Rebecca was in trouble

Mac was as sure of this as he’d ever been sure of anything. She was in terrible trouble somewhere up ahead.

Sled dog racing! he fumed. Whoever thought up such a ridiculous sport? “All right,” he bellowed to his team. “Get up.” His voice had an edge to it that he’d never used with his dogs before. They struggled valiantly against the ferocious wind and swirling snow.

Where the hell was the summit? They must be getting close. Mac looked ahead into the stormy darkness. Was that a sled in front of him? He reached out, and his hand connected with the solid wood of the driving bow. “Hey,” he shouted. “Rebecca?”

The top line of the sled bag ripped open in the fierce wind, and a man sat up. “Rebecca’s somewhere down below. She and her whole team got blown over. I don’t know how far they fell.”

Mac stared at the bottomless void. She could be anywhere along this slope or she could have tumbled clear to the bottom. How in God’s name would he ever find her in this whiteout?

He turned and plunged through the snow to the front of his team. He unhooked his lead dog from the gang line.

“Merlin, come!” he shouted over the howl of the wind. Then he turned his back on the dog and began a careful, step-by-step descent of the slope, panning his headlamp back and forth as he went.

He had to find Rebecca!

Dear Reader,

The Yukon Quest Sled Dog Race is without a doubt one of the toughest in the world—an epic journey covering one thousand miles of rugged wilderness terrain in temperatures that often reach minus sixty degrees Fahrenheit. It is the ultimate proving ground for mushers and their teams, and the cumulative effort of race volunteers, veterinarians, sponsors, handlers, families and friends. All of the characters in this story are fictional. I have taken a few liberties with both the race route and the rules, but have tried for the most part to give you, the reader, a sense of what it’s like to travel down a long trail behind a team of incredible canine athletes. And a hint of the camaraderie that can develop between the mushers themselves.

The history of the north country is written in the paw prints of the intrepid sled dogs who hauled freight, food, medicine and mail over thousands of miles of winter trails in some of the worst conditions imaginable, for the benefit of mankind. We owe them our esteem.

Nadia Nichols

Across a Thousand Miles
Nadia Nichols

www.millsandboon.co.uk

GLOSSARY OF MUSHING TERMINOLOGY

ALL RIGHT! | Command for dogs to get up and go. HIKE! may also be used.
BASKET | The main part of the sled that sits over the runners. Used to carry gear, injured dogs, etc. Also called the BED.
BOOTIES | Socks worn by dogs to protect paws against ice. Made from polar fleece and other high-tech material. Secured with Belcor strips.
BRAKE | Pivoting metal bar with two prongs that is attached between the stanchions at the rear of the BED. Musher stands on bar, which drives points into the snow and stops the sled.
BRUSHBOW | Acts like a bumper or deflector. Curved piece protrudes from front of sled and prevents damage to sled.
BUNNY BOOTS | The military version of PACK BOOTS. White rubber tops and bottoms.
DOG TRUCK | Used to transport dogs. Most common is a wooden structure built onto the bed of the truck with individual sections for each dog or pair of dogs.
DRIVING BOW | Sled handle with which the MUSHER steers the sled. Also called the HANDLE BOW or DRIVER’S BOW.
DROPPED DOGS | Any dog that cannot continue may be dropped at an official checkpoint or at an assigned dog-drop location.
FOOD DROPS | Food and equipment, bagged in burlap or poly bags and shipped ahead to checkpoints. Bags cannot exceed sixty pounds. Straw (for dog bedding) must also be shipped ahead.
GANGLINE | The main line. Dogs and sled are attached to this. May also be referred to as TOWLINE.
GEE! | Command for leaders to turn right.
HARNESS | Webbed material, fits dogs snugly. TUGLINE and NECKLINE are attached to this.
HAW! | Command for leaders to turn left.
LEAD DOG | Leader of the team. Intelligence and drive are important qualities. Teams can have one or two LEAD DOGS.
MUSHER | A person who drives a sled dog team.
NECKLINE | Short line—no more than twelve inches— attached to HARNESS and GANGLINE. Keeps dogs in place.
ON BY! | Command to go by a potential distraction such as another team.
PACK BOOTS | Felt-lined insulated boots. Usually rubber soled with leather or Cordura uppers.
PEDALING | Standing with one foot on the sled runner while pushing against the snow with the other.
POINT DOGS | These dogs run behind the LEAD DOGS. Sometimes called SWING DOGS.
RUNNERS | The two skilike “feet” that slide along the snow. Usually made of wood and covered in plastic.
SAFETY LINE | Extra line from sled to GANGLINE
SNOW HOOK | Double-pronged metal hook. Can be pushed into the snow and used as an anchor to halt the dogs for short periods of time without tethering them.
SNUB LINE | Attached to the end of the GANGLINE. Can be tied to an object (tree) to hold the dogs when the snow is too soft to use SNOW HOOK.
STANCHIONS | The upright pieces that form the framework of the sled. They hold the runners to the rest of the sled.
SWING DOGS | Either the same as POINT DOGS or may refer to the two dogs running between the POINT DOGS and the WHEEL DOGS.
TEAM DOGS | Refers to all dogs other than LEAD DOGS, POINT DOGS, SWING DOGS and WHEEL DOGS.
TUGLINE | Connects the dog’s harness to GANGLINE. WHEEL DOGS The two dogs running directly in front of the sled.
WHOA! | Command to stop the team.

To my beloved sled dogs, past and present, my heroes and my best friends, who have taken me on some of the greatest adventures of my life and who have always brought me safely home.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER ONE

Now promise made as a debt unpaid, and the trail has its own stern code…

Robert Service,

from The Cremation of Sam McGee

THE MAN WHO DROVE his truck up Rebecca Reed’s rutted dirt drive was a stranger, and her dogs let her know it long before she stepped out of the arctic entry to her small cabin and onto the front porch. She shrugged into her parka which had been hanging in the small pre-entry room as she watched his approach. The afternoon was chilly in spite of the sunlight, and the limbs of the aspen and willow were silvery and bare. Ravens were calling along the river and the wind played a lonesome song through the spruce behind the cabin. It was late autumn and the taste of snow was in the air.

He was tall. She could see that quite clearly as he climbed out of his truck. Even if his truck—with the dog box bolted to its rusting bed—hadn’t given him away, his clothing would have. “Uh-oh. Another crazy dog driver,” she commented to Tuffy, the small black-and-tan Alaskan husky who had followed her onto the porch. In her prime, Tuffy had been Bruce’s favorite lead dog, but she was old now, her muzzle graying, her movements stiff, and her eyes a bit cloudy. “I’ll lay odds he’s after a load of dog food and he’ll want it real cheap,” Rebecca said. “But how on earth did he get past my truck?” Tuffy looked at her quizzically and flagged her tail.

The stranger was dressed like a typical musher, and as he walked up the path toward the cabin, he paused for a moment to brush the worst of the mud off his drab-colored parka. His clothes were dog-eared, dog-chewed and dog-dirty. His insulated boots were patched with rubberized tool dip, his tawny shock of hair needed trimming, he was at least two days unshaven, and heaven only knew when he’d last had a decent bath. A bush dweller and a musher. A dangerous combination. He walked to the foot of the porch steps and paused there, looking up at her. “Hello,” he said with a nod and the faintest of grins. “Your truck was blocking the road and I moved it. Hope you don’t mind, but the hood was left up as if something was wrong so I took a quick look.”

“I went out to get the mail yesterday and it stalled on me,” Rebecca explained. “The battery went dead, but it shouldn’t have. It’s fairly new.”

“Well, your battery was fine, but the ground-wire connection was loose. I tightened that up, and she started like a champ, so I moved her down the drive a ways into that little pullover near the blowdown. I’ll drive her in for you if you like.”

Rebecca was taken aback. “No, thank you. I’ll walk out and drive back. Thank you very much for fixing it. My wallet’s inside. Hold on a moment, I’ll get it.”

He grinned and shook his head. “No, you won’t. I was glad to help and that was a real easy fix. The reason I’m here is that Fred Turner told me you sold dog food. He said you had the best prices in the Territory, so I thought I’d swing by your kennel on my way into Dawson.”

“I do sell dog food,” Rebecca said warily. “But it’s good dog food. I don’t sell the cheap stuff.”

“Good dog food’s what I’m looking for,” he said. He rubbed the back of his neck and glanced around her yard. “You’ve got quite a few dogs yourself,” he said.

“Forty,” she said.

“Forty!” He glanced up at her, and she noticed that his eyes were exceptionally clear and bright, a shade of gray that hinted at blue or green, she couldn’t tell which. “My name’s Bill MacKenzie. Most folks call me Mac.”

“Rebecca Reed,” she said, with a curt nod. “How much food were you looking to buy?”

“Well, I only keep fourteen dogs myself, and I have plenty of chum salmon to carry them through the winter. I was thinking along the lines of forty bags, if you had that much to spare. That should see me through till spring.”

“I could sell you that much food,” Rebecca said, “but that truck of yours is only a half-ton, and it isn’t even four-wheel drive. I doubt it could haul that heavy a load.”

“Well, I know it doesn’t look like much,” Mac admitted. “But it’s a tough truck, sure enough. She’ll carry a ton of food, easy, four-wheel drive or no.”

“How far do you have to take it?”

“Thirty miles or so. Not far. Hell, if it would just hurry up and snow, I could ferry the food back with my dog team. It’d be good training for them.”

Rebecca smiled faintly. “It’ll snow soon enough. You said you were on your way to Dawson, so I guess you’ll be wanting to pick the food up on your way back to wherever it is you live?”

Mac nodded. “That’d be great. I’m bringing a dog to the veterinarian for a checkup. She’s a good dog but she’s been off her feed for nearly a week. My appointment isn’t until four, so I thought I’d spend the night in town and get an early start tomorrow. I could be here by eight-thirty, if that’s all right with you.”

Rebecca shrugged. “Fine by me. I suppose if Fred Turner told you I sold dog food, he probably also told you that I don’t extend credit. My husband started this business five years ago and he gave credit to every Tom, Dick, and Harry that came up the trail. Couldn’t say no to anyone. When he died he left me in an awful mess. I’ll sell you however much dog food you need, but you’ll pay cash at pickup, same as everybody else. Twenty-five dollars a bag.” Rebecca narrowed her eyes as she spoke, aware that her words were hard and businesslike, and aware, too, that MacKenzie probably didn’t have two dimes to rub together. Probably didn’t even carry a checkbook or a credit card.

“I understand,” Mac said, nodding. “That’s good business.” He patted the flat, frayed pocket of his parka and grinned again. “Not to worry about my finances,” he assured her. “I’ve got me a good little jag of cash, what with all the furs I’ve sold. I could pay you right now if you like.”

“You can pay at pickup,” Rebecca said. “You’re a trapper?”

“I run a trapline up along Flat Creek.”

“Really.” Rebecca frowned. “How long have you been living out there?”

Mac paused, his eyes suddenly intent on searching the ground at his feet. The color in his windburned cheeks deepened. “Well, not that long,” he admitted. “Since early August. Actually my brother’s the trapper and they were his furs, but he’s gone to Fairbanks to finish his degree at the University of Alaska. He asked me if I’d like to spend a winter in the Yukon, taking care of his dogs and running his trapline. The timing was perfect, so here I am.” Mac grinned again, raising his eyes to hers. “They’re real good dogs. He ran the Yukon Quest with them last year and finished third. He told me to sell the furs and buy dog food for them.”

“Ah,” Rebecca said. “You’re Brian MacKenzie’s brother.”

“Yes. You know him?”

“He and my husband were friends.”

Mac nodded. “Well, he wants me to run his dogs this winter, so I expect I will. There’s not much to it, really. He gave me a some lessons before he left, and I’ve been working with the dogs for a few months now. We should be able to do really well at some of these races. I’d kind of like to win the Percy DeWolf. It’s only 210 miles and those dogs of my brother’s will eat that up like it was nothing.”

“Had you ever driven a dog team before you came out here?” Rebecca asked.

