Northern Exposure. Debra Lee Brown
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by the hearth. She struggled to get them on comfortably over the moleskin.
Joe resisted an overpowering urge to help her.
“Why not hire a guide?” Barb said.
“Can’t afford it.” Wendy laced the stiff boots, grimacing. “I’m covering my expenses myself. Besides, I don’t want a guide.”
“Why don’t you take her?” Barb arched a thick, dark brow at him. “You know every inch of the reserve and exactly where those caribou are likely to hole up.”
“No!” he and Wendy said in unison.
“Whoa. Sorry. I thought you two were…uh, friends.”
“We’re not,” Joe said.
“My mistake.”
Wendy’s cheeks flushed scarlet. “I’ll, um, be right back.” She headed down the hall toward the bathroom, and when they heard the door close, Barb was all over him.
“Who is she? She’s great! Where did you meet her? What happened with the two of you last—”
“I want you to take her back to her rental car out on the west road, then follow her to the highway. I want her out of here. Got it?”
Barb’s brown eyes widened. “Got it.”
“And don’t ask,” he said, as she opened her mouth to fire more questions at him.
A moment later Wendy’s footsteps cut short their conversation. “Okay, I’m ready.” She turned to him and stiffly offered her hand. Feeling awkward, he shook it. “Thank you for your…hospitality.” Her tone pushed the sarcastic-meter off the scale.
At the door their gazes met and, for the briefest moment, in her eyes he read the same unguarded fusion of emotions he’d seen in them last night when she was standing in his bedroom: compassion, longing, regret.
He was familiar with the last one. God, was he ever.
Barb called to him over the roof of her department pickup before she climbed inside. “Almost forgot. Your truck’s out of the shop. Couple of guys from the garage are bringing it up later this morning.”
“Thanks,” he said, then stood in the open doorway and watched as Barb turned her pickup around and drove Wendy Walters out of his life.
Good riddance.
But fifteen minutes later, he couldn’t stop himself from making the call.
“Wilderness Unlimited,” the operator uttered in an East Coast accent.
When Joe reached the senior editor, Wendy’s story was confirmed.
She was out here to shoot the caribou, only it wasn’t the magazine’s idea. It was Wendy’s. A photo essay slated for next month’s edition had fallen through, and Wendy had cut a deal with the editorial director to hire her as a staff photographer if she could deliver the caribou photos before the issue went to press. No small feat.
“No one’s ever photographed them up close,” Joe said into the receiver.
“That’s exactly why our little Wendy picked that particular project. She knew the magazine’s director would be champing at the bit for a coup like that. He couldn’t resist.”
“She must want that job pretty bad.”
“She’s desperate,” the woman said. “Can’t say I blame her. After what happened in that loft with that model—geez, he was only twenty-nine, Wendy’s age. So sad. They say it was an overdose of ecstasy or crack, I don’t remember which. Anyway—”
“I get the picture,” Joe said, not wanting to rehash the details he’d read in the tabloid.
“She’s trying to start over, make a new life for herself. Getting away from Blake Barrett is the smartest thing she’s ever done. She should have done it years ago. That snake didn’t even have the decency to speak to the police on her behalf.”
Blake Barrett. Joe wondered who he was. Ex-husband, maybe? Lover? Her boss?
“You take care of our girl, now. I worry about her out there on her own.”
Joe didn’t bother telling her that the photographer formerly known as Willa Walters was on her way back to the highway as they spoke. Next month’s issue would have to run without those caribou photos, and the petite blond who’d initiated a wild night of kinky sex and drugs resulting in the death of a male fashion model would have to find herself another assignment.
Preferably as far away from him as possible.
“You don’t say?” Barb slowed the green Department of Fish and Game pickup into the turnoff from the highway onto the spur road where Wendy had left her rental car.
“Yeah. The issue goes to press in three weeks. I’ve got to get those photos.”
She rummaged around in her knapsack, searching for her sunglasses. She pulled them out, along with an envelope crafted of high-quality stationery on which she’d scribbled some phone numbers. She’d been carrying the envelope around in her camera bag for the past ten days, ever since it had shown up in her parents’ mailbox.
The letter inside had been from Blake. When Wendy realized it, she’d kept the envelope with the phone numbers, and tossed the letter, unread, into her parents’ recycling bin—which was exactly where it belonged.
“Joe’s not gonna like it,” Barb said, jolting her back to the present. “You going in there on your own.”
Wendy stuffed the envelope back in her bag, and made a huffy sound. “It’s none of his business.”
“Don’t try telling him that. Joe Peterson thinks everything that goes on within a hundred miles of him is his business, and he wants it run his way.”
“Tell me about it.” Wendy smiled at her, and they both laughed.
Barb Maguire, a sturdily built woman in her early thirties with springy black ringlets framing a cherub-like face, was a breath of fresh air after spending the past fifteen hours with Warden Bug-up-His-Butt. Although, Wendy had to admit, it was a pretty nice butt.
“Seriously, if you’re planning on hiking into the east side of the reserve, you’d best be prepared for bears and bad weather.”
“I’m no amateur, despite appearances.” And despite the fact that it had been years since she’d done any camping or hiking. But she didn’t mention that fact to Barb. “I’ve got a carload of backpacking gear I know how to use and some emergency flares in case I get into trouble.”
Barb glanced speculatively at her half-empty knapsack.
“This is just my camera bag. I had no idea I was going to be out for more than a quick stretch of the legs yesterday. I spotted that caribou, and when he took off, I had to follow. There wasn’t time to go back to the car to get my gear.”
“Yeah,” Barb said, “those rogue bulls are just like men, aren’t they? Let ’em out of your sight for a minute and they’re history.”
Wendy laughed. “Speaking of history…and rogue bulls…” She looked pointedly at Barb.
“Ahh, so I was right about you two. Good. It’s about time he started living again.”
Wendy shook her head. “No, you were wrong, but I’m still curious. What’s his story?”
“Joe?” Barb sucked in a breath and readjusted her hands on the steering wheel. Shaking her head, she said, “He just can’t seem to get over it. Cat’s death, I mean.”
So that was her name. Cat Peterson. It fit her. “She was a beautiful woman.”
“You saw the picture.”
Wendy nodded.
“She was just