by Sue Pethick
“Hmm? When was that?”
“At the hospital. She had to take Uncle Danny in for some tests.”
“Oh, right. That was during oncology rounds.”
Emily sat up.
“Oncology? She told me they were just routine tests.”
“Calm down, Em. I’m sure everything’s fine.”
“But oncology? Carter, that’s cancer. What was my uncle doing there?”
“You know I can’t tell you that. Patient confidentiality—”
“Carter, please,” she said. “This is my uncle we’re talking about.”
“I’m sorry, Emily, but I’ve already told you more than I should have. If you need more information about your uncle’s treatment, you’ll have to ask him.”
Emily felt tears of frustration welling. She knew confidentiality was important, but this was a family member they were talking about. Couldn’t Carter at least give her a hint? Why was he treating her like a stranger?
You’re being ridiculous, she told herself. Of course he couldn’t tell her anything. Confidentiality meant nothing if doctors could throw it out the window any time a family member asked them to. If anything, she should be admiring him for standing by his principles.
“You’re right,” she said. “I’m sorry. I’ll give him a call and see what’s what.”
“Good girl.”
She winced. Being called a “good girl” always made her feel like an obedient animal.
“Listen,” he said. “It sounds like you need to get some rest. I’ll try and call you in a couple of days, okay?”
“Sure,” she said. “Talk to you then.”
Emily hung up, feeling sick at heart. The idea that her uncle Danny might be seriously ill seemed impossible. He’d always been a bigger-than-life figure. Pink-cheeked and barrel-chested, with his dark hair slicked back and a cigar always smoldering somewhere nearby, he was a man to whom no one remained a stranger for long. Only those who knew him well understood that his hail-fellow-well-met exterior covered a painful episode: the death of his brother, Emily’s father, for which he blamed himself.
She had to talk to him, find out for herself how sick he really was. Emily knew she’d never be able to sleep if she didn’t. She looked at the time and bit her lip. Was eleven too late to call? Surely, he’d understand, she told herself. If he knew how upset she was, he’d want her to call and set her mind at ease. Or at least stop herself from imagining the worst.
The call went straight to his voice mail.
“Oh. Hi, Uncle Danny. It’s me, Emily. I’m, uh, sorry to be calling so late, but—”
“Punkin’! I didn’t see it was you. How are you, darling girl?”
As her uncle’s voice boomed in her ear, Emily closed her eyes and felt a tear of relief run down her cheek. He sounded as strong and healthy as he always had. Why had she imagined there could be anything wrong? Nevertheless, she was glad she’d called.
“I hope I didn’t wake you.”
“Psh. You know I don’t sleep. But you. There’s nothing wrong, is there? You’re not in trouble?”
“No, no. I’m fine. Just wanted to call and say hi.”
“How’s Alaska?” he said. “Met any Eskimos yet?”
She rolled her eyes. Uncle Danny could be a bit un-PC.
“No, but one of my roommates is part Tlingit.”
“Oh, dear. I’d better put in my hearing aids. I thought you said she was a Klingon.”
“No, Tlingit. It’s hard to hear on the phone.”
“I’m sorry. Didn’t mean to offend.”
“That’s okay.” She paused. “Listen, the reason I called is that Mom told me you were at the hospital for some tests today. Are you all right?”
“Of course I’m all right. Fit as a fiddle.”
Emily frowned. Did his voice sound a little raspy, or was she just imagining things?
“You’re sure?”
“Yes, yes. You know how doctors are when you have good insurance. Well, not your Carter, of course, but—”
“It’s okay. I knew what you meant. So,” she said, “you’re really fine?”
“Yes.”
“And you’d tell me if you weren’t?”
“Well, I can’t promise that, but I’d tell you if the end was near, and I’m still a long way from the finish line.”
Emily took a deep breath and smiled. Carter must have been mistaken, she thought. It couldn’t be easy to remember what part of the hospital you were in when you were sleep-deprived.
“Well, I’m glad to hear you’re okay.”
