Thanks again for reading!
Sarah Varland
To Joshua and Timothy, for being the best boys anyone could ask for. You search all my books for a J and a T to see if those copies are “yours” (oddly enough you’ve found a J or a T in every book so far), so here are your names, boys. This one’s for you. Thanks for sharing with me your love of stories, for writing them down, telling me stories out loud and letting me read to you. You’re both great and I love you. Thanks for letting me work when I need to and for being so excited when this book was finished. And no, you can’t read Mommy’s books yet, no matter how brave you think you are. But I appreciate it. Love you both!
Contents
Five miles to go. Only five miles.
Emma Bass gripped the steering wheel tighter and checked the rearview mirror one more time, panic rising in her that she might see the car following her—again—even though it had been four thousand miles and over a week since she’d last seen it.
Fifteen days since she’d witnessed the murder of her company’s CEO. Fourteen days since she’d started to feel like she was being observed. All the time. Twelve days since her son, Luke, mentioned offhandedly that sometimes he felt like someone was watching him.
Twelve days since she’d realized there was nothing the police there could do to protect her since no one could prove they were in danger. Eleven days since she’d left Dallas. Nobody messed with her kid. She’d done plenty of looking back, but only for her and Luke’s safety. Emma knew by now that it was better to let the past be the past and to keep moving forward. At whatever cost. Always. Moving. Forward.
Except now, when she voluntarily blasted herself back eight years to college graduation and her ultimatum to her then boyfriend that she never should have given. Her or his family’s lodge.
Emma didn’t know why she’d done it. Maybe it had been because the thought of Alaska scared her. She wasn’t inept in the country, but there was a difference between the Georgia countryside—lazy, muddy rivers and gently rolling hills—and the rugged Alaskan wilderness Tyler had showed her pictures of. He’d done so eagerly, like he’d thought the picturesque scenery of his beloved Alaska would be enough to convince her to move there with him, get engaged, take some time to get to know the area and his family and then eventually get married.
Instead, every picture of the mountains towering over his ocean-side town had made her shiver a little. There was something so wild about Alaska still. Untamed. Unpredictable.
Emma was a fan of predictable.
Then again, maybe it hadn’t been any of that. Emma might like routine, but she was an adventurer, too, in some ways.
Sighing, she glanced in the rearview mirror and smiled at her seven-year-old’s face. Maybe the truth was that she’d taken a pregnancy test the morning of their graduation—and it was positive. And somehow, maybe in a swirl of stress and emotions and being overwhelmed by how her life was changing so quickly, she’d said stupid things to Tyler, things she hadn’t been able to take back.
He’d simply walked away. No, that wasn’t true. She’d panicked, realized she didn’t deserve him and practically chased him away. But he hadn’t come back. And Emma hadn’t been able to handle the idea that he’d marry her only because he felt obligated, didn’t want his future decided for him just because someone had decided hers.
So years had passed. She’d said nothing to Tyler. Every single night as she’d lain in bed, trying to fall asleep, desperately trying to convince her mind to stop, she regretted her silence. But every day it became a little harder to break.
Life, ready or not, was about to do it for her.
She’d known when Luke had told her he’d felt like someone was watching him that they were in trouble. Emma had hoped, foolishly, for the first few hours after