by Brenda Novak
Dr. Fielding didn’t ask, but she could tell he was curious as to why she hadn’t mentioned marrying Amarok if they might be having a child together. No one else could understand how truly complicated her situation was. She loved Amarok. There was no question about that. But at this point she wasn’t committed to spending the rest of her life in Alaska. She had responsibilities back in Boston, where she was from, and she knew he’d never be happy anywhere else. He’d been born and raised in Hilltop, was a sixteenth-part Inuit, on his father’s side. He was the town’s only police presence, too, and he thrived on living in such a rugged part of the world. Alaska was in his blood. Dragging him down to the Lower 48 would be like caging a wild animal.
And yet her biological clock was ticking. She wouldn’t leave Hilltop for another three or four years. By then, it’d be too late to have a baby, especially since she’d have to wait for another relationship to develop like the one she had with Amarok, which probably wouldn’t happen. Other than Jasper, way back when, Amarok was the only man she’d ever truly loved. He was also the only man she’d ever been able to sleep with. After the violence she’d suffered at sixteen, she struggled with trust issues. If she ever wanted to be a mother, this could be her one chance. She didn’t want to be childless without even considering her options. And if she did get pregnant? She’d simply have to stay in Alaska; that would make the decision for her.
“I’ll speak to him about it,” she said. But she wasn’t sure how to bring up the subject. If she did, she knew Amarok would want to talk about marriage. He had every right to ask for a lifelong commitment instead of gambling with his heart.
2
Jasper was tempted to provide one of the inmates at Hanover House with a shiv. If someone were to get shanked, at least that would be intriguing, give him something enjoyable to watch. Those were the kinds of thoughts that went through his mind when he was bored, and he was always bored when Evelyn wasn’t at the prison. He’d hated being a correctional officer in Florence, Arizona, had done whatever he could to relieve the drudgery, including aiding and abetting a few stabbings. But he wouldn’t have been able to get on at Hanover House if not for the experience he’d gained at Florence, so he was glad he’d never been caught. Now he looked forward to going to work if he thought he might bump into his old girlfriend—or even catch a glimpse of her.
Unfortunately, that wasn’t going to happen today. He’d heard someone say Evelyn wasn’t coming in, which explained the desire he felt to create a diversion, something to cause a little excitement. But he couldn’t draw too much attention to himself, especially negative attention. Ever since he’d moved to Anchorage eight months ago and started commuting to Hanover House in Hilltop, he’d worked hard to build the illusion that he was a dependable, nonthreatening, normal prison guard. Even Evelyn seemed to buy his act. Whenever he passed her in the halls, she had a smile for him. She believed he’d saved her life when Lyman Bishop attacked her last winter, so she should have a smile for him. But her complete trust wasn’t easy to win. And her boyfriend, Sergeant Benjamin Murphy—or Amarok, as the locals called him—was ever watchful. Although Amarok didn’t work at the prison, he visited Hanover House often to bring Evelyn lunch or pick her up if there was a storm.
It wouldn’t be long now, though. And recapturing Evelyn would be all the sweeter for the patience and effort he’d invested in making certain that moment went down perfectly. Thanks to the plastic surgery he’d had twenty years ago, the dye he used to darken his hair and the passage of more than two decades, she didn’t know what he looked like these days. He’d even grown a beard since coming to Hilltop. He had all that going for him but still had to be careful not to get overeager and ruin the perception of himself he’d so painstakingly created. If he screwed up, she might realize he was right under her nose.
“Hey, what are you doing standing there?”
Jasper clenched his jaw as Lieutenant Dickey approached. This wasn’t anyone he wanted to see, not when he was leaning against the painted cinder-block wall outside the cafeteria, scraping the dirt from underneath his nails and wasting time until he could go home. “Nothing. Why?” he said, immediately straightening.
“Because last I checked, you were getting paid for being here.”
