Holiday Heroes

by Rachel Lee

  He yawned as if to say, And what do you know about dogs?

  “Good point. Did anyone ever tell you that you’re too cute?”

  He settled his chin on his paws, looking at her.

  “Yeah, probably a million times already, and you’re what…three months old? If that?”

  His steady gaze never wavered, although his eyelids were beginning to sag again.

  “Nate was right about you. You’ll be bouncing around again in an hour. Maybe I should nap. You sure didn’t let me get a lot of sleep last night.”

  One of his ears twitched in response, then snap, his eyelids closed.

  That easy chair did look good, Melinda thought. She scanned the waiting boxes and decided there was no rush. Instead she settled in her chair, put her feet up and stared at the blaze through the glass door of her woodstove.

  Nice. Very nice.

  Her own eyelids drooped, and moments later she was sound asleep.

  The sound of howling and the rapid thump of feet awoke her abruptly. The oil lamp had burned out, and the fire was now little more than a red glow of coals. She could barely make out Noel running in excited circles, howling his fool head off.

  Well, at least it had been more than an hour, she thought, as she struggled to shed her dream and find the will to move.

  “Ahwooo!”

  “Okay, okay.” What did he want now? Another walk?

  Noel raced in frantic circles, colliding with boxes and walls but barely noticing, as if he were a ball in a pinball machine.

  “Ahwooo!”

  She pushed herself to her stockinged feet and headed for her boots, which were beside the door, beneath the hook for her parka. “Cool your jets, little man. I’m coming.”

  The radio crackled to life before she could shove her feet into her boots, and Nate Tate’s voice filled the room.

  “Melinda? Are you there? Over.”

  Sliding a bit in her stocking feet, she crossed to the desk behind the counter and lifted the microphone to her mouth, pressing the talk button. “I’m here, Nate. The howling you hear in the background is my Christmas present. I think he needs a walk.”

  “I won’t keep you long. I just wanted to alert you. We had a bank robbery today, and the perp shot one of the tellers.”

  “Who?” Melinda’s heart slammed. She knew most of the tellers, many from her school days.

  “Charlene Jansen. She’s okay. She was lucky. A little patchwork and she’ll be fine.”

  Physically, Melinda thought. She would be fine physically, but what about emotionally? “Thank God.”

  “That’s the first thing, but you also need to know that someone just saw the perp’s truck on the county road headed west toward your general area. I don’t see why he should come anywhere near you, because if he wants to get away he’d be smarter to turn south on County Road 33. But on the off chance he decided to duck into the mountains, I want you to be on the lookout, okay?”

  She tensed. “Yeah. I’ll watch out.”

  “Carry your weapon, Melinda. This guy is armed.”

  “I will.”

  “I’ll keep you posted. Out.”

  A sharp rap on the door caused her to freeze. Now she knew what had Noel so stirred up. It was late, though, and dark as pitch outside, and nobody ought to be banging on her door.

  Concerned and fearful, she changed tack and went to the kitchen. In a drawer, behind the silverware trays, she kept her service revolver. By feel, she released the safety. She didn’t have to check whether it was loaded.

  Then, moving quietly, she returned to the front door. Noel was now standing still, looking at her as if to say, I did my job. Now do yours.

  Her heart thudded in her chest. There had been a time when she’d been alone and had opened a door and…

  Not now! she told herself sternly. Don’t think about it.

  But whether or not she thought about it, the fear still sent her adrenaline through the roof. Pistol in her right hand, she reached out with her left to turn the knob on the heavy, old-fashioned dead bolt. It released with a thunk.

  Then she lifted the iron latch and slowly opened the door, the pistol pointing at whatever was out there.

  “Oh my God,” she gasped. It was Jon Erikson.

  He looked from her face down to her nearly invisible pistol. It was snowing again, and the night was only slightly brighter outside than in. To her, he was little more than a silhouette. “You come loaded for bear, huh?” he said, not so much as twitching a muscle.

