She looked down the seemingly endless road, then over the snow-buried fields, toward the snowcapped mountains rising into a sky going gray-blue with dusk and the oncoming snow.
Later, Alice would think of that indecision, that few minutes of hesitation standing in the bitter wind on the shoulder of the road. The few minutes before she took a step toward the fields, the mountains, that would have taken her into the lengthening shadows of the pines, away from the road.
Though it was the first sound Alice had heard in more than two hours—other than her own breathing, her own boot steps, the wind shuddering through the trees—the rattle of an engine didn’t register at first.
When it did, she scrambled back through the snow, felt her heart leap at the sight of the pickup chugging its way toward her.
She stepped forward and, rather than sticking out her thumb as she’d done countless times in her journeys, waved her arms in a signal of distress.
She might have been gone for three years, but she’d been born and bred a country girl. A Westerner. No one would drive by a woman signaling for help on a lonely road.
As it eased to a stop, Alice thought she’d never seen anything more beautiful than that rusted-out blue Ford with its gun rack, tarp-covered bed, and a TRUE PATRIOT sticker on the windshield.
When the driver leaned over, rolled down the window, she had to fight off tears.
“Looks like you need some help.”
“I could sure use a ride.” She gave him a quick smile, sizing him up. She needed that ride, but she wasn’t stupid.
He wore a sheepskin coat that had some years on it, and a Cutter-style brown hat over short, dark hair.
Good-looking, Alice thought, which always helped. Older—had to be at least forty. His eyes, dark, too, looked friendly enough.
She could hear the line-dance beat of country music from the radio.
“How far you going?” he asked in that western Montana drawl that sounded like music, too.
“To the Bodine Ranch. It’s just—”
“Sure, I know the Bodine place. Going right by it. Hop on in.”
“Thanks. Thanks. I really appreciate it.” She swung her backpack off, hauled it in after her as she climbed in the cab.
“You have a breakdown? I didn’t see anything on the road.”
“No.” She settled the backpack at her feet, nearly speechless with relief at the warmth pumping out of the truck’s heater. “I was heading in from Missoula, hitched a ride, but they had to turn off about six miles back.”
“You been walking six miles?”
In bliss, she closed her eyes as the ice cubes that were her toes began to thaw. “You’re the first truck I’ve seen in about two hours. I never figured on walking all the way. I’m really glad I don’t have to now.”
“Long walk, and for a little thing like you on her own. It’s coming on dark soon.”
“I know it. I’m lucky you came along.”
“You’re lucky,” he repeated.
She didn’t see the fist coming. It was so fast, so shocking. Her face seemed to explode from the blow. Even as her eyes rolled back, she slapped out.
She didn’t feel the second blow.
Moving quickly, thrilled the opportunity had simply fallen into his hands, he hauled her out of the truck cab, rolled her limp body into the bed of the truck under the tarp.
He bound her hands, her feet, gagged her, then tossed an old blanket over her.
He didn’t want her to freeze to death before he got her home.
They had more than a few miles to travel.
CHAPTER ONE
— Present Day —
Dawn bloomed, pink as a rose, tinting the snow-drenched mountains with delicate color. Elk bugled as they swam through mists on their morning pilgrimage, and the rooster crowed his insistent alarm.
Savoring the last of her coffee, Bodine Longbow stood at the kitchen door to look and listen to what she considered the perfect start of a November day.
The only thing that could make it better was one additional hour. Since childhood she’d wished for a twenty-five-hour day, had even written down all she could accomplish with just sixty minutes more.
Since Earth’s rotation didn’t accommodate her, she made up for it, rarely sleeping beyond five-thirty. When dawn broke, she had already completed her morning workout—a precise sixty minutes—showered, groomed, dressed for the day, checked e-mails and texts, eaten a breakfast of yogurt, which she was trying to convince herself to like with granola that she didn’t like any better than yogurt, while she checked her schedule on her tablet.
Since her schedule already lived in her head, the check wasn’t necessary. But Bodine believed in being thorough.
Now, with the predawn portion of the day in the bag, she could take a few moments to enjoy her morning latte—double espresso, whole milk, and a squirt of the caramel she promised her inner critic she’d wean herself off of eventually.
The rest of the household would pile in soon, her father and brothers from checking on the stock, getting the ranch hands going. Since it was Clementine’s day off, Bodine knew her mother would sail into the kitchen, cheerfully and perfectly produce a Montana ranch breakfast. After feeding three men, Maureen would put the kitchen to rights before sailing off to the Bodine Resort, where she served as the head of sales.
Maureen Bodine Longbow was a constant wonder to her daughter.
Not only was Bodine dead sure her mother didn’t actively wish for that extra hour a day, she obviously didn’t need it to get everything done, to maintain a solid marriage, help run two complex businesses—the ranch and the resort—while continuing to enjoy life to the fullest.
Even as she thought it, Maureen breezed in. Her short, roasted-chestnut hair crowned a face pretty as a rosebud. Lively green eyes smiled at Bodine.
“Morning, my baby.”
“Morning. You look great.”
Maureen skimmed a hand down a narrow hip and the trim, forest-green dress. “I’ve got meetings on top of meetings today. Gotta make an impression.”
She slid open the old barn door that led to the pantry, took a white butcher’s apron from the hook.
Not that a pop of bacon grease would dare to land on that dress, Bodine thought.
“Make me one of those lattes, would you?” Maureen asked as she fastened the apron. “Nobody makes them as good as you.”
“Sure. I’ve got a meeting straight off this morning with Jessie,” Bodine said, referring to the resort’s events manager of three months, Jessica Baazov. “About Linda-Sue Jackson’s wedding. Linda-Sue’s coming in at ten.”
“Mmm. Your daddy tells me Roy Jackson’s crying in his beer over the cost of marrying off his girl, but I know for a fact Linda-Sue’s ma’s determined to pull out every stop, and then some. She’d send that girl down the aisle to a celestial chorus of angels if we could provide it.”
Bodine meticulously steamed the milk for the latte. “For the right price, Jessie’d probably manage it.”
“She’s working out real well, isn’t she?” With an enormous skillet on the eight-burner range, Maureen began frying up bacon. “I like that girl.”