Chapter 4

CHAPTER 4

T hey didn’t have time for the whole explanation, but London had to give them something .

Moose stood at the end of the counter, Flynn and Axel also still standing, and she glanced at her watch. Darkness outside said that she had maybe an hour before Tomas expected her.

She’d already given Axel and Flynn the short version— A man from my past has kidnapped Shep, and I need to get him back. Then she’d checked her phone and forwarded Ziggy’s pin to Axel, who was looking at the map when Moose came down the stairs.

She looked at Moose, repeated herself, and ended with, “I never intended for Shep to get hurt.”

“Of course you didn’t,” Moose said.

Of course she didn’t.

She didn’t know why his words reached in like a steadying hand. Still. “But I feared it. Which is why I stuck around.” She sank down on the stool. “I don’t think Tomas will actually kill him—he wasn’t that guy when I knew him.”

“Your former fiancé? The one who is supposed to be dead?” Moose said. He was unrolling a topo map onto the island. “Axel, you got a location for that pin?”

Axel looked at the map, then his phone.

“Yes,” London said to Moose’s question. “But actually, he wasn’t really my fiancé—that was our cover story. He really started out as a mark—and that part is a longer story, but let’s just say that before I got my gig at Air One, I had a much different job.”

Silence.

“More of an international gig?—”

“Cut the lies, London. Just say it. You were a spy.” Axel narrowed his eyes.

Ah, Dark and Angry Axel from the basement was back.

She turned to him. “Not a spy. A highly trained agent in a group called the Black Swans.”

“The Black what?” said Flynn, who was texting on her phone.

“Swans. It’s a covert organization of women for hire in certain sensitive operations. Like infiltrating terrorist organizations to dismantle them from the inside out. In this case, the Russian mob. And please don’t call the police, Flynn.”

More silence. Flynn put down her phone. Then, “You speak Russian?”

“ Da. And French and Italian. A little Mandarin. I can understand more, even if I can’t speak them. My mom was a diplomat—I lived in eight different countries growing up. And I attended a European boarding school in my later years, so I was exposed to many different languages. My accent is a crazy mix of American, from my parents, and the influences around me.”

“Where’d you learn to fly planes and helicopters?” Moose had tacked down the map with salt and pepper shakers, a coffee mug, and a butter dish.

“Got my pilot’s license when I was seventeen one summer in America. Added the chopper cert during my sophomore year in college. Listen, I’ll give you the entire story after I meet with Tomas.”

“What does he want from you?” This from Flynn, who turned her phone over when it buzzed. London eyed her.

“It’s just Dawson. I only asked where he was.”

Dawson, Moose’s cousin and Flynn’s partner. Maybe wouldn’t hurt to have backup. But not the AK police.

Too many questions, starting with, well, her non-death.

“Tomas and I stole money from the Russian Bratva—the mob. I hid the money in a crypto wallet to protect it from any terror organizations or even the CIA—just to be sure. Then I went to meet my handler—and discovered that he’d been killed by a rogue agent named Alan Martin. We tried to get away, got separated, and then the avalanche happened?—”

“The one that you and Shep were in,” Axel said as he looked up from where he studied the map.

“Yes. And that’s another story, but I thought Tomas had died, so I ran. I didn’t know who to trust. So I went to Nigeria and hid. And that’s where I met Colt Kingston.”

“Colt?” Axel said. “You know Colt Kingston?”

“Yes. Sort of. He was on base with a security team from Jones, Inc., doing personal security for a doctor. I worked for a missionary outfit, flying.”

“You said you were a missionary when I hired you. Was that a lie?” Moose gave her a hard look.

She swallowed. “After the avalanche, I had a bit of a . . . let’s say a spiritual awakening. I joined the missionary group and wanted to leave the Swans behind. So no. But. . .” She sighed. “But the Swans tracked me down and asked me to keep an eye on some groups associated with the Boko Haram?—”

Axel’s eyebrow went up.

“Wasn’t Colt kidnapped in Nigeria?” Moose said, glancing up from the map.

“Yes. And when he was, I told Ziggy, my mentor slash handler. She told a guy she worked with named Roy, who told a friend of his, Pete Sutton, who called his boss, Logan Thorne. He somehow got word to Colt’s family and—anyway, Logan thought I was made, so he asked Colt to get me out of Nigeria. And that’s when Colt called Shep. And Shep called you.”

