She opened her eyes but they didn’t focus on him. “Hmm. Dweaming.” Her words were slurred. She closed her eyes and her head flopped to the side. Fear rushed his system like a bucket of cold water smashed in his face. His mouth parched, he scrambled out of bed and grabbed her hands and pulled her upright. She slumped back down onto the pillows.
What the hell was wrong with her?
“Cam? Cam!” He started shaking her gently, panic short-circuiting his brain as she slowly woke up.
Her pupils dilated and contracted until they finally settled on him in an unfocused daze. “Daniel? Ugh.” She collapsed back against the sheets, rubbing her forehead as if in pain.
“Don’t go back to sleep.” He held her hands tight, her fingers slippery but cold.
“I need my pack,” she said in a croaky voice.
Daniel raced to the desk and pulled it down from the shelf. He unzipped it and placed it on the sheets beside her, rummaging through it. “What do you need? What’s the matter?” He felt her forehead again. Hot and sweaty.
“Headache. I think I’m hypoglycemic.” Her words with thick and slow. “I need to test my blood sugar levels…”
He pulled out the lance he’d seen her use to prick her thumb and held her hand in his lap. Just an hour ago the sight of her hand in his lap would have aroused a completely different response in his vascular system. Now it was terror.
“Sorry,” he said as she flinched away from the lancet.
“Not your fault,” she whispered quietly.
Not her fault either, he thought as he pulled out a little strip of paper and blotted the single drop of blood onto it the way he’d watched her do many times. He grabbed her meter and turned it on, taking a moment to get the strip in the slot. “Thirty. Shit, that’s too low isn’t it?”
She nodded. “I don’t usually have these problems.” Then she dug through her bag and pulled out a tube of Life Savers, fumbling two into her mouth, biting down with a crunch. Sweat ran down her temples, sliding down her neck and between her breasts.
“Can you run and get me apple juice from the kitchen, please?” Her voice was fuzzy. The words not shaped quite right.
“You’ll be all right?” Daniel asked. “You won’t collapse?” Or die? Shit. What had he done to her?
“I’ll be fine.” She held up her candy. “Pure sugar. Just hurry.”
He ran. The tile and metal were cold under his feet, and he only realized he was naked when he got to the galley. Who the fuck cared anyway. It was 3 a.m. and no one was awake down here. He grabbed a rack of fruit juice and four bottles of water, one spinning off and rattling down the stairs as he took them three at a time. He dashed back to his room and pulled the plastic wrap off the case of juice boxes. It took him three attempts to nail a straw through the stupid little hole.
Cam propped herself up on her elbow to drink, naked except for the sheet. Daniel got up and closed the door.
“How often does this happen?” he asked. Did she really live life like this? And carry on as if everything was normal?
“Not very often,” she admitted and then carried on sucking the juice. He passed her a bottle of water when she was finished, and she took a sip. She tried to sit up so he piled the pillows behind her head.
“What else do you need? Chocolate?” He went to his desk drawer and pulled out a Mars bar from his stash.
Her smile lacked energy and she shook her head just a fraction. “I’ll wait fifteen minutes and then test again. Otherwise I’ll be spilling ketones all night.”
That sounded like fun.
“This is because we had sex, isn’t it?” God, he was furious with himself. He should have asked her, checked if it was all right for a woman in her condition to do all that stuff.
She sniggered though she still looked like shit. “Not because we had sex but…the unexpected exercise.” Her eyes sparkled. “It was worth it though.”
“Cam…” He narrowed his gaze in warning. This wasn’t a joke.
“You’re regretting it.” She sucked in her lower lip, blinked rapid-fire and looked away.
Her hands felt warm now, not as clammy.
“I don’t regret having sex with you, but I sure as shit don’t want this to happen to you ever again.” And that was the end of making out with Cam, which should have been a good thing because it would bring him to his senses and allow him some distance, except…it wasn’t.
