I trotted out the doorway of the rock shop and hurried around the corner of the barn-red metal building, past the rock garden with its whimsical statues frolicking among the boulders and flowers. My boots clomped as I hustled down the path through the woods, straight into the area marked by a big wooden sign. White-painted letters declared “HEALING VORTEX.” Three boulders, shaped like benches, hunkered in a semicircle around the empty space that was the so-called vortex of mystical energy. I stopped in the middle of the space. No spiritual effects lightened my psyche, or whatever the thing was supposed to do.

Maybe the vortex shunned me because I’d stopped believing in the supernatural. I liked the charming idea of an invisible energy field that healed what ailed you, but ridicule from school kids had squelched my fascination with the paranormal. I’d long since given up on caring what others thought of me, yet I couldn’t quite get back to those beliefs.

Glancing around, I realized no one was here. My customers must’ve left already or meandered down the trail to the waterfall. If I returned to the shop without speaking to the customers, or at least verifying they’d left the premises, my boss would chew me out good. “Go act like a tour guide,” Stan Lagorio had commanded, and I obeyed. A thirty-two-year-old woman should not have to schlep rocks and chase down tourists for minimum wage. Still, with my lackluster work history, I was grateful to have any job.

Sultry air stuck to my skin as I trudged down the trail. I swiped a bead of sweat from my temple. Summer on the Keweenaw Peninsula — the way-way north of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula — shouldn’t scorch. I mopped more perspiration from my brow, plodding onward. Up ahead, out of sight, the waterfall drummed a dull rhythm. Something else moaned beneath the rumbling, something like…

The throaty bellow of a human in agony.

I slid to a stop. My heart raced. Adrenaline electrified my every nerve as I struggled to peer through the trees, but the foliage blocked my view. The urge to flee blasted through me, but someone needed to check this out. If I galloped back to the store for help, the injured party might bleed to death or stumble into the water and drown. I inched forward.

A strangled cry reverberated through the woods.

I slipped my right hand under my blouse to close my fingers around the grip of the Bond Arms derringer holstered on the inside of my waistband — legally, thanks to my concealed carry permit and the permission of my employer. The pistol’s grip felt warm in my cold hand, heated by my body temperature. The two .357 rounds, one in each barrel, could stop a bad guy or at least slow him down. Never a victim again.

A chill seeped into me, penetrating to the very depths of my being. The air crackled with invisible energy that skittered across my skin. The trees towered above me as before, the sun still blazed overhead, and the waterfall still thundered further down the trail. But the atmosphere had shifted, like a shadow snaking across my soul.

Baloney. Energy didn’t crackle. No shadows infected me. I’d let my imagination mushroom into paranoia.

I pulled out my derringer and tiptoed two steps. Hesitated. Took another step. Listened.

The falls rumbled. Jagged breaths hissed from my lips. The weight of another gaze squirmed down my spine, but I saw nothing except aspen and maple trees, and wildflowers sagging under the weight of morning dew. I would’ve accepted I was alone and had confused the cry of a fox or bear for a human scream, if not for the worm of doubt burrowing into me.

A raven swooped down out of the high trees.

The bird squawked as it passed within inches of me. I ducked down. When I raised up again, the raven was gone. Had it been aiming for me? Christ, I was losing my mind.

I jogged down the trail and broke through the screen of trees into the clearing surrounding the falls. The water gushed over the twenty-foot-high red sandstone cliff into the small pool below, where it disgorged into a stream. No one stood on the wooden bridge that arched over the stream. I dragged in a breath, inhaling the clean scents of water and grass, but a sharper smell, almost metallic, lurked beneath the woodland aroma. The trail angled left, away from the falls and into the deeper woods. I sprinted around the curve, into the trees.

And tripped over the man sprawled across the trail.

My derringer popped out of my grasp as I stumbled sideways. Blood dripped from the man’s forehead onto the ground. The fluid stained his red hair and congealed as a dark puddle in the dirt. One arm lay twisted under his body. His eyes stared at nothing. His mouth gaped open, caught in the final scream.

I crouched beside the man, extending a trembling hand to check his pulse, but I sensed the truth before my fingertip dug into his flesh.

The man was dead.