“Mac, I’m not sure what to think. I’ve never been in this position before, I guess.”
He looked at her, puzzled. “You’ve never . . .” What? Been in love? Did he have feelings of love for her? Admiration, yes. Respect, yes. Desire . . . yes, that had scared him the most. But love? He looked at the outline of her face, her luminous eyes.
She seemed to know what he might be thinking—or at least he hoped she did—for she shook her head. Her eyes glistened. “I have a pretty sorry track record when it comes to relationships. Not that I’ve had a lot of boyfriends. In fact, I haven’t. Yes, I got asked out, but I know how relationships end up. And I can’t be that girl who hopes for so much and in the end realizes it was just a dream.”
He sat before her, cupped her face in his hand, rubbed his thumb along her cheek. “You’re talking about your parents.” But he understood her words and knew how it felt to pin his hopes on something, only to have it blow up in his face.
She shrugged and looked away. The grayness barely illuminated her face, but he saw the pain carved into it. “When I was twelve, four years before we left my father in the woods, my mother got a call on our HAM radio. Dad had been working undercover in Anchorage and had been shot. Of course, at the time we thought a gun had accidentally gone off by one of the hunters on his plane. My mother got a flight to Fairbanks, and we left within the hour.
“I’ll never forget seeing him, a central line protruding from his chest and an oxygen machine breathing for him. He’d been shot in the stomach, and it dissected his liver. My mother got us a room at a hotel, but we didn’t use it once. We stayed by his side, sleeping on a cot or in a chair until he was well enough to be released. We lived in the hotel for a month, my mother nursing him back to health. I remember it as a happy time. We played chess, and when I had him in check, he’d wiggle his knees and upset the board. My mother cooked all his favorites— oatcakes and porridge—on a hot pot. A couple of times they sent me out to get pizza.”
“Sounds like they loved each other very much. What happened?”
“Love was never their problem. I found out not long ago that they corresponded for years—still do. My dad just couldn’t give up his career.”
Suddenly the pieces fit into place. “As an FBI agent.”
He saw the sadness in her eyes. She nodded. “Gerard loved his job. But more than that I think he felt compelled to do his job.”
Gerard? Mac searched through his mental files. Her father couldn’t be Gerard MacLeod, could he?
“I told you he was a Vietnam vet. Only after I did SAR work and watched victims cope with the deaths of their friends did the connection spark. He saw so many of his friends die and couldn’t figure out why he wasn’t among them. I guess he thought he had to do something extraordinary to justify his shame of living.
“I’m not sure why he couldn’t choose my mother and me. Maybe he simply couldn’t accept that God had chosen him to live, and he had to somehow prove his worth to the world. Prove that saving his life had been worth it to God.”
Mac rolled her words through his mind. He’d always held a pragmatic view of life—the good of the many outweighed the good of the few. But since Brody’s death, that theory hadn’t helped him cope with the loss of his best friend or accept the man he saw in the mirror.
He might be more like Andee’s dad than he wanted to admit. Only, from his recollection, Gerard had been labeled a hero.
Nothing at all like Mac.
“In the end, though, I think it was their pride that kept them apart,” Andee continued. “Neither could say the words I need you. Or please don’t go. It broke my mother’s heart and turned my father into a bitter, driven man.”
As Mac ran his thumb down Andee’s cheek, her words burned. Anyone who needed him was going to get hurt, just like Gerard had hurt Andee and her mother. Most of all, if he slowed down enough to need someone, that would only get his attention off what was most important.
Andee smiled at him sweetly, sadly.
A woman would have to crash-land at his feet to get his attention. He’d joked about that to Brody so many times he’d actually started believing it. Only Andee had done just that. Crash-landed in his life, blowing apart his defenses. Somehow over the last few hours, he’d lulled himself into believing that maybe he could start over with Andee. Build that life his father had painted.
