Chapter 32
Mina
“Joe!” I lunged, trying to grab the cat as he rocketed past, hot on Betty’s heels. The puppy yelped as she dashed through the living room.
My cat eluded my grasp, but thankfully, Luke was there to scoop Betty out of harm’s way.
I blew tendrils of hair out of my face and glared at Joe, who now sat perched in the window, tail swishing, as he eyed Luke and the puppy. “You’re terrible.”
Joe lifted a paw and licked it, then swiped his face, like he hadn’t a care in the world.
Luke laughed. “I guess it’s a good thing we’re taking the dogs hiking.”
I sighed. “Yeah.” The demon cat was not a fan of Claire and Ozzie’s dogs.
He’d never really liked Pebbles, but he’d tolerated her.
With Betty now added to the mix, I think he felt outnumbered, so he’d gone on the offensive to maintain dominance.
All he’d really accomplished was to wreak havoc in the house and break a vase.
“Let’s get their harnesses on and get going.” I turned, looking for Pebbles.
A laugh bubbled free when I saw her peeking out from the edge of the couch, her gaze fixed on the cat. “Betty’s on her own, huh?” Walking over, I picked her up.
Luke and I made quick work of readying the dogs. In minutes, we had them and all our gear and were out the door, heading for the south end of Juneau to hike down Point Bishop Trail.
Thankfully, the drive there was much less eventful than the moments before we left, and we made it there without incident. Pebbles sat on my lap and looked out the window the entire way, while Betty snoozed on the floor at my feet.
The truck dinged for a moment as I opened my door before Luke shut it off. I wrapped my hands in both dogs’ leashes and got out. Luke hopped out and came around to take Betty. Once I had a hand free, I opened the back passenger door to get our backpacks.
Pebbles’s excited bark broke the silence surrounding us in the forest as Luke and I donned our packs beside his truck.
It felt a little crazy to take a Yorkie and a four-month-old black lab on a hike through the wilderness, but here we were.
Ellis stayed true to his word and dropped off the pack that would comfortably fit Betty, if she decided she was too tired to walk anymore.
Pebbles, one of us could carry without a problem. She weighed next to nothing.
Snapping the final buckle on my backpack, I curled the excess of Pebbles’s leash around my hand. Luke shut the truck door and locked the vehicle, then tugged on Betty’s leash, getting her moving in the right direction.
“Did you mark the GPS coordinates?” Luke glanced at me as we stepped toward the narrow cut in the trees that denoted the Point Bishop Trailhead.
Our plan was to walk to the beach and back, then head home for a late supper of burgers on the grill to celebrate the holiday.
At the end of it all, we planned to make some fireworks of our own between the sheets.
I couldn’t wait.
It didn’t matter that we’d burned up the sheets the last few nights. I was ready to do it again.
“Oh. No. I forgot.” Turning around, I pointed back at my pack.
“Can you dig it out?” It’s in the front pocket.
” We didn’t plan to stray off the path, but on the off chance something happened and we did, having the beginning coordinates marked would help guide us back if we got lost. It might seem silly to some, when we were on a marked trail, but this was Alaska.
A predator could alter our direction in an instant.
Just feet off the trail and we’d be in dense wilderness.
We also had two rambunctious dogs, one of which had proven a Houdini. I wasn’t taking the chance we would get lost.
Device in hand, Luke locked in our starting point, then put it back in my bag. “You ready?”
“Yep. Let’s go.”
Betty led the way into the woods, black nose to the ground as she clopped along on paws too big for her body. Every few feet, she would stop and chomp at a leaf or pick up a twig, mouthing it until the next one distracted her.
Pebbles followed, less focused on the ground and more focused on the woods around us. Her little head whipped back and forth as she trotted along, tiny toenails tapping on the rocky dirt.
At the rate both dogs were going, I had no doubt we’d be carrying them back to the truck. The question would be whether either of them made it to the place we intended to turn around.
“So, did Claire or Ozzie call you back while I ran to that job site to check the alarm that went off?”
I glanced at Luke, a scowl overtaking my face.
“No.” When we left the rehab center yesterday evening, we went back to my house, since I had the dogs.
Luke stayed the night but had to leave for a little while to check on a job site.
Thankfully, it had been a false alarm. He’d also taken the opportunity to run home and grab some hiking gear he forgot.
