“Fine,” he said brusquely. “If that’s your decision.” At best, he figured she’d last the night. By morning she’d be at the airfield with her luggage, anxious to catch the first plane out of Hard Luck.
An hour later Abbey sat on the edge of the thin mattress and tried to think. She hadn’t felt so close to tears since the day she’d filed for divorce. In some ways, the situation felt very similar to the end of her marriage. She was being forced to admit she’d made a mistake. Another in what seemed to be a very long list.
It hadn’t felt like a mistake when she’d accepted the job. It had felt decidedly right.
The problem was that she didn’t want to leave Hard Luck. She’d painted a fairy-tale picture of the town in her mind, and when it fell short of her expectations she’d floundered in disappointment. Well, she’d been disappointed before and learned from the experience. She would again.
No matter how eager Sawyer O’Halloran was to be rid of her, she was staying.
Really, she had no one to blame but herself. Her father had told her the free cabin and twenty acres sounded too good to be true. She was willing to concede that he was right. But it wasn’t just the promise of a home and land that had drawn her north.
She’d come seeking a slower pace of life, hoping to settle in a community of which she’d be a vital part. A community where she’d know and trust her neighbors. And, of course, the opportunity to set up and manage a library was a dream come true. She’d moved to Hard Luck because she realized being here would make a difference. To herself, to the town, to her children most of all. She’d come so Scott and Susan would only read about drive-by shootings, gang violence and drug problems.
Although her children’s reactions to the cabin had been very much like her own, Abbey was proud of how quickly the two had rebounded.
“It isn’t so bad here,” Scott had told her when he’d returned to the O’Halloran homestead with Ronny Gold. Susan had met Chrissie Harris and they’d quickly become fast friends.
The sound of an approaching truck propelled her off the bed in a near panic. She wasn’t ready for another round with Sawyer O’Halloran!
Sawyer leapt out of the cab as if he wanted to spend as little time as possible in her company. “Your luggage arrived.” Two suitcases were on the ground before she reached the truck bed. Pride demanded that she get the others down herself. He didn’t give her a chance.
Despite the ridiculous accusations he’d made, despite his generally disagreeable nature, Abbey liked Sawyer. She’d seen the regretful look in his eyes when he’d shown her the cabin. It might be fanciful thinking on her part, but she believed he’d wanted her to stay. He might not think it was practical or smart, but she sensed that he wanted her here. In Hard Luck.
He might provoke her, irritate her, accuse her of absurd things; yet she found herself wishing she could get to know him better.
That wasn’t likely. Sawyer O’Halloran had made his views plain enough. For whatever reasons, he wanted her gone.
All the suitcases were on the ground, but Sawyer lingered. He started to leave, then turned back.
“I shouldn’t have said that, about you duping Christian. It wasn’t true.”
“Are you apologizing?”
He didn’t hesitate. “Yes.”
“Then I accept.” She held out her hand.
His fingers closed firmly over hers. “You don’t have to stay in Hard Luck, Abbey,” he said. “No one’s going to think less of you if you leave.”
She held her breath until her chest began to ache. “You don’t understand. I can’t go back now.”
Frowning, he released her hand. “Why can’t you?”
“I sold my car to pay for the kids’ airfare.”
“I already told you I’d buy your tickets home.”
“It’s more than that.”
He hopped onto the tailgate and she joined him. “I want to help you, if you’ll let me,” he said.
She debated admitting how deeply committed she was to this venture, then figured she might as well, because he’d learn the truth sooner or later.
“My furniture and everything I own is in the back of some truck on its way to Alaska. It should get here within a month.”
He shook his head. “It won’t, you know.”
“But that’s what I was told!”
“Your things will be delivered to Fairbanks. There’s no road to Hard Luck.”
She wasn’t completely stupid, no matter what he thought. “I asked Christian and he told me there’s a haul road.”
“The haul road is only passable in winter. It’s twenty-six miles to the Dalton Highway, which doesn’t even resemble the highways you know. It’s little more than a dirt and gravel road. A haul road’s much worse. It crosses two rivers and they need to freeze before you can drive over them.”
“Oh.”
“I’m sorry, Abbey, but your furniture won’t go any farther than Fairbanks.”
She took this latest bit of information with a resigned grimace. “Then I’ll wait until winter. It’s not like I have any place to put a love seat, do I?” she asked, gesturing at the cabin.
“No, I guess you don’t.” He eased himself off the tailgate, then gave her a hand down. “I need to get back to the airfield.”
“Thanks for bringing our luggage.”
“No problem.”
“Mom. Mom.” Scott came racing toward her. Keeping pace with him was a large husky. “I found a dog! Look.” He fell to his knees and enthusiastically wrapped his arms around the dog’s neck. “I wonder who he belongs to.”
“That’s Eagle Catcher,” Sawyer said as his eyes widened in shock. “My dog. What’s he doing here? He should be locked in his pen!”
That evening, Sawyer sat in front of a gentle fire, a book propped in his hands. Eagle Catcher rested on the braided rug by the fireplace. The book didn’t hold his attention. He doubted that anything could distract him from Abbey and her two children.
