“No message. He said he’d get in touch with you.”
“Oh. I see.” Disappointment settled in. Well, that’s what she deserved for building up her hopes.
Mr. Lagunoff’s eyes twinkled behind thick glasses. “Nice to see you, Kerry. Come next door and enjoy a cup of tea with me. You’re probably lonely with Emma gone.”
Kerry made herself smile. “Thanks, maybe I will,” she told him.
He continued on his way with a jaunty wave, and Kerry hurried up the walkway to Emma’s house.
She took the mail inside out of the cold before riffling through it. Today’s take was mostly advertising circulars and correspondence for Emma, but one envelope was addressed to her. It was from her mother.
Dear Kerry,
I’m sending snapshots of Dad and me on Halloween. He’s promised me never to drag me to the neighborhood Halloween party again.
Dad’s so excited. We won four tickets to the Rose Bowl game! Charlene’s coming from Seattle for Christmas, and she’ll stay over for the game on New Year’s Day. Please tell us you’ll be here, too! I worry about you up there in the cold and snow, and it would be wonderful if you could come for an extended stay—maybe until after the baby’s born?
We love you and miss you and I’m ready to pamper you to your heart’s content.
Much love,
Mom
P.S. Charlene says she’s tried to call you a few times, but you haven’t been there. She worries about you, so please give her a ring when you get a chance.
The enclosed pictures showed her mother and father dressed as Beauty and the Beast for Halloween, her mother poised and pretty in a long flowing gown, her father decked out in some kind of furry getup that made Kerry smile. Suddenly she felt overwhelmingly nostalgic for the good times they’d all had together when she and Charlene were growing up. Spending the winter holidays with her family was an option that she hadn’t really considered because of the long distance involved, but it was warm in California. She knew that most of Alaska would be an icebox from now until May or June. In December, Anchorage would be lucky to get five and a half hours of daylight in a twenty-four hour period.
She didn’t have to decide about La Jolla right now. She’d think it over and discuss it with Charlene when she called her.
Since her return to Anchorage, Kerry had occupied the spare bedroom in Emma’s house, and Emma, a hospital administrator, was on assignment in Fairbanks for the next month and a half, performing unspecified financial tasks at a down-and-out clinic. That left Kerry on her own, which was okay, but she was getting tired of eating grilled-cheese sandwiches by herself. Maybe she really would take Mr. Lagunoff up on his offer of tea sometime.
As she hung her coat in the closet, she caught a view of herself in the hall mirror. Bemused, she pivoted for a full frontal view. She looked—well, like one of those Teletubbies on TV. Soon she would have to start wearing maternity clothes. Her oversized sweaters and leggings would not accommodate the growing baby for long. If Sam could see her now, he wouldn’t be the least bit attracted to her. She felt fat and, even worse, ugly.
If Sam could see her now… But he wouldn’t be seeing her. And that was a depressing thought.
If they were still weathered in at Silverthorne, if they had been forced to stay longer, they’d be sitting down at the scarred old table right about now making a meal of whatever they’d managed to scrounge together. Sam would be teasing her about something, and she’d be trying not to let him know that she was amused by it, and later they’d settle down in front of a roaring fire with mugs of hot chocolate. And after that, maybe they’d make slow, sweet love, making it last because they had nowhere to go and nothing to do but be with each other.
But, of course, none of that would be happening, not really. The whole lovely scenario was only a dream, a wonderful dream that Kerry sometimes slotted into her thoughts to make herself feel better when she missed Sam so much that she couldn’t stand it. When her heart ached and hung like a lead weight in her chest and when she longed to feel his arms enfolding her and his heart beating next to hers. When she contemplated life without him, because she understood all too well, all too unhappily, that that was the way her life was destined to be—without Sam.
