Alaskan Hearts

by Teri Wilson

  Sue’s smile grew warmer, but her eyes, black as ravens, remained serious. “I just came from the Gold Rush Trail veterinary office. There’s been an accident.”

  Clementine moved without thinking, setting Nugget on the bed and shoving her arms into her parka. Her mind spun with all the possibilities of what could go wrong out on the trail. If one of Reggie’s dogs was simply tired or not feeling well, Sue wouldn’t have made an effort to come to the hotel and find her.

  Her hands shook as she pulled on her mittens. All she could think about was Ben’s description of his dogs disappearing, one by one, under the ice.

  Not again. Please, not again. “Something happened to one of Reggie’s dogs, didn’t it? We need to find Ben. He’ll want to be there for Reggie.”

  “Not one of Reggie’s dogs. One of Ben’s.” Sue reached out and touched her arm. “The accident didn’t happen on the race trail.”

  “I don’t understand.” Clementine shook her head, as if she could shake the past few minutes from her memory. As if Sue had never knocked on her door, and her biggest worry was getting her research notes emailed back to the office before it closed.

  Then Sue spoke the words that threatened to break Clementine’s heart. “It’s Kodiak.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Ben sat with his head in his hands and tried to figure out how he’d ended up at the Gold Rush Trail veterinary office. Everything that happened this morning was little more than a blur. The one thing he remembered with absolute clarity was Kodiak’s bloodcurdling scream, echoing through the forest. It was the worst sound he’d ever heard. More frightening even than the cracking of ice, a sound that would forever make him ill.

  He’d known it was Kodiak at once. Even though Kodiak was way ahead of the sled, running lead, there’d been no doubt it was him. Ben knew Kodiak as well as he knew himself. He knew the husky liked to turn eight precise circles before settling down in his bed. He knew that if Kodiak were to lose a booty on the trail, it would be the one on his right hind foot. And when he drank water he always picked out any loose pieces of straw floating on the surface before he took his first sip.

  They were connected. They’d been connected before the accident on the Bering Sea, but afterward that bond had grown even deeper. Ben wouldn’t have been surprised to find out that when Kodiak bled, he bled, too.

  This, as it turned out, wasn’t the case.

  As the dog’s screams bounced off the canopy of snow-laden evergreens, Ben had gone into a sort of trance. Operating on autopilot, he threw the ice hook, stopping the dogs in their tracks. He ran through the shin-deep snow until he reached Kodiak, lying on his side. The dog’s breath came in shallow puffs, and the scream had turned into a pathetic whimper. The white snow around him had turned crimson with blood. There wasn’t a drop of it on Ben, though.

  The dog had stepped on a trap. Its metal jaws were clamped around his left front foot.

  Rage had blackened Ben’s vision as he’d scooped Kodiak in his arms and carried him back to the sled. He’d been running the dogs on his own property. Whoever had set the trap had done so illegally. It was rusty, meaning it had been there for quite some time. The trapper had likely tried to take advantage of the fact that Ben no longer mushed. When he’d been a contender, he knew the trail around his cabin like the back of his hand.

  Ben didn’t care who had done it. All he’d cared about was getting help for Kodiak. In his confused daze, he’d taken his dog where he’d always gone for help in his mushing days—to the Gold Rush Trail vet offices. It seemed only natural.

  He blinked, trying to remember who had been there when he’d carried a semiconscious Kodiak through the door. He couldn’t recall all the familiar faces. He’d just been so relieved to see Dr. Stu Foster, the Gold Rush Trail lead vet. If anyone could fix Kodiak, it was Stu. And Stu, good man that he was, never once had asked Ben why he’d brought Kodiak to the race offices. He’d simply taken the dog from his arms and gone to work.

  “Ben?”

  Ben looked up and fought back nausea at the sight of blood all over Stu’s scrubs.

  Kodiak’s blood.

  “Stu? How is he?” Ben started to stand, but then thought better of it. He didn’t trust his knees not to buckle.