“We just finished searching Cellblock B, and my shift is nearly over, sir. I go home at one.” Waking up for work in the middle of the night wasn’t easy, but Jasper liked getting off when he had so much of the day ahead of him. He wished all his shifts started and ended at the same time, but they varied.
“That’s no excuse for loitering in the halls. If you’re done with Cellblock B, search A.”
Most of the COs hated doing searches. Trying to drag a belligerent inmate out of his cell could be dangerous. The men incarcerated here didn’t have a lot to lose, which made them unpredictable. And the searches were mostly a waste of time. In Florence, a search turned up all kinds of stuff—handmade weapons, drugs, even cell phones. But the prisoners incarcerated at Hanover House didn’t have many visitors. That just left the guards and other employees to smuggle in contraband, and in an institution containing only 350 beds the risk of getting caught was too great.
Irked by Dickey’s imperial tone, Jasper felt his muscles tense, but if there was an aspect to his job he liked, it was rummaging through the inmates’ meager possessions. Threatening the men, invading their privacy, humiliating them whenever possible … Jasper found it all quite enjoyable. He figured any good sadist would. “Who should I get to work with me?”
“The same guys who helped you search the other cellblock.”
“No problem.” As far as Jasper was concerned, the sooner they started the better. He didn’t want to stay late. He had plans for after work. He had to go back to the cabin he’d been using so he could finish cleaning up.
“Then get your ass moving!” Dickey bellowed, even though Jasper was already on his way.
Jasper refused the temptation to throw him a dirty look. He hated taking direction from someone so obviously inferior to him. But most men were inferior to him, both mentally and physically—except, perhaps, Sergeant Amarok. It was because of Amarok that he’d had to kill his own parents. After all the help they’d given him over the years, that wasn’t something he’d wanted to do. They were the ones who’d gotten him out of the country in the very beginning, after he’d killed Evelyn’s three friends and tried to kill her. They’d also paid for all the plastic surgery he’d had back then, while he was in Europe. Without them, he would’ve been caught and prosecuted.
Yes, Amarok had made a brilliant move last winter. The Alaska State Trooper had forced Jasper to make a costly sacrifice. He was a worthy opponent, but this Lieutenant Dickey … he was just an asshole.
Ignore the bastard, Jasper told himself as he rounded up the other guards. Jasper had a reason for being at Hanover House, a reason to put up with Lieutenant Dickey and all the other pricks who enjoyed telling him what to do and when to do it.
He smiled as he pictured Evelyn. He certainly wasn’t working here for the money.
* * *
Amarok felt the tension that’d been knotting his muscles ease as soon as he saw a call from his home number come into the trooper post. “Where have you been?” he barked into the phone as soon as he picked up.
Evelyn hesitated. “What do you mean?”
“I tried calling you at work,” he replied. “I was told you never came in this morning.”
“How did you know I wasn’t at home?” she asked sheepishly.
Since he’d left before she did this morning, at first he hadn’t. That was why he’d gone back to check. “When I couldn’t reach you, I drove to the house. I’ve been in a panic ever since, trying to find you. I’ve got everyone in town on the lookout—Shorty over at the Moosehead, Garrett at the Quick Stop, all the waitresses at The Dinky Diner, even Margaret Seaver at The Shady Lady, not that I could imagine you having any reason to go to the motel.”
“You thought I might b
e having an affair?”
He heard the humor in her voice. “No. Considering your background, I realize that’s unlikely. Although you did eventually allow me in your pants.” They’d made love again this morning. That was why he’d called her. He couldn’t stop thinking about her. “So I guess it’s not impossible for a man to get past your defenses.”
“No one else has ever managed it—not after Jasper.”
She hadn’t had much sexual experience when she and Amarok got together, but they’d come a long way from the days when he’d had to be careful not to make her feel pinned down, overpowered or threatened. Now that she knew she could trust him, now that he’d put in the time to build that trust, she wanted to touch him or feel him inside her almost every day. Amarok couldn’t believe how lucky he was that the situation had changed. When he’d fallen in love with her, he’d decided he’d just have to cope with a difficult sex life, but the opposite was turning out to be true. “I was only being thorough, stopping by the motel,” he said. “Why would you scare me like that?”