  Slowly she flipped the safety on and lowered the pistol. “Sorry. There’s an armed bank robber on the loose, and I’ve got to be careful out here on my own.”

  “Sure, I understand.”

  He seemed to, she realized. “Do you need something?”

  “The, uh, outdoor facilities are locked.”

  “Oh! I clean forgot.” She stepped back and motioned him in. Noel at once started dancing around his feet and sniffing. She couldn’t help but notice that he tried to ignore the puppy.

  “I’m sorry,” she continued as she closed the door behind him. “We lock the outhouses in the winter, ever since that little girl in Colorado was kidnapped and dumped in one.”

  “I remember that. She was lucky those hikers came by.”

  “Yeah. Very lucky. So when the campground isn’t busy, we lock them. Here, let me show you mine. It’s more comfortable, anyway, and warmer. You’re welcome to use it any time.”

  “Thanks.” One corner of his mouth lifted, just visible in the glow from the stove. “Somehow I didn’t think you’d want me to dig a hole.”

  At that she had to grin. “Nope. Absolutely not. Gotta protect the groundwater.”

  She did have the convenience of running water and a flush toilet. She also had a shower, but unless she turned on the generator, it was a very cold shower. She’d gotten used to taking sponge baths most of the time, using a pot of water steaming on the woodstove.

  She lit another oil lamp and showed him the way, leaving him with the lamp. Then she tucked her pistol back into its hiding place and lit several more lamps in the front room. Now the place looked welcoming again, instead of like a cave on the edge of hell’s brimstone. The red eye of the dying fire no longer dominated.

  Squatting, she opened the stove door and threw in a couple more logs.

  When Jon returned to the front room, he eyed all the boxes. “What’s this?”

  “Christmas decorations.”

  “Wow.” Something in his gaze grew faraway. “You have no idea how long it’s been.”

  She waited, letting him follow whatever path memory was taking, then offered, “You can help me with them, if you’d like. I sure wouldn’t mind.”

  Slowly he came back to her. “I’d like that,” he said quietly. “I’d like that a whole lot.”

  “I’m not sure I want to start tonight, though. I meant to, but then I fell asleep.” She glanced at the pendulum clock on the wall and nearly gasped at the time. Past ten already.

  “I’m sorry I woke you.”

  She ran her fingers through her long, dark hair, pushing it back from her face. “No, that’s okay. It was just a nap, and I’d have had to get up soon to walk the dog anyway.”

  She looked at him, at his blond hair, shaved so close, what the Marines called “high and tight,” if she remembered correctly. His eyes, she thought, were green, but the light wasn’t good right now, and she couldn’t really remember.

  “How,” she asked unexpectedly, unable to stop the question as it tumbled out, “do you manage to pass in Afghanistan?”

  He grew very still, then visibly relaxed. “You’ve seen pictures. Men there cover their heads.”

  “But your beard…is that blond, too?”

  “Yeah, but I don’t grow it out.”

  “I thought beards were required.”

  He shrugged. “Under the Taliban, yes. But after the Taliban, a lot of men took great delight in shaving.”

  She nodded. “Sorry. I
don’t mean to pry. It just suddenly struck me…”

  “I know. My Swedish heritage pretty much sticks out. But I don’t often have to pass as anything other that what I am.”

  Feeling embarrassed, as if she’d made a major faux pas, she invited him to sit. “I think I want some fresh coffee,” she said. “Join me?”

  Again he hesitated, then nodded. “Sure. Just promise me you’ll give me the key to the facilities when I leave.”

  In that instant the whole wary mood lifted and she was able to smile again. “It’s a deal. But first let me walk Noel.”

  The dog was sitting by the door, his eyes pleading with her.

  “I’ll do that,” Jon said, surprising her. He scooped the pup up in one large arm and took him out.