“Nope. But I’m a quick study and my brother’s a good teacher. What about you? Are you planning to run any races this season?”

Rebecca shrugged again. “Depends on the training, I guess, and my work schedule.” She straightened up and zipped her parka. “You’d better get headed for Dawson. It’ll be pitch-dark soon, and I’ve still got chores to do.”

“Need any help? I could give you a ride out to your truck,” he offered.

“No, thanks. I can manage and I like the walk.” She started to turn away and then paused. “Be careful of that soft spot in the drive just before you get to the main road. Keep to the left of the deep ruts and you should be okay.”

Rebecca watched him turn and walk back toward his truck. Her eyes narrowed speculatively. “Early thirties,” she said to Tuffy, who had remained at her side. “See the way he walks? Definitely military. I should have guessed he was Brian’s big brother when he told me his name.” She laughed softly, the first time she’d laughed in forever. “Win the Percy DeWolf? He’s awfully arrogant, wouldn’t you say, Tuffy, for a cheechako who probably doesn’t know a dog harness from a doghouse!” Tuffy, as always, cheerfully agreed.

MacKenzie’s truck started hard, with much grinding and groaning. It took several tries for him to turn around in Rebecca’s yard, backing up into the irregular gaps between the spruce trees and the dog barn, and the dog yard fence and the cabin porch. At length, with a burst of black exhaust, he was gone, and the sound of the old truck’s engine faded into silence.

Rebecca gazed beyond her late husband’s dog yard, at the wall of rugged mountains that made up the Dawson Range. Bruce Reed, she thought, I miss you like crazy and I hate you for leaving me here with a pack of forty sled dogs to look after and a business that’s still in the red….

Her eyes stung with tears, and a sudden chill made her wrap her arms around herself as she stood on the cabin porch. Tuffy leaned her small but solid weight against Rebecca’s leg. Rebecca sniffed and let one hand drop to stroke the dog’s head. “I don’t hate him, Tuffy,” she said softly. “I’m just mad at him, that’s all. I want him back and he won’t come, but that’s not really his fault, is it?”

She might have stood there feeling sorry for herself indefinitely, but there were chores to do. There were dogs to feed, a wood box to fill, water to haul and, finally, her own supper to cook. Tomorrow she had sled dogs to train, more chores to do, more wood and water to haul, and the guest cabin needed a good cleaning in preparation for the steady stream of clients that would inhabit it once the snow came, some flying in from as faraway as Japan to spend a week in the Yukon behind a team of dogs. Bruce’s outfitting business, now in its fifth year, had gotten off to a slow start, but if Rebecca’s figures were correct, this year it would actually turn a profit. Nearly all of the available dates were filled with clients seeking a northern adventure. More than half of them were repeats. Between the food sales, the guided trips, and the small sums she earned writing a weekly column for a Whitehorse newspaper, Rebecca, without her husband, was managing to scrape by.

As she mixed the dog food in the big galvanized washtubs, three of them set side to shoulder inside the cabin door, she caught herself thinking about Bill MacKenzie. “He’ll never make it,” she said to Tuffy as she mixed the ground meat into the kibble and added copious quantities of warm water from the huge kettles steaming atop the woodstove. “He’ll never last out the winter in Brian’s shack up on the Flat. He may think he’s Jeremiah Johnson, but he doesn’t have a clue. This country will eat him up.” She shook her head and laughed for the second time that day. “Ex-military. He probably has a hard time tying his bootlaces without a drill sergeant instructing him.” She scooped the warm, soupy mix of meat, kibble, fat, vitamins and water into five-gallon buckets, hoisted two of them with hands that were callused and arms that were necessarily strong. She pushed the door open with a practiced kick of her booted toe, did likewise to the door from the arctic entry and emerged from the cabin to the wolflike chorus of forty huskies howling for their dinner.

Halfway through her chores she paused for a moment, pushed a stray lock of hair from her forehead with the back of her wrist and shook her head. “Boy, I feel kind of sorry for his dogs.”

“WE’LL NEED TO TAKE X rays to see what’s going on,” the veterinarian said, removing his stethoscope and laying it on the side table. “From what you’re telling me and from what I’m hearing inside her, it sounds like some sort of intestinal obstruction. Does she eat rocks?”

“Rocks?” Mac stared down at the small sled dog that he steadied in his arms. “Why would she do that?”

The veterinarian laughed. “You’d be amazed at the things we find in a sled dog’s intestines. Rocks are the most common. They start out playing with them and then for some unfathomable reason they swallow them.”

“Rocks,” Mac said. He shook his head. “I guess there’s a lot I need to learn about these dogs. Okay, so what happens now?”

“We’ll knock her out, take some pictures and if there’s an obstruction, we’ll go ahead and surgically remove it. She’ll have to stay overnight for observation, and I’d like to get some IV hydration into her.”

“And if you don’t find anything?”

“I’ll do some blood work and we’ll take it from there. The other option is to keep dosing her with mineral oil the way you’ve been doing and hope the obstruction works its way through. But she’s pretty dehydrated right now and she’s lost a lot of condition. There’s also the possibility of a rupture of the intestine, which would cause massive infection. It’s up to you. If you want to wait a little longer…”

Mac shook his head. “Go ahead and do whatever needs to be done. I don’t want to take any chances with her. Can I call here tonight and find out how she’s doing?”

“We should know how we’re going to proceed as soon as we see what the problem is. If you leave a number where you can be reached, I’ll give you a call.”

“I’m staying at the Eldorado,” Mac said. He stroked the dog’s head one final time before leaving her to the vet. “You’re a good girl, Callie,” he said. “You’ll feel better soon.” Sick as she was, Callie wagged her tail at his words and tried to follow him out of the examination room, which made him feel worse than ever. If someone had told him three months ago that he would be so attached to a pack of sled dogs, he would have laughed in disbelief, but abandoning Callie at the veterinarian’s launched him into a state of high anxiety.

He paced the lobby at the Eldorado for nearly an hour before the phone call came. The X rays showed a large obstruction, probably a rock. They were commencing surgery and would phone again to let him know how things went. Another ninety anxious minutes later, he got word that the operation had been successful and that Callie was fine. “That rock was as big as a hen’s egg,” the vet said. “I saved it for you.”

Mac’s relief was followed by intense hunger. He ate a huge and satisfying meal, then had a couple of cold beers while watching some of the locals shoot pool in the barroom. His thoughts kept returning to Rebecca Reed. Try as he might, he couldn’t get her out of his mind. Fred Turner was a taciturn old cuss, but he’d divulged a good deal about her when he’d stopped at Mac’s cabin for a visit two weeks back. “Terrible sad story,” Fred had said, shaking his head and blinking the sting of a large swallow of Jack Daniel’s from his eyes. “She came here with her husband, oh, must be five, six years ago. Quiet little thing. Shy. Hard worker, though. Worked right alongside her man, never shirked. Good with the dogs, too. She helped Bruce train, ran some races herself and did real well.

“Bruce, he ran the long races. The Iditarod and the Yukon Quest. Those are thousand-mile races. Tough races. Rebecca ran some of the shorter ones. Two, three hundred milers like the Fireplug, the Copper Basin, the Percy DeWolf. They started up a business giving tours by dog team and selling dog food. Best prices in the Territory on dog food. And then Bruce went and got himself killed. Hit a moose with his truck coming back from a supply trip to Whitehorse. We all thought she’d pack up and leave, but by God she’s stuck it out, all by herself. Folks say she hasn’t smiled once since Bruce died, and she’s got no family to turn to, just a mother back East who thinks she’s crazy livin’ way out here in the wilderness.”

Mac leaned his elbows on the bar and cradled the beer bottle between his palms. Fred hadn’t mentioned that Rebecca Reed was an arrestingly beautiful woman. Long, dark hair plaited in a thick braid, high forehead, wide-set blue eyes, straight nose, expressive mouth that wanted to smile but wouldn’t, and a determined chin with a little dimple in it. The thought of her living in that cabin all by herself, grieving for her husband, disturbed him more than he cared to admit. Divorced for several months, his own experiences with women had led him to conclude that most of them were fickle. Loyalty simply did not abide in them. Yet how could he explain this woman living in voluntary seclusion, this young widow who hadn’t smiled since her husband died? And might things have turned out differently for him in that military courtroom if he’d had the love and support of a wife like Rebecca? Would he have fought harder for his exoneration?

Mac sighed. Taking care of forty dogs must be a hell of a lot of work for a woman! Caring for his brother’s dogs turned him inside out, and getting away from them for just one day was more of a vacation than a three-week holiday used to be. How on earth did she manage all by herself?

“Hey, mister.” A man leaned on the bar beside him, olive-drab wool cap with the ear flaps turned up, windburned complexion, black eyes, red-and-black-plaid flannel shirt, green wool pants with bright orange suspenders. “Barkeep tells me you play a mean game of pool and you’re looking for some action.”

Mac finished his beer and straightened. “Well, I don’t know how mean it is, but it’s pretty good, I guess.”

“Good enough to place a bet on?”

“Maybe.” Mac followed the woodsman to the pool table, thinking smugly, Ha! Easy money!

Six hours later he opened his eyes and stared up at an unfamiliar ceiling. For a moment he couldn’t remember where he was or why he felt so awful. Pool… He’d played pool with a guy named Joe Redshirt, and Joe played a pretty mean game of pool himself. Whiskey. Joe had bought him several shots over the course of the evening. One of the last coherent memories Mac had was of an easy rail shot he’d pooched, and Joe’s deadpan voice drawling, “Don’t worry, son, I couldn’t make those shots when I was young, either.”

Mac closed his eyes, moaned, then opened them again, realization flooding through him. “Dammit!” He swung his legs over the edge of the bed and stood, not overly surprised to find himself fully clothed. He held on to the nightstand for a moment until his legs steadied beneath him, then staggered to the chair. His fingers dug into the frayed pockets of his parka with frantic movements, and he knew a moment of wild relief when he drew forth the carefully folded envelope that held the dog-food money. He spilled the bills out onto the coverlet and counted them. Sweat beaded his brow. He counted again, as if more might appear the second time around then sank onto the edge of the bed. By nature he was neither a gambler nor a heavy drinker, but betting on a game of pool had seemed like such an easy way to win money to help pay both the vet and the hotel charges, and Joe Redshirt had kept handing him those shots of whiskey…

…and somehow Mac had gambled away half his dog-food money.

One hot shower and thirty minutes later, he was standing in the vet’s office counting those same bills again. Then he pushed all but sixty dollars toward the receptionist. She counted it primly before writing him out a receipt. “I’ll get Callie for you now,” she said, and disappeared into the back room. Mac stared at the remaining bills in his hand with a feeling of doom. “Oh, God,” he said to the empty room. “I’m flat broke.”

When he finally got Callie comfortably ensconced in the passenger seat of his old truck, he was stunned to realize that it was nearly 10 a.m. He had an early-morning appointment to pick up nearly a ton of dog food from a beautiful widow named Rebecca Reed, who lived about an hour outside of Dawson…and who didn’t sell dog food on credit.

“Oh, God,” he said again, putting the truck in gear and heading down the Klondike Highway. “I’m a dead man.”

“YOU’RE LATE! Rebecca said, hands on her hips. I could have trained three teams of dogs in the amount of time I’ve spent waiting around for you.”

A stiff wind bent the tops of the spruce, and the overcast sky gave off an ominous thundering. “I’m sorry,” Mac said. He stood at the foot of the porch steps looking about as apologetic as she’d ever seen a man look. Those broad military shoulders were hunched, and his hands were shoved deep into his parka pockets. His tawny hair was tousled, though clean and freshly trimmed, and he had obviously shaved, revealing more clearly the strong, masculine planes of cheekbone and chin, but his eyes mirrored his abject guilt.

“Well, I’m not going to help you load the dog food. That’s your job. Back your truck up to that door on the end of the dog barn. Your food is on pallets stacked to the right of the door. Forty bags, though I seriously doubt your truck will take the load.”