“My dad gave up a thousand moments with my mother and me for his job and the big picture,” Andee said. “And even though I hang out with him every summer, probably trying to recapture those happy times, I know what I missed. I can’t live like that, Mac. I can’t be the girl you leave behind.”
“But maybe I won’t be FBI anymore,” Mac said. “I’ll resign, go home, fish, or work the pipeline. Or something.” He cradled her face with both hands. “You could come home with me. Start that FBO you’ve been talking about. We can have a happy ending here, I promise.” He hated the desperation that filled his voice, wanted to strip it away, but it had already tumbled out. He tightened his jaw against another flood of emotion, aware that he’d just made a fool of himself.
Especially because she shook her head. “Mac, whatever drove you to be an FBI agent is still part of you. You might think you’ve given that up, but I know better.” She touched his face, ran her fingers through his beard. “The thing is, I like your dream. You have no idea how much I’d like to meet your family.” She swallowed, leaving the rest unspoken. “But I can’t compete with that place inside you that will look for terrorists in every person you meet or imagine scenarios whenever you see a marked map or a gun.”
He began to protest, but she stopped him by laying a hand against his cheek. “I can’t take loving another man who lets me down.”
He closed his eyes, just concentrated on breathing.
“We’d better get back.” Andee stood, and with careful steps, she found her way to the jagged path and right out of his life.
Chapter 16
“YOU LIKE HIM, don’t you?” Sarah’s voice filtered through the early morning, hushed against the snappy air.
Andee let herself come fully awake, realizing that she’d been semiconscious for a while now, listening to the wind in the trees, shivering under the blanket she shared with Sarah.
“He carried you down the mountain,” Andee said by way of an answer.
“That’s not what I asked. I see the way you look at him. All that toughness drops from your eyes, and inside is the Andee that laughs at Conner’s jokes or buries her face into a child’s neck. You want to trust him.”
“I do trust him. I mean, enough to help us get out of here. He saved Flint’s life. He ran toward the sound of the bear instead of away. He’s a good man; I know it.”
“Of course he is. But I think he wants to be more for you.”
Andee lifted her hand to feel Sarah’s forehead.
“I’m not hallucinating the way he looks at you, Andee. He likes you. You should have seen him watching you put up the shelters last night. Every time I look at him, I see Mel Gibson in Braveheart, with that long hair, the half smile, those blue eyes, watching everyone like a protective warrior. He’s got the stuff.”
“He thinks we’re all terrorists—that’s why.” Andee kept her voice low.
“What?”
“He’s FBI. He thought that one of the passengers was a terrorist, going to blow up the pipeline. That’s why he watches everyone like a hawk.” She cast her gaze onto Nina, who lay with her back to them, rolled up in a sleeping bag.
“You’re kidding me.”
“No. He found a map marked with drawings of the pipeline and a two-way radio. We tried to contact help but got nothing. He, of course, thought it was part of some sinister terrorist plot. That’s why we had to hike out, although I’m thinking it was the right decision. I haven’t seen any planes overhead in the last three days, which means that the rescue teams don’t know where to look. We could be ice cubes sitting in that bowl, without food or water if he hadn’
t forced us off the mountain.”
“You wanted to hike out alone, didn’t you?”
Sarah knew her too well, knew that she’d risk her life before she risked the lives of others.
Andee said nothing, tucking the blanket around Sarah’s shoulders. “You need to get some rest. We’ll be at the homestead by this afternoon and in Fairbanks by tonight.”
“You know, you could stay in Alaska, Andee. You don’t have to go to Iowa.”
The statement stopped her movements. She studied Sarah’s face and saw she meant her words. “My mother needs me.”
“Your mother is the head of family practice of her own clinic. Somehow she’ll survive.”
Andee closed her mouth, looked away.
“I think you need her more. This running back and forth between your parents has to stop. And don’t tell me you’re not doing that. Everyone can see between the lines, trace the paths of regret. The fact is, you can’t erase time. Or heal your parents’ hurts. Maybe you can learn from them. In the end, you can only go forward and trust God that He’ll take care of it.”