“It wasn’t the sex, Daniel. Seriously. I normally check my blood sugar before I go to bed.” She looked at him from under her lashes, a blush forming on her cheeks. “Tonight I forgot.” She groaned and looked at the ceiling. “Plus, I didn’t eat all my dinner because I needed to make sure you were all right, which was obviously just a cover for me being horny.”
Daniel’s eyebrows rose.
“And then all that added…activity.” She took another gulp of water. “I’m an idiot and my head hurts.” She closed her eyes and leaned against the wall. “Hypoglycemia is a pretty common occurrence with diabetes, especially those of us who aim for tight control. But if I’m low before I go to sleep there’s a specially formulated snack I eat that releases sugar slowly into my body through the night. Really, Daniel.” She looked up and her color already looked better. “This isn’t usually a problem for me.”
He sat down and took her hand in his. Not a problem? Sinking into a coma when you were asleep and not being able to do a damn thing about it? Not a problem? What if she’d been alone…what if he’d already sent her back to her room so he could sleep without fear of having a stupid fucking nightmare?
She sat forward and stroked his hair. “It’s what we do.”
God. There was a hole in his chest filled with frustration and anger.
“When I was a kid, my parents would check my blood sugar every hour. Can you imagine having a child with diabetes?”
Daniel began to feel physically sick.
“My parents slept in separate bedrooms for nearly a year after I was diagnosed and had this alternate alarm system set for every two hours. But I’m pretty sure my mom woke every hour just to make sure dad didn’t miss his stint.” She looked at the tips of her fingers. “After a while I slept through the testing. But every morning I’d have sore fingers and my log book would be filled out.” She hugged him, her bare breasts pressed against his back, but he wasn’t feeling lust. What he was feeling now was something far more terrifying.
“Isn’t there some kind of warning system you can rig up?” He clasped her hand to his chest.
“No. Although I was reading about dogs who wake their masters if their blood glucose goes too low. Don’t ask me how the dog knows, but I was thinking about getting a pooch sometime in the future anyway.” She smiled and seemed to understand he was trying to handle a whole new set of circumstances. “I’ve been dealing with this for a long time, Daniel. I understand if it freaks you out.”
She’d been dealing with it longer than he’d been in and out of the army. Damn, he was a selfish sonofabitch to walk around like he had the weight of the world on his shoulders when he knew other people suffered. Cam was reopening his eyes, but he’d seen disease and poverty rip through a nation. Seen starvation carve out the bones of children.
But it didn’t change the fact he couldn’t help them anymore. He couldn’t even keep himself out of trouble without one crutch or another.
“It is terrifying thinking you can go to sleep and not wake up, I’m not gonna lie. But I’m not living my life in constant fear.” She squeezed his fingers, which had gone slack in hers. “I’m not doing that to myself.”
He looked away because he couldn’t speak past the thick lump of emotion lodged in his gullet. This woman was killing him by bringing him back to life. He did not want to come alive. If he lost his sense of self again, if he lost things that were important to him—it would kill him.
“So it wasn’t the sex that made my blood sugar low, although I understand if you’re not interested anymore.” She gathered the sheet arou
nd her breasts. “I mean, it’s gotta kind of weird you out being given that sort of wakeup call in the middle of the night.”
He couldn’t breathe. Middle of the night wakeup calls he was used to. He just hadn’t realized how many other people suffered them too. Nightmares and flashbacks seemed feeble and transient compared to coma and death.
“I mean it was just sex between friends.” Her tone wavered uncertainly. “I wasn’t expecting a relationship or anything.”
He’d remained silent too long, and Cam started to fidget as if she was about to climb out of bed and walk away. But he still couldn’t speak. He couldn’t look at her.
“I should go—”
“No.” He finally turned to face her and let her see the emotions raging through him. “You…we…weren’t just a one-night thing. It’s more than that.” He took in a deep breath of air that restarted his brain and brought him back to reality. “I’m not saying let’s run off to Vegas and get married—”
“Heaven forbid.” She sniffed and wiped her nose, and he wanted to laugh.
