Across the Vanishing Sky

One year after Nova’s disappearance, Braedyn drives into Starlight Grove with her eight-year-old son, Owen, and their dog, Yeti. She has used her savings to move here from Oakland, determined to continue the search for Nova herself. As they arrive, she reflects on the past year of dead ends and wonders if she is doing the right thing. 

Braedyn has trained Yeti as a search dog, and she runs an anonymous social media account, SearchingForSunrise, which is dedicated to their training journey. As they drive through town, she puts on a brave face for Owen and entices him with the prospect of a chocolate shake, but privately she seethes in frustration at the fact that the local Sheriff, Ezra Miller, has declared Nova’s disappearance a cold case and given up the search. Braedyn is just grateful that two of the sheriff’s deputies are sympathetic and help her as best they can, despite the sheriff’s reluctance. 

While parked in town, Braedyn checks her social media account and is unsettled to see yet another comment from Vincent Faber, Owen’s wealthy and estranged biological father. Whenever Braedyn blocks his latest throwaway account, he simply makes another one to continue digitally stalking her, as he has been doing ever since she left him when she first became pregnant. Shaken but resolute, Braedyn blocks this latest account, refusing to let him derail her new life or her mission to find Nova.

Dexter “Dex” Archer drives into his hometown of Starlight Grove after nearly a decade away working in DC. He immediately feels the weight of his family’s reputation; the townspeople view him and his brothers with fear and suspicion because their father was revealed to be a serial killer years ago, when they were all still boys. Now, he is greeted at his family’s home, Twisted Oak Ranch, by his great-uncle, Waylon, who raised him and his four brothers after their father’s crimes were discovered.

Dex has a boisterous reunion with his niece Skylar, whose father is his overprotective brother, Kol. He also greets his reckless youngest brother, Maverick. They discuss their other two brothers: Wylder, who owns a local bar, and Orion, who has become increasingly reclusive. The Archer brothers have formed a tight-knit family under Waylon’s care, but the stigma and trauma of their father’s crimes continue to haunt them.

Dex discovers that the guest cabin he planned to stay in is filled with his great-uncle’s collection of clocks and Bigfoot paraphernalia. Frustrated and needing a shower after his cross-country drive, he heads back into town to see Blaze, the eccentric owner of a local rental company. On the way, he is annoyed by a brief encounter with a maroon SUV, clearly driven by a tourist, takes a parking spot he was aiming for.

When Dex speaks to Blaze, who appears to be high, the man miraculously has a last-minute cancellation and offers Dex a cabin rental for the summer. After securing the key, Dex heads back to his car, lamenting his timing as a bird suddenly poops on him. He blames the stolen parking spot for his bad luck, reasoning that he wouldn’t be standing in this exact spot otherwise, and drives to the Creekside Cabins, eager for a shower.

Having picked up her own rental keys from Blaze, Braedyn arrives at her new cabin with Owen and Yeti. Inside, she is suddenly confronted by a tall, tattooed, and nearly naked man (Dex) who accuses her of breaking into his house. Braedyn is momentarily stunned by his good looks and is particularly fascinated by a large phoenix tattoo on his chest.

Yeti rushes in and growls at the man, causing him to stumble back and drop his towel. As he scrambles to cover himself, Owen appears in the doorway. Braedyn and the man quickly realize that they have both been given the same cabin. He reveals that Blaze gave him the wrong key; he and Braedyn are, in fact, neighbors. Braedyn is dismayed.

After clearing up the mix-up and leaving Blaze’s office, Dex encounters Sergeant Roger Oakley, an old acquaintance from the sheriff’s department. Dex then drives to the correct rental cabin. Observing the woman and her son, Owen, having a water gun fight in their yard, he is struck by their simple joy. Because he feels guilty about his disastrous first encounter with her, he also resolves to apologize.

Unable to resist the temptation to find out more about Braedyn, he uses his hacking skills to access her phone via the cabins’ shared Wi-Fi. Upon finding her photo-sharing app profile and discovering that her dog is trained in search-and-rescue and find both living people and human remains, his curiosity intensifies as he considers the woman with “secrets in her golden eyes” (41).

