Chapter 14

Logan

Sarah opens the door to her house and grins conspiratorially as she welcomes me in.

“She up yet?” I ask as I shrug out of my jacket and hang it on the coatrack just inside Sarah’s door.

“Nope,” she says. “But you’re here kinda early for her.”

I snicker because it’s already 8 A.M., and if Valentine’s still in bed, sound asleep, she sure as shit is not going to take kindly to me waking her up.

Oh well.

“You got her dog taken care of, right?” I ask Sarah as I head for the staircase that leads up to Valentine’s room.

“Already let the little pissant out this morning when I fed the boys,” she says, but I can hear the fondness in her voice. “But he’s going to bark at you when you go in her room.”

“I’m sure her bark will be worse,” I mutter as I start up the stairs.

I was not a happy camper when I saw Valentine yesterday on Main Street, looking once again like she stepped off the pages of a fashion magazine. Her clearly expensive tailored and tasteful clothing was a bitter reminder she doesn’t fit in here at all.

Not really.

Her giving me the major brush-off was an even harsher reminder that she was pissed at me beyond repair. When that little vixen told me she had a hot date before strutting into Jorgen’s shop, I was boiling mad.

For all of about five minutes.

But then I remembered that April was sweet on Jorgen, and I knew that Valentine was friends with April, which meant that without a doubt that Valentine did not have her sultry little eyes set on our resident fly master. It only took a quick call to Sarah, who confirmed for me Valentine’s nefarious plan to schedule a fishing excursion with April included to hopefully get them to really see each other. Sarah told me all of this with true fondness in her voice for Valentine and her efforts to make her daughter happy. Sarah also divulged to me that Valentine’s “big plans” for the day was taking April for a girlie trip into Ketchikan for hair and nails and new clothes. Why they were doing this if they were going fishing the next day was beyond me, but I fully admit I know next to nothing about women. I definitely proved that with Valentine the day before yesterday when I failed to give her the benefit of the doubt.

So yesterday I gave Valentine her space to do what she needed to do with April. I rescheduled the part-time officer in Ketchikan who helps me out on occasion for today.

And right now I square my shoulders and march up the stairs to Valentine’s room, because we are going to talk today and we are going to hopefully do it while I’m overwhelming her with a very well laid out plan.

The minute I open her door, Sassy pops her head up where she’s lying beside Valentine and issues a little growl in her throat. I halt and wait for her to let loose with a string of yaps, but she just watches me with her head tilted. Perhaps she remembers me from that one time I saved her from a nonexistent bear, or maybe she even has some sort of weird doggy sense that I saved her mother, but she lets me approach Valentine’s bed without issuing another sound. In fact, I see her little tail wagging the closer I get.

I put my finger to my lips and give the dog a “Shhh.”

Not really quite sure how to wake up Valentine and not shock the shit out of her, I decide to go with a careful prod. She’s on her side facing me, one hand tucked under her pillow and the blankets pulled up over her shoulders. She’s got a sleeping mask on her face that’s pink and looks to be made of satin with the word PRINCESS stitched in cursive across the front. I squat down beside her bed, put my hand to her shoulder, and give it a gentle shake as I say her name, “Valentine…honey…wake up.”

She comes awake with a jerk backward as her hand tears the mask off her face. Her eyes are unfocused as she takes in my hulking figure squatted by her bed. Valentine releases a bloodcurdling scream and her hand—the one not curled under her pillow—shoots out and catches me on the side of my jaw with a resounding crack.

“Fuck,” I mutter as I fall back on my ass, rubbing at my face.

“Jesus Christ,” she yells at me as she sits straight up in the bed, shaking her hand out. “What the hell are you doing skulking in my room?”

“Everything all right up there?” Sarah yells up the stairs.

“Just fine,” I call back as I come to my feet and with a pointed look at Valentine. Rubbing my jaw, I tell her, “I wasn’t skulking. I was gently trying to wake you up.”

“Why?” she snarls as she shoots a glare at Sassy for perhaps not barking to give her warning.

“Get up and get dressed,” I tell her, not at all happy with the way this has started out. “We’re spending the day together so we can talk.”

“We most certainly aren’t spending the day together,” she snaps at me as she starts to stand up from the bed. “I’ve got a fishing excursion planned with April.”

I place my palm on the center of her chest and give her a slight push so she sits back down on the bed. “Yeah…about that. I canceled your participation. It’s just April and Jorgen going, and frankly, you’d be a third wheel anyway.”

“You…you…” she stammers.

“Canceled your presence in the boat that April and Jorgen will be in today,” I say with a sly grin. “You’re coming with me.”

“I am not,” she says stubbornly.

I’m a big man, no doubt, but I can move fucking fast. Before she can blink, I’ve got her flat on her back and I’m kneeling over her with my palms on the mattress near her head. Valentine bucks her hips up hard to try to dislodge me but I don’t budge an inch. Sassy gives a playful yap, spins around on the mattress three times, and then flops to her stomach to watch it play out.

Valentine’s eyes go frostily aloof with mostly stubborn refusal to let me back in.