“How does Colt know Shep?” Moose said, now standing with his arms crossed, as if trying to dissect her story for lies.

No lies. Just misguided hope that she’d escaped her past.

“The military, I think. You’ll have to ask him.” After he’s safe . “You figured out where they are yet, Axel?”

He motioned Flynn over. “Working on it.”

“Why did Colt call Shep?” Moose asked.

Oh, shoot . She’d sort of wanted to leave out the bit where Shep had been spying on her—not spying, protecting her—for the past year, per Colt’s request. “I don’t know. I guess he knew we were friends, but . . . huh. Anyway, that’s how I ended up here.”

“Small world,” Moose said, running his finger along a ridgeline on the map.

She didn’t want to tell him how small—at least, not now. “I don’t know how Tomas found me, but he wants the bio card to the crypto wallet where I stashed the money.”

“If you have a crypto wallet, why can’t you simply access it over the internet and transfer the money?” said Axel.

“It’s a high-security cold storage wallet, and it can only be accessed through a bio card created from my DNA and eye scan. The bio card holds my data, so technically, if someone has that and the seed code, they can access my wallet.”

“What’s a seed code?” asked Axel.

“It’s twenty-two random words in a specific order that unlocks the wallet.”

“Is that why someone tried to kill you?” Flynn said.

“I don’t know. But right now, I don’t care. Tomas took Shep and asked for the bio card, and I’m going to give it to him.” Her hand went to her necklace, her thumb running along the pendant, a habit she should probably break. It only made her look weak.

“And then he gets the money?” Axel said, shaking his head.

“No. Of course not. He still needs the seed code. And that brings us to . . .”

“Here,” Moose said, and put his finger on the map, a point between Eagle River and Wasilla, in an enclave of mountains. “It’s an old hunting cabin near the Rabbit Lake trailhead. Looks like there’s a service road that runs back to it.”

She looked at the terrain map. “Lots of mountains.”

“Lots of cover. Tomas know how to shoot?”

“Tomas is clearly not just the accountant I thought he was, so I’m going to say yes to that. I’ll go in expecting the worst because, honestly, I’m not sure what I’m walking into.”

“What we’re walking into,” Moose said quietly.

She looked at him, and right then, it hit her.

They were with her.

She didn’t know why that sank in, found her bones, fortified her. “Are you sure?”

“You should have told us from the beginning, but yes,” Moose said.

Her mouth tightened. “Listen, Tomas might not be alone?—”

“Agreed. So that’s why we’re going to be smart about this. You and Flynn head to the cabin. I’ll go to the Tooth and get the chopper. We’ll run reconnaissance over the area, and if you get into trouble, we can swoop in and help.”

Right .

“And in case this does go south”—he pointed to the terrain and a blue line at the base of a mountain—“this is the Rabbit River—not a small one, but it has a hiking path, and right here is a falls. Should you end up on foot, follow the river. I’ll pick you up at this lookout area above the falls.”

“How big are the falls?” Flynn asked.

“Not big—thirty feet maybe. And this time of year, it’s not running strong. But it’s cold, so don’t go in.”

London looked at Flynn. “I don’t think?—”

“I’m going.”

London drew in a breath. The last thing she wanted— please —was for someone to die because of her. “We need to move, then, because Tomas is waiting.”

Hazel had come to the top of the stairs, wearing pajamas, her hair wet. “Are you leaving, Uncle Moose?”

He looked up. “I’ll be back in a couple hours. I’ll see you in the morning, pumpkin.”

She grinned, and Tillie appeared, her mouth grim. So maybe she’d heard them talking. But she met London’s eyes and nodded. Be safe , she mouthed.

Just like that, London knew it would be okay. Tomas, she could handle—she knew him. And if that’s all who was waiting for her, then she had high hopes she could hand over the bio card without bloodshed.

The sky had started to sift snow from the darkness as she climbed into her Bronco, Flynn beside her. Moose got into his SUV with Axel, and she followed them out of the driveway.

“So, sort of like Sydney Bristow?”

London looked over at Flynn. “Not even a little. First, yes, I have hand-to-hand combat skills, but put a three-hundred-pound man against me, and I can at best inflict enough damage to run.”

Flynn smiled. “Yeah, I get that. Body weight almost always wins.”

“But I can handle myself. Mostly, however, our tactics were in the area of infiltration and subterfuge.”

