Kurt stopped ten yards inside the south boundary line and aimed his light up at Brad’s wooden ladder stand.

“Look there,” Kurt said loudly to his two buddies.

“The stand’s right where Brad said it’d be.”

Russ Lindahl rubbed the back of his neck with a thick, callused hand.

“Brad say whether anybody else had keys to that bottom gate?”

“Brad said it was locked up tight for us,” Kurt said.

“He said Amy wouldn’t come anywhere near the woods today.”

“She’s standing right over there,” Dale called out from the dark tree line.