He nodded again, looked over his shoulder at the old rusted truck, then dropped his gaze to the toes of his worn-out pack boots. He stood silently at the foot of the cabin steps until Rebecca felt a knot forming in the pit of her stomach.

“What is it?” she said.

He sighed and dug his hands deeper into his parka pockets. He lifted his shoulders and let them fall. A snowflake fluttered down from the leaden sky and brushed over his shoulder unseen. “Well, the thing is, I’m a little short of cash,” he said in a low voice, speaking to the ground at his feet. “The vet bill turned out to be higher than I expected. You see, Callie ate this big rock…” He raised his eyes and pulled one hand out of his pocket, fingers unfolding to reveal the smooth egg-shaped stone cradled within.

Rebecca stared at the rock and crossed her arms in front of her. The wind was cold, but a curious feeling warmed her blood. “I see. Yes, that certainly is a big rock. So. You spent all your money on what had to be the most expensive surgery ever performed in the Yukon, and I suppose now you want me to extend credit to you?”

Mac shook his head. “I have enough left to buy a couple of bags. I can come up with more money. I’ll sell some stuff up at the cabin. A couple of bags will hold me over till I can hock my watch. I have a good one. A Rolex.” He bared his wrist to display the watch, but Rebecca was unimpressed. Another snowflake whirled through the air, a tiny dance of white, a promise of winter. He watched it land and disappear, then raised his eyes to hers. “I’m not asking to buy on credit. I’ll get the money. Callie’s okay, and right at this moment that’s all that matters.”

Rebecca’s arms tightened against herself. Bruce would have done the same. He would have sold his soul to the devil to save one of his dogs. And truth be known, so would she. “Take the food,” she said shortly, “and pay me when you can. Your brother, Brian, did very well with his trapline. I expect you’ll be able to make good on this loan in a month or so. I can’t abide the thought of those good dogs of Brian’s going hungry, and they can’t live on chum salmon…and egg-size rocks.”

Mac stared at her until she felt the cold knot in the pit of her stomach return with a vengeance. “What is it now?” she demanded.

“Trapping.” His eyes pleaded with her to understand, and the flush across his cheekbones deepened. Rebecca waited, grim-faced, for him to continue. “I tried trapping. I set the traps like Brian showed me. For a while there was nothing, and then I caught a fox,” he said. “When I came to check the trap, the fox was… It had…” He half turned away from her and rubbed the back of his neck with his hand. His shoulders rose and fell around a silent sigh. “I let the fox go. It just didn’t seem right.”

Rebecca looked at him for a moment and then turned her back abruptly, raised her hands to her mouth and coughed behind them to hide her smile.

“I don’t know what I’m going to do to earn the money, but something’s bound to come up.”

She turned around, her face composed, and nodded curtly. “I’m sure you’re good for it. Load the dog food. You have a long trip ahead of you, and it’s starting to snow.”

She watched him back the old truck up to the barn door and let her hand drop to rest on the head of the dog who was forever by her side. “He can’t trap wild animals, Tuffy,” she said softly, a bemused smile curving the corners of her mouth. “Who can figure the heart of a man?”

IT TOOK MACKENZIE a good thirty minutes to load the bags. Rebecca spent the time mixing her own batch of dog food for the evening feeding. The cabin was warm, and she lit an oil lamp against the early twilight. The hardest part of living in the north was the lack of daylight in winter months. It wasn’t so bad now, but come December the nights would be endless, and sunlight all but a precious memory. She gave the stew pot a stir and poked the pan of sourdough bread rising on the warming shelf, shifting it to a cooler spot. A light tap on the door drew her back onto the cabin porch. MacKenzie stood humbly before her. “Thank you,” he said. “I’ll be off now.”

“Good,” she said.

He nodded. “I’ll pay you within the month.”

“I’m sure you will.”

She couldn’t keep the edge of sarcasm from her voice. He nodded again and turned away, walked down the three steps and crossed the yard to where his truck was parked. He paused before climbing into the cab. “Need any mechanical work done on your truck?” he asked hopefully.

“Nope.”

“Two weeks,” he said. “I’ll have the money in two weeks!”

She didn’t reply, and he climbed into the cab and slammed the door. The truck started right up, but he had to work to get it into first gear. He pulled ahead with a lurch that stalled it. He started it again, waved his arm out the side window when the engine finally caught and slowly rumbled out of the yard, the old truck’s springs sagging under the heavy load. As he drove cautiously down the long rutted track that led to the main road, it began to snow in earnest, the flakes whirling past on a strong westerly wind. By morning there would be a foot or more. Winter came all at once in the north country and stayed for a very long time.

She stepped inside to fill the buckets with dog food, hurrying now to beat the darkness and the storm. The dogs howled with delight as she reemerged bearing their supper, which she ladled into the feed pans attached to the sides of their houses. “We’ll run tomorrow, Thor,” she promised the black lead dog, another of her husband’s favorites. “Maybe even with the sled.” She’d been training the dog teams with a four-wheeler since the weather had cooled in August, letting twelve dogs pull the ATV down miles of dirt roads, and while rig training was important, she couldn’t wait to get back onto the sled. Nothing compared to a fast run behind a good team of well-trained dogs. Rebecca had come to love the dogs and the lifestyle they represented. She had come to love this little place on the edge of the wilderness, the timeless cycle of the seasons, the ebb and flow of life, and the hard, harsh laws of the wild. If not for the aching loneliness that had hollowed her heart since losing Bruce, she would be quite content here.

“Okay, Quinn, I’m coming with the chow. Hold your horses!” She dished out the food quickly, moving amongst the whirl and dance of the excited animals with practiced ease, speaking each dog’s name as she fed it. Finally she dropped the scoop back into one of the empty buckets with a weary sigh. “Done and done.” The snow was already turning the ground white, and strong gusts of wind lifted it up in streamers. “Wild night ahead.”

She wondered how MacKenzie was making out on his long drive home, and no sooner did this unbidden thought enter her mind than the dogs erupted into a frenzy of barking, all eyes focused on the dirt track that led to the main road. She followed their gaze and after a few moments picked out the dark shape of a man moving through the thick veil of wind-driven snow. “It can’t be!” she said.

But it was. MacKenzie trudged into her yard and veered in her direction. His hair was plastered with snow. “I’m sorry to bother you,” he said over the roar of the wind. “My truck broke a U-joint about half a mile from here, just shy of the main road.”

Clutching both empty buckets in one mittened hand, she stared at him. “I guess it was too heavy a load,” she couldn’t resist saying.

“I guess,” he said.

“You got into that soft spot, didn’t you?” she said. He nodded. “Well, what do you want me to do about it?”

“I was wondering if I could borrow your phone.”

“You’re assuming I have one. Who do you plan to call?”

“God,” he said.

“I don’t have that kind of a phone. Mine is a limited-signal radio phone, and the best you can do with it is to call over to Sam and Ellin Dodge’s place. They have a ham radio and can call into Dawson for a wrecker, but nobody will come out tonight with a storm brewing. And even if someone does, a wrecker won’t get you home with a load of dog food for a pack of hungry dogs.”

“No, ma’am, probably not.”

“And if you don’t get home tonight, who’s going to feed your dogs?”

“Fred Turner. He’s staying at my place till I get back.”

“Fred Turner?” Rebecca glared at Mac. “Fred Turner’s about as dependable as one might expect an alcoholic amnesiac to be. If you left any liquor in your cabin, he’s drunk it all by now. Lord only knows what shape your dogs’ll be in when you get back.”

“I can fix that U-joint in jig time. All I need is the right part. I noticed you had an old, broken-down Ford parked behind the dog yard…”

“That old, broken-down Ford is my snowplow, mister, and you aren’t laying a hand on it! Sam Dodge has some junkers over at his place. He may have the part you need. Like I said, you can use my phone to call him, though you won’t be able to do much in the pitch-dark.”

“I have a headlamp in my truck,” Mac said. “Hell, I could work blind if I had to. I’m a fair enough mechanic. How far away do these folks live?”

“Sam and Ellin? Not far. Five miles down the trail, east of here.”

“Which trail?”

“That one.” Rebecca raised her free hand and pointed. “If you hurry you could get there and back in my four-wheeler before the snow gets too deep, but we’d better call ahead first.”

“I appreciate this,” Mac said, following her into the warmth of the cabin. He stopped inside the door and looked around while she hooked the radio phone to the twelve-volt battery. She noticed him staring at Bruce’s clothing on the wall pegs near the door and the pair of man-size Bunny boots behind the wood cookstove. “You have a real nice place here,” he offered. She said nothing, dialing Sam and Ellin’s number by heart and hoping that they had their phone turned on.

They did. Ellin answered on the second ring. Her voice was always warm and welcome to Rebecca’s ears. “’Becca! Sweetheart, how are you? I hope you’re all ready for winter, my dear, because its here!”

Rebecca quickly filled Ellin in, and within moments Sam was speaking directly to Mac about parts and pieces and tools and time. Finally, Mac handed her the phone and grinned. “All set!” he said. “They have the part I need. All I have to do is pull it, bring it back here, and fix my truck. Callie should be all right in the meantime.”

“I could drive you over,” she offered, albeit grudgingly. She had chores to finish, a column to write and a deadline to meet.

“No need, if I can borrow your four-wheeler.”

Relieved, she led him back out into the brumal blast, zipping her parka against the cold. It was rapidly growing dark. The four-wheeler was parked inside the barn, and she swung the door wide and held it open against the force of the wind while he started up the vehicle and drove it out. Once again she pointed at the mouth of the trail that led directly from her yard into the thick spruce forest. “Just follow that trail. You can’t possibly get lost. It takes you right into Sam and Ellin’s yard. Don’t worry about Callie. I’ll bring her into the cabin and keep an eye on her.”

“Thanks,” he said, visibly relieved. He shifted into first gear, and was swallowed up instantly by the darkness and the storm.

CHAPTER TWO

THE WIND MADE a noise in the eaves that sounded like a dying man’s moan, and Rebecca fed more sticks into the stove to thwart the deepening cold that worked its way through tiny cracks between the cabin logs and radiated up from the floorboards. It was nearing midnight, and still no sign of Bill MacKenzie. The storm had intensified, and more than eighteen inches already covered the frozen ground in some areas. Rebecca poured herself another cup of tea, her fifth of the night. Maybe it was time to get out of the dog-food business. The markup was so small, just fifty cents a bag. For the privilege of selling Bill MacKenzie forty bags, she had earned the tidy sum of twenty dollars, not even enough for one bag of food for her own huskies. And that was assuming he ever paid her.

It simply wasn’t worth the aggravation.

And where was he, anyway? He had her four-wheeler, a Honda that Bruce had spent a small fortune on four years ago. If he hurt that machine… “Okay,” she said to Tuffy. “He left here around four o’clock. It’s five miles to Sam and Ellin’s. He has to go out back and remove the parts he needs from the junkers Sam collects and that’s going to take some time. One, two, three hours? Even if Ellin feeds him—and she surely will— he should have been back at least three hours ago. The snow is too deep now for the four-wheeler, which means he’s stuck out there somewhere and freezing to death.”

Rebecca paced the small confines of the kitchen with mug of tea in hand. Tuffy raised her head and watched intently. “I can’t call Ellin,” Rebecca told the dog. “I thought he’d be back by nine so I didn’t phone before and now it’s too late, Sam goes to bed early and if I bother them now…” She took a sip of tea. “I have to! If he’s lost out there we’ll have to find him. It’s ten degrees standing temperature, but way below zero with the wind chill.”

She set her mug down with a thump on the kitchen table and plugged the radio phone into the battery. “Ellin? Ellin, it’s Rebecca! Where on earth is Bill MacKenzie!”

Ellin’s voice was drowsy with sleep. “Why, he’s right here! He’s spending the night. It was late and the weather was far too nasty for him to head back after he and Sam had gotten the parts, so we made him bed down in the boys’ bedroom.” Ellin’s voice lowered to a naughty whisper. “My dear girl, wherever did you find him! He’s a treasure!”