He heard her sigh.
“What’s going on?” he pressed. “You can’t simply disappear. You’re not like other people. I can’t assume everything’s okay and go about my business, not when there’s a chance you could be in trouble. Jasper could pop up at any time. He’s done it before. And you’ve had other close calls since you moved here.”
“I know,” she said. “I just … I wasn’t gone long. I thought I could get away for a few hours.”
“Away where?”
“I went to Anchorage.”
“With a storm coming in?”
“I felt I could beat it, and I did. It’s ugly out there now, but I’m home safe.”
“Don’t tell me you went shopping.”
“No, I went to see a doctor.”
He gripped the phone tighter. “What kind of doctor?”
Another pause.
“Evelyn…”
“An ob/gyn,” she said at length.
A burst of excitement brought him to his feet. “Are you pregnant?”
“No.”
He tried to shrug off the disappointment, careful not to let even a hint of it enter his voice. “Then what?”
“I went to see if … if anything had changed with my … ability to have a child since I was last checked.”
Obviously, she was trying to figure out why she hadn’t gotten pregnant. They hadn’t been doing anything to prevent it. He’d been wondering, too—and worrying that it wouldn’t be possible to have a child with her. “And?”
“My doctor thinks fertility drugs will help. But he needs to check your sperm count before we do anything else.”
“I’m willing. When?”
“I’ll have to call him back and set up an appointment.”
“Do it.”
“Okay.”
Silence fell as he tried to get a sense of what she was feeling. “Evelyn?”
“What?”
“Why didn’t you tell me about the appointment?”
“I don’t know,” she said, “but I’ve got several things I need to take care of for work, so … can we talk about it later?”
“Of course. I’ll see you tonight.”
After she hung up, Amarok stared down at the phone. She loved him; he knew she did. But his mother had also loved his father, and yet she’d hated Alaska. She couldn’t tolerate the dark, the cold, the isolation. She’d broken up the family, taken his twin brother and moved to Seattle when Amarok was only two and never looked back. Amarok hadn’t even known he had a brother until his eighteenth birthday, when he received a call from his twin. They’d remained in contact ever since, but Amarok still refused to have any sort of relationship with his mother.
By falling in love with Evelyn, having a child with her, was he setting himself up for the same kind of heartbreak his father had experienced?
* * *
The weather was so bad that Jasper almost decided to put off returning to the cabin. After assisting with the search of Cellblock A, he wasn’t in the best mood. Tex, one of the other COs, had seen him tearing up a picture of an inmate’s grandmother and had the nerve to call him on it.
Jasper had claimed he hadn’t meant to destroy the photograph, but that was a lame excuse. It couldn’t have been torn to pieces by accident, and he could tell Tex thought the same thing. This was the first time since coming to Alaska that Jasper had done something for which he could be written up—a stupid mistake.
He scowled as he left Hilltop behind. What was the big deal, anyway? So he’d torn up a picture? The inmate’s grandmother had died of a stroke while he was incarcerated. But if his grandmother was gone, she was gone. Why would the stupid idiot be trying to sketch her photograph, especially when he didn’t have the talent to begin with?
There was no use being maudlin and sentimental over a photograph.
Hopefully Tex would let the incident go, forget about it.
“He’d better,” Jasper mumbled as he strained to see the road through the rapid slap-slap-slap of his windshield wipers. The snow was coming down so thick, he couldn’t drive very fast. More than once he considered turning back. But because the day had ended badly, he persevered, figured he might as well get this over with. Disposing of the body was always the worst part of any kill. He couldn’t simply bury “Kat” like his victims in the Lower 48; the ground was frozen.
He could try to outwait the storm and come back in the next day or two. The problem there was that if another cold front hit right away and then another, he might not be able to reach the cabin until spring. And he couldn’t leave it that long. If someone else beat him out there, for whatever reason, and found the body in the shed, it would spook everyone in Hilltop. Amarok would open an investigation and the locals would feel twitchy and frightened and doubt anyone they didn’t know well.
