Iditarod Nights (13 page)

"Dillon Cord, this is Ethan Stanfield,
Claire's father."

Mr. Stanfield extended his gloved hand.
"Congratulations on finishing the race."

He had a firm grip, even through thick layers
of insulation. "Thank you, sir. Welcome to Nome. I need to take
care of my dogs and get a shower, but come by the Bering West later
and I'll buy you a drink."

The older man hunched further into his parka,
like a turtle drawing into its shell. "Make that a
hot
drink
and you've got a deal."

The dogs were taken down the street to a team
of veterinarians for a thorough check out. A drug testing team took
urine samples. Then Dillon and Frank trucked them home to Frank's
kennel yard to eat and rest.

He should have been dead on his feet, ready
to curl up like his team of athletes and sleep for twenty hours,
but Dillon's system was still on race time – run, rest, feed, check
feet, do it all over again, twenty-four hours, day after day. Now
nothing stood between him and his bed over the Bering West.

Except that Claire was still out there, on
the trail.

And he had to buy a man a drink. He couldn't
say what compelled him to make the offer. Did he hope to influence
Ethan Stanfield in some way? Convince him his daughter should stay
in Alaska?

Maybe he just wanted to meet the guy Claire
held dear to her heart. Find out what it was about him that had her
willing to turn her back on everything else.

Chapter 22

Dillon couldn't say what he expected Claire's
dad to be like – a hardnosed tyrant, a money-hungry suit, an
iron-fisted bully. None of those clichés fit the man who walked
into the Bering West and sat at the bar later that afternoon. Most
of the half dozen tables were occupied even midday because of
Iditarod activities around town. The young couple at the bar were
tourists from Minnesota. Marty Robbins sang
El Paso
on the
jukebox and the aroma of fresh ground coffee beans mingled with the
pervasive smell of hops.

Frank started over to take Ethan Stanfield's
order. "I've got this," Dillon said and turned to his guest. "Glad
you could make it. What'll it be?"

"Coffee, please. Black and strong." Stanfield
unbuttoned his parka and swiveled on the barstool to take in his
surroundings. "You have an interesting place here, Mr. Cord."

He'd done his best to replicate an old west
saloon. Decks of cards on round wood tables surrounded by an
assortment of straight-backed chairs invited the occasional poker
game. A brass boot rail ran the length of the polished bar. Behind
the bar, rows of liquor bottles reflected in the long, etched
mirror. Some might question a man with his history owning a tavern.
That is, if anyone knew his history. The tavern was testament to
himself that he'd put his drinking days behind him.

"The tourists like it," he said, and tossed
two coasters with the logo of a compass pointing west onto the bar.
He set a thick ironstone mug on each and nodded toward the
historical photographs of Nome. "People still migrate here after
the thaw to pan for gold."

Stanfield pulled deeper into his parka. "No
offense, but it would take more than the illusive chance of
striking it rich on a chunk of mineral for me to vacation this
close to the arctic, no matter what time of year."

"None taken." Dillon shrugged and commented,
"It's not bad once the sea ice thaws."

The older man barked a laugh. "Good God." He
lifted the coffee Dillon poured. "What makes a man choose to live
in such a bleak, isolated place?"

You're not welcome in this house.
"The
isolation."

"One man's harsh and bleak is another man's
safe haven." Stanfield took a sip, gave a long sigh. "That hits the
spot."

Dillon returned the carafe and sipped from
his own mug. Strong and hot. "Couldn't get enough of this on the
trail."

"What's it like out there?"

He saw the concern of a parent for a child in
Stanfield's eyes. But if the man was anything like his daughter, a
candy-coated answer wouldn't fly. "I can tell you it was forty
below with a wind chill factor that made it feel like minus eighty,
but until you've experienced it, those are just numbers." There
were no words to describe the incredible, harsh conditions. The
sleep deprivation. Hallucinations. "When you're in it, all you
think about is surviving. And when it's over, you're already
planning the next race."

Stanfield's head came up, his gaze sharp.
"No."

"Sir?"

"I can't go through this again."

"Is that why you made Claire promise to
return to Portland?"

