For fourteen years, Alanna had been afraid to speak up, afraid to try to get help. At first, that fear had been because she hadn’t known how her abductors would respond. Would they hurt her? Would they kill her? Later, it had been because, despite everything, she loved the Altiers and the four kids she’d called brothers and sisters. She’d become afraid of what would happen to all of them if she tried to sneak away and told anyone the truth.
For the past five years, she’d felt guilty about all of it. Seeing the pain she’d caused her biological parents and siblings Kensie and Flynn, wondering if some of the other kids wouldn’t have been kidnapped if she’d spoken up sooner.
She couldn’t change the past. But she could change the future.
This time, she wasn’t staying silent. She wasn’t going home and she wasn’t staying out of this investigation, whether the police wanted her help or not.
“We’re going to do this,” she told Chance. “We’re going to find them.”
* * *
“SHE’S GOT A lot of nerve, showing up here,” Peter muttered to no one in particular.
As usual, his partner, Tate Emory, heard him. “I don’t know. I feel bad for her. Imagine what she’s been through. It can’t have been easy to write that note and turn in the only family she’d known since she was five years old.”
Peter shifted and scowled at his partner, who’d strode over to stand beside him, moving silently. Or maybe Peter just hadn’t heard him, since Tate had come up on Peter’s left side. The side where his hearing was mostly gone.
Being new to the force, new to policing in general, hadn’t been a smooth transition for Peter. Most of the officers here still stared at him like the rookie he was. Worse, he knew plenty of them hadn’t wanted him accepted onto the force in the first place because of his hearing disability. Some of them were still trying to push him out.
He’d never felt that from Tate. His partner had only been on the force for five years, just long enough to have been present for Alanna’s dramatic rescue.
It had all started with a simple note, left between some money at a general store on the outskirts of Desparre. The note had been as straightforward as it was confusing, since at the time there’d been no indication Alanna was even alive, let alone that her kidnappers had taken other children. My name is Alanna Morgan, from Chicago. I’m still alive. I’m not the only one.
The FBI had done a quick investigation and called the note a hoax, yet another dead end in a more than decade-old cold case. But Alanna’s sister had believed it, had traveled over three thousand five hundred miles across the country in search of a sister she’d only known for five short years. The rescue had been sensational, making national news and putting the sleepy town of Desparre in a spotlight it desperately wanted to avoid. Now that spotlight might be returning.
Back then, Peter had been overseas, doing something he thought he’d stick with until it was time to retire. The scandal of the kidnapping had caught his attention only because he grew up in Luna, the little town next to Desparre where Alanna had finally been reunited with the sister who’d come to Alaska to find her.
Peter stared at the closed door Alanna had disappeared through, trying not to picture the embarrassment in her eyes. Yeah, he felt sorry for what she’d gone through, but five years had passed. Enough time to create a new life for herself with her real family, people who must have gone through hell thinking she was lost to them forever. She should have been home with them now, not out looking for a kidnapper. Because no matter what she said, he didn’t quite believe she was here to put Darcy Altier back behind bars.
Alanna Morgan might have started out as a victim, but now she could choose her path in life. And every nuance in her voice, the flickers of emotion he’d seen in her eyes, told him she was choosing all wrong. She was here for Darcy Altier, all right, but not to get her arrested. To help her hide.
“Why do you think she believes Darcy returned to Desparre?” Tate asked.
Peter shrugged, his gaze still fixed on that closed door. It was a good question. Darcy Altier had been granted furlough to bury her husband, who’d been killed in jail. She’d managed to slip free of her guards and run, but that had been in Oregon, back near the prison. A smart woman would head as far from the site of her original crimes as possible. So why did Alanna think that Darcy was here? Why was Alanna here?
“They’ve been in contact.” Peter spoke his thoughts out loud. It was the only logical explanation.
“Seriously?” Tate scoffed. “Alanna’s the one who turned her in. You really think Darcy would reach out to her after that?”
Peter turned to look at his partner. Tate was a couple of inches taller than Peter’s five-foot-ten-inch frame, his skin and hair a couple of shades darker. From the moment they’d met, Peter had felt a strange kinship with Tate, a sense that both of them had known hardship they didn’t speak of, that both of them had a restless desire to move past it.
“This woman raised her since she was five years old,” Peter insisted. “Alanna spent most of her childhood with her. I bet she barely remembered her real family. How much do you remember from before you were five?”
Tate shrugged. “Enough. Obviously Alanna remembered them or she wouldn’t have left a note for them to find her.”
“Sure, but then she continued to hide with the people who kidnapped her.”
“That’s a little harsh. She was nineteen. How much freedom do you think they gave her? You, of all people, should understand—”
Peter let out a humorless laugh. “Understand what? The lengths people will go to in order to protect someone who hurt them?”
That was something he definitely understood. He’d gotten an up-close look at the unnatural attachment a hostage could develop for their captor. That experience had destroyed his career as a war reporter—had destroyed much of the hearing in his left ear, too. There was no chance of recovering his hearing, no surgery or hearing aid that could improve it.