“And I’m glad you’re doing well.”
“I love you, Uncle Danny.”
“I love you, too, dear heart. Sleep well.”
CHAPTER 6
Pink cotton candy clouds dotted the pale blue sky the next morning as Sam and Bear walked into town. It had been full daylight for two hours and would remain so for another fifteen, so without fish to bring in, Sam had decided to spend some time checking out the “Ships for Sale” postings around town. A good ship wouldn’t stay on the market for long; he’d need to keep his ear to the ground to find what he was looking for.
Kallik had promised to ask around and see if anyone he knew was looking to sell, and Sam had told him what he thought he could afford, but he’d probably go higher if the right one came along. It was a delicate balance. He didn’t want to tip his hand to a seller who might have taken less, but neither did he want to miss out on the perfect ship if a few dollars more would make a difference. Sam wasn’t too worried about carrying debt. Fishing wasn’t his only source of income, and the way he saw it, the sooner he had his own ship, the more he’d be making and the faster he could pay it off. He looked down at the idle fishing tenders in the harbor, their crews busy doing maintenance until fishing resumed. Somewhere out there was the ship that would set him free, he thought. All he had to do was find it.
As they headed toward town, the smell of coffee mingling with the tang of the ocean made his stomach growl. Their first stop that morning would be Mollie’s Café. Mollie Boone had been a fixture in Ketchikan for as long as Sam could remember, and it was generally agreed that she made the best salmon hash on the island. Most everyone who worked the fisheries came into Mollie’s at least once a week; if one of them had mentioned a ship for sale, she would know it.
A series of long, low hoots told him a great gray owl was roosting close by. The enormous birds rarely flushed, preferring to stay hidden even when people came near. Occasionally, Sam would notice a dark shape in a tree and find a pair of yellow eyes staring down at him from one of its branches. This one was probably a female guarding her nest.
Bear lifted his head and growled as a thickset man stepped into the road ahead of them. His hair was grayer now than the last time they’d seen each other and the heavy beard had partially hidden the large red birthmark on the man’s left cheek, but Sam had no trouble recognizing him.
“Morning, Captain Reed.”
Sam took a firm hold of Bear’s collar.
“What do you want, Logan?”
“Nothin’. Just out for a stroll, same as you.”
Logan Marsh had been part of Sam’s crew until halfway through the last season, when he’d nearly gotten them all killed. Like a lot of those who worked the ships, Logan was a drinker—something Sam had no problem with as long as a man did his job—but during an especially memorable bender, Logan had taken a fall, injuring his back and leaving him hooked on pain pills. Sam hadn’t known the guy had a problem until the day the ship was caught in a storm and he discovered that Logan had sold the crew’s safety equipment for drug money. When they finally made it back to shore—battered and near-drowned—Sam had fired him on the spot. Since then, Logan Marsh had descended further into criminality, from theft to assault and attempted rape, each time pleading to lesser charges that netted him little if any jail time. According to Kallik, Logan blamed Sam for his troubles, which was why Sam very much doubted that this meeting was an ac
cident.
Bear continued to growl as the two men stared at each other, the sound filling the air with menace. The dog was gentle by nature, but he was fiercely protective. He wouldn’t hesitate to attack anyone who tried to hurt Sam, something Logan must have realized as he weighed his odds of success. Even if he were able to land a blow, it wouldn’t be worth being mauled by a hundred-and-fifty-pound animal. He gave Sam an oily smile and walked past, giving the two of them a wide berth.
“Well then,” he said. “I’ll see you around.”
* * *
At Mollie’s Café, Sam took a table in the far corner with enough room underneath for Bear to eat in peace. They each had two poached eggs over salmon hash, Sam washing his down with coffee so sweet it was almost syrup. Bear finished his quickly and started searching the floor for any scraps he might have missed. When Mollie came by to refill Sam’s coffee cup, he asked her if she knew of any tenders for sale.
She squinched up her face thoughtfully.
“Can’t think of any right off,” she said. “I could ask around, if you want.”