“But it was more than just one night,” he told her.
Whatever she was feeling was hidden by a veil of curls as she leaned down to grab her meter to recheck her glucose levels.
She sighed. “Even so you’d better pass me my clothes. You need some sleep and I’m going to be awake for at least another hour—”
“Stay.” Where the hell had that come from?
“No.” Her meter beeped, but she refused to look at him.
He leaned over but couldn’t see the screen. “What’s it at?”
She showed him the readout, her eyes dark but shimmering in the dim light, her smile sad but showing off her dimples. “Sixty-two.”
“Stay,” he repeated. And she wrapped her arms around her knees and nodded.
***
Dwight turned on his flashlight even though it was dawn. His head hurt and one eye was swollen shut and throbbing because that nutcase had caught him with a lucky punch. All he’d done was give that little bitch a slap. She’d deserved a hell of a lot more than that after all the shit she’d stirred up. He touched his chest and winced, wondering if he had a broken rib because every time he breathed, a sharp pain shot through him. One slow step at a time he climbed the ridge and headed into the bush toward Sylvie’s ATV.
Daniel Fox thought he could take him on? He was gonna teach that asshole a lesson he wouldn’t forget in years.
Clambering over exposed roots and through prickly shrubs was hell on his injuries but he forced himself onward. Too much to do to take a sick day. Too much at stake. He eventually found the dark hulking shadow in the gloom, and took a moment to catch his breath. He started to lean against a spruce tree but thought better of it—didn’t want to leave any evidence behind. As a precaution he’d borrowed someone else’s boots for the walk. He fumbled in his pocket for the latex gloves he’d taken from the geologists’ lab. A branch cracked loudly in the twilight and his head snapped up. His heart banged painfully, but he didn’t see nothing. There was a problem bear around the camp. He’d had it removed twice already. Next time he’d shoot it, but he hadn’t thought to bring his rifle. A red squirrel scampered through the leaves and he relaxed. Propping his flashlight on a stone, he pulled on gloves which smelled like rubbers and retrieved a sealed Ziploc from his pocket. He took out some Q-Tips, fumbled and dropped one on the ground.
Swearing, he knelt in the damp leaf litter, the moisture creeping through the thick denim of his jeans. He pulled a bottle of water from his shirt pocket and wet the end of the bud. Then he angled the light beam onto the dark encrusted blood on the ATV and worked the tip of the cotton bud into it. The end came away a dirty brown color.
Sitting back on his heels, he pulled out another plastic bag and carefully unwrapped the blade that Arnie had pulled on Daniel Fox yesterday. Both their fingerprints would be on the handle, and they might both get arrested, but Dwight would take that chance as long as the RCMP busted Fox. That would be enough to fire his British ass from the job.
Dwight worked the damp cotton into the seams of the knife, where the blade met the hilt. Taking his time, knowing he couldn’t afford to mess up, he repeated the process until the blade was lightly coated in Sylvie’s blood.
He placed the used swabs inside the Ziploc and shoved it back in his pocket ready for the incinerator, then he slid the dagger beneath the back wheel of the ATV and started uncovering some of the branches that hid it from view.
Eventually, one of the workers would notice the bright red vehicle abandoned in the bush. Then he’d radio the RCMP and wait for the fireworks to start.
***
The rabbit was still warm and twitched in his hands as the man checked for ground sign. The glutton had come this way again last night. Excitement filled him. He tried to contain it, but it prickled his skin like an electric current. There were fresh prints in the dirt and newly bent grass. The critter had passed the old tree on his usual nightly hunt, looking for food to eat or cache for the winter.
But the bastard wasn’t going to make it through another winter.
He didn’t bother to hide his footsteps. His rifle was cocked and ready as he cut into the bush toward the deadfall trap.
“That’s more like it.”
The rocks had fallen in, crushing anything unwise enough to have crawled beneath it. There was no noise on the mountain, just the foul stink of the musk the creature used to mark its food. And there was scat, as if the creature had taken a big dump so it could fill its cavernous insides with yet another stolen meal. Excitement made his fists tighten. Why would anyone want these creatures protected? He should do the world a favor and destroy every last one.
