Total pages in book: 127
Estimated words: 121020 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 605(@200wpm)___ 484(@250wpm)___ 403(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 121020 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 605(@200wpm)___ 484(@250wpm)___ 403(@300wpm)
Tyler nods. “You got it, Doc.”
In the distance, a head lamp glows faintly and volunteers are already moving into position, preparing to deliver another hero’s welcome. Only fifty-something more times to go.
“I guess I should get moving.” Tyler tugs his gloves back on. “I know you didn’t do that for me, but thank you, anyway.”
“No problem.” Without that layer of animosity—that his apology seems to have chipped away in an instant—I can already feel my unease around this man fading.
“You checkin’ out now, Brady?” Peter marches forward, his clipboard at the ready.
Tyler pulls his hood back up, the fur ruff framing his face. “Ready.” His voice is barely above conversation, but the dogs hear the command all the same. They bark and tug against their harnesses, excited to get going.
I move backward, out of his way.
“Is this your only checkpoint?” he calls out, peering at me from behind his cowl.
“No, I’ll be in Cripple, day after tomorrow.”
“Then you can hand me my gold.”
I can’t help my laughter at his brazen confidence. “I guess we’ll see.” Not that a veterinarian would be the one handing out the prize. The sponsor has a rep for that honor.
“Why? You don’t think I can do it?” His voice holds a challenge.
“You’ve never run the Iditarod before. Others have.” I shrug. “And you won’t be the only one racing for that prize.”
His eyes narrow. “So Hatchett’s going for it too, huh?”
“I have no idea what Harry’s doing.” I keep my voice even. Harry told me that in confidence. And that Tyler’s shooting for the gold means he’s planning on resting either at Cripple or even farther, at Ruby.
Twenty hours with Tyler Brady. Doesn’t stir the unpleasant reaction I expected.
His smile is crooked, but it makes his already handsome face impossible to turn away from. “Right.”
I struggle to stop the responding smile.
“See you there, Crusader.” With one last pensive look, he shifts his attention to the distance, a steely expression taking over his face. There are two hundred and forty miles of remote Alaskan tundra between here and the next time I’ll see him. He releases the snow hook. “Let’s go.” Another soft command, but that’s all it takes.
I watch the number on the back of his bib fade into the darkness.
Maybe Tyler Brady isn’t so bad after all.
CHAPTER SIX
“Marie?”
“Yeah?” I croak, burrowed deep in my sleeping bag, like a caterpillar waiting for my metamorphosis.
“We’ve got our first team coming in.” I hear the apology in Karen’s voice.
Already? “How long have I been asleep?” Surely, my head just hit my mat.
“I reckon you got almost two hours.” She snorts. “More than me!”
I don’t doubt it. Karen, a loud and tiny grandmother from Fairbanks, was busy heating soup and assembling sandwiches for the trailbreakers coming through on their snowmachines when our plane dropped us off early this morning. She’s been running the Cripple checkpoint for longer than I’ve been a veterinarian, and she does it all. If she’s not out at the greeting point to cheer on the mushers, she’s cooking in the checkpoint’s “headquarters”—a hut with plywood walls and metal shelves that are brimming with everything from paper plates to propane canisters and Coffee-Mate—all supplies Karen personally arranges to bring in every year.
Normally a two-hour power nap is all I need, but after the two-day whirlwind at Rohn, my body aches. Or maybe I’m getting too old for this.
“Lord, it’s hot in here. I wouldn’t put so much wood in that thing.”
I tug my cover down to confirm that the glow from the woodstove burns bright, illuminating the yellow walls of the arctic tent. “Tell Terry,” I mutter, unable to hide my annoyance. He stoked the tent stove with so much wood this afternoon that it was almost too warm for even base layers by the time I settled in. He must have snuck in and added another log while I was sleeping.
No wonder sweat is building around my shirt collar.
“They’re maybe a mile and a half out,” Karen warns.
I do the quick math. A mile and a half at six or seven miles per hour … “I’ll see you outside in five. Ten, tops.”
“Don’t make me drag you out of your bag.” She chuckles, but from what I’ve heard of Karen, the only thing she takes more seriously than her kitchen is a proper greeting for the teams, especially the first one in.
“Wait!” My eyes peel open, the sleepy fog lifting. “Do you know who it is?”
“I hear it’s that handsome rookie from Finland. See ya out there!”
There’s only one person she can mean. Tyler did it. He’s going to get his gold nuggets.
And Harry is going to be so pissed.
My soft chuckle carries through the tent.
* * *
Cheers and applause explode as the silhouette approaches through the stunted black spruce that dapple the otherwise empty, flat tundra. Tyler’s red musher’s jacket and the dogs’ matching red booties and coats provide a picturesque contrast to the sea of snow in the waning daylight. A trail photographer on-site for the grand entrance takes full advantage, snapping as the team slides in.