Against the Wild (16 page)

It was Monday morning, the weather cool, but the sky had mostly cleared, just a few fluffy white clouds in a crystal-blue dome. Lane was still thinking about Dylan's present as she sat next to him in his big, dark brown extended-cab pickup, rolling along the gravel road toward Yeil.

Art supplies.
It was as if he knew she had looked at those gorgeous mountains a hundred times since her arrival and imagined putting them on canvas. She had wanted to be a painter since she was a little girl. In college she had taken every art and design class she could find.

At the University of Illinois, she had met her best friend and now business partner, Haley Warren Brodie, in an art history class. Haley had graduated and gone to work in a prestigious gallery in downtown Chicago, but Lane had been forced to give up her dream in order to nurse her mother.

She had never regretted the decision, though it had ultimately changed her life. Instead of becoming an artist, she'd wound up in the interior design business, a far better-paying endeavor. She was good at it, she'd discovered. Exceptional, in fact.

But deep in the marrow of her bones, she still carried a secret yearning to paint. And somehow Dylan had known.

Last night she'd held a paintbrush in her hand for the first time in years. Since it was Sunday, Winnie had cooked an early supper, giving everyone a little time afterward to enjoy themselves before the new workweek began.

After they'd eaten, Lane had pulled on a sweatshirt and set up a makeshift easel on the porch in front of the lodge.

Her excitement grew as she mixed brilliant blues and greens, tans and browns, and several shades of white. Her fingers felt clumsy as she held the palette. Her brushstrokes were jerky, the thickness of the paint uneven, but eventually the picture in her mind began to show up on the canvas.

What little she had painted—a view out toward the snowy peaks across the bay—wasn't very good, but it was a start. And the joy she felt as she warmed to the task still amazed her. She hadn't really known how badly she had missed this lost part of herself.

The pickup bumped into a hole, jerking her thoughts back to the present. Wedged between Dylan and Caleb, she tugged her seat belt a little tighter, got a smile from Dylan that made her heart beat a little faster.

“You okay?” he asked.

“Are you kidding? This is more fun than a roller coaster.”

He chuckled and returned his gaze to the muddy gravel road. In completely different ways, he and Caleb were two of the best-looking men she had ever seen—though as far as she was concerned, Caleb's exotic dark features, high cheekbones, straight nose, and sleek black brows couldn't compare to Dylan's deliciously masculine, amazingly sexy, rugged good looks.

And those eyes. The most stunning shade of blue she'd ever seen. She felt them slice in her direction, and her stomach floated up beneath her ribs. She told herself the pickup had only hit a low spot in the road.

“You're smiling. You're supposed to be thinking about fake ghosts and finding out who the hell has been trespassing in my lodge.”

Her smile widened at the teasing note in his voice. “I was thinking about how good it felt to paint again.” Well, partly. Mostly, she was trying to ignore the heat curling low in her belly whenever Dylan glanced her way. “The painting I started isn't very good, but it feels great to have a brush in my hand again.”

Dylan chuckled. “You'll get the hang of it.”

They rode the last few miles in silence, passing a couple of small houses set back in the trees, Lane taking in the extraordinary scenery that appeared at every turn. Bright pink wildflowers along the road gave depth to awe-inspiring vistas of sea and mountains and moss-draped woods.

The road curved and Dylan slowed. “Moose,” he said, pointing to the massive four-legged creature grazing peacefully in a meadow just a few feet off to the side near the trees.

Lane's breath caught. “Oh, he's beautiful.”

“It's a she. Cow and calf.” He pointed again. “See the little guy in the bushes?”

“I see him! Oh, he's so cute. I can't believe the way they blend right into the landscape.”

“They may be cute,” Caleb said, “but a moose is the most dangerous animal in the forest. More people are killed by moose than grizzlies.”

“You come up on one when you're hiking,” Dylan warned, “steer clear.”

But she was too busy working on the remodel to be doing much hiking, and she didn't know enough about surviving in the forest to go by herself.

And she wouldn't be staying long enough to learn.

