Page 51 of Wind Valley

She’d given Gil a quick description, as well as his name—the first time Lachlan had heard it. Pete Perkins. Such a bland name for someone who had caused so much turmoil.

Lachlan had to admit, it felt good to know that Gil and Nick were keeping watch while he and Maura were gone. The more people she had backing her up, the better; he knew that she’d felt very alone during this entire experience.

Sam gave them the keys to the car he kept at the Blackbear airport, and they said goodbye on the nearly deserted tarmac. As they watched the little Beechcraft take flight, Lachlan couldn’t stop a chill from running down his spine. He had no idea what was coming next, and their last lifeline to Firelight Ridge was now receding into the darkness toward the mountains.

Cold air blew against his face, carrying the icy prickle of tiny snowflakes. They should find Sam’s car and decide what to do next.

“Lachlan,” Maura said softly. He startled and turned toward her. “I’ve been thinking. We don’t have to stay together. I can disappear in any direction. I still have some savings. I could find my way to Anchorage and catch a flight to Peru or something. This isn’t your fight, and I don’t want you to feel obligated to babysit me.”

A hot rush of emotion surged through him. Not anger, exactly, at least not at her. What she was saying made sense, from a certain perspective. But not from his. He set down his bag and gripped her by the shoulders.

“Listen, Maura. Until I was eleven or so, I barely understood the concept of being alone. I’d never once felt alone because I always had Gil. Even when I was on my own, I always knew that Gil was there. Both of us know that we can always turn to each other. In my opinion, no one should ever feel completely alone. I’m in this with you.”

“Just because we slept together—” she began.

“It has nothing to do with that.” He thought about it, then added, “Okay, it has a little to do with that. I could never walk away from someone I was just inside a few hours ago.” Was that a blush coloring her cheeks? “But mostly it’s that you’re going through something terrible and you shouldn’t have to do it alone. How do you think the human race has survived all these centuries? When saber-toothed tigers were chasing us, we defeated them together.”

Her face brightened and she almost smiled. “Loving the new nickname for SS.”

“STT. I like it. One letter away from STD.”

She made a face, then laughed ruefully. “I hope it’s the kind you can cure, not the kind you’re stuck with for life.”

Laughing about venereal disease, okay fine…whatever it took to chase that spooked expression off Maura’s face.

Once they found Sam’s car—a comfy Camry with a duffel bag of ice skates in the backseat to feed Sam’s hockey habit—Lachlan took the wheel while Maura pulled up the Maps app on her phone.

“It’s a five-hour drive to Fairbanks. Should we just wait until daylight?”

Even though it felt like the middle of the night, it was only six. That was Alaska in the winter for you, although these days the light was lasting noticeably longer. “I’m fine to drive. I don’t think we should wait around here any longer than necessary.”

But she wasn’t listening anymore. She was staring at her phone. “I got an email from my friend Marco,” she said numbly.

“Is everything okay?”

“I don’t know. He says SS is being accused of assaulting a woman in his custody. Her lawyer wants to talk to me. She wants me to testify against him. This is amazing. Of course I’ll testify. I’ll do anything to keep that…” Still scrolling, she gave another gasp.

“What now?”

“My parents emailed too. Oh my God. They’re the ones who contacted the lawyer after they saw the story about his arrest in the newspaper!” She looked up at him, her eyes shining. “Do you know what this means?”

“What?”

“They’re trying to help me. The whole reason I left Hopper was that I didn’t want SS and his father retaliating against my parents. I wanted them to be safe. They must feel safe enough to reach out to a lawyer.” She clutched at Lachlan’s arm. “Oh my God, it just occurred to me…is that investigator working for this lawyer? Is that why she was trying to find me?”

Lachlan hated to throw cold water on all this hopeful news. “Or the investigator is trying to find you to keep you from testifying against him.”

28

After a quick stop at a convenience store for some road snacks, they hit the road headed for Fairbanks. Maura watched the starlit landscape slide past the passenger-side window and tried to keep her heart from jumping out of her chest. In all her dealings with SS, she’d only occasionally felt physically in danger. Imprisoned, trapped, gaslit, manipulated, all of the above. SS used his size and physical ability as a means of intimidation, not to do actual harm. She’d come to Firelight Ridge so she could get away from him, not because she was in fear for her life.

Now? She was afraid. Her initial joy at the news that SS might finally pay for his actions had dissipated. How far would the Perkins family go to keep her from testifying?

“Maybe they just want to buy me off,” she murmured. “Make me sign an NDA or something. Maybe I’m being too paranoid.”

“It’s possible.” Lachlan didn’t sound very hopeful about that theory. “But wouldn’t it be enough for them that you had disappeared? Why go to the trouble of tracking you down?”

“Maybe they were afraid the other side would find me first. And maybe they did. We should see if Gil or Nick can find out more about who hired that investigator.”

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