“So where are the hordes of wild beaver I was promised?”

Danny clicked his tongue. “Don’t be impatient, they’ll show up. They’re probably waiting for the moose to come out of the woods first and do a dance in your honor.”

“They’ll be something to see.”

“You should see ’em on Canada Day. They’re all synchronized in their dance moves, and they wear little Canadian flags as capes.”

I grinned and Danny laughed.

We’d landed in Calgary just a few hours before and immediately headed straight for the Budget Car Rental. Danny said his dad offered to pick us up, but Danny wanted to drive through the mountains. He’d also mentioned that the rental car would probably be worlds more comfortable than whatever clunker his dad currently drove around.

When we first hit the road, I didn’t think I’d seen so much flat, vacant land before. I’d been promised mountains and forest, not golden wheat fields. But Danny had just grinned, blasted the music over the stereo, and cracked the windows. Luckily, I’d brought a warm jacket, because the November weather in Alberta was far past freezing, even though Danny didn’t seem to notice. “Canadian skin,” he’d said, as if that made him impervious to the cold. I’d grown up in Arizona, and this being my first trip this far north, I’d been startled the moment we’d stepped off the plane and hit an invisible wall of ice.

“Look.” Danny, one hand on the wheel, pointed into the distance through the front windshield.

“What am I looking at?” I asked, leaning forward.

Danny threw me a look. “The mountains. Duh.”

They were nothing but shadows in the distance. Blobs of gray on the horizon. “They don’t look very big. I grew up in Arizona, you know. We have mountains there.”

“Not like The Rockies.” When Danny spoke about the mountains, he sounded like he was telling me about an old friend.

Within the hours, the small speckles of color in the distance had grown to huge, towering rock formations I could barely wrap my mind around. In person, they were nothing like pictures. They were massive and littered with trees. Snow covered the tops, along with a thick, white fog, which created the illusion of an infinitely tall mountain. As we continued to drive along the winding road, deeper and deeper into the mountains, we became completely surrounded. It was like we’d entered a different world where the sky no longer existed, but these old titans took their place.

“Wow,” I said, practically pressing my face against the glass of the passenger side window.

Danny laughed. “I know, right? Nothing quite like ’em.”

“I don’t remember the last time I felt so small.”

“Ah, we’re all small, Ace. Just a snowflake in a forest.”

The base of each mountain was covered in trees. Their leaves were long gone, but their bare branches had sprinklings of snow on top. Along some of the bends of the road, rivers ran against the side. There were ponds with frost encasing them and small patches of rocks all around.

Danny had rolled up the windows as we’d gone deeper into the mountains. It must’ve been getting too cold even for his “Canadian skin.”

After a few moments of silence, Danny said, “There aren’t any shooting ranges in Banff.”

“I know,” I replied, my cheek still pressed against the cold glass.

He chuckled. “You already looked? What am I saying? Of course you already looked.”

“There’s one pretty close. Mind if I borrow the car one day?”

“Of course not.”

A small part of me settled at his confirmation, which was ridiculous because I knew Danny would understand. He was the only person in the world who knew what I wanted in life.

I remembered back to the first time I’d told him that I hated business and I couldn’t wait to graduate and toss whatever credentials it gave me to the wind. We’d been sitting across from each other in a burger joint near campus. Danny had asked me what I wanted to do after graduation, and in an odd moment of honesty, I told him.

“Like, with a gun?” Danny had choked out.

I nodded. “Yeah.”

“For the police?”

“Who else?”

“An actual sniper? Like from the movies?”

“My father worked as a sniper for the Indianapolis SWAT team for over twenty years. Saved a lot of lives. And my grandfather had been a detective in Ohio all his life.”

“Yeah? The color blue runs in your family’s genes?”

I shrugged. “My father first took me shooting when I was eleven years old. We were at my uncle’s farm, out back waiting for Easter dinner to be ready. The moment my fingers touched the metal, I knew. The second that pellet hit the can off the fence, I felt alive. I was eighteen the first time I lay on my stomach and looked through a scope into the crosshairs. It was as simple as that.”

Danny had leaned back in his seat and crossed his arms over his chest. “Huh. Gotta tell you, Ace, I’m kind of surprised. Never would’ve pegged you for a law enforcement type. So, after you graduate, you’re going to apply for the academy?”

“The very same day.”

“Why not just drop out and do it now? I mean, why bother finishing college if what you’re studying isn’t what you want to do with your life?”

I’d hoped the smile on my face didn’t look fake when I said, “Let’s talk about something else.”

Now, here we were, Danny and I, driving through the cold, winter tundra of Alberta, enjoying the comfortable silence through the cab of the car. Another reason he and I had become close was because he didn’t press me when he knew there was something I didn’t want to tell him.

“You asleep over there, chief?” he asked.

“Nope.”

“Good. We’ll be there in a few minutes.”

The sun mooned behind the base of the Rocky Mountains. A veil of dark navy peeked from the heavens and tumbled down over the sunset. Danny had warned me that it became dark early in the evening around this time of year. Still, the harsh coldness the evening brought with it surprised me.

Soon after, I spotted twinkling streetlights in the distance. We drove through the main street in the sleepy town. It looked like something out of a fairy tale—massive log buildings, green-tiled roofs, brick chimneys on every house.

“You should see it at Christmas,” Danny said. “It’s perfect. All covered in snow, wreaths on all the lampposts, holiday lights strung up on every building. When I was younger, they even had this ice sculpture festival. At night it looked amazing.”

