The Stranger (21 page)

I could see the officer’s lips moving, but I couldn’t hear the rest. The bear had killed the man and eaten his liver. His liver.

“Summer?” Seth’s face floated into my frame of vision. “You look sick.”

I grappled with the notion while I struggled to keep the food in my stomach. “You...um...you said bears don’t usually attack humans.”

“They don’t, usually.”

“Remember what I told you?”

“Yes,” Seth said.

“What is she talking about?” Officer Pug asked.

“Summer saw the bear too,” Seth said. “It wandered along the trail to the cabin.”

I rested my hand on my belly and focused on breathing.

“I think she’s had enough for today.” Seth got up and gestured for the troopers to do the same. “I’ll walk you out.”

Anya’s old bear friend, the same animal that had spoken in my loved ones’ voices and led me from the lake to the cabin, had stalked my wounded assailant, killed him and eaten his liver, the only part the bear in my dream/hallucination/vision had relished. My shadow soul, my bear yega, had eaten my enemy’s liver, presumably to avoid his yega’s revenge?

It was a bit too much. Never again would I pick up a book of Athabaskan legends. Period. My imagination was simply too fertile to deal with such vivid stories.

“Excuse me?” I croaked as the men ambled toward the front door. “I have a question.”

“Yes?” the veteran officer said.

“What happened to the bear?”

“We haven’t found it yet,” the trooper said. “We’ve got people looking, but we’ve found no traces of it.”

It was the most relief I’d felt all day.

Chapter Sixteen

By the time Seth came out of his office later that afternoon, I’d forced myself to tackle the present, where Tammy was nowhere to be found, my clients needed immediate changes to their plans, Jer’s project required lots of research, and my boss and stepmother vied for my head. Seth found me at the kitchen bar, parked in front of my laptop.

“Hey.” His strong hands kneaded my shoulders. “How are you holding up?”

His touch felt so good on my knotted muscles. “Jer’s tundra-friendly pylons haven’t been invented. Darius now wants the sixth floor redesigned. Hector demands I come back to Miami, even more urgently than before. Meanwhile, Louise thinks I’m in cahoots with Tammy to drive her insane.”

“I’m telling you,” Seth said, “your stepmother is off.”

“Seth!”

“No disrespect intended.”

“Right,” I said. “If all of that wasn’t enough, I talked to the innkeeper in Kenai. She has no idea where Tammy and Nikolai were going next. I swear I must have talked to every hotel, campsite, and bed-and-breakfast in south Alaska. It seems I’ve hit another dead end.”

“Too bad,” Seth said. “Maybe she’ll turn up again soon?”

“She better.” I got up from my stool and went to the fridge, where I pulled out my latest creation and settled it on the counter in front of Seth. “Here, I baked you a flan.”

“Wow.” He eyed the dessert and grinned. “When did you have time to bake me a flan?”

“I bake when I’m stressed.” I sliced the flan and spooned it onto a plate. “I’d rather abuse the oven than drugs and/or alcohol. It’s the lesser vice, don’t you think?”

“Absolutely.” He grabbed a spoon. “You won’t hear any complaints from me.”

“Let’s see if you like it.” I parked the plate in front of him.

He dug in. “Hmm.” His delight trickled down my spine and softened my center. “Awesome.”

I ignored the little pangs of need coursing through my body, scooped myself a piece and tasted my creation. It’d turned out really good. I swallowed another bite. “I’ve extended my search for Tammy to the interior and the panhandle,” I said. “Maybe I’ll get something productive that way. Your guy hasn’t come up with anything, has he?”

“Nothing helpful,” he mumbled around a mouthful.

“I can’t stick around forever,” I said. “My job is on the line.”

“You can’t leave,” he said between gulps. “There’s Tammy, of course, and the police investigation. They want you to stay until they figure out why George Peterson wanted to kill you.”

I poked at my flan. “I wonder how George Peterson got access to Fountain Way. Back then, it was a new building with great security. A guy like him in Fountain Way? Doesn’t make sense.”

“I thought the same thing,” Seth said. “I had Spider and his team dig out the list of owners for the period. Peterson’s name wasn’t on any of them, which means he must have been staying with someone else. The question is, who?”

“Maybe I should go back to Miami and take a look.”

“No way.” Seth set down his spoon. “You’re not safe out there right now. You can’t leave.”

“I can’t linger here forever. Someday, I have to go back to the real world.”

“This is the real world too,” Seth said.

“The idea that someone wants me dead still seems crazy to me.”

“We need find out who hired him and why,” he said. “Meanwhile, I’ve added some security measures. You’re safe here.”