“Ellin, for your information I did not find him! He bought a load of dog food from me, and his truck just happened to break down on my road! Do you mean to say that all this time he’s been sleeping?”

“Like a baby. We tried to call, but as usual your phone was unplugged. Don’t be mad, my dear. I must tell you that we’ve enjoyed his company immensely. He even helped Sam fix that old Bombardier of ours, he’s that good a mechanic! I must say, you’ve got yourself quite a man there, Rebecca.”

“Ellin, he’s not my man! I’m sorry to have woken you but I thought… I just didn’t know…” She glanced at Callie, who was curled on a blanket behind the stove, sound asleep. “I mean, it’s a bad storm and he—”

“You were worried. I understand completely.” Ellin’s grandmotherly voice soothed and reassured. “But worry no more, my dear. We’re taking good care of him and we’ll get him back to you safely first thing in the morning. Now go to bed and get some sleep.”

Rebecca couldn’t be angry with Ellin, and as she climbed the steep stairs to the cabin’s sleeping loft, she surprised herself by laughing for the second time that day.

BY MORNING the storm had blown itself out, and at 8 a.m. Sam and Ellin arrived, riding double on the wide-track Bombardier snowmobile and towing a sled. Bill MacKenzie was driving Rebecca’s Honda behind them. Rebecca had finished watering and feeding the dogs, and she invited the elderly couple into the cabin for a cup of coffee. Mac came inside briefly to check on Callie and then went out to rummage in the sled behind the Bombardier. She could see several mysterious tools protruding from the canvas wrappings he pulled out.

“Mac’s a darn good mechanic,” Sam said, as he settled himself into a chair at the kitchen table. Sam was in his seventies, lean and trim and bursting with the health and vitality of a man who had lived most of his life in the outdoors. Ellin’s hair was as white as her husband’s, and she was also in shape. They had lived in the Yukon all of their lives, had raised four boys in their cabin, home-schooling them with such success that all four had gone on to successful careers.

“He’s Brian’s older brother, and I remember Brian telling us he was in the military. I don’t recall which branch,” Rebecca said, pouring the coffee. “He’s taking care of Brian’s team for the winter.”

“Well, he certainly knows his stuff. He knows airplanes, too,” Sam said. “You should’ve seen his eyes light up when he saw my old Stearman! Said he’d help me get her back in the air this spring if I wanted. I guess I wouldn’t mind having some help.”

“I’ve never known you to refuse help,” Ellin said to her husband. “Now,” she turned to Rebecca. “Let me give you a bit of advice—”

“Ellin, before you start, let me just say this,” Rebecca interrupted firmly. “I’m not the least bit interested in Bill MacKenzie. I hardly know him.”

Ellin sat up straighter. “It’s been a long time since—”

“I wouldn’t go there if I were you, Ellin,” Sam advised his wife. “Rebecca knows her own mind.”

“Thank you, Sam,” Rebecca said.

“She can’t spend the rest of her life grieving.”

“When it’s time to move on, she’ll know it,” Sam replied.

“I doubt it. Rebecca’s one of the stubbornnest people I know,” Ellin said.

“Now, just a minute!” Rebecca nudged the sugar bowl in Sam’s direction. “I wouldn’t call myself—”

“Well, you are, my dear, and you might as well admit it. Trying to make a go of it alone here, running Bruce’s business—”

“My business now, Ellin, and I’m doing just fine with it. Better than Bruce did, if the truth be known.”

“It’s too much! You need help. Especially with the dogs and the tour business. What if you were out on a training run with a team of dogs and something went wrong? What if you never made it back home? Who would know you were missing? Who would know to come looking for you?” Ellin leaned over the table, her blue eyes earnest. “My dear girl, the lowest possible denominator in this part of the world is two. You simply can’t go it alone!”

Rebecca sighed and lifted her coffee cup. “Ellin, just what are you getting at? You want me to marry this man? This stranger?”

“He’s not a stranger. He’s Brian’s brother!”

“This conversation is getting a little too weird for me,” Sam said, pushing out of his chair. “I think I’ll go see if I can give Mac a hand.”

“Yes, you do that,” Ellin said, waving him away as if he were an annoying fly and turning her attention to Rebecca. “Not marriage, my dear. At least, not until you know each other a little better.”

“Thank you for that much, at least,” Rebecca said.

“I think you should hire him.”

“What?”

“Think about it. He owes you money. He told us the story about the dog food and also that he couldn’t pay Sam for the truck parts. So to work off the parts, he’s going to help Sam with some odd jobs. Maybe he could work off what he owes you for the dog food. You need a man’s help around here. He could get in your firewood, help with the tours, pick up the food in Whitehorse, help take care of the dogs—”

“No!” Rebecca said.

“Oh, I know what you’re thinking. Where will he live? He can’t stay in your guest cabin because most of the time it’ll be occupied with paying clients. Well, don’t you worry, I’ve thought it all out. He can stay with us. We have that log cabin the boys built. It needs some fixing here and there, but he’s perfectly capable of making it livable, and it has a good roof. He can move the junk that’s stored there into the hangar, and in his spare time he can help Sam with mechanical things, like keeping the snow machines up and running, and working on that old wreck of an airplane.” Ellin sat back in her chair with a self-satisfied smile. “Don’t you see how perfectly that would work out for all of us?”

“No!” Rebecca repeated. “No, I don’t. If you want to hire him, Ellin, you go right ahead. Be my guest!” She nodded to give her words emphasis. “But I want no part of it.”

SAM FOUND Bill MacKenzie wedged beneath the rear axle of his old truck, his booted feet sticking out into the snow. “Well,” Sam said, hunkering down on his heels and peering beneath the truck’s frame. “How does she look?”

“She looks like a broken U-joint to me,” came the muffled reply. “As a matter of fact, she looks just as broke today as she looked yesterday.”

“You’ll need to jack her up,” Sam suggested mildly.

“Damn straight, and if I had a jack I would, but this old truck of Brian’s doesn’t seem to be blessed with one, and to tell you the truth, I think I’d rather be horse-whipped than ask Rebecca Reed if I could borrow hers.”

“Well, now, son, I don’t see why that should bother you. Rebecca’s a good woman.”

There was a thump, a grunt of pain, and then, with much wriggling, Mac squeezed out from beneath the truck and sat up. A thin trickle of blood ran from a gouge over his left eyebrow. “I’m sure she is,” he said, rubbing the wound and smearing it with grease. “But that woman dislikes me and I don’t blame her. We’ve hardly known each other two days and already I owe her a lot of money. I’ve never owed anybody anything in my entire life. It’s no wonder she thinks poorly of me.”

“Oh, now, she don’t think bad of you.”

Mac laughed. “Well, if she doesn’t, she sure puts on a good show.” He climbed to his feet and brushed the snow off his pants. “I can’t do anything without getting the hind end of this truck off the ground. I better just bite the bullet and go ask if I can borrow her jack. She probably has three or four of ’em, all heavy-duty monsters capable of lifting a Mack truck.

“She has at least two that I know of,” Sam agreed. “I’ll ask her, if you want.”

Mac shook his head. “Thanks. I’ll do it. Her opinion of me can’t get much lower.”

They both heard the approaching truck at the same time, and moments later Rebecca’s old red Ford lumbered into view, plowing up a wave of snow before it. She cut the engine as she drove around Mac’s truck, opened the cab door and dropped to the ground. “Gosh! I thought for sure you’d have it all fixed by now,” she said.

“Couldn’t jack her up,” he said. “Couldn’t find the jack…”

“Ah,” she said, nodding calmly. “Well, I’ve got one. A good heavy-duty one.” She turned and walked back to the truck and Mac watched her, admiring the way she moved, her self-possessed grace, wishing more than anything in the world that he could do just one thing right in this woman’s presence. He saw her struggling with the heavy jack and moved to help her.

“This is great!” he said as he took it from her hands. “This’ll do the job. Thanks.”

“You’re bleeding,” she said.

“Bumped my head.” He turned back toward his truck. In a matter of minutes the vehicle was jacked up enough for him to crawl beneath it with his tools and spare parts spread on an old blanket beside him.

“How about a light?” Sam said.

“Oh, he doesn’t need one,” Rebecca said. “He told me he could work blindfolded, he’s that good.”

“Well, there’s a headlamp on the front seat,” Mac said. “if you wouldn’t mind passing it to me.”

He heard her footsteps march up to the driver’s side. She wrenched open the door. Long pause. “I don’t see any lamp.”

“Look under the stuff on the passenger’s side,” Mac called out, picturing the horror in her beautiful eyes as she beheld the heaps of trash in the cab of his brother’s truck. “It’s buried in there somewhere.”

She climbed into the cab, and as she did so, the truck began to move.

“Hey!” Mac shouted. Seconds later the vehicle shifted just enough for the jack to kick out from beneath the bumper. The back of the truck banged down hard, making him cry out as the air was driven from his lungs. He tried to move but couldn’t. The undercarriage of the truck pressed against him as one of the tires slid more deeply into a rut.

“Mac? Mac! Are you okay?” he heard her ask as her feet hit the ground.

“I’m fine,” he managed. “But…I’m kind of…pinned… under here…”

“Help me, Sam!” Rebecca sounded scared. “We’ve got to get this thing back up! Chock the front wheels again, front and back! Hurry!” Mac heard the frenzy of coordinated movements as they got the jack under the rear bumper and worked the long handle. The rear of the truck rose slowly, and he felt the pressure against his chest ease, though breathing was still difficult. “I think that’s enough!” Rebecca said. “Mac? Can you move at all?”

“Yeah,” he said, the word more gasped than spoken. “I’m fine. I just got wedged in a little too tightly.” He slowly inched his way out and just as slowly pushed himself into a sitting position. He looked at her…and felt as if he were gazing into the face of a beautiful angel that was drifting slowly away from him and into a gathering darkness.

“Mac?” Rebecca said, and then caught him as he slumped forward into her arms.

“WELL, BILL MACKENZIE, I think you’ll live,” Sadie Hedda said, corralling medical paraphernalia into her bag. “You’ll be a little sore, but that’s to be expected after being squashed by a truck. You’re young and strong and in very good shape. Your blood pressure is stable, and I don’t think there’s any internal bleeding. Like I said, you have at least six cracked ribs and some pretty impressive bruising, so you’ll be laid up for a while, and we’ll have to keep the ribs taped. But I don’t see any long-term complications unless you do something foolish, like puncture a lung.” Sadie shrugged into her parka and tucked her flaming mane of shoulder-length hair beneath a thick fleece hat. Her broad freckled face broke into a smile, and she reached to give Rebecca’s arm a squeeze, walking with her to the door. She lowered her voice to a barely audible murmur. “Jeez, Becky, you landed yourself a live one here! He’s one handsome son of a gun!”

“He’s not mine,” Rebecca said stonily. “How long does he have to stay in bed?”

“If I were you,” Hedda advised, “I’d keep him there as long as possible.”

“Sadie! I’m serious. My first clients of the season are coming to stay in this cabin very soon, and I need to do a lot of work on it before they arrive. I can’t have it tied up as a hospital! Shouldn’t we transport him into Dawson?”

“He’d be better off not moving. He’ll need a week of bed rest, followed by another three weeks of recuperation.”

Rebecca stared over Sadie’s shoulder at the man who lay on the lower bunk on the cabin wall opposite the woodstove. He apparently felt her gaze and turned his head to meet her eyes. In the soft glow of lamplight his eyes were unreadable. She felt a twinge of guilt, but after all, she had a business to run.

“Look, Sadie, I’ll have to take him into Dawson. He’ll get a lot more attention at the clinic. I have too much work to do here.”

“Well,” Sadie said, “it’s up to you, of course. I understand how things are. Can you possibly keep him here for two days? Yes? Good!” She pulled on her mitts and reached for her bag. “Becky, I wish you all the best, but I have to go. Roady Dan’s woman is expecting any moment now, and I promised I’d stay near my radio phone.” She looked over her shoulder. “I’ll check on you tomorrow, Bill MacKenzie, and no getting out of that bed to fix your truck!” she said. Then, with Rebecca on her heels, she exited the guest cabin and walked to her pickup truck.

