Page 87 of Wind Valley

If he was correct, his recent work would be groundbreaking, since jökulhlaups were notoriously difficult to predict.

What he didn’t know was which valley would get flooded. The earthquake had shifted the underlying ground formations enough that he thought there was a good chance the flooding would not take its normal route into Smoky Lake.

This year, he was making a bold prediction. If it came true, he’d have one hell of a research paper to publish.

He heard Maura let out a sigh. “It’s so peaceful up here. We should drag all the different sides up here and make them take some deep breaths.”

“Couldn’t hurt.”

“Poor Ruth. I saw her the other day and she’s mortified that her uncles and cousins are working with TNG. Can you believe Andrea offered them a one-percent stake in the business if they helped her? They’re the ones who came up with the free cell service idea. They know it’s our soft spot out here.”

Lachlan shook his head. “I almost went for it myself.”

Maura leaned against him and rested her head on his shoulder. He loved it when she did that. “I can’t be too angry with Andrea. At least she agreed to testify against SS. She makes a pretty solid eyewitness.”

Two days after Maura’s brush with death at the edge of Wind Valley, Officer Cromwell had picked up SS as he limped out of the forest, bloodied and exhausted. He was now in jail in Blackbear, awaiting trial on kidnapping and attempted murder charges.

The state of Colorado had dibs on the next charges against him. Pete Perkins would be spending the foreseeable future right where he belonged—in jails and courtrooms, unable to bother Maura.

Recently, the Blackbear police had sent word that their suspect was acting very strangely. He kept telling everyone that any minute now he’d turn into either a wolf or a werewolf. This new obsession had apparently eclipsed even his fixation with Maura. The Wind Valley wolf pack had gotten its revenge.

The man needed professional help, and hopefully he would get it. But all that mattered to Lachlan was that he was out of Maura’s life, and Maura was here, with him. They were together, and whatever they did next, they’d do it together. Their first stop would be Hopper, Colorado, so he could meet her family. But after that…

“You know, if my prediction is right, I’ll probably get all the funding I need to do some traveling,” he told Maura. “How do you feel about seeing the jökulhlaup in the Himalayas?”

Her face lit up, as he’d known it would. Now that she was free from SS, she was itching for more adventure. He just hoped he could keep up with her.

“Ask me again after I’ve witnessed one jökulhlaup,” she teased. “Maybe I won’t find it all that exciting.”

“Prepare to eat those words.” He looked at his phone. He had cameras set up at various points above all potential routes of the flooding, and a server storing all the footage. Elias, acting as his intern, was monitoring all the inputs. But up here, of course, he had no cell service. All he could do was watch and listen with his own eyes and ears.

He wasn’t the only one whose future depended on what would happen next. Andrea Reed and all the TNG executives were waiting anxiously for the snow to clear so they could begin transporting equipment into the valley. They’d already staged two bulldozers to clear a road. The Lamplight Motel was filled with workers waiting for the go-ahead.

After the big meeting at The Fang, the vast majority of Firelight Ridge residents had either refused to sell their property to TNG or were waiting to see how things panned out. They’d listened to what Lachlan had told them at the meeting—no matter what plans humans made, sometimes nature had the last word.

He checked his watch. A half hour to go before his predicted time window closed. Damnit, so much for that. Back to square one.

And then…just as he was ready to pack up and head back to town, a low thunderous rumble resonated from the direction of Korch Glacier.

“That’s the sound of the ice dams breaking up,” he said excitedly. “See, what happens is that…”

“Glacial lakes fill with meltwater and rainwater during the spring and summer, which puts pressure on the glacier,” Maura finished for him. He grinned at her, loving the fact that she’d remembered his explanation of the jökulhlaup. “Then when something causes the ice to break up—warming temperatures, in this case—the ice dam collapses and all that water drains into nearby waterways.”

“A-plus, Ms. Vaughn. A gold star, too.”

She sketched a little curtsy. “Is it always this loud? It sounds like a freight train!”

“They’re noisy, yes. They’re picking up boulders and slamming them into each other. You can hear the sound a good two minutes before you see it. If we see it.” He put his binoculars to his face and stared at the bend in the valley where the flooding outburst would come through—if it wasn’t going to Smoky Lake instead.

Maura stared through her binoculars too. “Last minute bet on which way it’s going to go?”

“Nope. Let the mystery unfold.”

Moments passed. The deafening roar of the flood grew louder and closer, and even up here, Lachlan felt the vibration in the ground.

And then—a massive wall of ice and mud and rocks and water burst into view. It barreled through the deep cut between the forested slopes known as Wind Valley, almost as if it was coming home. The intense force of the flow ripped up lower elevation trees by their roots and sent them tossing like toothpicks along the churning torrent.

“Oh my God,” Maura breathed. “That’s unbelievable.”

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