Chapter 11 #2
River shoved a hat in her hands, one free of a pom-pom. “It’s called a tuque. You wear it under this.” She held up a fur hat. “Just like the old sourdoughs used to wear.”
“A sourdough?”
“An original Alaskan gold miner.” River plopped it on Keely’s head, then wound a knitted scarf around her face.
“I don’t think I can move.”
“But you’ll stay warm. Now, goggles.” River grabbed a set from a peg by the door. “These are mine. Trust me on this.”
Keely put on the goggles, then accepted River’s help to slip into the parka, and finally worked on glove liners. River fitted on her leather mittens.
“I should be in some Alaskan photo shoot,” Keely said, trying to laugh.
River smiled, although it, too, looked forced, sad. “Come back, Keely. You’re always welcome here.”
And now she would cry. She pulled River into a hug, and Nance came up behind her.
“Be safe,” Nance said. And hugged her too. “We’ll be praying. God has you in his hands.”
Right. She didn’t want to wonder where God’s plans fit into this. So much for what her heart wanted.
And that thought stood Keely up, made her draw in a breath. Five long days ago, the thought of staying here, in remote Alaska, to build a life seemed . . .
Well, unthinkable.
And now at least a part of her longed for it.
More, that’s exactly what her birth mother had done, wasn’t it?
So maybe Dawson was right . . . maybe there was more of Vic inside her than she thought.
“We’ll make it,” Keely said, glancing over to Nance.
Then she went outside.
Dawson had bundled up, and she spotted him headed for the machine shed. He wore a pair of thick Carhartt coveralls, boots, a parka, the hood pulled up, and a face mask. Goggles sat on top of his head.
It felt like that moment before she went onstage, listening to the crowd cheer, knowing she was made for this.
River’s words edged in as Keely headed down the steps to the shed. “Trust God, and surrender to him . . . You not only get salvation, but you’ll be set free to discover yourself too. The person you were made to be.”
She looked to the gunmetal-gray sky, to the sun peeking through. Help me trust you, God.
From the porch, Caspian barked, and she spotted Griffin holding the dog by the collar. Sorry, buddy.
Dawson started up the snowmobile and drove it out of the shed. He stopped and met her eyes. “You sure about this?”
“Not in the least.” She pulled her goggles down and settled behind him, the seat creaking in the cold. Putting her hands around him, she leaned forward. “Drive, James.”
He laughed and pulled down his own goggles. “Hang on.”
She had no intention of letting go as they drove into the snowy, gray day.
He should have listened to his gut yesterday when it told him to leave.
Dawson maneuvered the snowmobile through the path in the forest, keeping the throttle open enough for the machine to skim the surface of the snow. Slowing would only make him sink.
Let his failures find root.
Yeah, he’d given in to the pull of staying, of comfort and, aw, who was he kidding? The sooner he got Keely out of the bush and to an airport, the sooner she was on a plane and back to her life.
Her real life.
Not the fake what-if fantasy he’d conjured up for himself last night after her stupid song.
No, not a stupid song. The kind of song that kept aflame the terrible hope inside him.
He wanted her. Her smile, the way that she teased him and yet made him feel like he might actually be a hero. And it didn’t help that last night she’d kissed him as if she wanted the future she’d sung about too.
Even now, she held on to him, her legs tight against his, leaning into him as the snow chipped up around them and spotted his goggles. The wind whistled in his ears above the drone of the motor, but the sun had started to break through the cloud cover.
Landon might be right about the storm dying.
They’d spent the last twenty minutes cutting through the forest, after muscling their way through the meadow that had trapped him before. Now, they emerged out to a riverbed, frozen over.
“Hang on!” He slowed, motoring down the edge, into the gully.
“How do you know where to go?”
“There are markers in the trees.” He pointed to an orange utility ribbon tacked high to a birch tree. “Orange goes to Sully’s place. The red ones are ranger tags to the cache cabins.”
He revved the motor again and followed the iced creek south.
The same creek that he’d found her in, maybe a mile or so north.
The route cut them south a quarter mile, and then he motored them out of the wash when it turned east and kept moving south.
She pointed to an orange ribbon, and he headed toward an opening in the forest.