“Thanks for coming so quickly, Sadie,” Rebecca said. “I appreciate it.”

“No problem. Keep an eye on him, Becky. He’s just the sort to try and crawl out of here under his own power. He really shouldn’t be moving around at all for a while.” With a cheerful wave, the nurse practitioner and EMT, who covered an area of some five hundred square miles, drove off.

Rebecca walked back to the main cabin where Sam and Ellin were waiting for Sadie’s prognosis. She delivered it glumly, slumping into a chair and dropping her head into her hands. “I rue the day that man ever drove his truck into my yard.”

“Now, Rebecca,” Ellin said, “let’s just be grateful that he wasn’t more seriously hurt.”

“I can’t be grateful for that right now, because right now I’ve got to drive clear to Flat Creek, find his cabin, and feed his hungry dogs, who incidentally, probably haven’t eaten for several days. Fred Turner was in charge of feeding them.”

Sam cleared his throat. “I know where that cabin is. Been over that way a time or two to visit Fred. I expect I could show you the way.”

“I didn’t know you ever visited Fred Turner,” Ellin said, her voice radiating surprised disapproval. “I can’t imagine what the two of you have in common. Why, that man is nothing more than an alcoholic reprobate!”

“Well, now, Ellin—”

“Would you drive over with me, Sam?” Rebecca asked. “I’ll feed my dogs before we go just in case we get back late. We can throw ten bags of food into the back of my truck and ferry it over.”

“And what about tomorrow?” Ellin asked pointedly. “Who’s going to feed those dogs tomorrow?”

Rebecca stared at her and then nodded slowly. “You’re right.” She slumped again, reconsidering. “Okay. Sam, here’s what we’ll do. We’ll drive over with one bag of food. We’ll feed the dogs, load them into my dog truck and bring them back here. Tomorrow I’ll sort out the rest. At least the dogs will be safe and cared for.” She pushed wearily to her feet. “I’ll get started with my chores.”

“And I’ll run Ellin home on the snowmobile,” Sam said, “and be back directly.”

“You will not,” Ellin retorted. “What about that poor young man? Who’s going to watch him? No, I’d better stay right here and keep an eye on Mac while you two do what you have to do.”

“Thanks, Ellin,” Rebecca said gratefully. “I guess we’ll be back when we get here.”

As she lugged the heavy buckets around the dog yard, scooping out the evening feed a good two hours early to her surprised huskies, she reflected on how much more complicated life had become in the past two days. She finished her chores in record time while Sam filled the wood box and hauled a couple of buckets of water from the spring. They climbed into her dog truck and she gave the cold engine a good prime before turning it on. It caught instantly and roared to life. “There’s nothing like a Ford,” she said to Sam, who returned with his usual, “unless it’s a Chevy.”

She was driving past the guest cabin when its door opened and that damn nuisance of a man emerged, pulling on his parka and weakly waving for her to stop. She did, nearly throwing Sam into the dashboard. She jumped out of the truck and charged toward him. “Where do you think you’re going! Get back inside!” She raised her arm and pointed behind him. “If you puncture a lung, don’t expect any sympathy from me!”

MacKenzie finished pulling on his parka. “If you’re going up to my place, I figured I’d ride along. I can take care of my dogs better than anyone. All I ask is that you throw a few bags of food in the back of your truck.”

“I mean it,” Rebecca warned. “Get back into bed!”

“I feel fine. I can certainly ride in a truck for a couple of hours, and I can take care of my own dogs. You’ll have your cabin back, too.”

“I won’t say it again,” Rebecca warned.

“You won’t have to,” Ellin said, walking up behind MacKenzie. “Go on, Rebecca. You and Sam get going.” She reached out and closed one hand firmly around MacKenzie’s upper arm. “You may think you’re big and tough, young man, but believe me, you don’t have anything on little old Ellin Dodge.”

Rebecca turned on her heel, stormed back to the truck and hoisted herself behind the wheel. Without looking back, she gunned the truck down the rutted, snow-covered track, causing Sam to clutch the dash with both hands.

“I’m so sick of arrogant, egotistical men!” Rebecca blurted.

“Well, I can surely understand that,” Sam said, casting her a wry glance. “You see so darn many of ’em on a day-to-day basis!”

It took nearly two hours to drive to the MacKenzie cabin on the banks of Flat Creek, the last few miles of unplowed road a white-knuckled adventure. “There it is,” Sam said, as the truck’s headlights picked out a wall of gray weathered logs. No lights shone from the windows, no smoke curled from the chimney, but to Rebecca’s relief the dogs appeared to be all right. She put on her headlamp and carried a bucket of kibble around the dog lot, giving each hungry animal a generous scoop. “This dog’s name is Merlin,” she said to Sam. “He’s Brian’s best leader and one of the smartest dogs I’ve ever known.” She gave Merlin a friendly pat. “I’ll water them when we get them home,” she said. “They aren’t dying of thirst, not with a foot and a half of snow on the ground.”

She went to the cabin door, noting that there were no tracks in the snow, and pulled the latch string. The door swung open. The cabin’s interior was as cold as ice, and in the light cast from her headlamp she panned the small, low-eaved room. It was an unbelievable mess. Dirty dishes and cooking pans filled the dry sink. A frying pan with something still in it was atop the stove. Clothing was heaped and thrown everywhere and trash covered the floor. Three empty whiskey bottles stood upon the cluttered table. Fred Turner had obviously stayed long enough to drink all of MacKenzie’s liquor before moving to greener pastures.

She slammed the door shut behind her and began the arduous process of loading fourteen dogs into her truck, gambling on which dogs could share a dog box without fighting. At length she and Sam had accomplished the task and the nervous growls and whines had faded into silence. It had begun to snow again. “Well,” she said to Sam, “let’s head for home.”

They left the MacKenzie cabin and crept slowly homeward in steadily worsening conditions. By the time her familiar turnoff came into view, three more hours had passed, and it was nearly midnight when they pulled into the kennel yard. Ellin had kept the lamps burning in the cabin, and the yellow glow shining through the frosted windowpanes warmed Rebecca’s heart. “Sam, take Ellin home in my plow truck,” she said as they climbed wearily out of the cab. “I’ll start it and get it warming up for you. And thanks a million for helping out.”

“Anytime, Rebecca. You know that.”

Ellin was waiting at the door when she entered. “He’s still alive,” she said.

“What a relief,” Rebecca said, scowling.

“It hasn’t been easy for him. He’s in quite a bit of pain, but he tries not to let on. His dog is in the cabin with him. She really wanted to be near him.”

“Ellin, have you been holding his hand the whole time we’ve been gone?”

“No, but I looked in on him from time to time and kept the woodstove going. I brought him some supper, some of your stew. I hope you don’t mind.”

“Of course not,” Rebecca said.

“He ate a little bit, but he doesn’t look very good to me. I think you should check on him. Maybe we should call Sadie back.”

“Certainly not. She has to drive nearly an hour to get here. If he’s dying, I’ll drive him into Dawson. If he isn’t, he’ll just have to suffer out the night. But first I’ll need to let his dogs out of the boxes and water them. You two get on home. It’s way past Sam’s bedtime. And, Ellin?” She gave her friend a grateful hug. “Thanks. I owe you.”

Rebecca spent the next hour tethering Mac’s dogs on two picket lines she’d strung between the spruce trees in her yard. She gave them pans of water flavored with meat scraps and kibble, and they drank the offering eagerly. She left them outside in the gentle snowfall while she spooned down a plate of the moose-meat stew herself, and then she loaded the dogs back into the truck for the night. This was an arduous chore. Lifting a sixty-pound dog up over her head was no easy task, especially when she was so tired. When Mac’s dogs were all bedded down, she checked on her own, and then on her way back to her cabin, she paused beside the guest cabin, debating whether to see how the patient was doing.

Finally she opened the cabin door quietly. Ellin had left a lamp burning on the table, which she’d moved closer to the bunk. Mac was asleep, and Callie was curled at his feet. His head was turned away from the table so that the lamplight shone on the back of his neck and his left shoulder. His breathing was shallow and rapid, but given the nature of his injuries, Rebecca thought that was probably to be expected.

Almost against her will, she moved closer to the bunk and gazed down at him as he slept. She felt a twinge of guilt at how she had treated him earlier. Aside from owing her a chunk of money, which he’d earnestly promised to repay, she had no real reason to dislike him so. Except…except that he was undeniably handsome, and she resented the fact that she was attracted to him. She was the widow of Bruce Reed, a man she had loved deeply and would for all time. She had no right to feel attracted to another man.

She turned away abruptly and fed three more good-size chunks of wood into the stove. With the dampers closed, the fire should hold through the night, especially since morning wasn’t too far off.

She was walking toward the cabin door when Mac shifted, moved his head from side to side and moaned. His breathing became more rapid. Rebecca froze. He made a strangled noise in the back of his throat, and one arm knocked the covers down to his waist. Callie sat up, alarmed.

“No!” he gasped harshly. “I can’t reach it! It’s no good, I’m pinned! Mouse, get out! Get out! Can’t breathe!” His arms thrashed and his breathing became even more labored. Rebecca found herself at his side, reaching down to stop his struggles, to wake him from the clutches of some awful nightmare, but the minute she closed her hand on his arm, he shot upright, smacking his head hard against the upper bunk. “Oh, God!” he gasped, grabbing her arm with a strength that both hurt and frightened her.

“Mac! It’s me, Rebecca! It’s all right, you were just dreaming. It was just a dream!” She put her hand over his, trying to reassure him.

“Mouse!” he said, his shoulders heaving as he gasped for breath.

“No, it’s Rebecca! Wake up!”

He turned his head slowly and his eyes focused. “Oh, God!” he said again.

“It’s all right, Mac! Everything’s okay.”

He released her slowly, raised a hand to his head and then slumped back onto the bunk, flat on his back, and moaned again. His skin was cold and clammy, and his face was pale.

“It was just a dream,” Rebecca repeated. “A dream about a mouse.”

“Not a mouse,” he said, struggling for breath, remembering. “Mouse! Mouse is dead. His plane crashed.”

“It was a bad dream,” she reiterated. “Do you want another pain pill? Sadie left some for you.” She rubbed her arm where he had gripped it.

He moved his head slowly back and forth. “I’m okay,” he said.

“Try to relax. You have a bunch of broken ribs. Breathing’s going to be tough for a while. I’m going to get you something to drink.”

“I don’t need—”

“I don’t care what you think you need or don’t need,” Rebecca said. “I’m going to get you something, anyway, and you’re going to drink it!”

She stood up, trying not to show how shaken she was, and quickly left the cabin. The cold darkness of the Yukon night braced her, and she welcomed the dry, clean sting of it. What if he died here in her guest cabin, especially after the miserable way she’d treated him? She rushed to her cabin and rummaged in the cupboards until she found a bottle of rum that Bruce had bought years ago. She tried to remember how to make a hot buttered rum, but for the life of her she couldn’t. She melted a good chunk of butter in a small pan, added a cup of milk and finally a generous slug of the rum. She heated a mug with hot water and poured the mixture into it, wrapped a clean towel around it to keep it warm and carried it quickly to the guest cabin. His breathing had improved, she thought, and he was still awake. These were both good signs. He smiled faintly at her, but his face was still pale.

“Can you sit up?” she asked.

“I’m sorry to be so much trouble,” he said.

She ignored his apology. Since sitting was obviously painful for him, she propped all the pillows behind him, until he was in a half-reclining position. “I made this for you. I figured it would help you sleep.”

He accepted it and sniffed. “Rum?”

“Rum and milk. Is there such a drink?”

“If you made it, I guess there is.” He took a sip and swallowed.

“Is it okay?”

“It’s just fine.”

“How are you feeling?”

He took another sip and considered her question carefully. “Like a half-ton pickup sat on my chest,” he replied. “How are my dogs?”

