“I am going home, Seth, later. If anything changes and that doesn’t seem wise, I will consider other options. But right now, the only concrete thing that has happened to me is that someone shot at you while I was with you.”
“They know you’re involved, though, or will know soon.”
“Maybe. Maybe not. Right now we have time and I’m going to appreciate that while I can.” She smiled and shook her head. “You don’t have to look so sad, okay? I was a cop, remember? I will be careful.”
And he believed her, but if he could take all the risk away, or at least most of it, he still would. Maybe that’s how it was when you cared about someone...still loved them, no matter what...
They ate the rest of their meal in quiet. She commented once on how good his moose steaks were, but that was the extent of their conversation for the rest of the night.
“So tomorrow, early?”
“Yes. I want to be able to go out and do a camping trip with you, a dry run. So we’ll need to leave really early to make sure we have plenty of darkness to practice in.”
She laughed. “As long as it stays dark right now, I think we’ll be fine whenever we leave.”
She wasn’t wrong. In January, even though they were technically gaining daylight every day since the winter solstice and the nights were getting shorter, it was still dark for many hours. Alaska was called the Land of the Midnight Sun, but that was only in summer. Right now the sun was scarce, no matter what time of day it was.
Seth walked Ellie to the front door, watched her walk to her car. He’d give anything to call her back, press a kiss to the top of her head and tell her again to be careful. But like she’d reminded him, she was a cop. He had no right to be so involved in her life anymore, to care like he once had. They were only friends. Barely that. He missed being her fiancé. So much that he ventured a prayer as he watched her drive away, and asked God if maybe this could be his second chance after all.
And if God could keep them both alive long enough for that to be a possibility.
* * *
Ellie’s second day of mushing training started earlier than she’d anticipated. When Seth had originally said “early,” she’d been assuming seven, maybe six. But here she was, pulling into his driveway at three in the morning, per his instructions.
She’d slept at her own house the night before, contrary to Seth’s urging to find a friend to stay with. He should have known that she wasn’t going to endanger her friends, not with how much risk they found themselves taking on. She didn’t want an innocent person in danger because of her. She didn’t particularly relish the peril against her, either, but it felt right, walking back into this case. She’d let Liz down years ago and nothing could ever make that right. But if she could at least bring the men who had killed her friend to justice, she’d feel the smallest bit of redemption.
An unfamiliar feeling had crept over her as she’d considered Seth’s suggestion last night and then realized the magnitude of what they were facing. When she’d been a police officer, walking into life-or-death situations had been something close to second nature. There was something less scary about it when she still had the illusion of control, when it had been assumed that she would be facing danger every day, when it was her literal job. Now, though, that control had been taken away from her, and she didn’t know how to process the feeling that felt a lot like...
Well, fear.
How did she face an emotion she wasn’t used to dealing with? Stuff it down? Listen too much to that lying voice?
She knew she should pray about it, seek God’s face—seek to know Him better—and not just His answers. Or His reassurance. But fear’s grip was too tight, and she felt frozen, unable to even pray or think through it. All she knew right now was that she was afraid.
She should walk up to Seth this morning, tell him thanks for trusting her to help him, but their plan was too dangerous. She could leave town and escape to Anchorage. Or maybe head farther south, onto the Kenai Peninsula and disappear into one of the little towns there. Homer, maybe. Or Moose Haven. At least that way maybe she could outrun the cold, hard knot of fear in her chest.
Or maybe not. She already knew, deep down, that running didn’t solve any problems—it hadn’t the first time, and it wouldn’t now.
Would she ever feel normal again?
Not if she didn’t face this. That was the truth, she felt it deep inside and recognized it as being the truth. So she stopped hesitating in the front seat of her car, took a deep breath and stepped out, heading for the house. She glanced quickly down at her fitness watch. Just after three. So she was a little late, but not very—
Suddenly, she heard something whiz past her. A gunshot, far wide of her ear, on her left.
They weren’t shooting at Seth this time. He wasn’t even with her. He was...where? Inside?
She ducked down, started to make her way to the other side of the car where she could shelter in place better. But...her eyes went to the dog yard, only for a second before she resumed scanning the dark, woodsy terrain where the shots had come from. She couldn’t move closer to the dogs. She might have been a musher for only around twenty-four hours, but Seth had made it clear to her that you took care of the animals, and in return they took care of you. She couldn’t bring harm to them. She hated the thought of it. Fear turned to anger now. How could anyone care so little about life that they’d kill several people and then come after more? Possibly endanger dogs?
Ellie was worried about them, but knew she couldn’t be foolish about her own life, either. She had so much more she wanted to do...and that took precedence over both anger and fear.
Her body pressed against the cold snow, she crawled toward the house. Another gunshot echoed in the darkness.
Where was Seth?
There, now he was coming out of the door of his house. Silly man, running toward gunshots and not away, though she supposed she appreciated that he cared enough for that.
“Get inside,” she hissed at him.
“Go around back,” he yelled to her as he shook his head.
