Lost in the Wild by Leigh Mayberry (i am malala young readers edition txt) 📕

Wilcox left Meghan’s office. She dropped into the chair behind the desk. Meghan ignored the stink-eye she got from Dana from the other side of the situation room. Meghan heard Wilcox begin addressing the troopers and cadets.

“We’re going to use the help of anyone willing to lend a hand. Let’s get a list of volunteers. Start with the people outside right now. Someone get in touch with Duane Warren. He’s the mayor. We need people to know this is a community effort, and we’re not here to take over. Get someone to contact the radio station and the local reporter. I believe his name is Calvin Everett…

Meghan looked through the latest early morning social media posts. She listened to Wilcox’s orders. It included dividing the groups into four teams for the door to door search for Christine. It included the additional searches for the hotel and apartment complex. Meghan didn’t put too much into what Wilcox told everyone, even if it sounded like her plan. He was a seasoned and experienced supervisor, and common sense put everything out in the open. The game wasn’t new, and most law enforcement officers knew how to play it.

Chapter Ten

 Meghan and Lester left the office shortly after noon. She rode on the back of Lester’s four-wheeler. The bright clear day started at 29°F with weather updates anticipating the upper 40s before sunset.

Morning brought Joane the reality check about Christine. Panic set in, and Meghan did her best through text messaging to ease the mother’s tension if such a thing happened.

Meghan had constant contact with Joane through texting on her private smartphone. Under normal circumstances, Meghan didn’t give out her personal number. She was a parent. A missing child meant more than privacy at that point. Meghan knew Joane having direct contact with the police chief kept her out from underfoot, and in one place. Meghan wanted Joane, Cecil, and Earl to stay at the apartment.

Meghan gripped the rear rack on the four-wheeler. She kept her face behind Lester’s shoulders to keep the wind from biting her cheeks. The heavily treaded tires thrummed under Meghan as she felt dread creeping into her belly. She missed her oversized parka and had to contend with the winter gear and lots of layers. At least, she had her bunny boots. The cold made Meghan anxious because a ten-year-old girl in the cold wasn’t an image she wanted to see.

Lester drove along Shore Avenue north and turned right on Rurik Way. He pulled up to a wide rectangular house with plywood exterior paneling. It needed a paint job, but the front porch had refurbishing with replacement steps leading up to the landing in front of the door. Meghan noticed the divots where an ATV often parked in front of the house. She looked around to the neighbors’ houses. The nearest residence had a view of the left corner of the house where Lester parked.

“Where are we?” Meghan asked.

“This is where Eugene Tuktu lives,” Lester said. He regarded the new steps before making his way up to the door.

Meghan kicked at the hole in the frozen mud. “I don’t think he’s home.”

Lester pounded on the door. Meghan stared at the four evenly spaced holes where Eugene managed to park every day. He wasn’t home. Lester had an insight that Meghan caught up when she put it together. She felt the jolt of realization, putting two random things together to make a parallel. Lester got ahead of her.

She ran up the three steps.

“Do you know if anyone saw him at the gym last night?” she asked.

Meghan banged on the door with her fist.

“No one I know who was there saw him. Silva didn’t see him or Joane at the school last night.” Silva Graves, Lester’s wife, sometimes worked dispatch for the police department when they were short-handed. “I left a voicemail on his phone last night and again this morning. He’s still out of range or something.” It was easier to drop the assumption than make speculations.

“So, we’ve got a missing girl and her uncle missing.” There was a moment when Meghan felt a little better about the situation. “Is there a chance he took her to Selawick or somewhere for the weekend?”

“Eugene does a lot of hunting, but if he didn’t check with Joane about taking Christine with him, I think wherever he now wasn’t broadcast to the rest of the family.”

“So, he lived here with Clifford?”

Meghan cupped her hands and stared through the front window standing on the tiny porch. Her boot kicked the coffee can overflowing with cigarette butts. She saw a disheveled front room with the large flat screen television taking up the lower half of the living room window.

The house had the same generic, prefabricated layout as the other houses around town.

“This is a three-bedroom house, isn’t it?” she asked.

“It looks like it,” Lester said. “I think Eugene probably built it with Clifford. That was before Alaskalytical Construction closed.”

Meghan winced at the topic. “Clifford worked for them too?”

Lester nodded. He stepped off the porch and scanned the roadway. Nine houses lined the street. To the left was the split where buildings sat on either side of Rurik Way facing Shore Avenue. Beyond the frontage road and the embankment, the Kinguyakkii Bay had chunks and large flat slabs of fast-flowing ice breaks near shore. Several meters from the ice blocks, the rest of the waterway looked clear. Winter ice made water travel deceptive. People using flatboat boats fared better than the round bottom or displaced hulls. Ice crept underwater a few inches or a few feet before it bobbed to the surface and punched holes in boats.

Meghan turned the doorknob, and the front door swung open. It was warmer in the house, but not stifling hot. It meant Eugene had a fixed budget,