She felt a stinging sensation behind her eyes and blinked to ward off the tears that were always all too ready to flow these days. She didn’t want to indulge in a pity party and she might as well accept reality. She’d be without Sam, all right, but she still had the baby. The baby, whom she pictured as an adorable round someone with chubby cheeks, dark hair and a winning grin. Just thinking about the baby cheered her, and she made herself unwrap the crib sheets that she’d bought today. They were printed with droll yellow teddy bears and they’d lifted her spirits considerably when she’d spotted them in the department store, so much so that she’d bought them at full price. Ever mindful of unpaid bills, she usually waited until she found a good sale to buy the things she wanted.
And now that she was thinking about bills, today she’d pay the ones she could, figure out what kind of brochures she needed for Silverthorne, and after that she might as well call her sister, Charlene, to reassure her that she was happy and doing well.
Was she really happy?
A difficult question. I want this baby, she told herself. It was true. She did want the baby. But it seemed to her that happiness had eluded her since that day when Sam’s friend Ollie mushed up to the cabin and bore her and Sam away on his sled. Kerry had been stunned when rescue happened so quickly, so stunned that she barely remembered the long jolting ride through the backwoods by dog sled, the creak of the harness as the dogs strained against it, Ollie’s shouts, the steaming vapor of her own breath curling back over her shoulders as they made rapid headway toward what passed for civilization in those parts.
Athinopa had been a tiny village with an airplane runway running parallel to the main street in the manner of such outposts. But the village had a shortwave radio, and that’s how Ollie had heard that two people might be stranded in the snowstorm near the Stanchiks’ cabin. Ollie hadn’t had any idea who the two people were and, when he’d arrived at the cabin, he had professed amazement that one of them was his good friend Sam Harbeck.
“That guy in the airplane—he was a young cheechako, a student pilot from the Lower Forty-eight on one of his first solo flights. He didn’t know to waggle his wings to let you know he’d seen you. He only knew to go back to the airport and tell someone he’d spotted two people out there. By the time someone radioed me, it was storming. I left the village as soon as I could, but I had no idea that one of the people I’d be rescuing would be my old friend Sam,” Ollie had told them.
Kerry and Sam had spent the night after their dramatic rescue in Athinopa, Kerry sharing a bed with Ollie’s teenage daughter, Sam in his sleeping bag on the floor of the Parkers’ small living room amid drying dog booties and harnesses. When the Search-and-Rescue helicopter had come for them the next day, Kerry had carefully kept her expression blank because she didn’t want to cry in public. And that’s what she’d wanted to do—cry until she couldn’t cry anymore. She hadn’t, though, not a tear. But her heart had been breaking.
Her parting with Sam had been strained and awkward.
“Well,” he’d said as they stood near the helicopter, its blades stirring up new fallen snow around them. “It’s been real.” It was a pretty lame thing to say, considering, and judging from his expression he knew it.
She could forgive him that. She’d gazed up at him, memorizing his ruggedly chiseled features, that funny little scar in the middle of one eyebrow, the way the groove in his upper lip seemed deeper when he was serious. He was serious then, his eyes all pupil so that they didn’t seem blue anymore. Unfathomable, that’s what they were. Somewhere in their depths, she thought she detected a remote sadness—if that’s what it was. With Sam, it was hard to tell.
“Thank you. Sam. For everything.”
“Kerry,” he’d said. Just her name. And for a
moment she’d thought he might kiss her goodbye, but the helicopter blades had been making a racket overhead and people were milling everywhere. The pilot stuck his head out and asked if they were ready, and then she was suddenly being boosted out of the chaos on the ground and into the helicopter by Ollie and Sam. And Sam was climbing in, then they were lifting off, villagers below waving to them, dogs running around excitedly, and Kerry’s stomach turning flip-flops.
The flight to Anchorage had been uncomfortable, disorienting and miserable. Sam had sat next to the pilot, she’d sat behind him. It was all she could do not to reach forward and ruffle her fingers through his hair one last time.
She’d spotted Emma right away in the crowd at the airport.