“Recruited in college?”

They turned onto the highway.

“First year of university, actually. I went to school in Lauchtenland, roomed with a woman named Pippa. She left for the Marines about the same time I left to join the Swans. I’ve never felt like I had a country—yes, I’m American, but I grew up mostly overseas—so being a Swan gave me a place, a purpose. Maybe even a sorority.”

“Who is this Russian group?”

“The Petrov Bratva?” She turned on the windshield wipers as the snow dampened her windshield. She followed Moose’s red taillights, the darkness encompassing, no stars out.

Could be tricky trying to find Tomas if he’d set up an ambush for her.

“They’re a faction of the Russian mob, headed by General Arkady Petrov, who sits in the Russian parliament. They’ve been at work for years trying to draw the US into a war—first by attempting an assassination of our president, then by trying to infect the happiest place on earth with the smallpox virus, and most recently, an attempt to bomb a NATO-affiliated country. They sponsor terror throughout the world, and my job was to break into their crypto wallet and change the code, making their funds inaccessible.”

She got off the highway and took the bypass through Anchorage, south, leaving Moose to continue on to the Tooth.

“Tomas was the accountant, this branch led by a man named Drago Petrov, and I knew if I could get close to Tomas, then I could get the seed code. I also needed the bio card, which I already mentioned is encrypted with a bio lock. I knew Tomas had access to it, because he was the one who transferred money in and out of the crypto exchange.”

“Where they can change money into different currencies.”

She glanced at Flynn, impressed. The woman wore a thick jacket, sturdy boots, a wool cap—prepared for the Alaskan winter. Then again, she’d originally worked on a police force in Minnesota, so she knew how to brave the weather. Her auburn hair poked out of the back of her hat, her profile serious.

She’d have made a good Swan.

“Tomas had his own reasons for wanting to extricate himself from the Petrovs, and I turned him. He called me his fiancée, and I got close to Drago. We didn’t trust that they couldn’t hack the lock we put on the account, so I created my own bio card and transferred the money into my account before I met with my handler.”

She got back on the highway. “The meet was set up in Switzerland at a mountain resort in Zermatt, but when I got to the chalet, I found my handler, Mick Brown, dead, and in his stead, a different man claiming that Brown was a double agent. Something inside me said it was a lie. I’d left Tomas behind, intending to get him later and figure out our next move, and all I thought was—run. So I did, and that’s when the mountain blew apart. I managed to get to a smaller chalet, higher on the mountain, but the slide took out the main lodge of the resort, killing twenty people. Tomas was never found, and after I was found, I ran. And left him behind.”

The service road led east, and she cut her beams to high. The snow had lessened, was melting on the dirt pack, and here, not much had accumulated. She slowed.

“I am sure he thinks I ran away with the money, but I haven’t touched it. It’s still in the account.” She sighed as the night pressed in around them, the trees arching above, just the beams cutting a swath into the bush. “When I came here, I’d hoped this was all behind me.”

“It will be after you settle this. But aren’t you worried the Russians have found you?”

“I’m not sure they know it was me—Tomas was the one who worked for them, was the inside man who accessed the money. But . . . yes. Of course.”

Flynn had been holding her phone and now zoomed in. “Just up the road here, there’s another road, probably the drive into the cabin.”

“We should leave the Bronco here and hike in. How far is it?”

“Three hundred yards, maybe? What’s the plan?”

London glanced at Flynn. “I think I go in, you stay behind, watch my back. He just wants the bio card.”

“What about the seed code?”

“I wrote down a code with the card.” She patted her pantleg pocket. “But it’s not right, and the minute he tries it, it will lock the account.”

“And he’ll come back.”

“I’ll be ready for him.” And the solution Ziggy had suggested flashed in her head.

No. She’d never killed anyone and never would.

Maybe Flynn read her mind, because she turned to London as they pulled over. “If he hurts you or Shep . . . I’m not letting him get away.” She grabbed one of the walkies that Moose had given them.

London nodded, then turned off the car and grabbed the other walkie. Slid the KA-BAR into her belt.

Then she went around to the back and took out her Glock and the night-vis monocular from her backpack.

She handed Flynn the night-vis. “Keep an eye on me.” Her own eyes would adjust to the darkness, and really, Tomas wouldn’t just shoot her. Probably.

She had left him for dead, however, so . . .