“I’m taking you out to explore today. We’re going over to the Misty Fiords so you can get to see some of the real beauty of Alaska, and hopefully some wildlife too. We’re going to talk. You’re going to let me apologize again for the other day and not giving you the benefit of the doubt. I hope you’re going to truly accept my apology and give me the benefit of the doubt that I learned a valuable lesson where you’re concerned. Valentine…you’re going to listen to me ask you for another chance to be with you for however long you’re going to be in Alaska, and I’m going to ask for exclusivity while you’re here. And finally, at the end of a very good day where all of this transpires, you’re going to come back to my house and I’m going to make you feel very, very good in about a dozen different ways.”

I notice that Valentine’s chest is rising and falling in short bursts, and her eyes took on a heated look when I mentioned going to my house tonight. Still stubborn, she says, “What makes you think I’d want to do any of that with you?”

I shrug and give her a mischievous grin. “Well, I can’t say that you want any of that, but your nipples are hard as rocks right now, so I’m thinking that last part about going home with me sort of appeals to you.”

Valentine gasps and immediately denies it, even as she looks down at her traitorous breasts. “They are not.”

Oh, God they so are…clear as day through her heavy thermal T-shirt. I prove my point by tweaking one with my forefinger and thumb, and Valentine’s eyes close with a soft moan.

In this moment, I could strip her naked and have her, but that’s not the order of how things are going to go today. So I move off the bed and pull her up by her wrists so she’s standing. Her eyes flutter open and she looks at me confused.

“Get a shower,” I tell her. “No makeup. Outdoor clothes.”

“But Sassy—” she starts.

“—is being handled by Sarah for the entire day and night,” I assure her.

That seems to snap her out of her daze and her eyes narrow. “I’ll go with you today and we’ll talk, but there’s no guarantee about tonight.”

“I’ll bring you back here to Sarah’s anytime you want me to,” I assure her. Then I give her a light slap on her ass and say, “Now hurry up and get ready.”

“When you said you were going to show me Alaska, I had no clue you were talking about from the air,” Valentine says through the headset she’s wearing. Despite the slight crackle, I can hear the wonder and awe in her voice as we fly over Misty Fiords National Monument, which at 2.1 million acres is really a designated part of Tongass National Forest. I’ve been here seven years, been coming to visit longer than that, and I never fail to have my breath taken away by the beauty: lakes formed by glacial runoff so clear you can see the bottom, snowcapped mountain peaks, green forests, and misty waterfalls. I haven’t traveled much in my life—a tour in Afghanistan while in the marines, not really my ideal vacation getaway—but I can’t imagine anywhere prettier than this.

“By plane is the best way to see this area,” I tell her through the headset as I pilot the Cessna turbo amphibian floatplane. The plane seats four but it’s just Valentine and me today.

“You didn’t tell me you were a pilot,” she says. We haven’t had a chance to “talk,” and we’ve kept it light and impersonal, since I practically dragged her grumbling body out of Sarah’s house this morning. She’d at least ceased complaining when I ran into The Wounded Caribou and came out with sausage biscuits and coffee. She went totally silent for a moment when she saw the plane as we walked down the docks to it except for that tiny gasp of surprised delight I know she didn’t want me to hear but I did.

“Never came up,” I tell her as I head toward Behm Canal, which is the major waterway that goes straight through the heart of Misty Fiords. “I actually own this plane with four other guys. We’re all recreational pilots and just do this because we enjoy it. We’ll take it out to go camping in some remote areas, or fishing and hiking. That sort of stuff. But none of us alone can afford one of these, so we all went in on it together.”

“How often do you fly?” she asks as she turns in the passenger seat to look at me.

“Once every few years,” I say with a shrug. “I’m a little rusty right now but it’s coming back to me.”

Valentine’s hands fly up and seize her shoulder harness, but realizing there’s nothing she can do that will help things, she squeaks, “You’re joking, right?”

“Totally joking,” I tell her with a chuckle, and I figure maybe laughter—or extreme fear—will get her to loosen up more with me. I then point to the east and tell her, “That’s Behm Canal below us. I’m going to set her down.”

“Why?” she asks, sounding slightly panicked.

“There’s a shore we can ground on and I brought a picnic,” I tell her. “We might be able to see some orcas if we’re lucky; definitely some sea lions.”

“What about bears?” she asks, a little panicked still, but also highly curious now.

“Not where I’m putting down, but we’ll fly back over an area where we’ll see some,” I promise her. The abundance of wildlife is extreme and she won’t be disappointed.

I land the plane on the water with no issues, as it’s fairly calm out today, and maneuver it over to a shore that’s only accessible if you have a floatplane or boat without a motor to ground it. The Cessna has floats with polycarbonate protection that enables beaching, so I pull it right up onto the rocky shore. Normally, I’d go on a long hike from here, but not today. I’m sure the last thing Valentine wants is to head into the woods again, but at least we can have a nice lunch on the shore and maybe spot some whales while we’re at it.

Mostly, though, I want to talk, and now that I’ve got her out here in the wilderness with no way to escape, she’s going to have to listen to what I say.