasp, heart pounding. Pain lashed through her lower back, so sharp and sudden that she flopped right back down onto the ground, breath knocked from her lungs.

Blinking through the pain, she took in her surroundings: thick woods, shadows stretching longer as evening settled in. Then it all came flooding back—she’d been ambushed near the restroom. Knocked out cold.

Did she fall down the mountain? Or had someone dragged her here?

“Hello?” Her voice was barely more than a croak, weak and trembling. “Please... someone help me.”

The words barely carried, swallowed up by the constant buzz of insects and the riot of birds overhead. Cloud Peak was a wild place; her cries were nothing next to the sound of the forest.

Desperate, Ruby reached for a bamboo stalk beside her and shook it hard, hoping the movement would catch the eye of anyone searching nearby.

Down the mountain, the Martin family was a mess of worry and frustration.

A security guard jogged up to the search coordinator. “Mr. Martin wants five more people on the team. Bring the search dogs.”

“That’s not nearly enough!” Tina snapped, panic sharpening her voice.

The coordinator didn’t bother hiding his irritation. “If you were really that worried about your daughter, Mrs. Martin, maybe you shouldn’t have let her hike up an undeveloped mountain at sunrise. Don’t pretend to be Mother of the Year now. What, you want a medal?”

“You—!” Tina bristled, cheeks flushing red.

“Let it go,” Emerson cut in, tugging Tina back. “Let’s just do what they say.”

Search dogs bounded up the path, but as darkness crept in, the search only got harder.

By the time the sun slipped behind the ridge, painting the sky with streaks of gold and purple, Colton finally tore his gaze away from the window and looked over at the man sitting across from him in the modern tea room.

Oliver sat there, long fingers absently turning a porcelain teacup he’d just picked up at an antique shop.

“Why not send more people up there?” Colton asked, voice low. “If something happens, won’t it come back to bite us?”

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