A film of snow covered the road. She turned on her phone and used it to guide her. If Tomas was watching from the trees, it didn’t matter—she needed him to know she was here and cooperating.

Please, don’t let him have hurt Shep .

The driveway led through the forest, the woods silent, the snow sifting gently from the heavens. If only things had gone down differently, she could be sitting in her cute bungalow in front of a fire. Maybe with Shep, sharing a pizza, playing a game of Scrabble.

The thought tightened her chest.

Things had been good—so good—for over a year here in Alaska. Made her believe in happy endings, even.

She should have known better.

The cabin sat in a clearing, small rough-hewn logs stacked together with chinking between them. It sat in darkness, a small SUV parked in front of it, covered in a thin layer of snow.

She wanted to call out, but maybe Tomas was waiting for her inside—which made sense. Still, she paused and inhaled a shaky breath.

Okay, here went nothing?—

The cabin exploded.

She threw herself onto the ground, her face in the snow, her hands over her head. Debris rained down into the yard. The fire roared, thundering, heat and light a fireball into the sky.

She pushed herself to her knees, staring at the furnace. It lit up the entire forest, the flames engulfing the house.

The windows of the SUV had shattered, the roof pummeled by fireballs of debris, which now burned in the yard.

Shep. No—oh no . . . no, no . . . no ?—

Shep!

Her knees buckled, and she hit the ground, her hand on a tree.

No.

Then, in the light of the fire, she spotted a figure—just an outline—but it fled into the forest.

And right then, Ziggy’s words hardened in her heart.

Tomas had to die .

* * *

His plan had worked better than he’d expected.

Shep paused only a moment at the edge of the clearing to watch as the cabin burned, the flames so hot he ducked down, his hand over his face.

Hopefully Tomas wasn’t in the area, standing too close. The last thing he wanted was to kill someone. But now maybe Tomas might think he’d expired in the fire, and this lie he’d told himself about London being alive might die with it.

It didn’t matter—Shep knew the truth, and he wasn’t waiting around for Tomas to return empty-handed and maybe unravel in a very lethal, anger-induced temper tantrum.

So yeah, he’d used the fork to free himself from the cuffs, then turned on the gas, leaving the stove unlit, but the pilot light that wouldn’t turn off would be sufficient to add oomph to the explosion. Then he’d jimmied open the window, climbed out, flashed the lighter and dropped it inside, closed the window again to keep the fumes inside, and run. The scant amount of air from the window delayed the flash—just a few seconds, but long enough for him to dive into the brush. Roll, protect his head, then get up and run.

Now he whirled around and, using the light from the blaze, took off through the forest. Away was the only direction in his head. Maybe later, after he’d trekked far enough, hunkered down, and survived the night, he’d sort out his bearings and find his way back to civilization. But without moonlight, he could be heading straight over the edge of a cliff.

And wouldn’t that be fun?

Still, anywhere—even a broken leg at the bottom of a cliff, but free —seemed a thousand times better than shackled to the sofa waiting to die.

He held his hands up to protect his face as the forest grew darker, the light from the blaze dimming. Still, the flames reached above the tree line and dented the night enough for him to keep from running into trees or earning a slap in the face from an errant limb.

He kept trekking, listening. The fire thundered behind him, but ahead, a whoosh, something louder—maybe a river. Which meant even in the darkness, the world might open up enough for him to see. And all rivers headed to the sea, so that seemed the right direction.

He followed the rush of the river, slowing as the darkness consumed him, plowing through the bushy arms of mountain hemlock and black spruce, his feet wet in the soggy loam of the forest floor.

Branches breaking. He stiffened as the thumps of footfalls broke through the clutter of the forest, the wash of the river, and?—

Shoot . Tomas was a hound dog with a bone.

Shep took off, pushing harder through the trees, toward a glimmer of light in the darkness. It helped that the clouds had jockeyed open, a wan amount of moonlight sneaking through.

He caught himself seconds before he careened right over the edge of the riverbank, jerking back just in time.

Not a far drop, from what he could tell, but?—

Footsteps, faster now, and he turned.

His pursuer tackled him flat-out in a flying run.

It blew them both out above the river, and for a second they hung there in space, the frothy tangle of whitewater below.

Then they dropped, splashing down, hitting the river with such force it knocked out Shep’s breath.

The frigid water jerked Tomas’s grip.

