Chapter 3: What I Kept In My Pocket
I left the house before sunrise.
My husband was asleep, or wanted me to think he was. I moved through the kitchen without turning on the lights and took the paper envelope from beneath the loose drawer liner where I had hidden it.
The photograph, the thread, and the receipt went into my coat pocket.
I carried no purse. I didn’t want anything that would slow me down or give him another place to look.
At a diner off the county road, I chose a booth near the front window. The parking lot was empty except for two delivery trucks. A waitress poured coffee and left without asking questions.
I didn’t drink it.
I called a number I had saved months earlier for a practical reason. The man who answered introduced himself as Daniel Reyes. He worked with property and trail-access records for the county. We had never met outside a brief exchange about a boundary document.
“I need to ask you something,” I said.
“Okay.”
“I need to know whether a photograph can show where it was taken.”
“Sometimes. Depends on the file.”
“It’s a picture of a trail.”
“Do you have the original?”
“No. A printed copy.”
He was quiet for a moment. “Then I can tell you what I recognize. I can’t certify anything from a print.”
“That’s enough.”
I almost ended the call there. He didn’t ask why I needed it. The restraint made me continue.
“I also need you not to contact my husband.”
“I won’t.”
“If I send you a picture, will you tell me what you see?”
“Yes.”
I sent him the photograph of the trail, not the note on the back. My thumb hovered over the message after it went through.
A minute later, three dots appeared.
“That’s the north approach,” he said. “The exposed section is past the second switchback. There’s an old service road below the trail. It’s not marked from the main road.”
“Could someone take that picture from a vehicle?”
“From the service road, yes. The angle would be about right.”
I looked out at the parking lot.
“Is the road open?”
“Not officially. The gate is usually chained.”
“Usually?”
“Somebody has been cutting the lock this season.”
The waitress returned with eggs and toast I hadn’t ordered. I thanked her anyway.
Daniel continued. “Why are you asking?”
I wrapped both hands around the coffee cup.
“Because I was there yesterday.”
He didn’t fill the silence.
“Three men approached me,” I said. “They tried to pull me toward the edge.”
The words sounded too plain. I expected them to break something open inside me. Instead, they sat between us, factual and cold.
“Did you report it?”
“No.”
“Are you safe now?”
“I’m not sure.”
That answer seemed to change his breathing.
“I can give you the number for the local sheriff’s office,” he said.
“Not yet.”
“Okay.”
I took the photograph from my pocket and turned it facedown. “One of them told me my husband sent his regards.”
Daniel didn’t ask what my husband’s name was. He asked, “Did your husband know you were going to the trail?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“I told him.”
The diner door opened. A man in a black jacket came in, glanced toward the counter, and left when he saw no one he knew.
My body reacted before my mind did. My shoulders tightened. My hand closed around the photograph.
Daniel heard the pause.
“Are you alone?”
“Yes.”
“Do you want me to stay on the phone?”
I looked at the receipt. The time printed near the top placed me at the gas station after the men left. It was one small fact, but it was mine.
“Yes,” I said.
We stayed connected while I finished the coffee. He explained how to save the original photographs with their dates intact and suggested I make a second copy somewhere my husband couldn’t access.
Before we ended the call, I sent him the picture of the handwritten note.
He didn’t respond immediately.
When he did, his message was short.
I don’t recognize the handwriting. But the photograph was taken from the service road.
I read it twice.
Then I stood, left cash beneath the cup, and walked to my car.
The mountain was visible between the buildings, its upper ridges hidden by cloud. I had thought the photograph meant someone had followed me.
Now I understood something worse.
Someone had been waiting for me before I arrived.
I put the car in gear and drove toward the county office, carrying the evidence in my pocket and Daniel’s number open on my phone.
May you like
I still wasn’t ready to tell the whole truth.
But I had stopped pretending there was no truth to tell.
