LITMIR.BIZ

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alone in the copter after the customers were safely delivered to their destination. Now she could relax as she lifted off and skimmed over the breathtaking Chugach terrain, catching glimpses of sparkling lakes, soaring over row after row of tall glaciers. Ivy had been born in Alaska, and sometimes she imagined there was still an invisible umbilical cord stretching from her heart down to the soul of this wild and magical land.

      “It’s born in us, love of the land and the air,” her father had once told her. “It’s an addiction, but it’s a good one.”

      She lifted the Bell up and over the final peak and began the descent to Valdez. As the ground came up to meet her, she could see her father standing outside the mobile trailer that served as an office for their company, Up And Away Adventures. Tall and barrel-chested, Tom Pierce was still ruggedly handsome and incredibly fit for a man nearly sixty years old.

      She set the chopper down precisely in the center of the cement landing pad and shut the engine off. The rotors thwacked as they slowed, before finally stopping. Ivy pressed the flight idle stop button and rolled the twist grip to full closed position. Light switches, off. Battery switch, off.

      Another mission accomplished, Captain.

      HE WATCHED AS HIS daughter expertly landed the copter on the pad. When the rotors stilled and the motor died, Ivy opened the door and jumped down, her long, lean body as toned as any athlete’s. She waved her blue-billed cap at him in greeting, then ran her fingers through the short, thick copper curls cut boyishly close to her scalp.

      Ivy’s mother had had hair that same color when he first met her, although now Frances had let hers go snowy-white. She wore her hair long, down past her shoulders. She styled it every morning with an artist’s precision and an arsenal of equipment. Tom had always liked watching her.

      Lately, though, she closed her bedroom door.

      Ivy, now, she wasn’t interested in gilding the lily, not that she needed to. She, too, was beautiful, although in a very different way than Frances.

      Ivy didn’t accentuate her looks or even seem to be aware of them, which of course drove her mother nuts. Under his mustache, Tom’s narrow mouth curled into a small, enigmatic smile. Frances’s makeup case was bigger than most suitcases, and all Ivy carried with her was a tube of stuff that kept her lips from chapping.

      “Hey, Captain.” Ivy smiled at him, her high, Slavic cheekbones an inheritance from his father’s side of the family. Tom’s sister, Caitlin, had them, too. But Ivy’s hair and her wide-set apple-green eyes were gifts from her mother, reminding him, as always, of Frances when they’d first met.

      Tom rubbed a hand absently across his chest, where the familiar tightness lodged whenever he thought about his wife.

      “So what’s happening?” Ivy looped a hand through his arm, and with an affectionate squeeze he trapped it against his side. She was only a couple inches shorter than his six-two. He’d long ago stopped caring that she automatically shortened her stride to accommodate his limp. The old leg injury was bothering him more than usual today, maybe a storm coming.

      “We got any more charters lined up?”

      “Nope, not for today. Might be some last-minute tourists, you never know.” Tom shook his head. “Just got back myself, I took that load of supplies up and dropped it where those damn fool climbers wanted. No sign of them, although their tent was there. I buzzed around a few times, place was deserted.”

      “Probably halfway up the mountain,” Ivy speculated. “Climbers wouldn’t waste a morning like this waiting for their supplies to arrive.”

      “Maniacs, the lot of them.”

      “Yeah, well, as long as we keep our radical opinions to ourselves, Captain, they’ll go on hiring us. And that’s good for our bank balance.”

      “I can play nice guy with the best of them,” he snorted. “Never pissed off a client yet.”

      “What a track record, keep up the good work.”

      Tom knew that visitors to Alaska often viewed him as an eccentric local character. He figured it didn’t hurt their business at all.

      She playfully punched his arm. “You’re such a phony. Everybody knows there’s a soft gummy center under that prickly surface.”

      Not everybody. He knew for a fact Frances didn’t think so. Tom squeezed Ivy’s arm a little tighter and changed the subject.

      “I’ve got that lumber and insulation Theo ordered loaded on the boat.”

      Raven Lodge was in a remote bay accessible only by boat or plane. “I’ll take it up to the lodge this afternoon if we don’t get any last-minute business,” Tom declared. “Theo really wants to get going on those new cabins. I hear he’s hired some damned yahoo from down south to help him.”

      “Oh, yeah? And how’d he meet this yahoo?”

      “Jerry down at the Anchor introduced them when Theo was in town a couple days ago. Perfectly fine carpenters right around here—you’d think Theo would hire local.”

      “Everybody’s working on the new hotel,” she reminded him.

      “Well, I hope this dude has more going for him than that so-called fishing guide from San Francisco Theo hired last year.”

      The idiot hadn’t known his elbow from his ass. He’d somehow foundered a boat with four tourists out in the Sound. Just luck that another boat was nearby, or the lot of them would have died from hypothermia.

      “Uncle Theo must have liked this current yahoo or he wouldn’t have hired him.”

      Tom knew she was teasing him. He grunted. “Theo likes everybody, that’s his biggest problem.” It wasn’t a criticism of his brother-in-law so much as a statement of fact.

      Ivy laughed. “You’ll get to judge the guy for yourself if you’re taking the stuff out. I have to pick up my skiers around three, so I’ll probably see you up there. You want a lift back with me?”

      “If you’re staying for supper. Caitlin told me to ask you. You open to that?”

      “Darn, I can’t tonight. I’ve got a date.” Ivy wrinkled her nose.

      “Then I’ll stay over, bring the boat back in the morning.” Tom grinned at her expression. “Date’s that bad, huh? Would this be Doc Fredricks you’re not excited about?” There were always men buzzing around Ivy, too many of them useless vagabonds from God only knew where. More than once he’d been tempted to scare them off, one way or the other. But the doc rated higher than most on Tom’s private scale.

      Fredricks was steady, he had a damned good job at the hospital. And it looked like he was going to settle in Valdez. Most telling of all, he’d managed to survive more than a few weeks with Ivy. Tom had to admit his daughter was fickle.

      “Dylan, yeah.”

      “He’s good people, Ivy. I hear he’s buying property. Has plans to build a house in that fancy subdivision just outside town, somebody said.”

      She frowned and pretended to think about that. “I think he mentioned something about it.”

      “He’s solid. You could do lots worse.” He worried about her. He knew from personal experience that the world could be tough on women.

      Ivy shrugged nonchalantly. “We’re just friends.”

      “Friends, eh?” Tom gave her a look. “Sounds to me like it’s one more case of nice guys finish last with you.”

      “You trying to marry me off, Captain?” He heard the mild reproof in her tone. He’d learned long ago that his daughter had a full share of her old man’s stubbornness, and more than a touch of his quick temper.

      “Nope, just want you to be happy, honey. Sometimes I figure you’re confusing good guys with bad. You’ve got a hell of a trail of broken hearts underneath those

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