“You’ll have to show me pictures.”

“Why don’t you just come with me?”

I didn’t say anything after that, and neither did Danny.

---

We pulled up to a log-cabin-style house about fifteen minutes outside of Banff. By the time Danny parked the car and we stepped out, night had fully fallen. The lights inside the house were on, but the darkness outside was almost startling. I was used to city lights and the gentle glow of people all around me. Out here there was nothing. Just dark trees and that big, black abyss.

“C’mon,” Danny said, popping the trunk. “Let’s go see my old man.”

I zipped my coat up to my throat and grabbed my bag out of the trunk. From where we’d parked behind a black truck, the path to the house was gravel and dirt. A deck wrapped around the front of the house, while three steps up were needed to reach the door.

Without knocking or unlocking the door, Danny turned the handle and pushed it open.

“Dad!” he called out, a trill of excitement in his voice. “We’re home!”

Even just hearing him call out for his dad sliced another cut into a wound that hadn’t even begun to heal.

A man rounded the corner, a bottle of beer in one hand. He smiled the moment he saw Danny and outstretched his arm. Danny’s bag thudded to the ground as he strode toward the man I assumed was his father, and wrapped him in a hug.

I watched the two of them, feeling like I was intruding on their moment of intimacy. But the longer I looked, the harder it was to pull my gaze away. Danny didn’t look much like his father—not really. Danny’s features were a little softer, a little sweeter. His father stood a few inches taller than me, while Danny was a couple of inches shorter.

“Missed you, kiddo,” Danny’s father said into his hair.

When the two men pulled apart and Danny’s father’s eyes met mine, Danny said, “This is Ace. You know, the shithead I’ve been telling you about for years.”

I rolled my eyes and Danny laughed. Taking a few strides forward, I held out my hand. “It’s good to finally meet you, Mr. Patel.”

His hand was warm and rough, his fingertips covered in hard skin. “Finally, the elusive Archer. It’s good to meet you. Call me Mallory.”

“Mallory it is.”

“Danny’s been talking about you for years. Glad you finally decided to come visit this lonely old man.”

Mallory didn’t look old. In fact, he barely looked old enough to be Danny’s father. I wouldn’t place him many years above forty. The hair around his temples was turning gray, but the rest of his hair was dark and thick, matching his trimmed beard.

“Thanks for having me,” I replied.

“How you liking Alberta so far? Cold enough for you?”

I remembered that I had my jacket zipped up to my throat. “I don’t know how anyone lives here. It’s so cold.”

“Cold and beautiful, Archer. Some of the best things are.” A tiny, sad smile tugged at the corner of his lips. He’d only let that look free for a second, but I knew it too well. The look a person carried around with them for those forgotten moments of existence—the look of pain.

Danny tossed his arm over my shoulder and yawned. “No offense, Dad, but I’m beat. Can we catch up tomorrow?”

“Of course. I was just about to call it a night. Archer, make yourself at home. I’ve set up the spare bedroom for you. It’s across the hall from Danny’s room, but I’m sure he’ll show you where everything is.”

“Night, Dad.” Danny turned and I followed him up the wood staircase, tossing one last glance over my shoulder at his father’s retreating figure moving into the kitchen.

“Your dad seems nice.”

“He is. And he’s not too talkative, so you two should get along just fine.”

“Maybe I’ll see if he and I can communicate through telepathy.”

Danny spun on the top stair, looked at me deadpan, and said, “You’d need a brain for that, Ace. Don’t think you have the right materials.”

I laughed and shoved him in the chest.

At the top of the staircase, a long hallway stretched out in front of us. The walls were wood paneled, or maybe just wood. All along their sides were framed pictures: Danny and his dad in a restaurant, both with goofy hats on their heads; Danny as a little kid with a backpack slung over his shoulder and a toothy grin; Danny and a woman standing next to one another, her in a dress, him in a graduation gown.

“This one’s yours.” Danny hitched his thumb into an open doorway. “Welcome to Chateau Patel. Try not to mind the barred windows or safety restraints on your bed. They’re for your own good.”

“You’re so funny when you’re exhausted.” I rolled my eyes at him.

“My room’s across the hall.” Danny gestured, his brows lifting.

“Okay.”

“Let me know if you need anything. Anything. Anytime, okay?”

“What—you think I’m going to have a spooky dream and crawl into bed with you?”

“We at Chateau Patel strive for nothing less than excellence.”

“Goodnight,” I said in way of reply. Flicking the light switch on, I walked into my room for the next week and shut the door behind me.

A twin-sized bed sat pressed up against the far wall. When I tossed my bag on the end of the mattress, I couldn’t help the chuckle that escaped at the sight of a cheesy wolf blanket sprawled across the frame.

I unzipped my jacket and tossed it, along with my hoodie, onto an ornately carved wooden chair in the corner. I took a moment to run my fingers against the smooth wood as I took in the fresh pine smell of the room.

By the time I’d turned the light off and crawled into bed, my brain was running wildly. Even when I closed my eyes, sleep was nothing but an illustrious friend from my past. I sighed heavily, pressing the palms of my hands into my eyes.

Instead of dreaming of sleep, I envisioned the smooth polish of the scope of my rifle. I imagined the thin, faint crosshairs in the distance. I envisioned the weight and feel of a trigger under the pad of my finger.

And to the crackle of gunfire, eventually, I fell asleep.