Peter had no doubt that Alanna had a similar unhealthy attachment, that she was suffering from serious delusions about the woman who’d stolen her away from her family. It made her motives questionable. Worse, it made her dangerous.
Tate was shaking his head, but Peter kept going. “You’re right. I do understand. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter if Alanna has spoken to Darcy or she just knows her well enough to predict her movements. If Darcy is crazy enough to actually come back here, Alanna is the key.”
Speaking the words aloud made anticipation swell in his chest and his gaze dart back to the closed door. Alanna was the key—and not just to locating a fugitive and solving a kidnapping, but to Desparre’s reputation as a quiet, safe place to be left alone. And to Peter’s future on the Desparre police force.
“Uh-oh,” Tate said. “I know that look.”
“Alanna is going to lead us to Darcy Altier and the missing kid.” He headed for the door, gesturing for his partner to follow. “We’re not letting Alanna out of our sight until she does.”
Chapter Two
Alanna stared through dense woods at the house where she’d grown up. She’d helped build it on this mountaintop, dragging wood alongside her “siblings” and helping her “parents” lift the framework into place. All those months of hard labor, of watching the house slowly take shape. When it was finally finished, she’d been proud of her home.
Now it looked derelict and empty, snow covering the driveway that no one had bothered to shovel. Likely no one wanted to buy a house built by a pair of kidnappers, once home to five stolen kids.
Once upon a time, she’d stared at it with happiness and love. Now, there was bitterness, too, with the memory of her “mother” and “older brother” firing weapons at Kensie as she risked her life to bring Alanna home.
Alanna swallowed hard as she stepped out of the truck she’d parked at the end of the gravel driveway. Chance bounded
out after her, quick despite his size, loving the heavy snowfall in Alaska. He stuck close to her, a faithful companion who needed no leash.
She’d come here straight from the police station, not even bothering to check in to her hotel yet. Now, she wondered if she should have taken a break, given herself a chance to emotionally acclimate to being back here.
Her attention snagged on broken bits of scattered wood. The sign with her “family’s” name and a No Trespassing warning had been smashed to pieces.
She bent down and picked up the largest piece, a splintered slab of wood that read Altier. She ran her gloved fingertips over the hand-carved lettering, remembering when Darcy had made it. The urge to take it with her was strong, but what if her family in Chicago saw it? They’d be hurt and full of questions she didn’t know how to answer any better now than she had five years ago, despite the degree in psychology she’d earned since coming home. So, instead, she set it carefully back on the snow, tucked her hands in her pockets and strode toward the house. Chance walked beside her, comfortable in the frigid weather that made Chicago seem mild.
It would be foolish for Darcy to come here. But she and Julian had spent so many years running from state to state, never staying long in one place, afraid to draw any attention. In this remote patch of Alaskan wilderness, they’d finally felt like they weren’t being chased. They’d been willing to put down roots, trusted that the children they’d raised wouldn’t turn them in for kidnapping them from families they either barely remembered or, in the case of Alanna’s youngest “siblings,” didn’t remember at all.
Walking around the edge of the house, her feet sank into deeper snow that dampened her pants just below the knees, where her boots ended. She peered through each of the windows on the ground floor. Nothing. No sign that anyone was inside, no sign that anyone had been here in a long time.
The furniture they’d picked out or built had been moved around—chairs knocked over, drawers hanging open with the contents spilled. All the things she and her “family” had left behind, had never been able to come back to claim. Alanna rubbed the bare finger where she used to wear a worn ruby ring, an Altier family heirloom that was the only thing she’d taken with her back to Chicago. She’d stopped wearing it when she’d noticed her parents and siblings constantly eyeing it, though they’d never actually come out and asked what it meant to her.
Focusing on the house again, Alanna leaned closer, peering through the windows into the living room, looking for any sign that Darcy had been here recently. The dirt on the wooden floors had faded to a light gray with no new tracks in the dust. It was clearly old, from when a slew of police officers had traipsed through, looking for her “family” five years ago. Back then, they’d already fled, but not far enough, not fast enough. The police had caught up to them.
Alanna squeezed her eyes closed against the memory of a circle of officers training weapons on her “parents” and screaming at them to get down. Of watching Julian and Darcy be flattened to the ground in deep snow, officers’ knees pressing hard into their backs as they were cuffed. Of her youngest “siblings” crying and clinging to her. Of her older “brother” scowling, the tension in his body telling her he might do something stupid.
Chance nudged his big head against her thigh, hard enough to almost make her stumble. Her eyes opened, a laugh breaking free despite the pain in her heart. “I know, boy. You don’t understand what we’re doing here.” She sighed, stroking her gloved hand over his soft head. “I used to live here.” Her attention drifted to the dense woods behind the house, the steep slope of a mountain that dropped off suddenly. Protection from fears she hadn’t totally understood as a child. “I used to be happy here.”
The rumble of an engine nearby made Chance’s head swivel. Alanna peered around the edge of the house, toward the street. This part of Desparre wasn’t on many maps. Houses were set apart by miles, far from the road and hard to find if you didn’t know where you were going. They were up higher in the mountains, in an area more prone to avalanches and deeper snow. Even locals didn’t often come this way without a reason.