The thought put a damper on her musings. She was here to do a job and then she'd be heading home. Dylan and Caleb were focused on the meeting ahead, and Lane forced her mind in that direction.

The road they were on went all the way to Waterside, but Yeil was only five miles from Eagle Bay so they were almost there.

Dylan glanced over at Caleb. “You think Payuk will be any help?”

“Maybe. Depends on what he knows. In a place as small as Yeil, people stick together. His first loyalty will be to his family and friends.”

Dylan turned off the main road, traveled another half mile, and the village came into view—what little there was of it. The largest building in town, the Yeil Market, was a one-story wooden structure with an overhanging porch and a pair of outdated gas pumps in front.

A sign above a brick building a little farther on read Y
EIL
C
OMMUNITY
C
ENTER
. The roads were unpaved, the town close to the water, with a floating dock where a few small boats bobbed peacefully in the sea. A scattering of wood-framed houses dotted the surrounding landscape.

“The market's pretty much all there is,” Dylan said. “It's got the bare necessities, and there's a food counter inside. They make sandwiches, serve frozen pizza they nuke in a microwave. You can get coffee, an egg wrap in the mornings, some packaged bakery goods.”

“Not exactly Beverly Hills,” Caleb joked.

Lane grinned. “Not exactly.”

“Payuk's house is the one down the road on the right.” Caleb pointed toward a wood-frame structure with a porch in front, pretty much what all of the houses looked like.

Dylan pulled up in front and turned off the engine. Cracking open his door, he stepped down, then reached up to help Lane down from the truck. The minute his big hands wrapped around her waist, she felt the sizzle. It zipped through her body all the way to her toes and every womanly place in between.

When she looked at Dylan, she saw the heat, the hunger that said he'd felt it too. She took a deep breath as he swung her to the ground, and Dylan let her go.

Thinking how much the lodge meant to him, she hoped the trip would be successful, that Jacob Payuk could help him put an end to the problems he had been having. Whatever happened, she needed to be sure he was okay when she returned to L.A.

 

 

Dylan guided Lane up on the porch and rapped on the door. He could hear footsteps on the other side as Caleb and Lane joined him. An instant later, a heavyset, dark-skinned man with thick gray hair pulled back in a ponytail opened the door.

“Dylan Brodie?”

“That's right.”

“I am Jacob Payuk.”

Dylan gave a nod of respect. “Elder Payuk. Thank you for seeing me. You know Caleb Wolfe, and this is Lane Bishop. She's a friend.”

Payuk's keen black eyes moved over the three of them. “My grandson, Andy, has told me what has been happening at the lodge. He told me you wished to see me. Come inside.”

They walked into the house, which had a living room with a hall leading to the bedrooms and a kitchen off to one side.

Payuk led them into the living room, furnished simply with a brown vinyl sofa and chairs, end tables, a couple of nondescript lamps, and an older-model TV. But the walls were filled with colorful Tlingit objects: woven rugs in red and black, carved wooden masks of animal totems colored in turquoise and red, intricately woven baskets. A carved wooden whale painted red and green sat on the coffee table.

He noticed Lane eyeing the pieces with interest. “Your artwork is beautiful,” she said with obvious appreciation. “We're planning to use pieces of Native artwork throughout the lodge.”

Dylan assumed that would make Payuk happy, but instead he just frowned. “The others will be here soon,” he said.

They didn't have to wait long before a knock came at the door. Payuk walked over and pulled it open, inviting two more men into his small house. They were clearly Indian, black-eyed, sharp-featured, their skin a burnished brown. Both were dressed in jeans, T-shirts, and a light jacket of some kind.

“This is my brother, Reggie, and this is George Tuck.”

Dylan made a polite inclination of his head. “Elders.” He introduced Caleb and Lane to the new additions.

“Please sit down,” Jacob said, and Dylan, Lane, and Caleb lined up on the sofa like recalcitrant kids. Dylan figured with the age difference that was about the way the elders saw them.

The brothers took seats in overstuffed chairs, and George Tuck brought a wooden chair in from the kitchen and settled himself between them.