It was hot already, not that he was complaining. Winter made his joints freeze. Sweat made his neck slippery and he felt the grime on his collar as he ran his finger along the seam. He dropped the rabbit and knelt beside the rubble. Slowly he started shifting rocks, hauling them off, each one making his arms shake because of the weight. He frowned, dragged back another rock, and another, becoming more and more frantic until he saw bare earth. The bait was gone. The trap was sprung but, like a phantom, the wolverine had disappeared.
He formed the sign of the cross on his chest.
Was it nothing but a spirit creature? A tuurngaq? Or maybe Sylvie herself come back to bedevil him from the grave.
No. Dammit! The tracks were real. The shit was real. The stink that coated his clothes and hands and made him smell like he’d been pissed on, that was real too.
He sat back on his heels and squeezed his eyelids together so hard they hurt. Tears formed and swam down his cheeks, but he kept his eyes closed, listening to the wind in the trees, feeling the sun’s warmth on his face.
He opened his eyes and sniffed away the misery, running the back of his hand beneath his nose. He wanted to rage, the way he’d raged the day Sylvie had tried to blackmail him. But rage had blinded him and he’d made a foolish mistake. He could have shut her up with false promises. Tricked her, hell, even given her enough cash to send herself into oblivion with whisky and blow. His hands shook as they curled around the stock of his rifle.
He climbed to his feet, his knee still paining him from too much walking. There was a cost to freedom and maybe this was it. Maybe this was a test. He drew in the mountain air and released it with a promise.
Whatever it took.
He’d do whatever it took to get what he needed, or he’d die trying.
***
Déjà vu.
Griff stood on top of the steps of the plane and looked out at the mist covering the Labrador coast. The rising sun revealed a world in that thin early morning light that felt clean and fresh and full of potential. And there was McCoy at the bottom of the steps, standing to attention like a soldier on parade. Charlie Watson was waiting beside her, and Griff’s appreciation of the natural beauty faded.
Maybe finding the missing ATV would bring them closer to solving Mr. Watson’s daughter�
��s murder. Griff hauled his kitbag over his shoulder and made his way to the airstrip.
He dropped the bag at his feet and stuck out his hand. “Mr. Watson. Constable.” He nodded to each in turn.
“Sir.” McCoy had returned to her usual uptight self, which somehow felt right. Her pale eyes were rimmed with sooty lashes, her thin lips pinched and almost invisible in the seriousness of her face.
Charlie stared at his outstretched hand as if Griff had Ebola. “They found my ATV yesterday, but you don’t arrive until now?” The man spat in the grit at his feet and McCoy bristled.
Pity stirred in Griff’s heart. He had a daughter too. And he’d made this man a promise. He reached out and squeezed Charlie’s shoulder. “I understand your frustration, and I apologize for not getting here sooner, but I was in court all day yesterday, and I wanted to assess the vehicle myself.” He paused. “No point finding evidence if we don’t follow through with a conviction in the courts.”
He raised his brows at the man, who looked away but nodded grudgingly. That was something anyway.
“How’s Mrs. Watson holding up?” It was always easier to talk about how women coped with grief. Men sucked at the emotion. They either buried it too deep or it buried them.
“She was doing okay, but then the funeral…” Charlie swallowed a sob. “The funeral hit her hard.”
“The Major Crime Unit is chasing every lead and following up every piece of information, sir. Constable McCoy is devoting all her energies to finding your daughter’s killer. We have not forgotten Sylvie, and we will get the person responsible. Trust me.”
Charlie tried to wipe away his tears, but they flowed too fast.
“Let’s give you a ride home before Constable McCoy and I go out to the site. Okay?”
“No.” Charlie backed away and shook his head, looking like a man coming out of a daze. “No. I need to walk. I don’t want Mary to see me like this.”
Edge of Survival Page 18