That could screw with his ability to get to Evelyn now that he was finally ready.
He shouldn’t have nabbed Kat in the first place, since he hadn’t been ready to take a victim to his house. But she’d been right there, walking down Spenard Road, the red-light district of Anchorage, which wasn’t far from where he lived, such easy pickings he couldn’t resist. And he’d known the hunting cabins in the mountains were rarely used after September. That constituted an Opportunity.
Besides, he’d been confident he could get away with whatever he wanted. Nothing he’d done had caught up with him yet. He’d been killing for more than twenty years, had fooled his parents whenever he needed to, two wives—both ex-wives these days—and various bosses.
Basically, he’d fooled everybody in one way or another, even Evelyn and Amarok last winter.
But he was now operating in a very different theater, and he should’ve taken that into account. Alaska offered him a lot of freedom and space, without a lot of police presence—outside of Anchorage. He’d kidnapped Kat a week ago and chosen to keep her in a cabin that wasn’t far from Hilltop so he could get to her more easily before or after work. He had yet to deal with the full brunt of an Alaskan winter, however, and this year winter was starting early. He might’ve underestimated how difficult returning there might be.
He gave the truck more gas. He could make it. At least he’d already scoured the cabin. Once he arrived, all he had to do was put her body in the back of his four-wheel drive, under the tarp he’d picked up at the hardware store last night. After the weather cleared, he’d drive her an hour or more to the other side of Anchorage and dump her in some isolated wilderness area. With any luck, she wouldn’t be discovered until spring.
Even if she was discovered sooner, she’d be so far away from Hilltop there’d be nothing to alert Amarok or anyone else in the town where he worked that they should take notice.
His tires slipped. He turned into the slide to avoid going over the side of the mountain and managed to regain control, but he was mad at himself for having to make this drive to begin with. He should’ve taken Kat’s body when he left her there t
he day she died. It would’ve saved him this nightmare of a trip. But she’d been such a weakling, she’d died before he was ready, and he’d had to get to Hanover House for work right after.
The radio had fallen to static, so he turned it off. If he had one complaint about Alaska, it was the lack of radio reception. Everything else he considered a plus, especially for a man like him. The sparse population. The isolated areas. The long, dark months.
Evelyn …
He immediately cheered up when he thought of the woman he’d fantasized about for so many years. He’d set everything up perfectly, recovered beautifully from what could’ve been a disaster last winter with Bishop. No one was as brilliant as he was. He was a good driver, too. He’d get through this storm, and he’d get around the small mistake he’d made letting Tex see him tear up that picture.
By the time he reached the cabin, he felt much better. He was humming “Heathens” by Twenty-One Pilots as he navigated the final hairpin turn. But then he saw something that made the hair stand up on the back of his neck.
There was a light in the window.
3
Sierra was trembling. She hadn’t found another person. She’d found a body—one with missing fingers, contusions, broken bones and ligatures.
Falling to her knees, she vomited everything she’d recently eaten. She couldn’t stop retching, so it took a while to gather even the small amount of strength required to stand. Her legs felt like rubber. But once she got to her feet, she forced herself to peer closer. She was hoping there might be a chance of saving the woman. Unlikely as that was, considering the temperature outside and the condition of the body, she’d read about miracles when someone who was thought to be dead had survived.
No. There was no chance, she decided. This poor woman wasn’t only dead, she was frozen solid. That was why Sierra could smell no stench, no odor of decomposition. And that was, undoubtedly, why the combination provided by the rental company hadn’t worked. Whoever had killed this woman must’ve used the sheet of paper the rental company kept on the counter with the combination to take off the original lock, after which they put on another, one of their own. So late in the season, he or she probably hadn’t expected the cabin to be rented but had taken that small precaution, just in case. The person who’d done this must also be the one who’d stacked extra wood on the back porch, which was how they’d gotten by until now.