Page 52 of Wyatt

“By?”

He didn’t want to tell her. But, “The FSB.”

“Is she in trouble?”

He couldn’t decide if she was pretty or simply handsome. Shapely enough, she had a sort of edge about her that, if he didn’t know better, would tag her as military. Lean, spare, and with an awareness of people who walked by that seemed reminiscent of his brothers. He’d put her in her late thirties, maybe, not the typical age for a woman in her, um, profession.

Maybe shewasa reporter.

“No. Nothing like that,” he said.

“Then what’s the urgency?”

Good question. Desperation, maybe? “If I don’t, then I…I feel like I’ll never see her again.”

Hopefully Nat wasn’t taking notes for her exposé on goalies who’d been hit too many times in the head.

“You Americans are so romantic.”

He snorted. “No. I have four brothers. Trust me, we’re not romantic. They’re all cowboys—”

“My point exactly.”

“Don’t believe everything you read.”

“I know. I’m a reporter.” She winked but put down her paper. “So, why this girl? Why now?”

He looked out the window. The train had started to slow as they’d entered the outskirts of the city, the outlying suburbs congested with blue and green painted houses, tall fences, cement garages, and dirt streets. Such a disparity with the cities. He spotted an elderly woman pumping water into a container in the middle of the street.

“She’s the one who got away.”

Nat said nothing, and he looked over at her.

“She’s…I’ve been in love with her since I was sixteen.”

“Really?”

“She came to live with my family after her mother died, and we spent the summer together. I taught her how to drive and to ride a horse, and she would shoot tennis balls at me in the barn and…I don’t know. She was quiet and she listened to me. She made me feel like I wasn’t the strange one.”

“Why are you the strange one?” Nat asked as she folded the newspaper and set it on the seat beside her. She picked up a sugar cube balanced on the side of her cup, then dipped it into the tea and put it in her mouth.

Huh. “I don’t know. Maybe it’s because I play hockey and…well, I guess I’ve always played hockey and no one else in my family does. My uncle played, and I got the bug when he came out to visit with my cousins from Minnesota one Christmas. We had a tiny rink in town that we used for recreation, and he took me down there and slapped some pucks around, and that was it. My mother signed me up for a local peewee team. I played wing back then, and I fell in love. And not just with the competition, but the sport. The quickness of gliding over the ice, the toughness of it, the skill it takes to handle a puck, even the teamwork. Maybe that was it—I was a middle kid in the family and felt pretty much invisible. My brothers loved the ranch, but I didn’t. And I think my father knew it—there was always something off between us. I didn’t feel a part of them. Then suddenly, I had something of my own. Hockey. And I was good at it—really good. I don’t know what it is, but when I’m on the rink, I feel almost invincible. Like…I was born to play.”

He looked out the window. The train was moving deeper into the city. “As I got better, I had to move away to play—I spent the summers at hockey camps, and when I was sixteen, I moved to Helena to play on a traveling team. I lived with my coach and his family. Coco came to live with us the summer before I moved.”

He turned back to Nat who was looking at him, listening.

“I was pretty freaked out, but she’d just lost her mom, so we sort of bonded over feeling like our lives were crazy around us.” He smiled, the memories sweet. “But together, we were safe. I felt seen, and maybe she did too.”

Nat said nothing.

“She’s the only girl I’ve ever loved,” he said quietly. “And I blew it. Somehow, I blew it. I mean—I don’t know why, or how, but…okay, I might know why, but I didn’t mean to…screw up. I thought…” He shook his head. “Last time I saw her, I let her go without a fight. I was stupid and hurt and angry. This time…this time, I’m probably still stupid and hurt and angry, but I’m also…well, I know what a jerk I can be, and I don’t want to be that guy anymore.”

He hadn’t a clue why he might be unloading all this onto a stranger. Stress maybe. And she just sat there and listened. But even as he spoke, he felt something shift inside him. A resolve, maybe.

Or perhaps just him hunkering down into the zone. He looked again at Nat. “Yeah, she’s in trouble. She needs me, and I’m going to be there, like I should have been before. I’m going to keep her safe.”

And once she duplicated the information that had been on the jump-drive—yes, he couldn’t wait to tell her he’d lost that—then his sister would be too.

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