The snowmobile coughed as they entered the thicket, and he slowed. Please, let him not have screwed up the spark plug replacement.
It coughed again, and the engine nearly died. He slowed more, the machine rumbling under him. C’mon—
A hundred feet into the forest, it coughed again and then sputtered out.
They slowed, then sank into the powder. He closed his eyes.
“That sounded fuel-related to me.” Keely got off. “Is it out of gas?”
“Griffin filled all of the machines when we fixed the spark plugs. I watched him.” Although, he hadn’t checked before they left. Stupid.
“It shouldn’t have used that much gas,” she said. “Maybe the fuel line was nicked.”
He also dismounted, and wrenched open the cover. “I would have seen it when I replaced the plugs.”
Around them, the wind shivered the trees.
He searched the engine compartment. “Nothing.”
A rattle, and he looked over to see her opening the snowmobile seat.
“My dad had one of these. An old one, but the fuel lines ran back to the—yep. The seat compartment is full of fuel. And it’s dripping out the back.
” She pointed to a small black puddle forming in the snow. “How much farther to the outpost?”
“I don’t know. Maybe a half mile? Less?”
“We’d better get moving.” She headed out past him, tromping into the deep snow.
He grabbed the keys and left the machine. Sorry, Griff. But it wasn’t going anywhere.
The snow wasn’t as deep here, a little easier to move than he’d thought, the bottom layer icy and firm. And inside his Carhartts, he worked up a simmer.
Could be his own frustration.
Still, the forest began to thin, the pine trees shivering snow into the air, and ahead, it opened to a snow-crusted meadow. The wind cast dervishes across the plain of white, and Keely stopped a moment, as if contemplating their path.
Then she pointed.
There, in the distance, in a landscape of gray and black, a building huddled in the snow. “Is that it?”
“I think so.” He headed out toward it, looking for any sign of life, but not even a light blazed from the front porch.
“It’s bigger than a cabin.”
The scarf muffled her words, but she seemed to be keeping up, and inside her goggles her gaze seemed lit, almost a triumph in it.
So maybe it hadn’t been a terrible idea to bring her along.
“It’s the Bowie fishing and hunting outpost. Part of their resort. They fly or ATV in guests, and Sully is the guide and host.”
“It’s like a postcard, out here in the middle of nowhere.”
He nodded. “But it’s off-grid. No electricity. It’s really popular in the summer.” A covered porch jutted off the front, with a tall A-frame roof with wings off each side. Timber framed, and a tall rock chimney protruded from the back.
No smoke wisping from the top, which seemed odd.
“Have you ever been here?” Keely asked, keeping up with him.
Wasn’t hard, with his knee aching. “No.”
Okay, that was a lie.
“My sister disappeared after falling into this river, so . . . I never . . .” He glanced at her.
Her gaze was on him, and then she reached out and took his mittened hand. Squeezed. “Well, then we’ll do this together.”
Then she let go and plowed forward in the snow.
Okay then. He followed her up the porch, to the double front door with antlers over the frame. She knocked and then tried the door.
It opened.
And his gut screamed, No.
He grabbed her jacket and pulled her back, and she nearly fell into his arms. He caught her, trapped her in his embrace. “Me first.”
He set her behind him. “Wait.”
Her eyes widened, and she nodded.
Then he went inside.
A gloomy darkness hovered through the room, dented only by the windows that allowed in the ghostly light of the day. The great room rose two stories tall, with a couple round tables in the middle and a leather sofa facing a cold, dead hearth.
He could nearly hear his heartbeat echo.
A chill ladened the air, although not freezing, so some heat remained, but on the counter sat a French press coffeepot, half full. A cast iron pan on the gas stove with standing grease, and . . .
Yes, something felt . . . off.
“Is anyone here?” Keely came in behind him.
He rounded on her. “I told you to wait.”
She pulled down her scarf, and her mouth opened, and aw, he hadn’t meant it that way, but . . . “Something smells . . . oh no—”
Blood. He spotted it, a dark puddle on the kitchen floor. He put out his hand to keep Keely away, but she wasn’t moving, her gaze on something else.
