North Country Man. Carrie Alexander

last night—quaint and picturesque, the old brick buildings softened by spring flowers and the bursting foliage of mature trees. A number of businesses had opened their doors, but the downtown area wasn’t very busy aside from the occasional pedestrian and a few cars and other vehicles crisscrossing the intersection. Alouette businesspeople would likely welcome the increased tourist traffic of an aggressively marketed B and B inn. It wasn’t only the Whitakers she should think about. If she recommended that Bel Vista buy Bay House, it could turn out to be a boon to the town as a whole.

      Uh-huh. So why did that feel like a justification?

      She didn’t relax until she reached the desolate county road. The soothing quiet and the fresh green promise of spring spoke to her. In the dark, the forest had seemed foreboding. Now it was bright and alive…but all the same.

      She drove slowly, looking for familiar landmarks. A tree was a tree was a tree. Coming from the opposite direction made it even more difficult to tell them apart.

      She continued on to the Buck Stop, planning to turn and retrace her route. When she pulled into the sparse gravel parking lot, bumping across ruts worn into the dirt, she saw a woman lounging beside the crooked screen door, smoking a cigarette beneath a Live Bait sign. Would that be Wild Rose Robbin? The one Noah saw regularly? She was about medium height, a lighter weight than Claire but built sturdily. A strong woman. Or maybe that was the attitude she projected, even though half her face was hidden behind an unruly mop of dark hair.

      Claire parked. She shut off the engine, then hesitated, wondering how she should approach the stranger, who was looking at her unfamiliar car with some suspicion.

      The woman took a deep drag, dropped her cigarette and snubbed it out beneath her heel. Instead of leaving it, she stooped and picked up the crushed butt, exhaling twin plumes of smoke through her nostrils. She ambled toward the car. “Can I help you?”

      Claire rolled down her window. “Maybe. Are you, um, Rose?”

      The woman cocked her head to one side. “Wild Rose, yup.” She scraped back her tousled jet-black hair, revealing a face that was not as old and ravaged as Claire had expected. As if an employee had to be as run-down as the business—Claire scolded herself.

      Wild Rose had a hard face, though. Her expression was sober and reserved, and her narrowed dark eyes had the weariness of one who’d seen it all. And maybe done it all, too.

      Claire gulped. “I was wondering…do you know Noah Saari?”

      Wild Rose’s shrug was neither a confirmation nor a denial.

      “I met him last night,” Claire said, uncomfortable with the other woman’s scrutiny. She’d dressed casually this morning, in pants, a sweater and the trim suede jacket, but she was still bandbox perfect in comparison to Wild Rose’s disheveled hair, loose plaid shirt and scruffy, threadbare jeans. Rose’s boots were like Noah’s, built for rugged use, whereas Claire had on a pair of expensive black leather ankle boots with stacked high heels. You wouldn’t know to look at her that she’d grown up in T-shirts, shorts and flip-flops. In her years away from Florence, she’d forgotten—purposely, she supposed—how to dress for the country.

      Wild Rose hadn’t responded.

      “He helped me get my car out of the ditch,” Claire prompted.

      “Mmm.”

      “I, uh, thought maybe you’d seen him this morning. He might have mentioned me? It seems I lost my purse, and I was hoping….” Claire let her voice trail off. She didn’t know what she was hoping. That Noah had found her purse and dropped it off at the Buck Stop, or that he’d been so awed by their meeting that he’d emerged from his lengthy hibernation to seek her out?

      “Noah doesn’t come by that often.”

      “But he was here last night.” Claire remembered the small brown paper parcel tucked inside his belt.

      Wild Rose’s mouth pursed. “He had a craving.”

      Thoughtful, Claire drew her teeth across her bottom lip. She really did not need to get involved in that. Her father hadn’t been a drunk or anything, but he’d tippled frequently enough that it had contributed toward his all-around laziness. Sam Levander’s name had been on the sign, but it was his no-nonsense wife who’d run the family’s thriving gas station and repair shop, leaving Claire to manage domestic duties.

      “Does he live close by?”

      Wild Rose folded her arms, one hand cupped around the cigarette butt. “Why’re you asking?”

      “I’m Claire Levander, from Chicago. Here on…business. I’m staying at Bay House. I ask because I lost my purse, as I said, and I thought possibly Noah had found it.”

      “He’ll return it if he did.”

      “He doesn’t know who I am.”

      “Does now.”

      “Oh.” Claire blinked. “All right. Thank you.” She didn’t move.

      “Anything else?” Wild Rose prompted.

      “I’m—no.” She could hardly ask this taciturn woman about Noah’s past. Or his scars. “Thank you,” she repeated. “I’ll be on my way.”

      Wild Rose nodded. She walked away, tossing the butt into a rusty trash can beside the door, then turning to look as another car pulled into the parking lot, spitting gravel as it braked hard. Wild Rose’s expression twisted and she fled inside, letting the screen door bang shut behind her.

      Claire watched as the fair-complected man she recognized as the Whitakers’ next-door neighbor emerged from the black BMW. Lindstrom was the name. He glanced at her and she smiled, almost reflexively, feeling wary. He looked presentable enough, expensively dressed and good-looking in a conventional, slightly flabby way. Home in Chicago, her friends would have probably voted that this one was more her type than Noah Saari. But there was a sour air about the man that made her uneasy. As if he’d gone soft and rotten at the core.

      Lindstrom stopped, leaning casually against his car while he evaluated Claire. She sat up a little straighter. “Hi.”

      He nodded.

      She was determined not to make another overture.

      “You’re a guest at Bay House?” he finally said.

      “That’s right.”

      “I’m Terry Lindstrom.” Not boasting, but smug.

      She wanted to say, “So?” Not a good idea. “Claire Levander.”

      “Staying long?”

      “About a week.” Out of the corner of her eye, she saw movement behind the screen door. Wild Rose was watching.

      Lindstrom slouched, both he and the gleaming auto looking out of place outside the Buck Stop. “If you want to escape the Whitakers to have a good time, give me a call.”

      Hmph. Claire started her car. “Thank you, but I’m looking forward to staying in with the Whitakers. I hear they’re big on Scrabble.” She drove away with her head high, hoping that would be the last of Terry Lindstrom. Wild Rose was probably quite capable of dealing with his sullen attitude, although it was hard to imagine why the man would be slumming at the dilapidated store.

      Claire cruised slowly along the road. There was no reason she couldn’t find her purse—or Noah—on her own. It couldn’t be that difficult. If she had to, she’d prowl through the underbrush until she found the path into the woods.

      Minutes later, that’s what she’d come to. Either the trees had grown leafier since last night or she was hopelessly unobservant, but she wasn’t able to distinguish the right location until she’d parked and walked along the roadside. Eventually she discovered the log she’d run into, spotting the fresh yellow gash in the trunk through a gap of broken branches. From there, she was able to retrace her steps—more like a panicked zigzag if she remembered correctly—until she