Gravity pulled at the man's face. "Her idea,
not mine." He lifted his mug and paused before drinking, as though
giving himself time to choose his next words. "Did she tell you
anything about her mother?"

"No, sir."

"My wife, Caroline, had cancer. Very
aggressive cancer. Claire was eleven when her mother went in for a
risky surgical procedure. Caroline promised our daughter she'd see
her again soon, a promise she wasn't able to keep."

"It must have been hard on both of you."

"Terrifying," Stanfield admitted. "I lost the
only woman I'd ever loved and suddenly found myself with an
eleven-year-old girl to raise. I made a lot of mistakes, but we
survived. And since her mother's death, Claire has been unyielding,
to the point of obsessive, about keeping promises."

"She didn't want you to feel abandoned."

Stanfield nodded and sipped his coffee.

Dillon saw the man's hand shake and looked
away. Jealousy dug at him. A jealousy he had no right to. He had
nobody but himself to blame for the break in his relationship with
his parents. Still, he couldn't stop from saying, "You didn't try
to talk her out of it."

" I won't lie, I would miss her. But my
daughter's good at what she does. Better than good. I'd hate to see
her give it up for..." He hesitated, considered. Tammy Wynette
belted
Stand By Your Man
and he sighed. "Less."

Dillon should have taken offense, but he
understood where the man was coming from. And with that
understanding came the knowledge that he would not be the one to
get between Claire and her dad. Where that left him in the
equation, he didn't have a clue.

"Have I answered your question, Mr.
Cord?"

"Yes, sir." He reached for the carafe.
"Refill?"

"Thank you but no." Stanfield stood and
buttoned his parka. "I've kept you long enough. You must be
exhausted."

Dillon shook the man's hand, said, "It was a
pleasure," and meant it. "Claire will be happy to see you."

"Stunned is more like it. Maybe a game of
poker later?"

"Not if you're the one who taught Claire how
to play."

Stanfield grinned. "How much did she take you
for?"

"A box of matches."

"Well, I can assure you, your odds are better
with me. I taught my daughter the basics of the game. The finer
points she figured out for herself. I suppose I could take somewhat
dubious comfort knowing that if she gets tired of being an
attorney, she can support herself as a card shark."

Dillon chuckled. "I don't doubt that."

Chapter 23

Shortly after 5:30 the next morning, Claire
and her dogs rounded the corner onto Front Street. People clapped
and cheered their arrival. In the predawn darkness, crisscrossed
strands of multicolored lights overhead dotted the chute in festive
bursts of red, blue and green. Claire stopped her team under the
burled arch, exhausted, cold, and grinning wide enough to crack the
ice on her face.

"Welcome to Nome," the checker said.

"Thank you." A man bundled in a new parka and
ski pants approached. "Daddy?"

"Peanut." He staggered at the force of her
hug. "You've lost weight," he said, patting her back. She pressed
wind-chapped lips to his cheek and he gasped. "God, you're an ice
cube!"

She laughed. "It's good to see you too."

Janey and Andy greeted her at the same time.
When she scanned the crowd for Dillon, Janey pointed over and up to
the balcony of a two-story wood building a few yards away, the
Bering West. Claire's heart took a small lurch when she recognized
Dillon standing at the railing. He gave her two thumbs up and she
waved.

"He's treating us all to breakfast later,"
Janey commented. "Anything we want, he said."

Claire prayed the rush of heat up her neck
didn't melt the ice crystals clinging to her cheeks. She turned
away and got to the business of thanking her dogs, completing her
check-in and getting her team settled in the dog yard. Her official
time: eleven days, fourteen hours and eight minutes. She finished
her first Iditarod in thirty-fourth place.

***

During the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race,
Nome's population of 3,500 swells by 1,000 or more people from all
over, looking for an opportunity to rub shoulders with famous
mushers and take part in dozens of events – fine art shows, native
crafts, sing-a-longs, Idita-Rides, Idit-A-Shoots, helicopter tours,
hoedowns and hulas – turning the coastal city into the "Mardi Gras
of the North."

And all those people needed to eat. Dillon
donned an apron and began mixing a massive batch of pancake batter,
while Vic prepped tomatoes, onions and ham for country scrambled
eggs. A breakfast crowd – both tourists and regulars – had already
begun to form outside.