In all the years he’d lived in Hard Luck, Sawyer had only known intense fear once, and that had been the day his father died.
He never worried, but he did this June night. He worried that Susan or Scott might encounter a bear on their way to the outhouse. He worried that they’d face any number of unforeseen dangers.
He couldn’t help recalling that Emily O’Halloran, an aunt he’d never known, had been lost on the tundra at the age of five. She’d been playing outside his grandparents’ cabin one minute and was gone the next. Without a sound. Without a trace.
For years his grandmother had been distraught and inconsolable over the loss of her youngest child and only daughter. In fact, Anna O’Halloran had named the town. She’d called it Hard Luck because of her husband’s failure to find the rich vein of gold he’d been looking for; with the tragedy of Emily’s death, the name took on new significance.
Worrying about Abbey and her children was enough to ruin Sawyer’s evening. Surely by morning she’d see reason and decide to return to Seattle!
Eagle Catcher rose and walked over to Sawyer’s chair. He placed his head on his master’s knee.
“You surprised me, boy,” Sawyer said, scratching his dog’s ears. He wouldn’t have believed it if he hadn’t seen it with his own eyes. Eagle Catcher and Scott had acted as if they’d been raised together. The rapport between them had been strong and immediate. The first shock had been that the dog had escaped his pen and followed Sawyer’s truck; the second, that he’d so quickly accepted the boy.
“You like Scott, don’t you?”
Eagle Catcher whined as if he understood and was responding to the question.
“You don’t need to explain anything to me, boy. I feel the same way.” About Abbey. About her children.
He tensed. The only solution was for Abbey to leave—for more reasons than he wanted to think about. He prayed she’d use common sense and hightail it out of Hard Luck come morning.
The cabin wasn’t so bad, Abbey decided after her f
irst two days. It was a lot like camping, only inside. She could almost pretend it was fun, but she longed for a real shower and a meal that wasn’t limited to sandwiches.
Other than their complaints about having to use an outhouse, her children had adjusted surprisingly well.
The summer months would be tolerable, Abbey thought, but she couldn’t ignore Sawyer’s warning about the winter.
As for her work at the library, Abbey loved it. Sawyer had seen to the delivery of the bookcases from his mother’s house, along with a solid wood desk and chair for her.
The day after her arrival, Abbey had set about categorizing the books and creating a filing system. Someday she planned to have everything on a computer, but first things first.
“How are things going?” Pearl Inman asked, letting herself into the library.
“Fine, thanks.”
“I brought you a cup of coffee. I was hoping to talk you into taking a short break.”
Abbey stood and stretched, placing her hands at the small of her back. “I could use one.” She walked to the door and looked outside, wondering about Scott and Susan, who were out exploring. It was all so different from their life in a Seattle highrise. She knew Scott and Ronny spent a good part of each day down at the airfield pestering Sawyer.
If Scott wasn’t with Ronny, then he was with Sawyer’s dog. Abbey couldn’t remember a time her son had been so content.
Susan and Chrissie Harris spent nearly every minute they could with each other. In two days’ time they’d become virtually inseparable. Mitch Harris had stopped by to introduce himself. Mitch, Abbey recalled, worked for the Department of the Interior and was the local public safety officer. He seemed grateful that his daughter had a new friend.
“I can’t believe the progress you’ve made,” Pearl said, surveying the room. “This is grand, just grand. Ellen will be delighted.”
Abbey knew that Ellen was Sawyer’s mother and the woman who’d donated the books to the town.
“I don’t suppose you’ve seen Sawyer lately?” Pearl asked, pouring them each a cup from her thermos.
“Not a word in almost two days,” Abbey admitted, hoping none of her disappointment showed in her voice.
“He’s been in a bad mood from the moment you got here. I don’t know what’s wrong with that boy. I haven’t seen him behave like this since his father died. He blamed himself, you know.”
Abbey settled on a corner of the desk and left the chair for the older woman.
“What happened to his father?”
Pearl raised the cup to her lips. “David was killed in an accident several years ago. They’d flown to one of the lakes for some fishing, which David loved. On the trip home, the plane developed engine trouble and they were forced down. David was badly injured in the crash. It was just the two of them deep in the bush.” She paused and sipped at her coffee.
“You can imagine how Sawyer must have felt, fighting to keep his father alive until help arrived. They were alone for two hours before anyone could reach them, but it was too late by then. David was gone.”
Abbey closed her eyes as she thought of the stark terror that must have gripped Sawyer, alone in the bush with his dying father.
“If I live another sixty years I’ll never forget the sight of Sawyer carrying his father from the airfield. He was covered in David’s blood and refused to let him go. It was far too late, of course. David was already dead. We had to pry him out of Sawyer’s arms.”
“It wasn’t his fault,” Abbey whispered. “It was an accident. There was nothing he could’ve done.”
“There isn’t a one of us who didn’t tell him that. The accident changed him. It changed Hard Luck. Soon Ellen moved away and eventually remarried. Catherine Fletcher grieved something fierce. That was when her health started to fail.”
“Have I met Catherine?” Abbey asked, wondering why Pearl would mention a woman other than David’s wife.