“That’d be great.” Sam glanced toward the men at the next table. “But I’d prefer you didn’t mention it was me asking.”
Mollie gave him a sly wink.
“No problem. Lots of folks selling don’t want their names broadcast, either. Sometimes I think this whole town is one big rumor mill.”
“You may be right.”
The bell in front rang as another customer walked in.
“I gotta go,” Mollie said. She took out her order pad and handed him his ticket. “Here. Write your number down, I’ll give you a call if I hear anything.”
“Thanks, I appreciate it.”
Sam left his cell number and a large tip and he and Bear headed out.
After that, they stopped by the union hall, which was crowded that day due to the fishing ban. There were no tenders posted on the board, and a few disgruntled seamen were saying that anyone betting his savings on the fishing industry was a fool, given the current conditions.
“Every year, the season gets shorter and the fish get smaller,” one said. “Pretty soon, there’ll be no fish left. Then where will we all be?”
Sam did his best to disregard their grumbling. He’d seen worse years than that one, and the fish had always come back. Governments were putting limits on the amount of stock they took each year, too, and there was still a lot of ocean out there. It might last forever and it might end tomorrow. Either way, he figured, there was no sense in worrying about it.
With breakfast time over, the cruise ships were disgorging their passengers onto the docks. Avid bargain-hunters swarmed onto Front Street and into the open arms of shopkeepers for whom every arrival was a windfall. Ketchikan was a magnet for all sorts of artists, and the promise of eager summer buyers made toiling through the dark months bearable. A few years back, Sam had let himself be talked into joining a musical theater group and ended up loving it. Once salmon season was over, they’d be starting rehearsals for their winter production.
Giving the tourist district a wide berth, Sam and Bear checked out a few more community bulletin boards, spreading the word to a couple of people whose discretion could be relied upon, but nothing new had been posted and no one he spoke to knew of a vessel like the one he was looking for. It was frustrating. He knew he’d have had better luck posting his own information and the type of ship he wanted, but the chances that word would get back to Travis or Jack were too great. As difficult as it was, Sam would just have to be patient. When they reached the last place they could think to look, they turned around and started back.
Having done everything he could to find himself a ship, Sam was feeling antsy. He’d never been good at killing time, especially during fishing season, and the last thing he needed was to go home and start pacing the floor like a caged animal. Maybe he’d just head down to the dock, see if his crew needed a hand. They might not be hauling fish, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t plenty of work to do. There was nothing like cleaning the bilge or scraping barnacles from the hull to distract you from your troubles.
“Come on, Bear,” Sam said. “Let’s go see how Ben and Oscar are doing.”
Sam kept a sharp eye out for Logan Marsh as they crossed Washington, wondering where the man had slunk off to. Running into the guy so close to his own neighborhood had given him an uneasy feeling. What if Logan had been watching Sam’s house, waiting for him to leave so he could break in? Coming home to find the place trashed—or, worse, being confronted by an armed and angry man—would be a nightmare. Sam might be a big guy, but hatred was a surprisingly effective tonic. If the two of them came face-to-face again, there was no telling what might happen.
The cannery was up ahead on their right. As Sam and Bear got closer, they slowed down to take a look. With no fish coming in that day, the enormous white building seemed abandoned. Gulls and crows that should have been feasting on the dock strutted around the empty parking lot, searching for scraps and fighting over anything they found. The doors that had been open just the day before were closed, the only workers inside doing cleaning and maintenance, glad to be making a few dollars while the place sat idle.
Sam had a fleeting recollection of running through those doors and seeing the girl—Emily—sprawled on the floor, facedown in fish guts, and smiled. When he first realized that it was a girl Bear had knocked over in the cannery, he’d been expecting hysterics. Instead, Emily had looked up with those amazing eyes and smiled. At the time, he assumed she was trying to tell him she was all right, but when he thought about it now, Sam wondered if what she was really doing was telling him that she got it. She knew how funny the whole thing must look and would have been laughing, too, if she’d been in his place. He wished he’d had a chance to ask her about it last night when she showed up at the bar, but with Kallik grinning at him like an idiot, there was no way.