“Kerry! Kerry, I’m over here!” Emma, long-limbed and slender, had rushed forward. While her friend had oohed and aahed over Kerry’s plight in the wilderness, over the hollows in her cheeks and the circles under her eyes, Sam had quietly slipped away. Disappeared. And, not surprisingly, Kerry hadn’t seen or talked to him since.
So why, a month later, had Sam come to Emma’s house?
Kerry couldn’t imagine. He was history.
AT THE CORPORATE offices of Harbeck Air, Sam marched out of his inner sanctum and barked at his administrative assistant. “Get me the file on Kerry Anderson.”
She stopped scrolling through the document on her computer screen. “You mean the file on Doug Anderson?”
“No, I told you to start one on Kerry.” For convenience, Sam kept file folders on all his friends, and that’s where he filed information pertinent to the friendship—invitations, Christmas cards, and if there was something he wanted to discuss with a friend next time he saw him or her, he dropped a reminder to himself into the file folder.
“I don’t remember your mentioning it.”
“Well, I’m mentioning it now.”
“If you don’t mind my saying so, you’ve been awfully crabby since you came back from your vacation.”
This gave him pause. He scowled. “I do mind your saying so.”
“Then cancel the thought.”
“All right, all right, but I’m not canceling the request.”
“File on Kerry Anderson. Right.” Ann Blyler scribbled a reminder to herself on a stick-on note and tacked it to her computer screen. She’d been Sam’s assistant ever since he’d taken over Harbeck Air from his father, and she was efficient in the extreme.
“And Ann?”
“Yes?”
“Bring Kerry’s file into my office as soon as you can.”
“Of course.”
Sam wheeled and strode back into his inner sanctum, where he stood at the wide plate-glass window and surveyed his domain, which consisted of a fleet of float planes, another of planes with skis or wheels, several runways and a brand-new hangar. It was satisfying to take stock of the empire he’d built in such a short time. Usually he felt good about it. Today he didn’t. He felt empty.
He’d anguished over seeking Kerry out for the past month, ever since their precipitous departure from Athinopa. He was slightly acquainted with her friend Emma, whose telephone number was unlisted; so he didn’t have a clue about how to reach Kerry by phone, but at least he knew where Emma lived. The house was an attractive green clapboard structure nestled between fir and spruce trees, and he’d driven by twice before actually stopping at the curb. He’d knocked and knocked on the door, but had managed to raise no one but the bespectacled little man next door who had peered at him myopically through the curtains at his kitchen window and finally emerged on the porch to ask what Sam wanted.
Kerry, was what Sam had said, meaning it in more ways than one, but the man said he’d seen her leave earlier. Sam had thought about dropping his business card in the mailbox, but decided that it wouldn’t do any good. Kerry wouldn’t call him anyway.
“Mr. Harbeck?” Now Ann stood at the door to his office.
He turned around, morose and sure that he looked it. In fact, Ann wrinkled her forehead.
“I’ve put the Kerry Anderson file on your desk.”
“Thanks.”
“Will that be all?”
“For now. Oh, by the way, you wouldn’t happen to know anyone named Jolie, would you?”
“Jolie?”
“Right.” He managed to look disinterested. Well, he was. He didn’t really want to call this Jolie, whose face he couldn’t remember. He did remember Kerry’s face, however. It haunted his dreams, bedeviled his days, had impressed its bright image on his very soul.
“No, I’m afraid not. I know a Julie—several, in fact—but no Jolie.” He thought Ann was looking at him strangely.
Time to put this to an end. It wouldn’t do for Ann to think the boss wasn’t tending to business.
“Get Carlin on the line. He wants to talk to me about buying some planes.”
“Yes sir.” Ann went out and shut the door behind her.
Sam picked up the folder she’d set on his desk. KERRY ANDERSON, read the label. After a moment’s thought, he slid the envelope containing those papers from the sperm bank out of his desk drawer. He read them over carefully, thinking he might as well throw them away. They were of no earthly use now.
But for some reason, he couldn’t bring himself to toss them. They were a link to Kerry and the time they’d spent together, and it was all he had of her except, of course, his memories. He tucked the papers into the folder and slid it under a pile of others on his desk.