I knew Seth. I knew he meant what he said. After last night, I also understood that the danger was real and I was grateful for his precautions. But I couldn’t put my life on hold forever. Could I? I had responsibilities, obligations. I owed it to my mom to find her real killer. I also had to find Tammy.

My phone chimed. I looked at the screen. Hector. My stomach began to churn. What was I going to tell him now? Not that I’d had a run-in with an assassin for hire. He’d never believe me.

I clicked on the cell. “Hello?”

“When I gave you a job, I expected you to be at your office and carry the load,” Hector said in a tone that curdled the flan in my belly. “I also expected you to answer your phone.”

“Sorry,” I mumbled. “I was out of range.”

“I didn’t expect you’d leave for weeks at a time and abandon your projects.”

“I’m trying my best,” I said. “I’ve kept up with the Darius project. We’re on budget, on target and on schedule.”

“I’m tired of excuses and family emergencies,” he said. “Between Louise and Tammy, you’ve got a full-time babysitting gig.”

“But—”

“I did you a favor,” Hector said. “I hired you out of the goodness of my heart, because your father was my partner once. I gave you time off to go to Alaska because I know Tammy and Louise and, frankly, I think that they’re both living impaired. But if you’re not in my office by tomorrow at five o’clock, you’ll never work as an architect in Miami again.”

“You must understand,” I said. “I can’t leave until I find Tammy...”

“This goddam idiot is fixated on you.” Seth plucked the cell out of my hand and spoke into the phone. “Hector Carrera? My name is Seth Erickson. I’m the CEO of Erickson & Erickson Enterprises. Look me up if you’d like, but don’t interrupt me.”

“Seth?” I groped for my cell. “What are you doing?”

Seth kept a firm hold on the phone and ignored me.

“We’re currently in the process of accepting design bids for a milestone, multi-million-dollar portable housing project,” he said to Hector. “The bidding process is by invitation only. Miss Silva has some innovative thoughts on the project. I’m inviting her—and only her—to submit a bid on behalf of your company.”

“Seth,” I muttered. “Give me my cell back!”

Seth put his hand over the speaker. “Hush, Summer, let me take care of this.”

Hush
,
Summer?

“Carrera and Associates may have a shot at the project,” Seth continued. “But only if you stop hassling Miss Silva and allow her to do her research. Obviously, she’ll need to stay in Alaska to liaison with our people here. Are you interested?”

I imagined Hector’s excitement on the other side of the line. Of course he’d be interested! It was a milestone project that would enhance his reputation worldwide and line his pockets. The bidding would be unavailable to him any other way and, even if he had to send me to Mars, he’d never turn down a multi-million-dollar project.

“Excellent,” Seth said. “We’ll get the paperwork rolling. A good day to you too.” He clicked off the phone and handed it to me. “That’s done.”

The look on my face must have given him a hint of my emotions, or else the smoke billowing out of my ears gave me away.

“What’s wrong?” he said.

“What’s wrong?” I glared. “That was
my
boss you just talked to!”

“Yes, so?”

“Hector was
my
problem.”

“Please.” Seth rolled his eyes. “The son of a bitch was out of control. How the hell did you end up working for a jackass like him anyways?”

“I came out of grad school in the middle of a recession,” I said. “I was lucky he offered me a job.”

“He treats you like dirt,” he said. “He won’t do that again.”

“Because you promised him a bidding invitation to a multi-million-dollar contract.”

“I didn’t lie to him,” he said. “Your work on this project is top-notch. You’ve made more headway on the specs than anybody else. I want you on the project.”

Was he crazy? “I have a full-time job in Miami.”

“You can have a full-time a job here, too.”

I rumbled inside. “Don’t do this, Seth.”

“Do what?”

“Mix the mayo with the ketchup.”

He frowned. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“Don’t try to cram our private and professional relationships into the same bucket,” I said. “I might seem dumb to you, but I’m not completely clueless.”

“I thought you said you didn’t want to get fired.”

“My job, my decision.”

“Stop doing that,” Seth said.

“What?”

“That thing where you frown, stick out your chin and flick your hair.” He pointed at me with the spoon. “It means trouble, and I don’t need trouble with you. The bid offered a solution all around.”

I stomped my foot. “You can’t keep me here by offering me a job and you can’t go around bribing people to keep me on. I’m skilled. I don’t need you to create an artificial position for me!”

“It’s not an artificial position,” he said. “You are very much needed on this project.”

I narrowed my stare on him. “Did you interview me for the position?”

“I didn’t need to,” he said. “I saw your work.”

“Did you interview other candidates and measure me against their qualifications?”

“No, but—”

“The only reason you want to hire me is because we’re sleeping together.”

He scowled. “I wouldn’t have offered you the position if I didn’t think you were qualified.”