  “He’s going to be fine. He’s lost a lot of blood, but we’ve given him a transfusion. I want to keep him here overnight. He’ll need antibiotics and lots of rest, but he’s going to be fine, Ben.” Stu clamped a comforting hand on Ben’s shoulder.

  “And his paw…” Ben couldn’t bring himself to finish the question. He knew dogs survived with three legs all the time, but a sled dog with a missing limb was too heartbreaking to even contemplate.

  “We were able to save it.” Stu crossed his arms. Beneath the bill of his Gold Rush Trail baseball cap, the look in the veterinarian’s eyes hardened. He spoke sternly, carefully. “Ben, I’m telling you that Kodiak is going to be fine. This isn’t like last time. Do you understand?”

  Ben nodded.

  Not like last time.

  He tried to digest the words, to believe them. As they sunk in, he had to fight the flow of relieved tears that threatened to wrack his body. He sniffed and pinched his eyes.

  When he was finally able to speak, he managed to choke out, “Thank you. Thank you so much. I know I should have taken him to a regular vet.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. This is where Kodiak belongs.” Stu aimed his finger at Ben’s chest. “This is where you belong. Don’t forget it.”

  Ben couldn’t even think about such things. Not now. Not when his shirt was still covered with Kodiak’s blood from where he’d carried the bleeding dog inside. “I’ve got to get to Nome tomorrow to cover the end of the race. Can I leave Kodiak here while I’m gone?”

  “Absolutely. He needs his rest. We’ll take good care of him.” Stu nodded toward Moose, curled at Ben’s feet. Until that moment, Ben had forgotten about the dog entirely. “Sue said she’d go by your place and pick up Reggie’s dogs. She’ll get them back home. What about your other dog?”

  Ben stared down at Moose. He couldn’t even remember bringing the husky with him to the clinic. She was a good dog. He’d actually been surprised the stray dog was so biddable, seeing as she’d been living on the streets. In his experience, it sometimes took a while for stray huskies to come around and trust people. Not that he could blame them.

  Biddable or not, Ben was in no condition to even contemplate forming a dog team. “This isn’t my dog.”

  “No?”

  “No.” Even as Ben denied ownership of the dog, the husky sighed and planted her chin on his foot. She gazed up at him with her mismatched eyes. One blue, one brown.

  “Looks like your dog to me.” Stu shrugged. “Give me about a half hour or so and then you can come on back and see Kodiak. Don’t forget what I said. You belong here, Ben.”

  Ben said a silent prayer of thanks when Stu disappeared without any further commentary about where he belonged. Ben just couldn’t take it anymore. He felt hollowed out, like an empty shell.

  Everyone thought he belonged on the trail. He’d never been tempted to listen to anyone’s opinion on the matter, save for one. Clementine’s opinion mattered to him more than any of the others. He cared about what she thought. He’d wanted to be strong again, for her.

  And look where that got me, he thought bitterly. Here.

  He should have known better than to think he could mush again. He hadn’t entertained the thought in four years. Why had he tried to become a different man now after all this time?

  The door to the clinic blew open and Clementine rushed in. Her windswept golden curls framed her flushed face like a halo. She looked innocent, just as she had the first time Ben laid eyes on her.

  A bittersweet sadness came over him as he looked at her
now. Her beautiful green eyes swam behind a veil of tears.

  For love, he realized, and a lonely ache settled in his heart. I wanted to be a better man because I love her.

  * * *

  Clementine took a cautious step toward Ben. The glazed, empty look on his face tightened the guilty knot in her stomach. The moment Sue told her that Kodiak had stepped in a trap, remorse had hit Clementine like a slap in the face.

  She’d pressured him back on the sled. He’d mushed for the first time in four years with her because she wanted to learn. And then she’d teased him about ending up on a motorcycle with flames. She’d just wanted him to live again, but instead she’d led him here, to this moment. What she wouldn’t give to see him driving down Main Street in downtown Aurora on a motorcycle with the biggest, reddest flames imaginable right now.

  This is my fault.

