Page 65 of Wind Valley

“Never heard of them.” Bear picked up a cloth and wiped the counter even more vigorously than usual.

“So some cell phone company’s trying to buy up property out here in the middle of nowhere? Why?” Nick said. “Some new development?”

“Can’t be that. We’re surrounded by national park land. A new development wouldn’t fly. I don’t know. Like I said, people aren’t talking. Yet. I’m working on it, but I don’t want anyone to get in trouble for breaking a contract.” Bear turned to Maura. “You might see if Pinky’s gotten an offer. I haven’t seen him here since you left.”

“Did the investigator ever talk to him?” she asked.

“Yup. Right here at this bar. He launched into one of his long rants about alien abductions, and then said that government scientists had come and taken you away. Sobbed into his beer over how much he missed his granddaughter, how they’d taken all your stuff with them and he didn’t think he’d ever see you again. Jackie didn’t buy a word of it.”

Even though they all laughed, Lachlan caught a sheen of moisture in Maura’s eyes.

“Oh, Pinky, he did exactly what I asked him to do. I need to get home and check on him. He’s probably worried about me. I’m surprised he isn’t here right now.”

“He was here earlier,” Lila said. “But then he remembered he had to check his trapline before the storm hit.”

“He still hasn’t done that?” Maura shook her head as she slid off the stool. “It seems like he’s forgetting things more and more lately. I keep telling him all those conspiracy theories are going to rot his brain. I swear, they’re like an addiction.”

Lila hopped from behind the bar again to give her a hug goodbye. “Stay inside during this storm, okay?”

“Are you…sensing something?” Maura asked delicately.

“Me? No. Bear’s the weather forecaster in the family. He says it’s going to be a whopper. I’m pretty excited, actually,” she admitted, her eyes shining. “One of the more important moments in our relationship came during a blizzard. I’ve had fond feelings for them ever since.”

“Oooh, tell me more. Sounds juicy.” Maura linked arms with Lila and the two of them walked toward the exit, heads together.

Lachlan hung back to ask Bear one more question. “Has anyone else mentioned seeing a wolf, possibly injured, possibly coming right up to their homes?”

Bear shook his head. “That would be unusual. Maybe it’s Qisaruatsiaq.”

“Excuse me?” Lachlan wasn’t sure if Bear said a name or sneezed.

“It’s an Inuit legend of an old woman who was abandoned to live by herself. Eventually she turned into a wolf.”

A shiver crept down Lachlan’s spine. “And then what?”

“Nothing. She was a wolf, doing what wolves do, hunting.” Bear shrugged as he turned off the neon sign over the bar—the first step in closing down. “You know, Native Alaskan peoples generally have great respect for wolves. It’s the Europeans who feared them. Here, we feel kinship toward them. They’re dedicated to their families—their packs—and they often have to defend their homes, just like us. They’re tremendous hunters, which my Ahtna ancestors admired and also envied.”

Lachlan hadn’t known that Bear had Ahtna heritage, but it did explain his deep connection to the territory here. “What do you know about the wolf packs here locally?”

“We have two types of wolves here, the gray and the brown, but as to packs, I can’t tell you much. I did hear there was a thriving pack out past Wind Valley. I think they gave that professor’s family some trouble. Ate their chickens, that kind of thing.”

Lachlan should have known that Bear knew about the Reeds. He knew everyone. “What else do you know about that family?”

“The Reeds? Not much. She only came in here once, right before they left. She made a call to her family, from what I happened to hear. Crying, saying they were right. A couple days later, an Apache helicopter showed up and they were gone. Her family must have had some serious pull.”

“She came from a wealthy family?”

“That’s what I heard. Oil and gas.”

Oil and gas. A bell chimed in Lachlan’s mind as a connection was made. Wasn’t TNG an oil and gas company before they rebranded?

“Better get going.” Bear gestured toward the front door, which Maura had just opened, letting in a blast of snow.

The storm was here.

He hurried to join Maura in the arctic entry. She had managed to close the door, and was leaning against it as wind pounded against it like a fist. “Now what?” she asked him, her eyes wide, the sparkle of melting snowflakes on her eyelashes.

“Ani is staying with Molly and Sam, so my place is empty,” he offered, visions of sex in a snowstorm dancing through his brain. He firmly dismissed them. “But you probably want to check on Pinky, right?”

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