Leaving early. Back tonight. Talk then. Stay safe.
After stowing the mail in the Beaver and doing the customary preflight check, he climbed into the pilot’s seat, started the engine, and taxied out of the cove.
The waves were whitecapped in the main channel. The plane pitched slightly as John turned into the wind, set the flaps to takeoff position, and opened the throttle. The Beaver shot forward and roared into the air.
Wind rocked the wings and battered the fuselage as the plane climbed to cruising altitude of ten thousand feet. He’d hoped to fly above the storm, but even here, the air was rough. He might have postponed the mail flight for a day or two, until the weather cleared, but this was the day when many folks in the villages received their assistance and dividend checks. For some, even a short delay would be a hardship.
The main storm front had yet to move in. If it proved to be too dangerous, John knew he could set down on some lake or inlet to wait out the worst of it. But he wasn’t worried. The sturdy Beaver was built to take a beating. It had survived plenty of storms. So had he. This one would be no different.
* * *
Emma woke to the clatter of hail against the windowpane. According to the bedside clock, it was almost eight. But the room was barely light.
She swung her legs off the bed and pattered barefoot to the window. Roiling soot-black clouds filled the sky outside. The wind howled, blowing the hail in a wild tattoo against the glass. The storm had struck in full fury. She could only hope that John had cancelled his flight. Surely he wouldn’t go up in weather like this. But John was a determined man.
Had he left her a message? Rushing back across the room she snatched up her phone. Dread jerked a knot in her stomach as she read his text from earlier this morning. Just as she’d feared, John had taken the plane up in the storm.
There was no TV in her room, but there was one mounted over the bar downstairs. She dressed in jeans and a sweater, splashed her face, finger-combed her hair, and hurried downstairs.
The TV in the bar was already on, tuned to a local news and weather broadcast. A half dozen people were watching it. Most of them appeared to be guests who were worried about their airline flights. Luggage was stacked in the lobby, but clearly no one was going anywhere this morning.
Too nervous to sample the breakfast buffet, Emma pulled out a stool and sat at the bar to watch the images on TV. What she saw only heightened her fear for John. The storm was a big one, with rain, hail, and sleet pounding the Alaskan coast from Ketchikan to Skagway and beyond. Emma saw news shots of flooded streets, highway wrecks, beached fishing boats, and airports with grounded planes and cancelled flights.
Where was John in all this? He must’ve set down somewhere. What was it he’d said when she’d asked him about flying in bad storms? Something about landing and waiting out the weather. Surely that’s what he would do.
Turning away from the TV, she rose, walked to the front of the restaurant, and looked over the low curtain that shielded seated patrons from sidewalk traffic. Beyond the glass, sleet and hail flew past the window, blown almost horizontal by the keening wind. The docks and water were a blur, glimpsed through streaking daggers of icy white. A few vehicles, their drivers accustomed to storms, moved along Front Street at a crawl. Here and there, people, caught unaware or driven by some urgent errand, staggered into the wind, clutching their parkas and ponchos around them.
The tall figure of a man emerged like a wraith from the swirling whiteness. Walking along the docks at a leisurely stroll, almost as if the storm didn’t exist, he paused opposite the hotel and stood looking across Front Street, toward the window where Emma stood. Although it didn’t make sense that he could see her through the sleet-blasted window, she took an instinctive step back from the glass. A chill passed through her body.
She could still see him, but not his face. He was wearing a storm poncho over a dark hoodie that was drawn down and over his forehead and cheeks, leaving little more than his eyes and mouth visible.
Even without a clear look at the man, Emma knew it was Boone. No one else could trigger the gut-clenching dread she felt when he stepped into the street, walking at an even pace toward the window, as if he wanted to prolong her fear. Emma knew she should get away and hide where he couldn’t find her, in case he dared to come inside. But since he’d likely heard from Philpot, he would already know she was here. Something compelled her to face him, to look him in the eye and let him know she was strong enough to stand up to him.
She moved forward again, next to the glass.
He stepped from the street onto the curb and came across the sidewalk to stand under the scant shelter of the overhang. They were face to face now, separated only by the glass. She looked into those cold blue eyes and felt the paralyzing fear that flowed down into her limbs. She willed her features to freeze, betraying nothing.
Without breaking eye contact, he reached up with his gloved hands and pulled back the poncho and hoodie that covered his head. Emma stifled a gasp as she saw the blistered, hairless patch that ran down the left side from crown to jaw, barely missing his eye.
This was her doing.
Slowly, the same way he’d unmasked himself, Boone covered his head again. With the same cold smile on his face, he turned away and walked into the storm. He had wanted to show himself. And he’d wanted her to know that because of what she’d done to him, he would make her suffer. If he had to chase her to the ends of the earth, he would never let her go.
* * *
John had made stops at Wrangell, Petersburg, and a couple of tiny settlements between. He was twenty minutes from Sitka, cruising at seven hundred feet, when the storm front hit with force that rocked the Beaver like a child’s paper toy. Sleet splattered the windows. Clouds swept in around him, cutting off his vision. Even with the wipers working, he was flying almost blind.
John swore, knowing he’d pressed his luck too far. Trying to climb over the storm now would be an almost suicidal risk. There was no place to go but down.
He knew he was over water. But the convolutions of the coast, with its inlets, islands, and reefs, could be treacherous. The simplest miscalculation might be enough to crash the plane into a mountainside, a rock, or even a tree.
He radioed his position and plan to anybody who might be listening. Then, with an eye on the altimeter, he began a careful descent. Howling wind battered the Beaver, shaking it back and forth like an animal with prey in its jaws. As the plane dropped, John struggled to see through the roiling clouds. His eyes strained for the slightest glimpse of the landscape below.
At two hundred feet he broke out below the clouds. A sleety rain was falling, drops splattering the plane like machine gun fire. Near the ground the wind was even stronger. But at least he could see. He was flying low over a narrow channel dotted with rocky islands. Landing the plane would be tricky, but he’d been in tighter spots—like the lake he’d landed on to rescue Emma.
Engine slowed to idle, flaps down, nose slightly up to slow the descent, he picked an open passage and glided in for a landing. Th
e storm was beating the waves to a froth, which was likely why he failed to see the massive rock looming just below the surface. The left float shattered as the plane skidded across it, careened partway onto its side and crashed to a stop.