“They’re fine. You can see them tomorrow. They’re out in my truck, fed and watered.”

“Thank you. More than I can ever say.”

Rebecca stood. “Can I get you anything else?”

He shook his head. “I appreciate everything you’ve done. And I’ll be out of here soon, I promise you.” She nodded and turned toward the door. “Hey,” he said, and she looked back. “Was Fred Turner there when you got to my cabin?”

Rebecca shook her head. “There were no tracks in the snow, and your woodstove was two days cold. And you’d better lay in a few more bottles of whiskey for the winter. Looked to me like Fred found your stash.” She smiled briefly and closed the cabin door gently behind her.

HIS DREAMS OPENED doors to his past that he kept tightly closed when he was awake. In his dreams he relived every awful moment of that awful time. When he awoke it took him minutes, hours, days, sometimes, to close all the doors, to rebuild and fortify the walls that kept him safe, kept him sane.

This morning he lay in soft-breathing stillness, staring up at the hand-hewn planks of the bunk above him. The stove still held a fire, but its warmth was ineffective. The light through the thickly frosted window was dim and gray. It was early, very quiet, and very cold. Callie shivered at his feet.

Mac moved tentatively, shifting his upper body on the hard, lumpy mattress, and caught his breath. No doubt about it. Having a truck fall on you was a seriously painful business. Of course, if he hadn’t been so stupid about overloading his truck, none of this would have happened. Even worse that it had to happen right in front of her.

Rebecca regarded him as a cheechako and she was right. He was definitely the idiot of the North, completely out of his element. A few months ago he’d been in the Persian Gulf flying one of the most advanced technical fighters off one of the most advanced Nimitz carriers, and now he was lying on a bunk in Yukon Territory with a bunch of broken ribs at the mercy of a woman who didn’t care for him one little bit, in a land so hostile that all he had to do was walk out into it and he could quite easily die.

He shifted his legs beneath the thick wool blankets. He couldn’t just lie here. If he had to crawl back to his brother’s cabin, he’d crawl. A man had his pride, after all. Sometimes it was the only thing in the world he had. The effort cost him, but he made it as far as the stove, where he fed two split chunks of dry spruce onto the bed of coals and closed the door. He knelt in front of it with the blanket around his waist, shivering, his breath making little frost plumes in the cold cabin air. If this was technically still autumn, what would winter be like? Would he still be alive then, or would wolves be gnawing on his bones?

The cabin door opened and he glanced up. It was Rebecca.

“What are you doing out of bed?” Stern, disapproving voice.

“Freezing to death,” he replied.

She was carrying a coffeepot and two cups and looked bright and alert, as if she’d been awake for hours. She had walked bareheaded and without a parka from the main cabin, and her hair fell in a thick, glossy tumble clear to her waist.

“I brought coffee,” she said, scrutinizing him. “How are you feeling?”

“I feel just fine,” Mac said.

“Oh, yes, and you look just fine, too. Actually, your dog looks a lot better than you do. I’ll bring her a bowl of food in a little bit.” She set the coffeepot and mugs on the stove and then helped him to his feet with a strength that her small stature belied. “Get back into bed.” She guided him to the bunk and steadied him while he sat. Sitting was still painful, but he didn’t move while she poured him a cup of coffee, black, no sugar, and handed it to him.

“Thank you.” He cradled the mug between his palms, relishing the warmth that radiated from it. The coffee smelled wonderful. Rich and fragrant. He tasted it, and something inside of him eased. “This is very good.”

She poured herself a cup and gazed at him over the rim. Steam curled up and wreathed her face. She was without a doubt the most beautiful woman he’d ever laid eyes upon. Rebecca Reed had the kind of beauty that came from within. He lowered his eyes, afraid of what might be showing in them. “It’s twenty below zero and clear,” she said. “The rivers should freeze up soon.”

His brother Brian had talked a lot about the rivers, one in particular. “My brother calls the Yukon a drifter’s river,” he said. “A river of dreams.”

She smiled through the steam. “Bruce and I paddled a canoe down it from Whitehorse to Dawson. Everyone should do that at least once in a lifetime. It mellows the soul.”

Bruce. Her dead husband. Mac took another swallow of coffee. It didn’t taste quite as good this time. He glanced at her hand, noting the gold wedding band she still wore. “Must have been a good trip.”

“It was a great trip. Our honeymoon.” She fiddled with the stove’s dampers and stuffed two more pieces of birch into the firebox. The stove began to roar like a blast furnace, the metal ticking rhythmically as it heated. “I should drive you into Dawson today for X rays.”

“No need. I feel fine.”

“You look flushed. My guess is you’re running a fever.”

“Can’t be. I’m freezing to death. Where are my clothes, by the way?”

“Ellin took them. They needed a bath. Sam and Ellin have loads of hot water and a washer and dryer, thanks to a big propane water heater and a huge diesel generator. They have a shower, too, which Ellin forces me to use from time to time.”

“That must be hard to take.”

“Sheer torture. I can only stand it for about thirty minutes at a time.” He noticed that she almost smiled. “I have a sauna here and it’s great, my clients love it, but it’s just not the same.” She rose to her feet. “When I’m done feeding and watering, I’m going to run some dogs. I’ll bring you breakfast before getting started and I should be back by two. Will you be all right by yourself?”

“I’ll be fine. I’m sorry to be such trouble.” Rebecca nodded and began to leave, taking her coffee mug with her. “Rebecca,” he said. She paused and turned. “You have to believe me when I tell you I’m not usually like this.”

Her eyebrows raised slightly. “Like what? Half-naked and freezing to death?”

Mac drew the wool blanket more tightly around his waist, and felt his color deepen. “I’m not usually such a nuisance. I’m actually a fairly intelligent, capable, self-reliant man, and I have good common sense.”

“You do?” she said.

“Yes, ma’am. I’m loaded with it.”

This time the smile made it to her lips, and they curved in a most delicious way. “Well,” she said, “you certainly couldn’t prove it by me.”

And then she was gone, taking her smile and its sunshine with her.

CHAPTER THREE

REBECCA WAS STILL SMILING three hours later, twenty miles down the trail. The dogs were trotting smoothly, moving through the fresh snow as if it wasn’t there. She had put Cookie and Raven up in lead, two young females with loads of drive and intelligence, and they were doing a great job. The sky was a deep vault of blue, the sunlight bright, the air very still and very cold. Her eight-dog team was covering ten miles an hour, not bad at all on an unbroken trail and pulling about a hundred pounds of weight in the toboggan sled.

“Raven! Gee!” The main trail intersected with a cutoff that would loop around and take them home. Raven pulled to the right as ordered, taking Cookie and the rest of the dogs with her. “Good girl, Raven! Good girl.”

Common sense? Hah! The man was hopeless. He would most certainly die out there in that trapper’s shack on the Flat this winter. He would starve to death trying to feed his dogs. He would freeze to death trying to keep a fire in the woodstove. Common sense, indeed! What on earth possessed him to think he could come into this wild land and survive?

And now she was stuck with taking care of him and his dog team, all of which made her wonder just how much common sense she, herself, had. She laughed aloud, the noise startling her dogs and causing them to break their gait and glance back at her. “It’s okay, gang. Good dogs. All right.” They faced front again and their tug lines tightened as they forged ahead. She could still picture Mac sitting on the bunk with that old wool army blanket pulled around him, his broad shoulders bared to the chill of the room. She hated to admit it, but Sadie Hedda had been right. William MacKenzie was one long, tall, handsome man—even if he didn’t have one shred of common sense. He had something else, though, something she couldn’t quite fathom….

Rebecca shifted her weight on the sled runners, bent her knees and bobbed up and down to warm up the backs of her calves. Her toes were cold even in her heavy boots. This was nothing new. Her toes and fingers were always cold from October until May. It came with the Territory.

“Okay, you huskies, pick it up!” Cookie and Raven broke into a lope at her words, and moments later they were heading home. The trip back would be quicker on the broken trail, and she’d have time to run one more team before she had to start evening chores. The other dogs in the yard heralded her arrival, and Rebecca was surprised to see her red plow truck parked in front of the main cabin. As she looped her snub line around the hitching post, securing the team, Sam stepped out onto the porch. At the same moment, Ellin emerged from the guest cabin. Ellin’s face was radiant as she strode across the dog yard.

“Rebecca,” she said as she approached. “We’re taking Mac over to our place. Sam’s rigged a sled behind the Bombardier for Mac to lie in so it’ll be an easy trip for him. He can stay in the boys’ room for now and move into the cabin when he’s ready.”

Rebecca unsnapped the dogs’ tug lines and began stripping the polar fleece booties from their feet. “Ellin, you and Sam have enough to do without taking care of an invalid.” She reached for the stack of galvanized feed pans and dropped one into the snow in front of each dog, then opened the prepacked cooler to give each some broth thick with chunks of liver.

“He won’t be an invalid for long, Becca. Sam could use some help around the place, and the way I see it, God has provided it in the form of this nice young man.”

Rebecca straightened, one mittened hand pressing into the small of her back. She looked at Ellin and sighed. “You do have a way of looking at things.”

“He’s going to be a big help to Sam. If he can do all the things Sam thinks he can, Bill MacKenzie will be worth his weight in gold. After all, he did fix the Bombardier, and that thing hasn’t run since the turn of the last century.”

“He’s a big man, Ellin,” Rebecca cautioned. “Probably eats a lot.”

“I cook a lot. Can’t get out of the habit after raising four boys. There’ll be plenty to eat. And Sam has fixed up one whole end of the hangar for the dogs.”

“You’re taking his dogs, too?”

“Of course! It’ll be fun having a dog team around the place again. I miss them.”

“Take some of mine!”

“Becky, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. This is too much for you. You can’t go it alone.”

Rebecca bent to pick up the empty feed pans. “I have another team to run, Ellin.”

“Yes, I know,” Ellin said curtly. “And another team after that, and then there are the chores to do. The wood to split, the water to lug, the dogs to feed.” She sighed. “Well, my dear, I’ve had my say and as always, it’s fallen on deaf ears. I really think all mushers have dog biscuits for brains!”

“I love you, Ellin Dodge, and I always will,” Rebecca said, arms full of feed pans. “But I have to do things my way.”

Thirty minutes later she was out on the trail again with another eight-dog team and Ellin’s words echoing in her ears. Her neighbor was right. It was too much. There were days when Rebecca felt like giving up, days when everything piled up in front of her like an unscalable mountain, days when she was so lonely and exhausted that she would drop her head into her hands and weep like a baby. Those were the bad days, and while not all of her days were bad, they were all long and lonely and hard, and they were making her hard in ways she didn’t like.

Bringing coffee and breakfast to Mac this morning was the first time she’d felt like a woman since Bruce’s death. There was no denying that the simple act of handing Mac a cup of coffee had made her feel good inside. And the way he’d looked at her had made her feel… He had made her feel… Oh, for Pete’s sake!

“Twister! Get up, you lazy beast!” she chastised a young wheel dog, whose job was to run directly in front of the sled. “I’ll feed you to the wolves if you don’t pull your weight!”

Ellin was right about Sam. He did need help. Sam and Ellin’s boys had all become very successful, but none of them had wanted to remain in the Yukon. Sam had given up the mail route he used to fly two years ago. He probably shouldn’t be flying at all, but she’d like to see anyone try to keep that old man out of the sky. And then he’d gone and bought that old wreck of a Stearman with the dream of restoring it to its former glory. Rebecca shook her head. It was true about men. They never grew up. They were just boys grown tall.

“Come on, Minnow, you can do it. Good girl!”

Well, anyhow, she was rid of Bill MacKenzie. He’d be gone when she got back and she could spruce up the guest cabin and get it ready for her first clients, who would be arriving in a few weeks—and none too soon. She desperately needed the money the dogsled tour would generate.