Wasn’t the shooter behind the house somewhere? She didn’t want to be even more at risk.
Should she listen to him? Or...wait, was he shaking his head at the danger? Or trying to throw off whoever was shooting at her and trick them into believing she was going behind the house?
Either way, the front was her best bet. She just needed to hurry. She army-crawled farther, the snow soaking through her clothes and chilling her front. She made her way around the corner of the house, feeling her shoulders relax as she approached the front door.
Almost there. Please, God, let her make it.
Another shot. Pain rocketed through the side of her left leg. She squeezed her eyes shut, pushed herself up off the ground with her bare hands, the hard snow cutting into them. If the shooter already knew exactly where she was, then moving slow like this was actually making her more of a target than if she just ran. And Ellie had no interest in being any more of a target.
She sprinted to the front door, her leg screaming at her, making her limp slightly, and turned the handle which Seth had thankfully let unlocked and dove inside.
Silence. No more gunshots. She lay on the floor, panting, her breath coming much faster than usual and keeping time with her pounding heart. Her leg still stung, but not enough that the wound could have been from a gunshot. She reached down.
Splinters of wood were stuck in her leg, in the outer part of her thigh, maybe from part of the deck that had exploded out like shrapnel when a shot hit it?
“Are you okay? Did he hit you?” Panic escalated in Seth’s voice as he came toward her. She pulled her hand away from her leg and shook her head.
“No, no, he didn’t hit me.”
“I’ll be right back.”
“Seth!” she yelled but he ignored her, and went out the back doo
r. She waited in the silence, breathing hard and wincing at the pain in her leg. God, please let him be okay.
The door creaked open and Seth came in, shaking his head. “No sign of him. The shots came from behind the house?”
Ellie nodded.
“He’s gone. Let’s look at that leg.” He locked the door behind him and walked toward Ellie.
“You’re bleeding.” He motioned to her hand, which she’d held up in protest, but yes, she could see now it was dripping blood in several places. Probably not very reassuring. Her leg stung and throbbed; it needed some first aid, and she’d likely have a bruise, but it was nothing that would bench her. She was seeing this thing through now. If she hadn’t decided before, she’d done so as soon as someone had made the mistake of actually shooting at her.
Seth knelt down next to her and looked at the wound.
“It’s fine. Really.”
“Would you be quiet and let me see it?”
“It’s a few giant splinters. And, what, you got some kind of medical training since I knew you last?”
“Who do you think takes care of the sled dogs out on the trail if something happens?”
“So you’re a vet?”
“Um, no, I’m a musher.”
“And that qualifies you to look at my leg?” She tugged it away from him and forced a smile. “Really, I’m fine. I’ll go in the bathroom in a sec and clean it up.”
She couldn’t afford to let him this close again. And if the kiss was evidence of anything, it was a sure sign that she did not have all her defenses up and firing when it came to Seth Connors.
His shoulders sank. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there. I came back for this. I thought if I could see him—” He motioned toward the wall, where a shotgun stood propped against it. She hadn’t seen him bring that in earlier; she’d been too distracted.
He wouldn’t have been able to see anything in the inky blackness of the woods right now. Even if he’d been able to make out a muzzle flash, Ellie believed strongly in what she’d learned at the police academy: never shoot without positively identifying your target first. A firefight with an unknown target could be tragic for someone innocent who got in the way.
“You wouldn’t have been able to see him and take him out,” she reminded him without lecturing.
He shook his head. “I should have been able to do something.” He stood back up and paced away from her. Ellie stood too and watched him. She could feel the tension coming off him, the frustration bred by powerlessness. She understood the feeling all too well.
“I’m fine.” She stepped up next to him and put a hand on his biceps. It was toned and muscled, much more so than it had been when she’d known him before. She almost pulled her hand back in surprise, but took a deep breath, not wanting to be caught reacting.
“I need these guys caught.”
“You think it’s more than one?”
“Well, in the entire operation, yes. After us? I have no idea.”
After us. He was right; that was one way this morning had changed things. They’d suspected that she might personally be in danger, but Ellie wasn’t afraid to admit that she probably hadn’t taken the threat seriously enough until now.
“I don’t know if we should do this.” Seth paced away from her again.
When he came back, she spoke. “Hey.”
He stopped. Looked at her.
“If we don’t do something, they’re going to keep operating. Isn’t the fact that they’ve attacked us both, or tried to, evidence that we are onto something, or they think we are? We can’t stop now, Seth. It’s too late for that.”
He met her eyes, seemed to acknowledge that truth.
And then came the sound of something clattering behind the house. He ran toward the back door, grabbing his shotgun on the way. Ellie’s heart jumped inside her. She’d never get used to seeing him run toward danger, would never be okay knowing that each time she saw him could be the last.
They had to solve this and she had to help him stay alive. Because even if she could handle walking away from him, for both their sakes, she couldn’t handle losing him forever.