Andee closed her eyes, wishing Sarah’s words didn’t burn.
Sarah continued. “When I think of people with past hurts, I think of Rahab, the woman who hid the spies. She heard of God and wanted to trust Him. Even though everyone around her told her she was a fool, she acted on faith that God would save her. And God took her and her entire family out of Jericho and put her right in the middle of the lineage of Christ. Transformed her and gave her a new life despite her ugly past.
“Don’t you think we all have regrets—choices we wish we hadn’t made or that others hadn’t made for us?” Sarah said. Her eyes shimmered with memories that Andee knew gave her a foundation from which to speak.
“But we have to trust that God’s going to redeem us, our mistakes, and our choices,” Sarah continued, her voice soft. “Lacey and Micah are learning that. Dani and Will are learning that too. You can’t let regrets—yours or others’—keep you from going forward. You gotta trust God one step at a time, expecting Him to work it out. Remember our psalm?”
Psalm 42. The one they quoted when life got darkest, when after fifty hours of searching they still hadn’t found the victim. “‘Why am I discouraged? Why is my heart so sad? I will put my hope in God!’” Andee quoted.
“Hope in God, the One who has a perfect view of our lives. You need to face the sunrise, Andee, not the shadows behind you. God loves you, and you can expect Him to guide you because you’re His child. If you seek Him, He’s not going to let you screw up.”
“I like what I do,” Andee said. “I like flying, and I like being an EMT—”
“I know. But you also want a family, Andee. Dani and I know that better than anyone. We saw your face when Micah and Lacey got married, when Emily jumped into Micah’s arms. It made me hurt for you.”
Andee swallowed through her thickening throat. “I’m happy for them.”
“Of course you are. But be happy for yourself too. Out there is a great guy. And after the chaos clears, he might just be the one. But not if you don’t give him a chance.”
Andee sat up, making ready to leave. “It’s not about chances. Mac is an FBI agent, all the way through to his bones. I don’t think he’s going to give that up for me, despite what he says.”
Sarah caught Andee’s arm and pulled her back into her line of vision. “Don’t judge Mac by Gerard’s standards or weaknesses. Have a little faith.”
Andee smiled and patted Sarah’s hand. Faith. It wasn’t that she didn’t believe God, but she’d seen what faith in her father had done to her mother.
She climbed out of the shelter. The rising sun had begun to burn off the clouds. The cool air raised the hair on her neck, but the day looked hopeful, with a swipe of lavender across the sky. A day for hope, for going home. The sound of the river flowing against the rocks and the smell of the campfire still lingering in the air gave a surreal picture of a family camping trip. She stretched, working out the kinks in her arms, feeling a little like a mole with all this dirt caked on her. She needed to wash her face, brush her teeth, and hopefully soon she’d be able to take a whirlpool bath some place with room service.
She looked upriver, wondering about breakfast, and was surprised to see a large figure sneaking northward. The person disappeared behind a spruce tree, then moved away.
Mac. What was the man doing? Creeping up on a caribou? Or on another wild-goose chase?
See, she’d been right to believe that the sly FBI thing wouldn’t leave his body on a whim or a command. She turned away, intending to bank the fire and start the coals when she heard movement behind her.
Nina probably. “Can you help me find some firewood?” she asked, turning.
“No, I’m afraid I can’t.” Nina held the killer whale for her son in one hand and Andee’s Glock in the other. “Because, you see, we have other plans for today.”
Mac should have suspected Phillips had an agenda the moment the big man started spouting off missionary speak. All that mumbo jumbo about breaking free of bondage, of resurrection of spirit. Mac should have seen through it to the code. New world governments, breaking the bondage of American capitalism, raising the spirit of revolution—that’s what Phillips had meant.
Mac watched Phillips steal through the morning mist, climbing over the rocks, escaping the riverbed and their motley cast of survivors.
Where was he going? Mac hated that his cynicism couldn’t see past this little early morning excursion to some other excuse other than a rendezvous with Phillips’s terrorist buddies. Maybe Andee had been right last night about the job being so much a part of him that he’d never break free.