Three hundred yards from the cabin she stopped the team, snubbed the sled to a nearby spruce and loaded the toboggan bed with six armloads of the firewood that had been cut to length and stacked beside the trail. She used dog power to pull the load to the cabin and had barely finished watering, snacking and unharnessing the dogs when a familiar truck bounced into the yard. The cab door opened and Sadie Hedda jumped down, waved, then grabbed her parka and shrugged into it as she crossed toward the guest cabin, one hand clutching her medical bag.

“He’s gone, Sadie,” Rebecca called, tossing the wood from the sled onto the cabin porch.

Sadie turned to stare at Rebecca. “Gone? Gone where? My Lord, Becky, the man was seriously injured, and he was in no shape to be going anywhere! I know you didn’t want him here, but surely you didn’t drive him off!” She was walking rapidly toward Rebecca as she spoke.

“No, Sadie, I didn’t. Ellin and Sam have adopted him. If you want to do a follow-up exam, you’ll find him there.”

Sadie was visibly relieved. “Rebecca,” she said. “I know it’s none of my business, but where did you find that guy?”

“I didn’t find him! He came here to buy dog food.” Rebecca continued to unload the firewood. “He’s Brian MacKenzie’s older brother and he’s taking care of Brian’s dogs for the winter while Brian finishes his degree at the university. He says he’s going to race the team and expects to do very well. He thinks there’s nothing to mushing, that it’s easy as beans and anyone can do it. And, oh, by the way, he’s also planning to win the Percy DeWolf.”

Sadie grinned. “Where’s he from?”

“Dunno. But he was in the military. Some kind of mechanic, I think.”

“Mechanic,” Sadie said, eyes narrowing appreciatively. “Mechanics can come in awfully handy around here.”

“Yes. I’ll be glad when he fixes his truck and gets it out of my driveway.”

Sadie shoved her hands in her parka pockets and frowned at Rebecca. “I know he owes you money, but is that the only reason you dislike him so? I mean, you have to admit that he’s the best-looking thing to step into the Territory in a dog’s age. Does he smoke?”

“Nope. At least, I don’t think he does.”

“Good! I like the idea of a Marlboro man without the cigarettes. By the way, if you’re throwing him back, throw him in my direction, would you?”

“He’s a free man,” Rebecca said as she threw the last log onto the porch. “But, Sadie, it wouldn’t be a bad idea for you to stop by Sam and Ellin’s. Your patient looked kind of off-color to me this morning. I think he might be running a fever.”

“A fever! That’s not good at all,” Sadie said ominously. “I’d better get over there straight away.” Without another word she marched back to her truck, jumped in and roared off. Rebecca eased a cramp in the small of her back as she watched Sadie disappear. She longed to sit down in the rocker beside the woodstove with a cup of hot tea, but there was no time. She had to mix the dog food, fill the wood box, haul endless buckets of water up from the springhouse, and then feed the dogs before full dark. It was going to be cold tonight. She needed to be sure that each dog had enough straw in its house to make a warm bed.

No time for tea. No time for herself. And certainly no time for anyone else, especially a helpless cheechako like William MacKenzie.

IT TOOK FAR LESS TIME than Sadie had predicted for Mac to recover from his injuries. Within a week he was up and about, doing light chores over Ellin’s protests, but by the end of the second week he counted himself cured and was taking care of his dogs when he wasn’t helping Sam work on the Stearman.

In his third week at Sam and Ellin’s, he used Sam’s old Jimmy to haul his dog truck from Rebecca’s driveway to Sam’s hangar where, with Sam’s help, he replaced the U-joint. The next day he drove his truck to his brother’s place on Flat Creek, picked up his few belongings, the two dogsleds, feed dishes, the harnesses, gang lines and other assorted mushing paraphernalia, and returned to the little cabin on Sam and Ellin’s property. The day after that, he began training his dog team.

The trails around the Dodges’ place were the same trails that Rebecca trained on, so Mac had anticipated that they’d run into each other frequently and had been looking forward to it more than he cared to admit. But during his first week, he saw no sign of Rebecca. He finally mentioned her absence to Ellin.

“She’s probably out on a trip with some clients,” Ellin explained. “She usually heads down toward Guggieville or up toward Inuvik. You might swing by her cabin and see if Donny’s old blue Chevy is there.”

“Who’s Donny?” Mac asked.

“Donny’s a good kid. He takes care of Rebecca’s kennel when she goes on her trips. He’s Athapaskan.”

Mac spent the rest of the afternoon splitting firewood for Sam and Ellin, but the next morning, bright and early, he was on his way to Dawson City, where he sold his Rolex for far less than it was worth. He drove directly back to Rebecca’s with the money. She wasn’t there, but Donny was.

“She could be gone two, three more days,” the young man said in answer to Mac’s question. “Maybe more, maybe less. Hard to tell sometimes. Three Japanese clients. Big money.” He smiled broadly.

Mac left an envelope for Rebecca. He’d sealed a brief note inside, along with the money from the sale of his watch, promising to pay the balance by the end of February. Mac had big plans for February, and if everything worked out, he’d have more than enough to pay off his debts and buy more dog food. Feeling pretty good about things in general—better than he’d felt in more than a month—he returned to Sam and Ellin’s place and harnessed a team of dogs for a training run. Sam came out of the hangar to watch him take off. “You might try the trail that leads down to the river,” Sam shouted over the frenzied barking of the dogs. “The Mazey Creek trail. The river’s frozen solid and it’s fine traveling right now—you can make a lot of miles on it. Good training!”

Mac nodded, pulled the release knot on the snub line, and the team shot down the trail at warp speed. Mac loved the takeoffs best of all, the wild, blind explosion of power and speed that catapulted the sled—with him hanging on for dear life—down the narrow twisting path that led from the Dodges’ cabin out onto the main trail, which, in turn, led to the river. He’d avoided running the river before because of the rough pack ice. But Sam was right. If he was going to make good in February, he’d need to start putting longer miles on his team.

When he reached the main trail, he gave Merlin the command to turn to the right. “Gee, Merlin!” He grinned, as the big, handsome, blue-eyed, black-and-white husky veered unerringly to the right. “Good dog!” The idea that one could steer sled dogs with mere voice commands was still novel enough to astound him. Driving a big team of dogs was like driving a freight train from the rear of the caboose without the benefit of rails to keep the train on track, and without a steering wheel to make the turns. A good lead dog like Merlin made the job easy. A simple verbal command and the entire train turned smoothly to the right or the left.

The trail veered suddenly and Merlin disappeared from sight, followed by five pairs of dogs, all running hard. The sled whipped around the corner, and Mac had a split second to assimilate several facts: One, he was airborne; two, his team was below him, descending an extremely steep bank that dropped onto the pack ice of the river; and three, when his sled came down to earth, there was going to be quite a spectacular crash.

And there was. He heard a high-pitched scream and thought for a moment that it had come from him, although it sounded like a woman’s scream.

“Son of a bitch!” he roared just to hear his own voice, which to his relief sounded normal. “Whoa!” The dogs were still running. In fact, they were running faster than they ever had before, even though the sled was on its side and he was being dragged along behind it, gripping the driving bow with all his strength. “Whoa! Merlin, whoa!”

He heard another scream, closer this time, and definitely not coming from him. The scream was followed by a steady stream of excited babbling in a foreign language.

“Kanemoto! Hold your team!” another voice, a woman’s, firm and familiar, shouted in English. “Hideka! Run up and take your lead dogs! Hold them steady! No, Kanemoto, don’t get off the sled! Stay on the brake! The brake! That’s right! I’m going to try to catch that team!”

Oh, no, you’re not, Rebecca Reed, Mac thought grimly as he struggled to right the capsized sled. He got one knee onto the bottom runner, ignoring the pain of the foot board digging into his kneecap. He got his second knee on it, and then both knees were jolted off and he was being dragged face down again. The ice hook was bouncing wildly beside his head, having flipped out of the sled bag when the sled capsized. He seized it with one mittened hand and in the same motion jammed the pointed tips into the ice. The sled stopped so suddenly that his head smashed into the driving bow. He jumped to his feet, jerked the sled back onto its runners and barely had time to get on again before his team lunged forward, ripping the ice hook loose, and galloping madly toward two oncoming teams.

There were screams from the passengers in the other sleds, snarls, barks and growls from the dogs on all three teams, and Rebecca’s voice clashing with his own as they both shouted, “On by! On by!” to their leaders.

“Kanemoto!” Rebecca shouted. “Run with your sled! Don’t let your team stop! Keep them moving!”

Rebecca was driving the first team, which passed Mac’s flawlessly. As she came abreast of him, she gave him a brief up and down, an even briefer smile and a curt, “Hello, Mac. Nice recovery!” Then she turned her head and shouted encouragement to the three clients struggling with the team and sled behind her. The Japanese clients managed to keep their team moving, and soon Mac had the trail to himself again. He looked back to see that Rebecca’s team was charging up the riverbank. Her clients’ team followed close on her heels. When she reached the top, she raised her arm to him in a slow farewell wave. Her action startled him so much he didn’t have time to wave back before she was gone.

REBECCA STOOD under the hot, powerful, therapeutic stream of water in the Dodges’ shower and let her muscles relax for the first time in more than a week. She was tired but she felt great. It had been a good trip, a profitable trip, and she couldn’t wait to tell Ellin about the unexpected bonus she’d gotten. Rebecca squeezed more shampoo from the bottle and lathered her hair for the third time. The tension between her shoulder blades was beginning to ease as the forceful stream of hot water worked its magic.

She exited the bathroom in a huge cloud of steam dressed in clean clothes top to bottom, thick wool socks and expedition-weight fleece. She padded into the warm kitchen with the towel still wrapped in a thick, white turban around her wet hair. “Thank you, Ellin. Once again, you’ve saved my life.”

Ellin poured a second cup of tea and set it on the table. “Sit down and tell me what’s gotten you so excited. You’ve been hopping up and down since you got here this morning.”

Rebecca dropped into a chair and pulled the tea toward her. “I can’t believe it myself. It’s a dream come true for me! Ellin, Kanemoto’s coming back here in February.”

“That’s wonderful! Two trips in one winter! He must be some kind of nut, but so long as he’s rich, who cares!”

“No, Ellin, he’s not coming back for another trip. He wants to be my handler for the Yukon Quest! We talked about the race a lot this past week. He’s always wanted to be here for the running of it. He said how much fun it would be if he personally knew a team and driver. Then we began to discuss the possibility of my running the race!”

Ellin’s eyes widened with surprise. She blinked rapidly and sat up straighter. “My dear, you never said anything about running the Quest this season.”

“I hadn’t planned to. It’s way too expensive. But Kanemoto has paid my entry fee, and Ellin, you know he usually gives me a tip at the end of each trip, a couple hundred dollars or so. But yesterday? Yesterday he writes me a check for five thousand dollars. Five thousand dollars! He hands it to me and says, ‘You get ready to run that race, Miss Reed. I’ll be back to handle for you one week from race start!’ Can you believe it!” Rebecca leaned forward, eyes sparkling. “I have my first official sponsor!” Then, after a brief pause, she said, “What’s wrong, Ellin? I thought for sure you’d be excited for me.”

“Well!” Ellin said, composing herself quickly. “I am, my dear, I’m just surprised, that’s all. That’s something, all right!” Ellin took a sip of tea. “The Yukon Quest is a very tough race, Rebecca,” she cautioned.

“I’ve already talked to Donny about taking care of the kennel for the two weeks I’ll be gone. Oh, Ellin, I can’t believe it!” Rebecca jumped out of her chair and paced to the woodstove and back. “I’ll need to get my toboggan sled fixed—one of the rear stanchions is cracked and the bed plastic really needs to be replaced— and I’ll have to buy some new harnesses. I think I have enough booties, but I’ll have to check. Bruce has all the right gear—” She stopped suddenly and raised a hand to the towel wrapping her head. “Bruce had all the right gear,” she corrected slowly. “And I’m sure it’s all still there, stashed out in the barn. His lightweight aluminum cooker, the training notebooks, those are important. I’ll have to find them. Meat. I’ll have to order some good ground meat in Whitehorse and feed the dogs really well. Then there are the food drops to organize. Oh Lord, the food drops! Ellin, you can’t imagine the sleepless nights spent calculating how much dog food, people food and extra supplies needs to be shipped to each checkpoint before the race starts. Fortunately, all that information should be in Bruce’s notebooks. He kept notes on everything. He…” She turned and looked at Ellin. “I wish I could tell him about this. He’d be so excited at the idea of his dogs running the Quest again.”