They’d just stepped onto the dock when Sam’s phone buzzed. He checked the caller. It was Mollie.
“Hey, what’s up?”
“Guy came in here a little while ago, says he knows of a tender for sale. I got his number if you’re still interested.”
Sam felt his heart leap. Maybe this was the one!
“Of course I am. What’s the number?”
She gave it to him and he repeated it twice to be sure he had it right.
“I’ll give him a call right away. Thanks, Moll. You’re the best.”
Sam’s hand shook as he dialed the number. As the line rang, he started pacing the dock, Bear watching him uncertainly. He was formulating a message to leave on the guy’s voice mail when he finally picked up. Sam asked about the tender for sale and the man gave him the particulars, including the price he was asking for. It was a bit more than he wanted to spend, but if it was as clean as the man said it was, it could be worth it. They agreed to meet at the southern marina in an hour to look it over. By the time Sam hung up, he’d sweated through his flannel shirt.
He looked down and grabbed his dog around its neck.
“This could be it, Bear. Isn’t it great?”
CHAPTER 7
Problems at the cannery had still been on Emily’s mind when she went to work that day. The place might not have been processing fish, but that didn’t mean the interns had the day off. Instead, Tim Garrett had decided it was the perfect opportunity to give them all a lesson on the federal regulations pertaining to fisheries. The goal, he said, was to give them a deeper understanding of how and why NOAA had developed rules for the taking of fish in Pacific waters. Unfortunately, Tim’s idea of teaching was to spend the morning reading the rules verbatim over the hum of the cannery’s generators, and by midmorning, eyelids were starting to droop. If Emily’s mind hadn’t been busy elsewhere, she was sure she’d have fallen asleep.
She tried not to let Tim see her as she sneaked another quick peek at the clock. It wasn’t his fault that “Subpart H Regarding Deviations From the Allocation Schedule” was so boring, but it fe
lt as if time were standing still. Emily had been rehearsing what to say to enlist Sam Reed’s help since she woke up that morning, and the more time that passed, the less confident she felt. In the back of her mind, she kept hearing Noah’s snide retort when she declared her determination to find the source of the problem: What was she going to do about it?
What she wasn’t going to do, she told herself, was turn her back and pretend that things were fine. She could see how tightly wound Tim was, and on the drive to work, the other girls had told her how distracted he’d been, trying to deal with complaints while he worked with the interns. If there was an answer out there, she was determined to find it. First, however, she had to get Sam’s buy-in, and as Tim droned on, Emily was losing her nerve.
At last, twelve o’clock rolled around and he let them out for lunch. As the others argued about which fast food joint to hit, Emily hung up her lab coat and grabbed her wallet. She’d get herself something to eat on the way back, she thought, right after she’d talked to Sam—if she talked to Sam. The fact was, she had no idea which of the many tenders tied up outside was his.
Emily hurried down the metal stairs that led from the catwalk to the factory floor, feeling the structure vibrate with every footfall. She was already at the bottom before the rest of them started to descend.
“Hey, Emily!” Rachel called out. “Aren’t you coming with us?”
She shook her head. “Got an errand to run. I’ll see you guys after lunch.”
Through the row of windows that lined the southeast side of the building, she saw people out on the sidewalk making their way to their own lunchtime rendezvous. Then a blur of black caught her eye as it hurried past.
Bear!
She looked ahead and saw Sam a few feet in front of the dog. Head down, hands tucked into his jacket pockets, he seemed to be in a hurry. If she didn’t get out there fast, she might miss him.
Emily ran to the big double doors and tried to push one open. It was surprisingly heavy, and she was only able to move it a few inches, just far enough to squeeze through the narrow opening. By the time she got out to the sidewalk, there was no sign of Sam or his dog. Nevertheless, she told herself, they couldn’t have gotten far, and she knew which direction they’d been going. If she just headed that way, she’d run into them sooner or later.