It meant we left a little later than planned, but I was okay with that.
It hadn’t delayed us that much. Only about forty-five minutes, since he was halfway to Juneau for the job site alarm anyway.
One day, maybe, he would move to Parker’s Landing and delays like that would be a thing of the past, but for now, we were commuting the half hour to see each other.
And while we had the discussion about our relationship the other day, I still felt like we were dangling on the end of the line, the hook not quite set.
I knew it was me and my insecurities, but I couldn’t shake the feeling, no matter how much I reminded myself he’d chosen me over the dark-haired beauty with long legs and more money than she could count.
“Did you try calling again before I came back?”
Shaking off the disquieting thoughts about our oh-so-new relationship, I focused on the conversation.
“Yes. It went straight to voicemail for both of them. Claire left her friend Christine’s number in case of an emergency.
I called her just to make sure they were all right.
She said they were due back this evening and that she’d pass along the message to have them call me back. ”
“I guess that’s all we can do, short of sending someone to retrieve them.”
“Yeah. And this is something that can wait. If Miranda is involved, she doesn’t know we’re on to her, so she’s not going anywhere.” I shook my head. “I still can’t see her as a killer. Sure, she’s a sneaky, lying bitch, but a killer?”
Luke shrugged one shoulder, using his other arm to rein Betty back in. “People do crazy things for money.”
They did crazy things for a lot of reasons.
That thought sparked another. “What if it wasn’t about money?”
He frowned. “What do you mean?”
“What if it was motivated by something else? Like, love.”
“You think Miranda was in love with Rich Stevenson?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. We never really explored that possibility, did we?”
“No, not really. I guess it could be true. They’re the same age and are from the same small town.” He looked at me with a smile. “I guess we add it to the list of things to discuss with Ozzie.”
I chuckled. “Yeah.”
A comfortable silence fell between us, broken only by the shuffle of our feet, the dogs scurrying through the detritus littering the trail, and the birds flitting through the pines.
We were far enough from the beach, and the forest was thick enough that only the muffled sound of waves hitting the shoreline reached us.
I cast a side-eyed glance at Luke as we walked. Should I bring up our relationship status? Did I need to? I mean, he introduced me to his family.
Yes, my inner voice whispered. For your own peace of mind.
I let out a quick puff of air through my nose. Fine.
“So, you know how you’ve been introducing yourself as my boyfriend?” I tipped my head to the side and looked up to see his face.
His mouth quirked. “I wondered when you would bring that up.”
I huffed a short laugh. “So, is that what we are, then? Also, why do I feel like a high schooler asking my homecoming date that question?”
Luke laughed and hooked an arm around my shoulders, pulling me into his taller frame. I gripped his backpack and let out the slack on Pebbles’s leash, so I could rest my other hand on the front of his shirt.
“New love has a giddiness to it. I think it makes us feel youthful again.” He kissed the top of my head.
I barely felt it. One word reverberated around in my head.
Love.
Is that what this was?
I mulled it over, turning the word and the feeling coursing through me this way and that. But the concept was too new. Too fresh. I couldn’t land on an answer just yet.
Instead of dwelling on it and trying to define it here and now, I shelved it for when I was alone and could properly think about it. I feared if I tried now, I might upset him by not having the answer he wanted to hear straight away.
“You’re feeling youthful again?” I asked, smiling. “How is that possible when you’re still a spring chicken?”
“I’m hardly fresh. You’re not that much older than me. We’ve had this conversation.” A smirk hovered on his lips and a bit of mischief danced in his eyes.
It was my only warning before he slipped my hold and had me plastered to his front, his mouth hovering millimeters from mine.
“Want me to prove how young we both still are?”
Delight skated along my nerve endings, pricking the skin on my head and neck. Need pulsed deep within me. It was on the tip of my tongue to say yes when Pebbles barked and tugged at her lead.
Chuckling, I backed away. “Later. Once we’ve worn these two out and they’re down for the count all night.”
Heat shimmered in his eyes. “We still have strawberry syrup left. And chocolate and whipped cream. I’m about to have the best sundae I’ve ever had in my life.”
A need so intense I felt it to the ends of my hair roared through me. I tugged on Pebbles’s leash, picking up the pace.