My Mother Hurt My Wife—Then Our Baby Disappeared

The climb became a vertical nightmare.

The logging trail terminated at the base of the old timber sluice—a colossal, decaying wooden flume constructed decades ago to float massive hemlock logs down from the ridge into Pike Lake. Decaying trestles rose seventy feet into the air, creaking violently beneath the buffeting mountain gale. At the base of the structure, a swollen mountain creek had breached its banks, churning into an angry torrent of white foam and black water that swept away mud and boulders.

Ethan swung his flashlight beam across the roaring creek.

The narrow footbridge made of railroad ties was gone, completely submerged beneath three feet of violent, freezing runoff. On the far side of the torrent, the muddy bank ascended toward the massive corrugated-iron silhouette of the abandoned Blackwood Sawmill.

"Look!" Claire pointed.

Caught on a snag of twisted iron rebar in the middle of the flooded footbridge was a strip of fabric. A pale pink flannel strip from Lily’s swaddling blanket, flapping wildly against the white water.

"Stay back," Ethan shouted over the roar of the river. "Claire, the current will drag you under!"

"She was carried across!" Claire shouted back, her eyes frantic. "If they crossed it, we cross it!"

She didn't wait. Claire slung the shotgun over her back, stepped off the muddy bank, and plunged directly into the waist-deep torrent.

The freezing mountain water hit her like an icy sledgehammer, instantly knocking her off balance. Claire screamed as the current ripped her feet out from under her, sweeping her downstream toward the rocky cataract below.

"Claire!"

Ethan lunged into the black water, diving forward without hesitation. The shock of the cold nearly paralyzed his diaphragm, but he kicked with desperate fury, lunging with his left arm. His fingers caught the thick nylon strap of her shotgun sling. He dug his boots into the gravel bed, grinding his teeth until he tasted iron, fighting the insane force of the river.

"I’ve got you! Grab my jacket!" Ethan roared.

Claire clawed her way up his arm, sputtering river water, her fingers locking onto his collar. Together, bracing against each other like two dying trees in an avalanche, they fought their way across the submerged railroad ties, one agonizing inch at a time. The current hammered against their ribs, tearing at their clothing, but neither let go.

With a final, desperate heave, Ethan shoved Claire up onto the muddy boulders of the opposite bank. She scrambled up into the ferns, coughing violently, and reached back to pull Ethan from the suction of the water.

They collapsed on the mud, panting, soaked to the bone, their bodies shaking uncontrollably from the onset of hypothermia.

Ethan rolled onto his side, coughing up water, and looked back at the snag. The pink fabric was gone, torn away by the river.

"We're... we're losing time," Claire wheezed through chattering teeth, pushing herself up with the shotgun. Her face was deathly pale, her lips tinged with blue, but her eyes burned with an terrifying, unstoppable light. "The mill... they’re inside the mill."

Ethan forced his leaden legs to work. He stood up, shaking the water from his revolver. The gun was wet, but the cylinder was sealed well enough.

They stood before the rusted iron walls of the Blackwood Sawmill. The colossal structure loomed four stories high against the cliffside, its rusted corrugated siding groaning in the storm like a dying beast. Most of the high windows were smashed out, leaving gaping black voids that stared down at them like empty eye sockets.

At the main loading bay, the heavy sliding iron door was cracked open just wide enough for a person to squeeze through. Fresh mud was smeared along the edge of the rusty steel panel.

And from somewhere deep inside the cavernous, pitch-black belly of the mill, echoing off the hollow sheet metal and iron machinery, came a sound that made Ethan’s heart stop entirely.

It was faint. It was muffled.

A baby’s cry.

High-pitched, terrified, and short of breath.