“I don’t know, but maybe it wasn’t random.” Hannah had been mentally sorting through the mess since they discovered Angel was missing. “Just hear me out.” She explained about the accident, what happened to Angel’s parents, and how she ended up staying at Boone’s house. Since Jackie and Danielle had been off the entire day, they’d missed out on the gossip.
“Boone said she mentioned seeing a shadow before the accident,” Hannah explained. “I didn’t think much of it because she’d been through a terrible ordeal, but what if there really was a monster of some sort out there?”
“You didn’t see it, though,” Jackie pointed out. “You were right there.”
“I was also focused on the sky. There was weird lightning. Cooper saw it, too. It wasn’t just a storm.”
Realization dawned on Jackie. “You’re thinking the dust storm wasn’t just a storm either.”
“It makes sense.”
“Except I saw on the news that the forecaster said dust storms were possible up here today,” Danielle countered. “He was saying it this morning. Angel wasn’t even out here at that point.”
Hannah hadn’t considered that. “No, but the storm was more intense than others we’ve had like it since I’ve been here. There was zero notice. One second it was sunny and the next second it was on top of us. It was so fast we couldn’t even get to Angel.”
“That does sound weird,” Jackie conceded. “Did Angel say what the shadow she saw looked like?”
Hannah shook her head. “I was going to ask her, but we had all day. She was upset because her parents hadn’t woken up. I didn’t want to push her before she was ready. I thought, if she was more comfortable with me, she would be more likely to open up about what she’d witnessed. I never got the chance to test my theory, though.”
“Well, it definitely could be supernatural.” Jackie exhaled hard enough to lift up her bangs. “We’re searching blind out here, though.”
“We’re not giving up.” Hannah couldn’t bear the thought of ending the search. At least this way she was doing something. If she stopped, she would have nothing to do but think about the myriad ways she’d failed Angel. “We have to at least go down to the creek. That’s the boundary.”
Jackie looked as if she wanted to argue but ultimately nodded. “Okay. We’ll head to the creek.”
Hannah marched the rest of the way up the hill and then pulled up short, a sharp buzzing sound tickling her inner ear.
“What the heck is that?” She stuck her pinkie in her right ear and jiggled it around.
“What’s what?” Danielle asked with a blank face.
“That!” Hannah continued trying to clean out her ear. “That ... ringing sound.”
Danielle shifted her gaze to Jackie, concern etching across her face. “I don’t hear a ringing sound. Do you?”
“No.” Jackie tilted her head and concentrated. “I ... well, that’s not entirely true. I hear a very low buzzing, like maybe a bee is around somewhere.”
“It’s not a bee.” The noise was enough to have Hannah’s agitation flaring. “It’s really loud, like maybe a power line fell or something.” She scanned the ground. “You don’t see a power line out here, do you?”
Jackie was incredulous. “I hate to break it to you but there are no power lines out here. There’s only one at the top of the mountain.”
“Oh, right.” Hannah rocked back on her heels. “Then what is that noise?”
Jackie worked her jaw for an extended beat and then raised her hands. “Conmostro,” she muttered under her breath.
“What’s that?” Hannah asked, intrigued.
“Latin,” Danielle replied. “She’s using her magic to see if there’s other magic close by.”
“I didn’t know that you could do that.”
“I believe that’s because you keep finding trouble rather than taking the classes I’ve so generously offered,” Jackie intoned.
“Good point.” Hannah forced a smile as her eyes drifted to a spot about five feet in front of her. Either it was a trick of the sun or there was legitimately a shimmer there. “Try it again.”
Jackie repeated the words, and this time the shimmering became more apparent.
“Is that ....?” Danielle shuffled closer, her eyes going wide. “It is.”
“What is it?” Hannah was alarmed at the woman’s sudden change in demeanor.
“It’s a wall of sorts,” Jackie replied, her eyes narrowed as she studied the shimmer. After a beat, she extended her hands and allowed them to move over the area. “It’s more like a dome.”
“A dome?” Hannah had trouble wrapping her head around what the other witch was saying. “What does that mean?”
“I’m not sure.” Jackie allowed her hand to cross the barrier. “It’s not keeping us inside. I mean … we’re not stuck or anything.”
“It’s there for a reason,” Hannah was adamant. “It has to be a way to trap us inside.”
“Except it doesn’t trap us inside.”
“Then it does something else.”
“I would agree. I have no idea what that something else is, though. We need to test it.”
Hannah was all for that, although her heart still ached at the thought of Angel being taken. “Do we think this has something to do with Angel going missing?”
“I don’t see how, but it seems like too much of a coincidence to be a separate phenomenon. I guarantee this wasn’t here two days ago. I walked down to the creek then. I would’ve noticed it.”
“So, what do we do?”
Jackie shrugged. “We run some tests. That’s all we can do.”
That wasn’t what Hannah wanted to hear. “There must be something more than that.”
“Not that I’m aware of. If you have any ideas, though, now would be the time to spring them on us.”
“I need to think.”
“That sounds like a terrifying prospect.”
7
Seven
“We’ve been over this town from top to bottom,” Boone announced when he tracked down Cooper in front of the saloon. “We’ve gone through every room ... and closet ... and storage shed. Angel isn’t here.”
Cooper worked his jaw. He understood why Boone was upset, but he didn’t feel a lecture was
