Most likely Sophie would accept the puppy, while continuing to regard him with her thousand-yard stare.

Wyatt was in trouble. He’d figured it out six months ago. He hadn’t just fallen in love with an amazing woman, Tessa Leoni; he’d fallen in love with her kid. And while dating in your twenties was all about hoping the parents liked you; dating in your forties was all about hoping her kids accepted you. In that regard, nine-year-old Sophie was proving a tough nut to crack.

Not that she hated him. Maybe.

They headed back down the ravine.

The other officers were dropping back, per the handler’s request. Wyatt had issued the command by radio. It was a tough call to make, pulling back the human searchers in order to bring in a canine. But the rule of thumb was that one dog was worth 150 volunteers. Meaning Annie was the best hope they had, and for her to do her job, she needed all the searchers and their various scent profiles out of her way.

Some of the state and local officers were already passing them, heading up as they headed down. Now Barbara and Peter from Fish and Game paused on their return to scratch Annie’s nose. Not having been issued her work command yet, Annie responded by preening happily.

The searchers all looked tired, Wyatt thought, but not dispirited. The search hadn’t been going on long enough to be considered a failure but, at the four-hour mark, was becoming more concerning. How much ground could a young child have really covered in the early hours of the morning? And why wouldn’t she backtrack at the sound of their voices?

They had passed from an easy search into the land of more troubling. These officers, especially Barbara and Peter, were experienced enough to know it.

They arrived at the crashed Audi. Frechette whistled low under his breath as he took it in.

“Damn. Talk about a nose dive. It’s like the thing sailed over a cliff or something.”

Wyatt didn’t comment. Without any results from the Total Station, he wasn’t sure about the “or something.”

Annie took in the wreckage as well, whining low in her throat. She was no longer dashing about, but regarding her handler fiercely. She knew, Wyatt thought. With a dog’s unerring sense, she understood it was time to work.

Frechette told the dog to stay. She whined again but did as she was told. The handler walked around the scene, taking in the broken glass, the bloodstains, the pieces of warped metal. He was looking out for his dog, Wyatt realized, as was his job.

The handler came around, peering in the rear passenger’s side window. “Think the kid sat back here?”

“That’s our assumption,” Kevin spoke up.

“Clean,” Frechette commented.

Wyatt frowned. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, most of us carry a lot of shit in our cars. Extra jacket this time of year, snacks, bottles of water, I don’t know. Mail we haven’t taken into the house yet, dog leashes, random junk. At least, my vehicle has most of that stuff. Bet yours does, too.”

Wyatt couldn’t argue with that. He stepped closer. First time around, he’d been focused on the damage in the front. This time, he saw Frechette’s point. The floor of the rear of the vehicle contained some shards of glass, most likely from the broken whiskey bottle or dragged from the front as the driver had crawled through. But, yeah, the normal detritus of everyday life—old coffee cups, bottles of water, snacks for the child, iPad for playing in the car . . . Nada. The rear seats, cargo area, held nothing at all.

Apparently, the only item the driver thought you needed for a road trip was a bottle of Glenlivet.

“That a problem?” Wyatt asked the handler.

“Not at all. Good news, really. I was worried the back might have more glass, be hard on Annie’s paws. Way I see it, we can load her into the cargo area, have her jump into the rear seats and get to work. Hey, Annie!”

The yellow Lab, still obediently sitting next to Kevin, whined in response.

“Wanna work?”

A single enthusiastic bark.

“All right, honey. Let’s go to work. Come, Annie. Come!”

The dog bolted to his side, a yellow bullet that paused only long enough to home in on her handler’s face, awaiting the next command.

“Up!”

She leapt into the cargo area.

“Go!”

She was in the passenger’s seat, not sniffing, not exploring, big brown eyes still riveted to Frechette’s face.

“Okay, Annie,” Frechette called through the open rear hatch. “Here’s the deal. There’s a missing girl and you’re gonna track her. Track, do you understand?”

Wyatt thought this was a pretty colloquial approach to dog training, but what did he know? Annie certainly seemed to understand, ears pricked, body on high alert.

“Scent up!”

The dog dropped her head, began snuffling over the seat, the door handle, the window. Her lips were peeled back slightly, as if she was taking the scent not just into her nose but into her mouth and tasting it.

“Go find, Annie. Go find!”

The dog whined, now working the rear seats in her own grid pattern, back and forth, back and forth. She was on the hunt, no doubt about it, her attention no longer on her handler, but 100 percent focused on catching scent.

She backtracked. Moved from behind the passenger’s front seat to behind the driver’s seat. More anxious sniffing, another low whine. Exploring both rear car doors thoroughly, up and down, side to side. Then a first exploratory paw, stepping off the seat onto the glass-studded floor.

Thank God for dog boots, Wyatt thought. He couldn’t have watched it otherwise.

More whining, anxious, distressed. Then Annie was back on the seats, side to side, back and forth. Then with a graceful hop she was over, in the rear cargo space, diligently working that space inch by inch.

Some dogs lie down to signal they are on scent. Others barked. Wyatt wasn’t sure of the nuances, but best he could tell, Annie wasn’t having any luck yet. And it was pissing her off.

She glanced at Frechette, whined again, clearly frustrated.

“Scent up!” he repeated.

The dog dropped her head, back to work. She leapt from the cargo area to the rear seats. Then, after another few minutes of careful exploration, backtracked to the middle of the bench seat. She snuffled, paused, snuffled.

Then, facing forward, she leaned forward toward the glass-strewn center console, her movements slow and careful. She understood glass, Wyatt realized. Or at least had enough experience with it to know to proceed with caution. More sniffing, above the glass. And then.

Woof.

She retreated to the center of the bench seats. Woofed again. Jumped over the seat backs to the cargo area. Another bark, tail up, eyes back on Frechette as she ran to the rear bumper, body on high alert.

Frechette got the message. “Track, Annie. Track!”

She sailed out of the car, a tad too enthusiastically, then had to backtrack to recover the trail. But within a matter of minutes, she was on scent, head down, sleek body moving effortlessly over the ground as she jogged from side to side, bush to bush. She began to ascend the ravine; they followed.

Moving in the dog’s wake, Wyatt began to notice things he hadn’t spotted before. The way this one bush had a broken branch. Another offered up a long strand of dark hair caught between two leaves. A person had come this way, and to judge by the freshness of the snapped twig, very recently.

Tracking was never completely linear. They stayed ten feet back, allowing Annie plenty of space to work as she jogged forward, eased back, raced right, then regrouped to the left. An older, wiser dog might have paced herself, whereas Annie had clearly thrown herself into the chase. Come hell or high water, she was gonna find her target.

They worked their way up the ravine in a slow zigzag pattern, as if the initial person hadn’t known where she was going. Had been stumbling around in the dark.