  By the time he returned, Melinda had the coffee perking on the stove and was seated on the edge of her chair. It had just occurred to her that she was showing a remarkable amount of trust in a man she had just met. Ordinarily she was skittish around strange men, sometimes even panic-stricken. Could her memories of Jon in high school be sufficient to counter all that had happened since then?

  Maybe so. Or maybe it was something about him. For all that he tried to seem distant and reserved, there was something else, something that seemed to promise safety. Something that said he was by nature a protector.

  An odd thing to think about a man whose job probably involved killing people. Yet she was sure, at some deep gut level, that he would never hurt her. Very few men had ever made her feel that way. In fact, giving it some thought, she realized she felt that way about Nate Tate and his deputy Micah Parish, and no one else.

  But then, they were the ones who’d found her, who’d saved her. But for Micah’s skill at tracking…

  She quickly jerked her mind back from that precipice. If she went there, it might be hours before she could return to the stability she had managed to create over the last ten years.

  Jon was sitting on the couch now, leaving her alone in her thoughts, absently stroking Noel as if he weren’t even aware that he was doing it. His eyes were on the flames dancing behind the glass door of the stove. He had given her privacy for her thoughts without even being asked.

  But maybe he also wanted privacy for his. He must have far more ugly memories than she did. Quietly she scooted back in her chair and put her feet up. The sense of comfort she had felt earlier as she dozed off with the dog returned, as if it had never been interrupted.

  After a bit Jon rose and took two cups down from the hooks on the wall behind the stove. He filled both of them with coffee, asking, “You like anything in yours?”

  “No, thanks. It takes too much effort to keep milk and cream up here, and I hate that powdered stuff.”

  “Me too.” He passed her a mug with a half smile, then resumed his seat beside the dog. Noel nestled in contentedly.

  “He’s adopted you,” she remarked.

  “Not for long.”

  He wanted no attachments, she realized. Like her. Solitude wasn’t merely comfortable, it was safe. “So you have to go back at the end of your leave?”

  He nodded.

  “For how long?”

  He turned his head, gave a little shrug. “Probably for the rest of my career, the way things are going over there.”

  “Do you think we’re really helping?”

  “There? Actually, I do. Some of them would prefer the Taliban, of course, but most of them just want to go back to the times before the Russians invaded. The only hope we have of giving that back to them is to restrain the warlords and the Taliban.”

  “Will that ever happen?”

  “I think so, but I can’t say when. It’s a big leap these people are trying to make. But I told you that.”

  She nodded and sipped her coffee. “Do you like anything about it over there?”

  He surprised her with a smile and a nod. “Actually, I do. People are people the world over, and there’s a lot of really nice folks in Afghanistan. I’d like to see women treated better, but that will come with time.” He shook his head. “There’s one story that upsets me, though. The Taliban invaded a small village not too long ago and burned the girls’ school. They threatened the life of the teacher, too. So now classes are being held in some village elder’s home, and the teacher travels to and from the school wearing a burkha so she can’t be identified, and her brothers go with her to protect her.”

  “That’s awful!”

  “And that’s the kind of thing I want to see the end of. That’s why I’m in those mountains hunting Taliban.”

  “So it’s a good cause.”

  “I think so.”

  But she didn’t want to imagine the price he was probably paying.

  “Enough about that,” he said, rising. He refilled his mug and paced around the room. “I’m supposed to be on leave. Away from all that.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  He shook his head. “Don’t be. There’s a large part of me that can’t leave Afghanistan anyway. And common sense tells me it would be dangerous if I start relaxing, since I have to go back. I need to keep my edge.”

  He paused and looked at her, trying to smile. “On the other hand, there still has to be some way to refresh myself.”

  She didn’t know what to say or to suggest. “Do you think you’ll get refreshed sleeping in the snow?”

  “Maybe. Maybe that’s all I need. To see the mountains as a friend again, rather than as a potential enemy.”

  “Well, if the snow lets up, we can do something about that tomorrow. I’ve got an extra pair of Nordic skis left by the last ranger. They’d probably be just about right for you. Like I said, you can help me hunt for avalanche hazards.”

