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Firelight Ridge.
She stopped where she was and watched, riveted, as shadows and colors came and went. Time slipped away as she lost herself in the dance of sinking sun and mountain peaks. One of those was called Fire Peak. Somewhere back there was Korch Glacier, and Smoky Lake. Snow River. And the Firelight Ridge Ice Falls. What did the Ice Falls look like in the light of sunset?
Lila had better be here, because she didn’t want to leave until she saw all of those spectacular sights.
8
Molly had guessed wrong. At the third bar in town, The Fang, the one she never in a million years would have pictured Lila in, there she was. Behind the bar, of all places. Pouring drinks. Chatting happily with a number of weathered old geezers who spoke to her as if they’d known her forever.
Stunned, Molly let the door close behind her, shutting out the glorious sunset light and surrounding her in the dimness and the reek of decades of drunken late nights on the edge of a frontier.
There was another scent mixed in with the Jim Beam and the sweat. Molly knew it well. Wherever Lila went, she brought her aromatic oils with her. They were her tools for managing the atmosphere wherever she found herself. As long as she had her lavender and her sage, and sometimes her frankincense, if the situation was especially difficult, she could handle it.
Molly sniffed again. Frankincense. So no matter how carefree Lila appeared, The Fang was presenting her with some kind of challenge.
“Fancy meeting you here,” a deep voice murmured in her ear. She didn’t need to look to know that Sam the Pilot was at her side. Who else did she know in town? Besides, she liked his voice, the velvet rumble of it; she’d taken note of it even during her flight-induced panic.
“Yeah, what are the odds? Of all the gin joints in all the random dots on the map of Alaska, we happen to walk into the same one. Doesn’t everyone come here?”
“No, The Fang is strictly for the old-timers. The newer generation would rather go anywhere else. The Moosejaw’s not bad. They water their drinks as a matter of public safety. No weapons allowed.”
“You’re saying weapons are allowed here?” She looked around nervously at the crowd, who were all sipping their drinks like law-abiding citizens, at least at the moment. She would have expected a mostly male clientele at a place like this, but there were a decent number of women, too. To her eye, they all looked intimidatingly strong and capable.
Except Lila, who still looked so delicate that a brisk breeze might blow her off her feet…but also as if she’d quickly figure out how to fly in that same breeze.
Sam followed the direction of her glance. “Friend? Is she the one you’re here for? I kind of figured.”
She gave him an irritated look. “You could have mentioned something. I just searched the entire town and ran into some real oddballs.”
“Not my business. Just like you told me.”
He had a point there.
Molly returned her gaze to Lila. She’d been blond as a child, but soon after her eighteenth birthday, her hair had turned a pure snowy white. It didn’t make her look old, just more…ethereal. The white hair made her deep, nearly purple eyes stand out even more, and added to her fairy-like aura. It was also easier to add color to her hair, in the form of streaks of fuchsia or turquoise or even marigold. But at the moment, it was just white, though the bar lighting made it glow like rare silver.
Did Lila know she was there? She had a way of knowing things without “knowing” them. Every time someone tried to call her “psychic,” she rejected the term. “I’m intuitive,” she’d say. “Just like everyone is. But most people can block out their intuition, and I can’t. It’s too loud.”
“How long has she been here?” Molly asked Sam. For some reason, she was nervous now that she’d found Lila. What if Lila really had come here to escape everyone from her old life? What if she really didn’t want Molly to have followed her? Could she turn around right now and go back to New York?
Well, no, she couldn’t, because a storm was on its way and her ride back to civilization was probably about to get hammered.
Besides, since when did Molly Evans shy away from a problem? Never. She believed in facing things head-on, no matter how painful. That was how she’d managed to create a life for herself far away from Barlow, Indiana, where she and her family were everyone’s favorite laughingstock.
“If there’s one thing to know about Firelight Ridge, it’s that we stay out of other people’s business. If she’s your friend, why don’t you ask her?”
“I’m getting there.” She let out a long sigh. “And here I thought we had something special. I am ‘with you,’ remember? Or is that only when you need me to fend off sketchy wilderness dudes who have some mysterious beef with you?”
“Oh, it’s very special.” He settled an arm around her shoulder and gave a low, intimate laugh. “I’m here for you, babe. Want to go make out at the bar?”
“No.” She wriggled away from his arm, dismissing the little shiver that went through her at the contact. He smelled good too, surprisingly, as if he’d recently been in the woods. He no longer wore the leather jacket with the sheepskin lining that he’d worn on the plane. But the thick olive-green sweater that had taken its place was equally flattering.
Sam Coburn was an attractive man, no doubt. She could do worse when it came to a very temporary fake date.
Lila was pouring a beer from the tap, which faced directly toward the door where Molly was loitering like the coward she definitely wasn’t. And suddenly she was looking Molly directly in the eye, as if she wasn’t at all surprised to see her. But ecstatically happy at the same time. A smile spilled across her face, her delicate features overcome with joy. She waved her free hand, beckoning Molly to the bar.
“What the…?” Molly muttered to herself. What was Lila up to? If she was happy that Molly was here, why hadn’t she told her she was going to Firelight Ridge? Why had Molly dropped everything to get here, as if it was an emergency, when clearly it wasn’t?
“You don’t sound happy to see her,” Sam commented.