Shep’s feet hit bottom, the cold nearly stopping his heart, but he jammed his elbow back and hit Tomas. The man broke away, and Shep pushed to the surface.

The current grabbed him and wrestled him downstream, the cold in his brain, his cells, colliding with his reflexes. He slammed against boulders, the pain sharp and bright, his body numbing, and in the darkness, he was a pin ball.

He got a glimpse once of Tomas, also fighting to stay afloat, but still crazily hard after him. What was his problem?

Shep flopped in the water, turning, his legs rubber as he tried to kick to shore.

Then, the thunder. Oh no . . . because despite the darkness, in his bones he knew?—

Waterfall .

Aw —so he’d take it back. Give him the cabin and a fighting chance with Tomas. Water choked him, running over his face, into his eyes, his mouth. He turned, tried to kick, but he could barely feel his body. The fact that when he hit rock it didn’t break his bones like before probably wasn’t a good thing. Mostly because he couldn’t feel it, so who knew what damage he might really have.

Maybe God would be merciful and he’d die before he went over?—

Nope . The current grabbed him, spun him, rolled him over and over. Then—lights. They shone down over the falls, the water, and he looked up to see—what? A chopper. Maybe the Air One chopper—which seemed crazy, but . . .

Then the door opened, and in the opening stood a form—Axel. He had hooked onto the line, appeared about to go in the water?—

The current grabbed Shep and sent him over.

The dump of water gobbled him whole, pummeled him, pushed him to the rocky bottom. His feet scrubbed and he pushed hard, surging up, and popped out of the froth, gasping.

The chopper hovered above the falls and he waved his hand—“Axel!”

But the roar ate his words, and the current again grabbed him, spun him. He fought it, turning, and in the glow of the spotlight, glimpsed Tomas shooting out, dropping hard.

The chopper rose up, the light washing away from him toward the churn of the water.

No —he was over here!

But maybe they’d lost him, had gone back to search.

Shep rolled to his stomach. Swim. Swim and get away, and then the team could pick him up. His arms might be moving—he couldn’t tell. But here, the current calmed a little, not quite as rampant. He had nothing left, so he rolled onto his back, feet out, and rode the river, glancing back to the tumult of the falls.

No Tomas, so maybe . . .

No. He didn’t wish death on anyone. . . .

Overhead, the moonlight pierced the clouds, turning the river silvery, the forest skeletal, the chopper still upstream.

His body had numbed now, and he started to shake, his core temp dropping. The current roughened, his eyes blinded. He coughed water—there wasn’t a hope he’d survive another plunge.

Then, up ahead, on a rock outcropping, he spotted a downed tree across the water.

Please, hands, work .

He reached out for the branch—more of a log, really, with a few remaining bushy arms. He missed the first branch, the trunk rolling past his frozen hand, but just as he passed under it, a miracle. The tree shifted, and a branch caught him in its V.

He turned and threw both arms around the space, hugging the trunk. Sorta. Maybe. But the river pushed him into the curve of the branches, pinned him there.

He clasped his hands, barely feeling them, and tried to hold on, kicking, angling for balance. The tree had been in the water for a while, much of it bare with a tangle of branches, but maybe not so long that it had turned brittle, because it held his weight.

But he couldn’t haul himself up on it.

And the water wanted him, the rapids tugging him. His grip loosened?—

“I got you!”

He looked up, searched for the voice, tried to make out the person in the darkness, but his rescuer wore night-vision goggles. The man leaned out from the rock, one foot on the log, and grabbed Shep’s jacket. Then he grabbed Shep’s wrist and hauled him out of the water, onto the log. He kept hold of his jacket and helped Shep work back to the shoreline.

Shep dropped onto the rocky embankment, drew his arms around himself, and started to tremble. No, he’d call this shaking. Violent shaking, his teeth rattling, his body out of control.

“I know, mate. It’s cold, and now you blew up our shelter, so we’re in a fix.”

No. What—no— Shep opened his eyes, stared up at the man.

Tomas? But he still wore NVGs, so?—

The man stood up then and hustled back out to the tree. Shep rolled over as the voice lifted over the rush. “I got you, lovely. Don’t fret.”

Then his rescuer hauled another person from the water. Sopping wet, wearing a wool cap, boots, a thin shirt. Shep made out . . . curves?

His attacker?

The man who could be Tomas pulled the woman to the boulder and dropped her next to Shep, behind him.