  “I wouldn’t know what in the world to look for.”

  She smiled. “I can teach you.”

  “What do you do if you find something risky?”

  “Post it. It takes professionals to come out here and detonate the dangerous slides. I just try to keep everyone, myself included, away from them.”

  “Sounds like a good rule for life in general.”

  She nodded, thinking that indeed it did. But life still set traps, and no matter how many dangerous areas she identified, there was always the chance that she would miss one. And one was all it took.

  Chapter 6

  The morning dawned with the brightness that could come only with a fresh snowfall reflecting the sun. Blindingly bright, so bright that she needed her protective sunglasses with their mirrored tops and bottoms.

  Noel seemed to like the change in weather, prancing and leaping and jumping in the snow like a dervish at top speed. He started barking, and the sound soon brought Jon out of the forest. He looked ready to go, except for ski shoes. Luckily the last ranger had left a pair of those behind, too. They were an almost perfect fit, and before long they were skiing away from her cabin toward the steeper mountain slopes.

  Avalanche hazard signs were permanently posted in most places, so Melinda’s task was to mark them with caution tape if she felt the danger was high. After her survey, she could post a sign at her cabin announcing the level of danger. In theory, at least, nobody went anywhere in the park without checking in with the ranger, purely for safety reasons. So far this winter she hadn’t had any trouble with people ignoring that precaution.

  For now, as they followed a hiking trail through the woods, she allowed Noel to scamper around them and wear himself out. When they approached the danger zones, she would leash him, or tuck him into her backpack.

  From the sounds of Jon moving behind her, she could tell he was enjoying himself. He kept pace steadily, and the woods were filled with the swish-swish of their skis on snow.

  Just about the time Noel began to lag, they were approaching the first danger spot. Melinda halted, and Jon came up beside her.

  “Not far,” she said to him. “In another five minutes or so, we’ll be above the trees.”

  He nodded, and took the opportunity to dig his poles into the snow and squ
at.

  “You’re not getting blisters, are you?” she asked.

  “I don’t think I’m capable of blistering anymore.” He glanced at her, his mouth curved wryly. “I’m one great big callus.”

  She tried not to read any more into that statement than he probably meant. Noel came over to her, no longer prancing, and curled up at her feet, evidently ready to nap.

  “I wish I could do that,” she said. “Just curl up in the snow and be comfortable.”

  “You’d need a fur coat.”

  “Would that be so bad?” She released the clasps on her skis and stepped out of them. The puppy lifted his head and watched.

  She swung her backpack off her shoulders and dug into it, pulling out some dog biscuits and a couple of energy bars. She passed one of the bars to Jon.

  “Thanks.”

  Noel poked at the biscuits with his nose, then flipped them through the air with a quick jerk of his head. Then he was off, hunting them down.

  “I guess,” Jon observed, “he needs to kill them first.”

  Melinda laughed. “Maybe so. I’m kind of surprised, actually. I didn’t realize watching a dog could be so entertaining. I mean, I watch wild animals all the time. I’m fascinated by their habits, and keeping an eye on them is part of my job. But I never thought of dogs as being just as interesting.”

  “Clearly you’ve never had one before.”

  “Have you?”

  He nodded, his gaze following the puppy. “In another life. One of the things that fascinates me about them is the way they make a bridge between us and the rest of the wild. You can still see the wolf in them, but you can also see the human.”

  She squatted, her back against a tree, and looked at him. “The human?”

  “We breed them to serve our needs, so of course they reflect us to some extent.” He crumpled the foil wrapper from his energy bar in the palm of his hand and tucked it into one of his parka pockets. “Think about it. From all I’ve read, wolves are basically shy and retiring when it comes to people. They kill only to eat. Dogs, on the other hand, are far more aggressive in general. They’ll even bite the hand that feeds them. We’ve bred that into them. Hardly surprising, when you look at our species.”