“I’m sure he would,” Ellin said quietly.

Rebecca returned to the table and sat down again with a happy sigh. “I can’t wait!” She took a sip of tea. “I wonder if Mac’s still planning on winning the Percy DeWolf.”

“He’s been training,” Ellin said vaguely.

“Yes, I know. I met him on the river yesterday. He was dragging along quite nicely behind his sled.”

“Dragging?”

“Yes. On his face. Oh, Ellin, you should have seen it.” Rebecca couldn’t stop the laugh that burst from her. “His dogs came tearing over that steep bank by the Mazey Creek trail, and they were flying! Next comes his sled and it’s airborne. I mean to say, it shoots out over the top of the riverbank at about twenty-five miles an hour, straight into the air, with Mac standing on the runners holding on for dear life!”

“And then what happened?” Ellin said.

“He crashed!” Rebecca said. “It was the most spectacular crash I’ve ever seen! I don’t know what held that sled of his together or what kept him attached to it. But I’ll say this much for him, he didn’t let go. Slamming over that pack ice must have been brutal on his poor beat-up body, but he didn’t let go of that sled.”

“I wondered why he was limping around this morning,” Ellin mused.

“Limping! I’m surprised he can even walk.” Rebecca wiped her eyes. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I know it’s not the least bit funny, but I can’t help it.”

“But, my dear, what did you do?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, didn’t you try to help him?”

“I didn’t have to. He got the sled stopped using his snow hook and managed to climb back onto the runners. I said hello when we passed.” Rebecca grinned and took a deep breath. “I think he was in a state of shock. He never said a word.”

Ellin regarded her for a silent moment and then shook her head. “Rebecca Reed, I do believe you have a cruel streak in you.”

“I guess I must have,” Rebecca confessed. “I haven’t had such a good laugh in a long, long time. He’s all right, isn’t he?”

“If he were dying, he wouldn’t say so.”

“Maybe we should call Sadie to come have a look at him.”

Ellin frowned. “There’s little need of that. Sadie’s been looking him over every day this week. She’s after him, mark my words. She shows up every afternoon around feeding time, because she knows he’ll be taking care of his dogs.”

“He’s in good hands, then. I won’t worry about him.”

“I should think you should. My dear girl, it’s not Sadie he’s interested in.”

“Ellin!” Rebecca warned.

“He’s a good man, Rebecca,” Ellin said staunchly.

“Well, I don’t know about that,” Rebecca said, standing up and stretching stiff muscles. “But if he keeps on the way he’s going, he might make a good musher someday. He didn’t let go of his sled.”

“I certainly hope you’re right,” Ellin said, looking directly at her. “Because there’s something you should know. Sam has fronted him the money to enter the Yukon Quest this year. Rebecca, Mac will be sharing the race trail with you all the way from Whitehorse to Fairbanks.”

Rebecca froze in midstretch. “You’re kidding, right? Oh, Ellin, please tell me you’re kidding!”

Ellin shook her head. “I wish I could, because I don’t believe he’s got the experience to run a thousand-mile race. But he believes he can. He also thinks he can finish in the money and win enough to pay you what he owes you.”

“Is that what this is all about? The money he owes me? Does he realize how tough a race the Quest is? Does he realize he’d be lucky just to finish it? And what about the expense of running it? Does he know how much that would set him back?” Rebecca slumped back into her chair. “I can’t believe it,” she said, shaking her head. “Mac actually thinks he’s going to run the Yukon Quest. Well, he’s in for a rude awakening. The race officials will never let him enter. He’s not qualified!”

“SO WHAT DO YOU THINK of our Sadie Hedda?” Sam asked, leaning against the Stearman’s fuselage.

“Sadie? Oh, she’s a real good medic and a nice woman,” Mac replied, his voice deliberately noncommittal. His upper body was awkwardly wedged headfirst into the rear cockpit of the old plane. His legs were draped over the back of the pilot’s seat, and he rested the heels of his stocking feet on top of the fuselage. He was silent for a moment, trying to decide whether to carry on this personal discussion. “Well, the truth is, Sam, she’s coming on to me like a freight train, and I’m afraid if I stop running, she’ll just mow me down.” Embarrassed, Mac coughed. “Could you hand me the safety wire pliers? Thanks.”

“Sadie’s the kind of woman who sees what she likes and goes after it,” Sam explained slowly.

“I don’t have a problem with women going after things. I just don’t want to be gotten by her, that’s all. And I don’t know how to discourage her without hurting her feelings, but I guess there’s no avoiding that. Ah! All done! I think that’ll be just fine. You better check it over, though. Let’s see what else I can play with while I’m in here…” Mac took a deep breath. “Sam, Sadie’s a great girl, but the thing is, there’s Rebecca.”

“I see.” Now Sam’s voice was neutral. Mac waited for him to speak again. When he did, his tone was gruff with emotion. “Rebecca’s like a daughter to us, Mac. I don’t know what we’d do without her.” He glanced into the open cockpit and shook his head cautiously. “She and Bruce were real close.”

“Yup,” Mac said heavily. “I got that part.”

“Sometimes, I think it’s harder for a woman to cope with grief when the death is unexpected,” Sam said. “For a long time after Bruce died, Rebecca shut herself away from everyone and everything. Didn’t eat, wouldn’t speak, just sat in that lonely cabin and stared at the wall. For two whole weeks that went on, and then one day she just got up, went outside, and started running the dogs.”

“She’s real good with the dogs.”

“Yes, she is. She loves those dogs,” Sam said. “In some ways, I think they saved her life.”

“WELL, THESE SWEET ROLLS are done,” Ellin said, sliding the pan out of the oven. Why don’t you go and fetch Sam? He’s out in the hangar working on that plane of his. I swear he thinks more of that old thing than he does of me!”

“I doubt it,” Rebecca said, reaching for her parka. “But that antique flying machine definitely comes a close second.”

She had combed out her hair, but it was still damp, and in the frigid air the dampness crystallized as she walked across the packed snow of the yard toward the big Quonset hut. Sam always kept the old double-barrel stove roaring when he was working inside the hut, and the hangar was surprisingly comfortable even on the bitterest of days. Rebecca opened the door and slipped quickly inside, surprised to see Mac’s dogs still tethered on their picket lines. She had assumed he’d be out training.

“I don’t know, Sam,” she heard Mac saying as she pulled the door shut behind her. His voice sounded strangely muffled, as if it was coming from inside a deep well. “I’d like to think you’re right, but I just don’t know. What I do know is that I have to pay her back what I owe her, and the sooner the better.”

Rebecca could see Mac’s legs sticking out of the rear cockpit of the huge yellow Stearman. She could also see Sam standing near the top of the stepladder on the plane’s off side, but neither man had noticed her. “I’d like to start all over again without that big debt hanging over my head,” came Mac’s voice. “And who knows, maybe that won’t help. Maybe nothing will change her opinion of me. I seem to be in competition with a dead man and I’m losing. Do you have any idea what that does to a man’s ego?”

Rebecca felt her face flush. She reached back, opened the door again and slammed it hard behind her.

“Sam? You in here?”

“Over here, Rebecca,” came Sam’s slow, mellow voice.

“Ellin’s made a batch of her cinnamon rolls and she’s just taking them out of the oven.” Rebecca walked toward the old plane. She saw Mac’s legs writhe about wildly as he wriggled, twisted and levered his body out of the cockpit.

Rebecca waited until he’d extricated himself and was sitting on the back of the pilot’s seat. “What are you doing in here?” she asked. “I should think you’d be out running your dogs. If you plan on entering the Quest, you’ll need to put at least another thousand miles on them. Better hop to it! Oh, and by the way, that was an interesting technique you employed yesterday coming down the Mazey Creek trail.”

“You liked that, did you?” Mac said.

“That was without a doubt the most spectacular crash I’ve ever witnessed,” Rebecca said. “And the most miraculous recovery, I might add.”

“Coming from you, I take that as high praise.”

Rebecca nodded. Mac was dressed in dark-green wool army pants and a thick red-and-black-plaid flannel shirt with the sleeves rolled back. His arms and hands looked strong and powerful, and she had no doubt that they were. For him to have held on to that sled yesterday had required Herculean strength. She noticed his fancy Rolex watch was missing. “Look, Mac, don’t take this the wrong way, but you don’t have enough experience to run the Yukon Quest.”

“Maybe you think I don’t, but the dogs, you have to admit, do,” Mac said, narrowing his eyes on her.

“The judges on the race committee don’t base their decision on the dogs. They want to be sure the musher is qualified to run a long-distance race, and you have to prove yourself by finishing some shorter races, like the Fireplug and the Percy DeWolf. They won’t let you run the Quest.”

Mac’s grin was irritatingly arrogant. “They’ve waived that requirement,” he said with a casual gesture of the pliers he held in one hand. “Sam told them I’d been trapping up on the Flat with my brother’s team of dogs and they figured that was qualification enough. I’m good to go.”

“Good to go?” Rebecca stared at him incredulously. “You can’t be serious! You have absolutely no idea what you’re getting yourself into!”

“Ignorance is bliss,” he said.

“Baloney! Ignorance can kill you out there!” she snapped. “Sam, I can’t believe you fronted his entry fee knowing how inexperienced he is!”

“Well,” Sam said, dusting off his coveralls and avoiding her eyes, “I’d better get inside. Ellin’s cinnamon rolls don’t like to be kept waiting…”

“Trapping up on Flat!” Rebecca scoffed when the door had closed behind Sam.

Mac eyed her defiantly. “I lived there for four months with the dogs.”

“You trapped one fox and you let it go!”

“Would it have made me a better musher if I’d trapped two hundred wild animals and killed them all for their pelts?”

“That’s not the point! This race is about being tough, about having tough dogs, about being able to travel across a thousand miles in some of the worst weather and over some of the most gruelling terrain there is. Believe me, it isn’t like that Walt Disney movie Iron Will. You can’t live on a piece of fruitcake for two weeks, never feed your dogs, and end up winning enough money to save the family farm. You can’t fake it out there. It’s for real, and it can get really, really nasty!”

Mac’s eyes narrowed speculatively again. “You don’t think I’m tough enough, is that it? You think I’m too much of a greenhorn to go the distance?” He pushed himself off the side of the cockpit and descended the ladder propped beside the plane, stepping off the bottom rung to stand beside her. Even in his stocking feet he stood a good ten inches taller. He braced the palm of his hand against the plane’s fuselage and looked down at her with those clear, piercing eyes. The nearness of him scrambled her thoughts. She felt her heart rate accelerate and a curious warmth flush her face.

“I don’t think you can get the miles on your team,” she said. “You’ll need at least a thousand training miles. Competitive mushers put more than twice that many on their dogs before they run that race.”

“I’ll put the miles on them.” He reached for his boots beneath the tail of the plane. “I’ve got until February and it’s only November now. We’ll be ready.”

“Good to go, right?” she said caustically. “Look, Mac, if you’re running the Quest to finish in the big money, I’ll tell you right now, you don’t have a snow-ball’s chance in hell.”

He paused, boots in hand. His expression was carefully polite. “Why, thank you, Rebecca Reed, for your inspirational vote of confidence. You don’t know what it means to me to have your support.”

Rebecca pulled an envelope out of her parka pocket and held it out to him. “Here,” she said. “Take this. If you’re really serious about running the race, you’ll need every cent you can get.”

Mac recognized the envelope and a muscle in his jaw tightened. “That’s your money,” he said.

“You pawned your watch to get it, didn’t you?”

“That’s right. And I’ll pay you the rest of what I owe at the end of February. Keep it, Rebecca,” he said, and his eyes were steely. “I mean it.”

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