EIGHT
Nothing was present to indicate the cause of the clattering by the time Seth arrived. Once again, he was too late, unable to do anything to keep Ellie, or himself for that matter, safe. His shoulders sagged. Defeat tasted bitter.
He had tried not to let her see inside how shaken he was, but had probably failed at that, too. She’d always been able to read him too well. But the fact that she’d gotten hurt at all was unacceptable to him.
“Anything?” Ellie asked from inside as he stepped back in and locked the door.
He shook his head. It was like chasing a ghost. No, he wished that were true. It was more like being chased by a ghost. Seth wanted to hit something. But he wouldn’t because Ellie was there and watching, and he wasn’t about to put a hole in his wall or something equally stupid just because he was mad.
As much as Ellie looked at him like nothing had changed and he was the same guy he’d been before...well, it wasn’t exactly true. He was starting to have the feeling he was going to have to tell her that one of these days. He had gotten into dog mushing and changed his life, yes, but only after he’d hit somewhere that had felt awfully close to rock bottom.
He’d like to think he was past that now. He’d left Anchorage and his job that was too fast-paced. He hadn’t had a drink in over two years.
He’d tried so hard to be the kind of man Ellie deserved, while always wondering if she’d left him because she’d sensed somehow that he wasn’t good enough for her. That his faith wasn’t strong enough. Maybe that he wasn’t strong enough.
Seth exhaled, tried to breathe out and expel all of the last thirty minutes, if such a thing were even possible. “Now will you be convinced that you need to stay with someone?”
“I don’t know who I’d stay with.” Her voice was even. Calm. Honest. But still somehow vulnerable. He couldn’t quite categorize it, which reminded him of all the years that had passed since they’d been close. He’d once been able to tell most of what she was thinking on a fairly consistent basis.
They’d lost so much in the intervening years. And he needed to remember that unlike had been the case with him, the distance between them had been Ellie’s choice. Some part of his mind kept thinking that maybe this was a second chance, that maybe they could start over.
She. Didn’t. Want. That.
Seth had to focus on that, had to remind himself no matter how many times it took until he could get the information through his stubborn skull.
“Look.” He took and breath and prayed that he was succeeding in keeping his voice casual. “I get that you can’t stay here in the house with me. But I can sleep outside in a tent, in the dog yard. No one will be able to get close without the dogs sounding the alarm. Then I can hear and come back inside if you need me. You said yourself that you don’t want to put anyone else in danger. You can’t stay alone anymore without being foolish. At least here there’s someone to call the police, who knows what’s going on. There’s the chance of having someone to help.” Even if he hadn’t been successful earlier, he felt the point was still valid.
She studied him. “You’d sleep outside in a tent?”
He nodded, not sure how to interpret her look. She looked...well, almost smitten, and he had to be reading that wrong. But she looked like she appreciated his chivalrous gesture. It made him feel like the king of the world instead of a guy who’d said he could give up his house for a couple days to keep a woman he’d loved for years safe.
“Okay, yes. We have, what, one day until the expedition starts? I can stay in your guest room until then.”
He ran a hand through his hair, messing it up and shaking his head at the way their lives were turning out. Definitely nothing like he would have expected. And not i
n a good way.
“Are we still going out today?” she asked.
Seth hadn’t figured that out yet. They needed to get some more training runs in if Ellie was going to pass for a dog musher, but without knowing where the person who had been shooting at her was, he wasn’t eager to do that right now.
He thought about the trails he usually took, the ones he didn’t, and made a decision.
“First I need to reach Raven Pass PD and tell them about the gunshots.” Seth made the call and they promised to send an officer as soon as possible, though they said there would be a delay due to a bad accident on the highway.
Finally he turned back to Ellie to answer her question. “Let’s wait for daylight and then back up and head out to some other trails.”
“Around here?” she asked.
He shook his head. “No, we’ll have to drive up toward Wasilla.”
That was around a two-hour drive away, but he felt like it would be worth it. The likelihood of someone following them that far and neither Seth nor Ellie noticing wasn’t high. It would be safer both for them and the dogs this way.
Besides, he could use the drive time to explain to Ellie some of the details of how to camp, to talk over how the cookstove worked, how to give the dogs a snack, things like that.
“All right, if that’s what you think is best.” Ellie yawned, barely managing to cover her mouth with her hand.
“Since we aren’t leaving yet, do you want a quick nap?”
She looked hesitant, and her eyes were wide. He’d forgotten how much younger she always looked when she was tired. “Are you sure? We can get started now. I don’t want to be what slows us down.”
But already he could tell the decision had been made. Her adrenaline was crashing, and if they were going to go undercover, she needed to be well rested and able to hold it together under pressure. A nap would be the best course of action right now.
“I could use a little more rest,” he said, knowing it was the truth but also that it was a reason to give her what she needed, one she wouldn’t fight. Unless he was imagining things, she narrowed her eyes a little, like she saw straight through, but finally nodded. “Okay, yes, I’d love a nap if you can point me in the right direction.”
Alaska Secrets Page 9