Mac ducked behind a black spruce while Phillips topped the ridge above him and disappeared. He waited, counting his heartbeat, feeling the seconds spiral out, imagining Phillips as a terrorist, maybe even planted in New York when the towers collapsed. He wouldn’t be surprised if Al-Qaeda, Hezbollah, or even the newest cell he’d read about, Hayata, had thousands of sleepers in America.
Waiting.
The thought spurred him to action, made him crouch and steal quietly up the rock. Maybe he did have FBI in the blood. Maybe he could never shake free of the desire to do something meaningful, to save lives, or—as Andee had accused—to save the world.
Was that so horrible?
“I can’t take loving another man who lets me down.”
He’d mulled those words over and over and over in his head during the night until they had finally driven him into a nightmarish litany of missed anniversaries, births of nephews and nieces, Christmases, and especially birthdays. A thousand memories he’d sacrificed for his job. Perhaps Andee had been right in turning him away.
What did he expect from her? Being in any branch of the military or protective government agency meant sacrificing for the big picture. It meant a guy sometimes missed out on the essentials of life. Like friends. Even a family.
Mac’s foot spilled stones out, and he froze, listening to them bounce on the shelf of rocks.
Okay, he could admit that maybe he’d been about protecting himself also. He’d just never been any good at investing in someone, remembering their needs, thinking beyond himself. Because the minute he invested, he started to care. And when he cared, he left himself open for the sucker punches in life. No, Andee had hit right on the spot. He couldn’t handle letting another person down either.
He climbed to the edge of the ridge, then shrank back. He saw Phillips not far away, sitting on a rock, his back to him.
Did he have a radio?
Mac eased over the edge, listening.
Aye, the man was speaking.
Mac launched himself over the top of the cliff and dived at Phillips, blitzing him. He landed with his knee in the man’s spine, his arm pinning his neck. “Where is it?”
“Where’s what?” Phillips choked out. “What’s the matter with you?”
“Where’s the radio? I know you’re cont
acting your people.”
Phillips lay there, eyes wide, mouth open in shock. “I . . . don’t have people. I was praying.”
Praying? Mac scanned the area, looking for the radio or a GPS. Nothing. He cringed and pushed himself away from Phillips. He couldn’t even bear to give the man help up from the ground. He backed away from him, a hand to his head as he shook it.
Andee had been right. He needed to get as far away from himself and this job and who he’d been as fast as he could.
Phillips stood and brushed himself off.
“I’m sorry, man. Are you okay?”
“Are you okay?” Phillips asked. “I’m not the one sneaking up on people like some sort of thief.”
“I thought you were . . . a . . . terrorist.” Now that Mac said it aloud, he realized how stupid he sounded. He should go bury his head in a glacier or something.
“I’ve been called a lot of things. Nosy. Preachy. A wise guy. Even idealistic. But never have I been called a terrorist.”
“Sorry.” Mac stuck out his hand in apology.
Phillips took it, the expression in his dark eyes matching the forgiveness in his grip.
“So you were praying?”
Phillips nodded, turned, and opened his arms to the expanse around him. In the west, the sunlight reflected against the jagged peaks, turning the snowcaps to glitter. Farther away to the east, a shredded veil of low-hanging clouds covered more mountains. In the valley below was Disaster Creek, a wild jumble of white water and rock, and just past that, the Dalton Highway, a strip of dirt that parted the mountains. “I thought this might be the perfect place to greet the morning with God. What do you think?”
Mac breathed in the pine-scented air and felt the sunshine warming the day. He nodded. “Looks like the perfect day to hike back to civilization.”
“I knew God would save us. Can you believe that only four days ago Ishbane thought we’d freeze to death and eat each other?” Phillips said.
Mac chuckled. “Aye. Except Ishabane’s fears were unfounded—he doesn’t have enough meat on him to make an appetizer.”
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