Chagrined that “the hot, slightly unhinged man” (42) is her new neighbor, Braedyn sets aside her dismay and begins to settle into her new life in Starlight Grove. One day, she observes Dex sitting shirtless on the roof of his cabin and attaching an unknown gadget to it. As she gets Owen ready for his first day at a local summer camp, she reassures him, trying to combat his anxiety about being the new kid.

After Owen leaves, she enters the spare bedroom she has designated as her investigation headquarters. In her previous home, she had slowly converted Nova’s old room into an investigative space. Now, she has a large map of Starlight Grove and the surrounding areas on the wall. The map is marked with colored pins, indicating key locations from the day Nova disappeared. She vows to never give up on her hope of finding her friend.

Knowing that Sheriff Miller will not appreciate her visit, Braedyn nonetheless goes to the Juniper County Sheriff’s Department to inform him that she has officially moved to town. A hostile Miller dismisses her efforts and repeats that Nova’s case is cold; he judges that her disappearance was likely an accidental death. Braedyn is frustrated that she cannot convince the sheriff to give her access to video footage from the day of Nova’s disappearance.

Two of Miller’s deputies, Roger Oakley and Travis Moore, are more sympathetic to Braedyn. Roger, who remembers her from the initial investigation, surreptitiously offers to ask a computer-savvy friend for help accessing the old camera footage. 

Later, while seeking a job, Braedyn goes to The Boot, a local bar. The owner, Wylder Archer, hires her for a position as a daytime server and bookkeeper. As she is finishing up the conversation, her grumpy neighbor, Dex, walks in. She accuses him of following her and teasingly describes their awkward first meeting to Wylder and to his other employees, Aidan and Cora. After she whimsically declares that Dex broke into her house and flashed her, she leaves him to explain their strange first meeting.

The narrative switches to Dex’s perspective of the same scene. After Braedyn leaves, Dex endures some good-natured teasing before he and Wylder discuss the anonymous vigilante work that they and their other brothers do on the side. In an effort to make amends for their father’s crimes as a serial killer, they use his inherited wealth from his import/export business for nothing other than funding their work to find missing persons, never accessing that money for personal use. Dex reflects that their father’s violent legacy makes him fear that the instincts of a killer are lurking in his own genetic makeup.

Braedyn attends her first meeting with the local chapter of Compass, a support network for families of missing loved ones. As she connects with the local group leader, Holly, and a therapist named Aster, she is surprised to see that her new coworker, Cora, is also in attendance; Cora’s mother has been missing for 11 years. As the meeting convenes, Braedyn shares Nova’s story with the group, explaining that she moved to Starlight Grove to continue the search.

After the meeting, Braedyn mentions to Holly, Aster, and Cora that she has been able to indirectly obtain the services of a tech-savvy friend-of-a-friend to help her with locating crucial camera footage. They realize that she is talking about Roger Oakley’s friend, who is known for being a skilled hacker and who once worked for the FBI. Both Aster and Cora confirm that the hacker’s name is Dex. A stunned Braedyn realizes that her good-looking but grumpy neighbor is the very person she needs to help her.

From his cabin, Dex watches Braedyn and Owen returning home and resists the urge to hack further into her online life. As he participates in a group text with his brothers, they successfully coax their reclusive brother Orion into agreeing to a family dinner. Later, Dex hears a scream from Braedyn’s cabin and rushes over with a Taser, fearing an attack. Although he briefly considers retrieving his 9mm from his SUV’s gun locker, his aversion to firearms leads him to stick with the Taser.

He bursts into the backyard, only to be hit with a water balloon. Braedyn and Owen are having a water balloon fight to celebrate summer. Braedyn teases him for his seriousness, nicknaming him “Buttercup.” Owen invites him to play, and Dex feels a powerful pull toward their carefree joy. Although he declines, he helps Owen by revealing Braedyn’s hidden stash of water balloons, then retreats from the happy scene, feeling that the darkness in his past prevents him from embracing such lightheartedness.