“You have asked to see us. We are here. Tell us why you have come.”

Dylan looked at each of the men, giving them equal respect. “As you all must know, I'm the most recent owner of the Eagle Bay Lodge. I'm here because of the problems I've been having since my daughter and I moved in, problems that have continued to worsen over the past few weeks.”

He went on to tell them about the crying in the night and the footsteps, the ghost of a warrior that had appeared in the hallway.

“Perhaps you have angered the spirits,” George Tuck said.

“I've angered someone. It definitely isn't a spirit.” He went on to tell them about the hoax, about the fake ghost, the camera he had found, and the speakers someone had been using to make the eerie noises.

“The last owner believed the lodge was haunted,” he said. “Some of these same things happened to him and his wife. His wife was afraid to stay there. Finally, he was forced to sell the lodge, and I was the man who bought it. Fortunately, I discovered what was really going on. What I want to know is who's responsible. I came to you hoping you could tell me why this has been happening over the years.”

The older men spoke between themselves. Heads were shaking, the conversation low and much of it in Tlingit.

Jacob Payuk, who appeared to be the oldest and the leader, finally answered. “We do not know who has done these things.”

There was something in the careful way he said the words, something he wasn't saying. “All right—you don't know who's involved. But I have a very strong suspicion you know the reason this has been going on. You may not know who's responsible, but you know why they want the lodge to fail.”

A long silence ensued. The men exchanged a few more glances. Jacob Payuk spoke again. “Do you know about the murders?”

“I do. Ms. Bishop and I researched the history of the lodge, starting with the man who built it, Artemus Carmack. We went to the newspaper office in Waterside, read old
Sentinel
accounts of the murders of Carmack's wife and eight-year-old daughter. Two Tlingit villagers were responsible.”

“That is not true!” George Tuck was on his feet, his dark skin flushed beneath his high cheekbones.

“The paper said something about bad working conditions,” Dylan pressed. “Something happened to set the men off. That night they broke into the lodge and killed Olivia Carmack and the little girl, Mary. Will Seeks and Thomas Shaekley were found guilty of the crime, hanged, and buried in the cemetery at Eagle Bay.”

“All lies! All of it!” Tuck was shaking.

“Sit down, George,” Jacob said firmly.

Tuck's jaw looked tight as he sat back down in his chair. Dylan remained silent.

“There are few in Yeil who do not know the story of the murders,” Jacob said. “Though they happened over seventy years ago. Most of those who live here know the truth.”

Dylan straightened. “Exactly what truth is that?”

“That the men who were hanged that day were innocent. They were good men, family men. Not the sort to murder a woman and child.”

“Artemus Carmack was a cruel, violent man,” George Tuck said harshly. “He had been drinking that night. He and his wife fought bitterly. In a fit of rage, Carmack killed her and his small daughter.”

Reggie Payuk's hand tightened into a fist on the arm of his chair. “It was easy for him, a man of great wealth and power, to blame the men who worked for him. The villagers spoke no more than a few words of English. They could not defend themselves.”

Lane's face looked pale as she leaned forward on the sofa. “If Artemus Carmack killed his family, he got away with murder. Do you have any proof?”

Reggie Payuk merely shook his head, as did the other two men.

Dylan finally understood. “That's it, then. Someone wants the lodge to fail as payback—revenge for the two innocent men who were hanged.”

“The men were from Yeil,” Jacob said. “They have clansmen here and in other villages. Tales of injustice do not end with a single generation. They are handed down from family to family, father to son. Perhaps destroying the lodge is someone's way of finding justice for the innocent men who were hanged.”

But the hangings had happened decades ago and he hadn't had a damned thing to do with them.

“It can't continue,” Dylan warned. “You realize that. If you decline to help me, I'll be forced to bring the police in from Waterside. Is that what you want?”

Reggie Payuk looked unmoved. “We do not know who is responsible for these acts.”

“And if you did?”

He shrugged his thick shoulders. “A wrong must be righted. Perhaps this is the way.”