  She wished he would stand, so she could pull him into a hug. He didn’t. He remained sitting on the bench that lined the wall of the wood-paneled waiting room, with Moose stretched out beneath him. When Moose trained her mismatched eyes on Clementine, the dog’s plumed tail beat a happy rhythm on the tile floor. She didn’t move, though. She remained right beneath Ben, with her chin resting on the toe of his shoe, as though standing guard over him.

  Fiercely loyal to her musher.

  Already.

  Clementine blinked furiously in an effort to hold back her tears and sank onto the bench next to Ben.

  “I’m so sorry, Ben.” She reached for his hand. It was icy cold as usual. Clementine wanted nothing more than to warm him up and somehow make everything better.

  “How did you know I was here?” Realization dawned in his empty eyes and he nodded slowly. “Sue.”

  “She came by the hotel and told me about Kodiak.” Clementine was almost afraid to say the dog’s name.

  She held her breath until Ben released a long sigh. “He’s going to be okay. At least that’s what the vet says. I haven’t been able to go back and see him yet, though.”

  Clementine finally allowed herself to inhale a lungful of air. Thank You, God. “What happened?”

  “His foot got caught in a hunting trap.” Ben clenched his jaw and stared down at the floor. Sure signs he didn’t care to elaborate any further.

  Clementine wrapped her fingers around his strong arm and squeezed, forcing him to look at her. At first he didn’t move. He stayed completely still for a long, quiet moment. When at last he turned his gaze on her, his blue eyes were filled with such haunting vulnerability that a deep ache formed in Clementine’s chest. She felt as though she could see straight into his soul. And what she saw there was fear.

  This was Ben. Her big, rugged Alaskan. The look of raw helplessness on his face was too much.

  She gave his arm a squeeze. “He’s going to be fine. The vets here for the race are the best in the world.”

  “I know.” Ben hung his head. Despite the good prognosis, he looked as though he carried the weight of the world on his shoulders. “I have to leave for Nome tomorrow for the paper. Kodiak’s going to stay here so they can keep an eye on him.”

  Nome.

  Clementine had been so anxious to tell Ben that she, too, would be going there for the end of the race. Now, for some reason, she was afraid. She wished they had more time, that she could wait and tell him later, when he felt better about Kodiak. But time was the one thing they didn’t have.

  “I’m going, too,” Clementine whispered, “to Nome.”

  Since the moment he’d first kissed her and she saw stars, Clementine knew she had to stay for the end of the race. She knew Ben wanted her there, too. She’d seen it in his eyes at the banquet when he asked her how long they had until she went home. Even back when they’d gone shopping for her bunny boots, he’d wistfully told her how much she would love Nome.

  But his reaction now was one of cold, stony silence. He was so quiet, in fact, that Clementine wondered if he’d even heard what she said.

  “I’m going to Nome,” she repeated and made her best attempt at a smile.

  If Clementine had held out any hope that he would still be happy at the news, it vanished when she heard him speak.

  “I heard you the first time,” he said flatly.

  He didn’t sound angry at all. In fact, Clementine would have preferred that he did. Instead, he sounded empty. Dead inside. And she knew without a doubt that the fear she’d seen in his eyes had made its way straight to his heart and squeezed it in a vise so tight there was no longer room for anything—or anyone—else.

  Whatever had developed between the two of them had vanished. However beautiful it had been, it had lasted only an instant, like diamond dust.

  She took a deep, steadying breath. It might be too late for her and Ben, but she wasn’t about to leave for Texas, Nome or anywhere else without making sure he didn’t blame himself for another four years.

  Shame coursed through her. She shouldn’t have encouraged him to mush again. He’d said taking her had been a one-time thing, and she should have left it at that. Why did she have to ask him if he missed it? Ben led a perfectly respectable life. She couldn’t imagine the pain he’d lived through the last time he attempted to conquer the Gold Rush Trail. He’d obviously been working on his relationship with God. She wished she’d been more patient. It might be obvious to her—and most everyone else in Ben’s life—that he was meant to return to mushing, but it was a dangerous sport. Only Ben would know when he was ready.