“I’m qualified, that’s true, to get myself a new job if I need to.” I cleared the dirty dishes from the counter and dumped them in the sink. “If I want to find work in Alaska, I’ll apply for a job in Alaska. And that’s not all. You told the police not to tell me about George Peterson’s death. You thought I was going to fall apart.”

“I didn’t want you to get upset. What’s wrong with that?”

“It would be normal for someone to be upset in a situation like this,” I said. “The guy came after me and then the bear ate his liver...his liver!”

I still couldn’t get over that one.

Seth came around the counter and put his arms around my waist. “Baby, I...”

“No, Seth.” I pushed him away. “I can deal with my own problems. I get to make my own choices. I can take care of myself.”

“Perhaps,” he said cryptically.

I wheeled on him. “What do you mean ‘perhaps’?”

“Personally,” he said, crossing his arms and leaning against the counter, “I think that for a girl who claims to be risk-averse, you take too many risks.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“Let’s take the day before yesterday, for example,” he said. “I told you to go home with Robert. What did you do instead? You jumped out of a damn helicopter.”

“It was low to the ground.”

“You don’t do crap like that.” His stare grew stern. “You could’ve been hurt. If that wasn’t enough, you ignored my instructions, set out on a wild chase, and exposed yourself to incredible danger.”

“I did not!” My temper flared. “I had a theory based on logical expectations and—surprise!—it panned out and you’re free.”

“I don’t mean to be an ungrateful son of a bitch,” he said. “But I wouldn’t have minded a few more hours with my ass parked in detention in exchange for your safety.”

“I minded!” I said. “I didn’t want you in jail. And how on earth could I’ve known that man was going to come after me?”

“Contingency thinking,” he said. “It’s what I do for a living. I’m fairly good at it, if only you’d trust me. You would’ve been safe, had you followed my instructions.”

“Okay, well, maybe, but you need to know I’m not very good at following instructions.” I cocked my fists on my hips. “In fact, I flunked kindergarten because I couldn’t follow instructions. So get over it, Erickson.”

“No, you get over it,” he said. “You want to live in Alaska? You better listen to me.”

“Who says I want to live in Alaska?”

He winced and I knew right away that I’d scored a blow below the belt. In all honesty, I wanted to find a way to be close to him too, but I had a lot of stuff to work out in my mind and some of it was complicated. I hadn’t planned on coming to Alaska, let alone to linger out here. I hadn’t planned on Seth either. The way I felt frightened me. My life was in Miami. My family too. I was responsible for Louise and Tammy. If I didn’t take care of them, who would?

Seth modulated his voice with visible effort. “The first time I met you, I had to pick you up from the pavement.”

“I slipped on the ice!”

“Last night, I had to shake icicles from your hair.”

“Not because I was careless or reckless.”

“You said the punctured brakes weren’t about you,” he said flatly. “But you were wrong. It was about you, about your mother. Someone wants to kill you and whether you’re ready to accept that or not, you’ve got to own up to the fact that you are in danger.”

“I have!” I said. “And that’s why I need to go back to Miami and figure out what this is all about.”

“Going back to Miami is not the answer,” he said. “Let the police do their work. Let us finish this investigation before you go anywhere.”

“But—”

“What’s going to happen the next time?” he said. “Am I going to have to scoop parts of your brain back into your thick skull?”

“Oh, come on. Don’t you think you’re being overly dramatic here?”

“Dammit, no!” he snapped. “Last night? For a whole half an hour, I thought you were going to die.”

“But I didn’t die, right? That should count for something.”

“If something were to happen to you...”

The anguish in his stare blew me out of the water. I had no doubt that his emotions were honest. Had the situations been reversed, I might have felt the same fear. Oh, God. What a mess.

“Don’t ever lie to me,” I said. “Don’t keep things from me and don’t run interference. You’re powerful, I get that. You’ve got resources. Great. You’re brilliant, smart, and capable. Fantastic. But I want a shot at my life. Do you hear me?”

“Loud and clear.” He plopped down on a stool. “But promise me you’ll stay here, in Alaska, until we find who’s behind all this.”

“I’ll stay until I find Tammy,” I said. “That was our deal. After that, we’ll have to see where we are.”

“Okay, fine.” He kneaded his temples. “Now, can you please stop fighting with me? You’re giving me a headache.”

“Who’s giving who a headache?”

“Not too many people fight with me.”

“That may be because you act like a bully sometimes.”

“Me?” He scoffed. “You’re like a pit bull from hell when you’re mad.”

“I am not!”

“Oh, yes, you are.” He reached out, caught my wrists in his hands and pulled me into the space between his knees. “I’d rather take on ISIS any day. I don’t like it when you’re mad at me. It feels wrong. Besides, I’ve got to be out of here in twenty minutes.”