He turned and spotted a dish, broken on the floor. And then a trail of blood from the kitchen through the house.
“Please, stay here,” he said quietly, his heart thundering, and followed the blood.
It pooled in the bathroom in the claw-foot tub, but a handprint on the wall in the hallway led him to a bedroom.
Ransacked, or at least the bedclothes torn off, onto the floor.
“Dawson?”
He headed toward the front door. She stood in the opening, pointing out, and as he came up, he spotted a couple drops of blood in the snowy debris of the covered porch. In the distance, a shed’s doors hung open. He went down the steps, crunched in the snow, and stood at the edge of the shed.
Empty.
She’d followed him, now edged up behind him. “What were you hoping to find?”
“The ATV that Griffin mentioned. And maybe the snowmobile that Sully borrowed from the community.”
His gaze fell on a pair of cross-country skis hanging on the wall, along with a hunting bow, and a number of rifles locked up behind a cage.
He turned to her. “Let’s get inside. Warm up. We can call Moose on the ham radio.”
She said nothing, and he hated how he’d barked at her.
They returned to the house and he closed the door behind her and then deadbolted it. Then he pulled off his goggles, mittens, and face mask and set them on the table. She did the same, and pulled off her parka hood, shaking out that beautiful blond hair.
The memory of his fingers tangled up in it last night swept through him. Oh boy.
He’d really been hoping Sully might be here.
“I’ll get a fire going,” he said. “You look for the radio.” He pointed to a small adjacent office off the main room. “Could be in there.”
Cordwood piled against the side of the tall fireplace. The damper lay open, so no wonder the freeze had found its way in.
He found birchbark tinder in a box, along with broken pieces of kindling, and built a log cabin fire, two bigger pieces of firewood at the bottom, a smaller one crossing it, kindling in the middle.
A box of long matches sat on the mantel, and he lit the birchbark. It caught, crackled, and for a moment, the sound of the snow and wind seemed to surrender to it.
“I will get you home, Keely. I promise.”
Dawson suddenly never wanted to break his word more in his life.
“Daws. I found it.”
He stood up, turning.
And a rock went through him at the sight of the handheld radio transceiver in one hand, an antenna in the other, the antenna bent, the transceiver in loose pieces.
“That’s the ham.”
“What’s left of it.”
He closed his eyes, listened to his heartbeat. Blew out a breath. Then looked at her again. “Okay. I know there’s another radio at the cache cabin, a couple miles up the river. I can get there—”
“We can get there.”
He swallowed, then walked over to her. Put his hands on her shoulders. “Your cop dad taught you how to shoot a Glock. Can you handle a rifle?”
“What?”
“There’s only one set of skis in the shed, and the snow is way too deep to walk.”
She blinked at him. “What . . . Daws—”
“We gotta get help.” He looked away. Shoot. Maybe he shouldn’t leave her. Because his gut started screaming all sorts of dangers.
Starting with Thornwood and ending in—well, all the things that could happen out there in Alaska, from grizzly to house fires, and now he needed to sit down, the coil in his chest so tight it cut off his breathing.
And all he could think was . . . Caspian. Usually, right about now, the dog would edge up to him, and he could feel the dog’s fur in his hand.
It always felt like his dog was . . . well, comforting him.
“Dawson?”
“I’m fine.” And when he met her gaze again, something had shifted inside her expression.
“I’ll be fine. Yes, I can handle a rifle. Wren is running out of time. Go. I’ll get the rifle and lock the door, and I might even try and figure out how to fix this radio.”
Of course she would.
He stared at her, then bent down and pressed his forehead to hers. “Don’t ever let anyone—especially you—accuse you of being a coward.”
She smiled, then lifted her head and kissed him.
Sweetly, perfectly, the kind of kiss that he might hang on to, and it was all he could do not to grab her jacket and deepen the kiss, to stir up the hope of yesterday.
And maybe it was too late for that anyway, because as he let her go and met her eyes, she wore exactly that in her hazel-blue eyes.
Hope.
“Come back to me,” she said.
“Stay put. I’ll be back.” Then he grabbed his hat and mittens and face mask, went to the gun safe, pulled out a rifle, and headed back out into the blizzard.