  “Ben, what happened to Kodiak today wasn’t your fault. If anyone should feel responsible, it’s me.”

  “No.” He shook his head. “Don’t say that.”

  “I pressured you. You wouldn’t have been out there if I hadn’t come to Alaska.” She swallowed around the quickly expanding lump in her throat. “I should have minded my own business.”

  “Stop,” he ground out through clenched teeth. “Please.”

  He lifted his hand to her face and traced the curve of her jaw with his fingertip. “Don’t you see? Your sense of adventure, your thirst for life…it’s one of the things I love most about you.”

  Clementine wished she could put her finger to his lips and stop him from saying anything else.

  “You challenge me.” He smiled a bittersweet smile and dropped his hand back to his lap. “I thought I could be man enough to live up to that challenge, but I can’t. I tried. It’s hard. You can’t imagine how hard.”

  “Ben,” she started to protest, but he gave her a weary look that said she may as well not bother.

  “I think it would be best if you didn’t go to Nome,” he said calmly.

  “I understand.” Clementine stood and wrapped her arms around herself. Her teeth chattered and she suddenly felt colder than she had since the moment she first set foot in Alaska.

  Ben rose to his feet and wrapped his arms around her. His embrace, which had once felt like home, now felt like nothing more than a goodbye.

  “Bye, Ben.” She backed out of his arms, eager to escape to the refuge of her hotel room and figure out what to do next. Where to go. He’d made it clear he didn’t want her in Nome. But going back to Texas now seemed utterly out of the question.

  “Wait.” Ben grabbed her wrist.

  She stopped and searched his face for a sign that he’d come to his senses and made room for her, and God, in his heart again. She found none. “Yes?”

  He glanced down at Moose but didn’t say anything.

  He didn’t have to.

  Clementine called the dog to her side and the two of them walked out the door without a backward glance.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Next to walking away from Ben, returning Moose to the animal shelter was the hardest thing Clementine had ever done. What normally would have been diff
icult beyond measure was made even worse by the tender state of her emotions. She stood before the reception desk trembling, with tears in her eyes, as the poor dog leaned into her side. In the end, she couldn’t even manage to look Moose in the eye before she fled the building and made a beeline back to the Northern Lights Inn.

  At least she’d stayed long enough to make sure the shelter staff knew Moose’s name. The husky would no longer be a nameless, homeless dog. Every living creature deserved a name.

  By the time Clementine stumbled through the revolving door of the hotel, she wanted nothing more than to crawl in bed and pull the covers over her head. She forced herself to pack first, figuring she may as well get that over with, too. Next, she finished emailing her notes to the office. Then she lay in bed and stared at the ceiling of her darkened hotel room. Sleep was impossible.

  In less than twelve hours she would be on a flight home. Beside her, Nugget was curled into a tight ball, with her tail wrapped around her tiny black nose. Like a miniature little sled dog, Clementine realized with a pang.

  “I didn’t realize you would take that T-shirt so literally,” she murmured. The puff of fur on Nugget’s head moved with Clementine’s breath and tickled her chin.

  She wondered how long the Pomeranian would sleep in such a position after they returned to Texas. How many nights would it take before she stretched out on her back with her paws in the air like she had before? One? Three? Ten?

  Likewise, how many nights would it take for Clementine to forget the feel of snow flurries falling on her skin? How many days would pass before she once again felt more at home sitting in her Nature World cubicle than standing on a sled zipping through a forest of evergreens?

  And how long before she stopped missing Ben?

  She glanced at her bags, packed and piled beside the door. Disguised by the shadows of the unlit room, they could have belonged to anyone, headed anywhere. Texas, Fairbanks…Nome.

  It wasn’t too late to change her mind. She’d never changed her plane ticket. Even though the one in her handbag had Houston, Texas, as its destination, there were still a handful of seats available on the evening flight to Nome. She’d checked one last time just before climbing into bed. If she booked a reservation, she would no longer be on the same afternoon flight as Ben, but she’d be there by midnight.