Page 53 of When the Silence Breaks

But the Iridium GO! device signal wavered—one bar, then none ... then one again. The device blinked green for a heartbeat, then amber. Ryder clenched his jaw.

“Come on ... just one bar.” The signal flickered, caught, and he hit send on his message to Holt before it could vanish again.

Hovering beside him, after sending a text, Sarah retrieved her email. “There’s something from Tessa like I hoped. It’s the audio file. Will it download?”

“A small file like that?” He sent her a half-hearted smile. “Maybe. But it’s going to take a few minutes and maybe more than we have.”

For what seemed like entirely too long, they both held their breath. Was she silently praying too?

Finally, Sarah let out a shaky breath. “It’s taking forever.”

“What did you expect?” Ryder’s eyes locked on the screen. “We just need—”

The bar froze at twenty-two percent. Great. Of course. He pushed down his own impatience.

Sarah sucked in a breath. “No, no, no...”

Ryder smacked the side of the device lightly, as if that ever did any good. Suddenly, the bar jumped to thirty percent.

Forty-five.

“Come on, come on...” Yeah, he was impatient too. This could be a very big mistake.

Outside, the wind rattled the cabin walls. Sarah leaned in so close, he imagined he could hear her heart hammering as the final percent clicked into place. Any longer, and he would need to cut the connection.

“Got it.” Ryder exhaled hard.

Her big eyes held his. “Now let’s hope we can actually hear.”

“And that it was worth the risk.” But what was done was done.

“Wait, looks like Tessa responded to my text,” she said, sharing the message.

All is well. Keep safe and come back to us soon.

The relief in Sarah’s eyes was clear, but they still had to listen to the recording. Dread settled on him. Then there was the item he’d found today that still burned in his pocket, and he needed to know more before he shared his thoughts—ifhe shared them.

“You ready to listen to the file?” Her finger hovered over the file on her phone.

Guilt suffused him at withholding anything from her. They needed to be open and honest and build trust.

“Wait,” he said. “Not yet.” On second thought, Sarah needed to hear this from him, to know this, before they learned more. He should have told her the moment he’d recognized the coin.

“What?”

He tugged the half of the military challenge coin out of the side pocket in his pack and set it on the table.

“What does it mean to you?” she asked. “Don’t think I didn’t notice your reaction to it earlier.”

He thought he’d hidden his shock. “I have the other half. It belongs to my grandfather.”

She stared at him, her eyes narrowed. “Wait ... you think your grandfather found this coin and left half of it in the cave?”

“I wish it was that simple.”

“Then what are you saying? How can you know this is the other half?” She scooted her chair back as if to put distance between them.

“I was on a hunting trip with him when I saw it and asked about it. I was just a kid.”