Ann buzzed him. “Mr. Carlin is on line one,” she said.
He scooped up the phone, glad of the distraction. He didn’t want to think about Kerry anymore. He didn’t want to, but he knew he would anyway.
IT WAS WHEN Kerry was putting the Silverthorne brochure together that she ran into trouble. She needed to include information about how to get to Silverthorne, and she and Sam had informally agreed that Harbeck Air would be the charter airline of choice for her guests.
Should she call him?
She’d rather not. She didn’t trust herself because she knew that hearing his voice would make her want him even more.
Absently she went to the phone and stared at it. If only it would ring and it would be Sam! But it didn’t ring. It seldom rang for her, only for Emma.
If she had been home when Sam dropped by yesterday, she could easily have broached the subject of flights to Silverthorne. She mulled this over, wondering if that was in fact the reason that he had visited.
As she sat there, she felt a flutter of movement in her abdomen. She thought it might be indigestion, but her stomach felt fine. She felt it again, placing her hand over the spot. When she finally realized what it might be, she jumped up and ran for the book she’d bought about expectant motherhood. She found the page she was looking for, scanned it quickly and sank down on the couch in awe of the moment. She’d just felt the baby, her baby, move for the very first time!
She felt the little ripple again, and without warning, tears began to stream down her face. She had no one with whom to share this tender moment, and she’d never felt so alone in her life, not even on that horrible night she’d spent in the shed with the bear waiting outside to gobble her up.
After a while, she dried her tears and decided that it was time to visit Mr. Lagunoff, who might not be at all interested in the fact that the baby had moved, but could probably be counted on to quote snatches of Robert Service’s poems about Alaska and to provide a steaming cup of Earl Grey.
Some days, that was good enough.
SAM COULDN’T help it. Somehow that afternoon his car drove itself through the neighborhood where Emma lived, and it stopped in front of her house.
Again, no one was home. You wouldn’t think an expectant mother would want to go out in the cold weather so often, he thought grumpily. Like Ann said, he’d been grumpy a lot lately, and never so much as today. Too bad he was supposed to go to a gallery opening tonight, something for which he could muster no interest.
This time before he left Emma’s house
, he slid his business card under the storm door.
The gallery opening was as boring as he’d expected. Shortly after his arrival, he managed to shunt himself off into a small side gallery, where he gazed moodily at several paintings hung there. They had a vaguely familiar look, something about the subject matter. Or was it the colors? He moved closer to inspect them more carefully.
“Nice, aren’t they?”
He turned around blankly. A man was standing in a doorway, leaning on it casually. He wasn’t dressed for a party.
“I think I’ve seen this artist’s work somewhere,” Sam said.
“Oh, you won’t find the artist’s signature, although those paintings have been authenticated. These are some of her very early works, completed before she realized that her paintings would have value. Elise Anderson is the artist’s name.”
“Elise Anderson,” Sam repeated. He remembered that dark little closet in the attic at Silverthorne, the paintings that had escaped destruction by Doug’s grandfather’s second wife. He remembered sharing his first kiss with Kerry in that closet and—
“Yes, Elise Anderson died much too prematurely. Her works are selling for astronomical prices. We paid ten thousand dollars for that small one in the corner.”
“Ten thousand!” The figure jolted Sam out of his reverie.
“It’s true. Amazing, isn’t it?” The man sauntered over to look at the largest painting. It was, Sam was sure, of the bend in Chickaback Creek. The colors were strong, the strokes bold.
“If someone had an Elise Anderson painting, do you think you could sell it?”
“Sure, especially if it’s signed. They’re hot right now. In fact, I’m in the back room researching Elise Anderson. Did you know that she planned to create an artists’ colony somewhere in the back of beyond, I think it was called Silverthorne—” He prattled on, but Sam didn’t listen.
He was sure that Kerry had no idea that those paintings in the lodge were worth so much money. Knowing how much she worried about finances, he should call her and tell her about it.
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