Shep rolled over, his body breaking apart with the cold, but who?—

Then the man took off his goggles. “Told you she wasn’t dead, mate.”

Wait— what?

The woman was trying to get to her knees, and now Tomas—yep, the jerk had saved him—knelt and helped her, unzipping his jacket and putting it around her shoulders.

Then who’d nearly drowned him?

The woman looked at Shep, and even in the dusty light, he could make out her features, her eyes, that set of her mouth.

No . . . no . . . he must already be dead, because—it couldn’t be.

He’d thought he couldn’t turn any more brittle, but when she sighed and opened her mouth, he simply shattered. London. London.

“Shep. Are you okay?” She crawled over to him, put her hand on his chest as if to confirm his heartbeat.

He just stared, because despite the shouting inside, his mouth opened but no words came.

“He’s sliding into hypothermia,” said London, her own voice breaking with cold. “He needs a blanket, and we need to get him someplace warm.”

“How about the cabin the bloke just blew up?”

Shep looked at Tomas, back to London.

Tomas didn’t look in the least surprised to see her, which made Shep the chump among them.

Maybe he wasn’t as cold as he thought. “I’m fine,” he finally roughed out. Not even a little, but . . . yes, hours ago, he’d dreamed of this moment, of seeing her again, telling her that he loved her, that he was sorry he’d waited too long to tell her, that if he could do it all over again . . .

Instead, “You lied to me.”

London looked at him, and her mouth opened. Then closed. “I can explain.”

“You lied to me!”

Overhead, a light skimmed the surface of the river, the thunder of the chopper drowning out her words, the turbulence of the river. Shep spotted Axel again at the door, now waving.

Then behind them, as the chopper rose, a shout. “Freeze, right there. Don’t move!”

Flynn Turnquist emerged from the woods, holding a gun trained on Tomas. A night-vision monocular hung from a lanyard around her neck. As she stepped out onto the rock, she looked at London. “You okay?”

Shep blinked at her. What? Not undone and shaken to her core that London was in fact not dead on a slab in the Anchorage morgue?

And then it clicked.

Somehow, London had alerted Air One to his kidnapping, sent them in for rescue. Which meant they all knew.

His chest burned, which might not be better than feeling nothing. In fact, maybe he’d take numb again, because he couldn’t even look at London as Flynn motioned Tomas to his knees.

“Point of order, I rescued them from the river.”

“Shut up, Tomas,” London said.

“I wasn’t going to hurt him—I just needed your attention.”

“You’ve got it. But now I’m also mad.” She moved over to him to pat him down. “He’s not armed,” she said to Flynn.

“Can I put my arms down?”

Flynn shook her head. “Just . . . stay there.”

Overhead, Axel lowered down a basket.

London moved over to Shep again. “Are you okay?”

He just stared at her. Then he rolled and, still shaking, pushed himself up. He rocked on his feet, and Flynn moved in to grab his jacket.

He tore away from her, his gaze hard. “You knew. All this time, you knew .”

She shook her head, but he didn’t believe her. After all, she was with the police department. He’d always suspected something . . . not right. After all, how did it take thirty days to figure out that the body they’d pulled from the lake wasn’t London’s?

He reached up to guide the basket to the ground.

“You go first, Shep,” said Flynn.

“No. London goes first. Then Tomas, because if he tries to run, I’m stopping him. And I don’t trust London not to run.”

He met her eyes then and didn’t care even a little about the hurt in them. “Get in the basket.”

She drew in a breath, then obeyed, visibly shivering.

Axel brought the basket up, then sent it back down, and Tomas got in.

“I hope London can handle him if he causes trouble in the chopper,” Flynn said, looking up.

He didn’t know what side London was on at the moment. “Axel is there.” Still, he wasn’t sure, and appreciated the way Axel grabbed the man out, manhandling him a little.

The basket came down empty. “You’re next.”

“You’re freezing.”

“You have a gun.”

She got in.

By the time the basket came down for him, he nearly fell into it. Axel winched him up, helped him onto the deck, and Flynn was there with a thermal blanket. Axel pulled in the basket and shut the door. “Let’s go, Moose.”

Shep leaned back, shaking, drawing the blanket to himself, staring at London, who sat beside Tomas.

Her dead fiancé.

And despite the heat that tried to find him, to steel the trembling inside, there wasn’t a hope of putting his shattered world back together.