Her heart rate picked up as she squinted at the street for any sign of life beyond the thick trees. Could it be Darcy? If it was, how would she react to Alanna’s presence?
Five years ago, Alanna’s older “brother” Johnny had started talking about wanting to get married. It had put an ache in Alanna’s heart with the realization that she’d never have any memories with the family she’d tried for fourteen years to remember. Not unless she acted.
So, she had. When Julian had taken her into some stores on the outskirts of town, she’d slipped a note into the stack of bills they’d used to pay. She’d been so afraid Julian would notice. She hadn’t been afraid he’d hurt her—she’d stopped fearing that long ago. But she had been scared of how he’d react if he found it.
Yes, he’d kidnapped her. There was no way to spin that; it was just wrong. But he’d loved her. He and Darcy had raised her; they’d homeschooled her in every subject so well that when she’d returned and taken her GED, it had been ridiculously easy. She’d sailed through college, too. But it hadn’t just been academics. They’d taught her to be self-reliant in the dangerous wilderness, taught her skills that Kensie and Flynn still shook their heads at with awe. They’d raised her with love and, as the years went by, she couldn’t stop herself from loving them, too.
Back then, she had been so focused on seeing her birth family again. She hadn’t let herself consider the possible consequences for the people who’d raised her, or for the kids she’d called brothers and sisters, who she still missed desperately. She knew if she’d paused to think about all of that, she never would have done it.
The sound of the vehicle reached her ears again, this time the slow grind of tires over snow that hadn’t been packed down yet. Was it Darcy, noticing the unfamiliar truck in the driveway, afraid to approach?
Alanna stepped out from behind the house, hurrying toward the street with Chance bounding after her. He loved the snow, thought it was a game, but she was too anxious to pay much attention. Would Darcy stop if she saw Alanna now? Or would she speed away?
When Alanna reached the street, a dark SUV backed quickly out of view. It was too quickly to decipher who was in the vehicle, but there were two people in the front seat. One thing Alanna knew for sure: it wasn’t a child in the passenger seat. It looked like there were two men in the car.
Pinpricks of awareness swept across her arms. The Altiers had built this home in as secluded a spot as they could find. But that seclusion worked both ways. Right now, it meant no one would hear her cry for help.
Back in Chicago, the news stories had called her a hero, had highlighted how it all ended, with her leaving a note for her family to find her. But in Alaska, it was different. In Desparre, she wasn’t the girl who’d helped five kids go home to families who missed them. She was the girl who’d put their sleepy, intentionally below-the-radar town on a national stage. She was the girl who’d been hiding in the woods for years, never reaching out for help. Because while the locals might have a live-and-let-live attitude about someone else’s business, they also protected their own. If she’d asked, they’d all said, they would have helped her.
In all the years she’d lived in Desparre, she’d never asked. It was pretty clear some of them hated her for it.
“Chance, come on.” She tapped her thigh twice, then ran for her truck, the dog close on her heels.
They hopped into the vehicle and then Alanna was speeding in the other direction, away from the strange SUV, away from the downtown. Deeper into the mountains.
* * *
“WE SCARED HER off.” Tate stated the obvious as Alanna and her St. Bernard jumped into their truck and took off at a speed that would normally get them pulled over.
Silently, Peter cursed himself for getting too anxious, getting too close. But he’d been intrigued by the ho
use deep in the wilderness where five kids had been hidden away for years. Like a lot of Alaska, Desparre was known for being a place where people could get lost. Most people were here for legitimate reasons—wanting to run from some tragedy in their life, wanting to recharge in Alaska’s wild beauty or even wanting to hide from someone who meant them harm. But Alaska sometimes attracted people for the wrong kind of reasons, too... People like the Altiers.
The house wasn’t what he’d been expecting. It was pretty, a log cabin set back in the woods at the crest of a mountain. The isolated location was particularly creepy, though, as he considered the dangerous drop he knew was right behind the house and the dense woods where a family could hide with shotguns. That last part had actually happened when Alanna’s real sister had come searching for her and almost died in the process.
When police and the FBI had gone through the house after the Altiers had been arrested, they’d found a stash of forged documents. They’d also found years’ worth of family pictures. According to police gossip, the earliest pictures showed obviously distraught kids, but as time went by, that changed. The pictures started to show what looked like a happy family. The most disturbing thing of all, according to one of the Desparre police department’s veterans, was how much they’d all looked like a real family. Apparently the Altiers had grabbed kids who looked like they were related. The veteran had confided in Peter that what haunted him most was that if Alanna hadn’t left the note, no one would ever look at the seven people living in this house and think for a second they weren’t a legitimate family.
To Peter, the scariest part was how that lie still seemed lodged in the mind of the person who had been the least brainwashed, the one who’d ultimately turned the kidnappers in.
Still, rumor had it that the Altiers had learned from their mistakes—when two of the kids they’d kidnapped couldn’t forget their real families, they had started abducting younger children. It appeared that Darcy was sticking to that pattern, because police believed she’d grabbed a three-year-old boy not long after she’d escaped custody.
Alaska Mountain Rescue Page 2