"It's been like this all week," Vic groused,
his knife rapping the cutting board like a woodpecker on caffeine.
He'd pulled his long, gray-streaked hair into a braid at his back,
his thick arms bare to the shoulders, exposing the tattoo of a
woman's name – Reta – on his right bicep.

Some day Dillon planned to ask about Reta.
Some day when he drummed up enough courage. "You love it," he said,
to which his cook gave a boisterous hoot. "Besides, it's good for
business."

"Good enough for a raise?"

"Dream on."

Damn, it felt good to be home. Comfortable.
The routine, the bantering, keeping busy. There was nothing wrong
with falling back on routine while deciding what the hell to do
next.

Helen and Kristi swung into action as soon as
the doors opened, showing people to tables and taking orders.

"Order!" Helen bellowed. "So who's the looker
at table two?" she asked in a loud whisper. Just about everything
the woman did was a low roar.

Dillon had reserved table two for Claire and
her group. He knew which one of the bunch he'd choose as "the
looker" but doubted it was the same one Helen had her eye on.
"You'll have to be more specific."

"Nice build, gorgeous gray hair. In my age
neighborhood."

Helen's age neighborhood was vague, at best.
Dillon knew she had at least a decade on the "40" she put on her
job application, but he let it slide. The woman knew how to
waitress and customers liked her. That's all he cared about.
"Name's Ethan Stanfield," he said. "He's an attorney from Portland,
Oregon."

"Is he spoken for?"

"Not that I'm aware of." The conversation
he'd had with Claire's dad yesterday afternoon led him to believe
the man still mourned his deceased wife. What was it like to love
somebody that deep? He figured his brash, outspoken employee had as
much chance of attracting Stanfield as a moose had of flying, but
what did he know? His own experience in the romance department
didn't count for much.

Helen grinned and waggled her eyebrows.

"Be nice," Dillon told her.

"Aren't I always?"

Dillon chuckled. "You don't really want me to
answer that, do you?"

"Hell no!"

A few minutes later, he turned toward the
pick-up counter with a loaded plate of food in each hand, and
stopped short of colliding with Claire.

"Whoa! Sorry," she said, taking a quick step
back.

But not so quick he didn't have time to plant
a kiss on her forehead before she got out of range. "Good morning."
He set the plates on the counter. "Orders up!" He turned back and
saw Claire standing to the side, looking uncertain. Tired.
Irresistible.

"Helen said it was okay. If I'm – "

He hauled her close, whispered, "It's okay,"
and kissed her for real, full on the mouth. She tasted of coffee
with a dollop of Claire for sweetness.

"I missed you," she said on a breath.

His heart bumped. "Me too." He kissed her
again. Deeper. The uncertainty of tomorrow warned him to go slow,
but that was damn near impossible when he had her curves pressed
against him, warm and smelling like lavender soap.

A wolf whistle pierced the air.

Dillon flinched, felt Claire's smile on his
mouth. He eased his hold with a sigh and shot a glare at Helen.

She winked, picked up the orders and
sauntered off.

Still looking amused, Claire commented, "I
thought you didn't cook."

"He doesn't!" Vic hollered.

"I can hold my own in the kitchen."

Vic grunted. "Is that why my sausages are
lookin' like desiccated dog turds?"

"Damn it." Dillon made introductions as he
scraped burnt links into the garbage. "Claire, this is Vic. Vic,
Claire."

Vic flashed her a grin. "Charmed,
darlin'."

Claire gave a smile and quick wave. "Nice to
meet you." She moved toward the door. "I'd better let you get back
to...cooking."

Dillon shot her a smile. "Catch you
later?"

"Absolutely."

***

The dining area of the Bering West consisted
of half a dozen booths and eight tables, every one of them
occupied. The combination of gnarled polished wood and red vinyl
gave it a homey atmosphere that Claire found appealing. Unlike its
modern, stainless kitchen, tarnished gold pans and pick axes hung
beside framed sepia prints of bearded prospectors and their pack
mules, testaments to Nome's history as a booming mining town.
Bat-wing doors reminiscent of a Dodge City saloon, circa 1800s,
separated the bar from the restaurant.