“Catherine Fletcher. Used to be Catherine Harmon. No…no, she’s in a nursing home in Anchorage now. Her daughter lives there.”
Pearl must have read the question in Abbey’s eyes. “Catherine and David were engaged before World War II. She loved him as a teenager and she never stopped. Not even when she married someone else. David broke her heart when he returned from the war with an English bride.”
“Oh, dear.”
“Ellen never quite fit in with the folks in Hard Luck. She seemed different from us, standoffish. I don’t think she meant to be, and I don’t think she realized how she looked to others. It took me a few years myself to see that it was just Ellen’s way. She was really quite shy, felt out of place. It didn’t help any that she didn’t have children right away. She tried. God knows she wanted a family. They were married almost fifteen years before Charles was born.”
“You said Catherine got married?” Abbey asked, her heart aching for the jilted woman.
“Oh, yes, on the rebound, right after David returned from the war. She gave birth to Kate nine months later and was divorced from Willie Fletcher within two years.”
“She never remarried?”
“Never. I thought for a time that she and David would get back together, but it wasn’t to be. Ellen left him, you see, and returned to England. Christian was about ten at the time. She was gone well over a year.” She shook her head, then sighed. “You can understand how David’s death affected everyone in town. Especially Sawyer.”
“Of course.”
“What I don’t get is why he’s upset now. He’s walking around like a bear with a sore paw, snapping at everyone.”
Abbey gaped at her. “You think it’s got something to do with me?”
“That’s my guess. But what do I know?” Pearl asked. She drank the rest of her coffee and stood up to leave. “I’d best get back to the clinic before someone misses me.” The clinic was in the community building, close to the school and the church.
She tucked the thermos under her arm. “So, are you staying in Hard Luck or not?” she asked. Her question had an edge to it, as if she wasn’t sure she was going to like the answer.
Abbey told her the truth. “I’d like to stay.”
“That doesn’t answer my question.”
Abbey grinned. “I’m staying.”
Pearl’s lined face softened. “Good. I’m glad to hear it. We need you, and I have a feeling Sawyer wants you to stay, too.”
Abbey laughed in disbelief. “I doubt that.” And if it was true once, she felt certain it no longer was.
“No, really,” Pearl countered. “Unfortunately that boy doesn’t have the brains of a muskrat when it comes to dealing with an attractive woman.” She made her way to the door. “Give him time and a little patience, and he’ll come around.” With a cheerful wave, Pearl left.
Abbey returned to work and got busy unloading another box of Ellen’s books. Knowing what she did now, the collection took on new meaning for her. Many of the books dated from the early to mid-fifties. Those were the childless years, when Ellen had yearned for a baby. Abbey suspected that Ellen O’Halloran had gained solace from these books, that they’d substituted for the friends she hadn’t been able to make in this town so far from England.
As she set a pile of Mary Roberts Rinehart mysteries on the desk, she heard the distinctive sound of Sawyer’s truck pulling up outside.
Her heart started to race, but she continued working.
He stormed inside and stood in the doorway, hands on his hips. His presence filled the room until Abbey felt hedged in by the sheer strength of it. “Have you decided to stay?” he demanded.
“Yes,” she answered smoothly. “I’m staying.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yes,” she said with conviction. And she was sure. During her conversation with Pearl, she’d made up her mind.
“Fine. You’re moving.”
“Where?” Abbey had been told often enough that there wasn’t any other place available.
“You can stay in Christi
an’s house. He phoned this afternoon, and he’s decided to make a vacation out of this trip. I’ll let him decide what to do with you when he gets home.”
Chapter 5
“What?” Abbey’s eyes flashed with annoyance—and confusion. “I’m not moving into your brother’s home.”
The last thing Sawyer had expected was an argument. Okay, so maybe he hadn’t made the offer as graciously as he should have, but he had an excuse.
The woman was driving him crazy.
Worrying about her and those two kids stuck out on the edge of town had left him nearly sleepless for two nights. It wouldn’t have bothered him as much if there’d been neighbors close at hand. But so far, the other cabins remained empty.
“You won’t be there long,” he said. And he’d thought he was doing her a favor! He should’ve known that nothing with Abbey would be easy.
She picked up another of his mother’s books, handling it with respect, then added the author and title to a list. “The kids and I are doing well where we are. Really.”
“There are dangers you don’t know about.”
“We’re fine, Sawyer.”
He inhaled sharply. “Why won’t you move?”
Abbey’s shoulders lifted in a small, impatient sigh. “It isn’t entirely your brother’s fault that he didn’t know about Scott and Susan.”
“True, but you aren’t entirely to blame either.”
“It’s very thoughtful of you to offer me the house, but no thanks.” She glanced up and gave him a quick smile. For a second Sawyer swore his heart was out of control, and all because of one little smile.
“All right,” he said, slowly releasing his breath, “you can move into my house, then, and I’ll stay at Christian’s.”
“Sawyer, you’re missing the point. I don’t want to put anyone out of his home.”
“Christian isn’t there to put out.”
“I know that, but when he does return I’ll have to go back to the cabin. There’s nowhere else for me and the children to move. I can’t see that shuffling us from one temporary place to another is going to help.”