Cold Ridge

Prologue

Carine Winter loaded her day pack with hiking essentials and her new digital camera and headed into the woods, a rolling tract of land northeast of town that had once been dairy farms. She didn't go up the ridge. It was a bright, clear November day in the valley with little wind and highs in the fifties, but on Cold Ridge, the temperature had dipped below freezing, wind gusts were up to fifty miles an hour and its exposed, knife-edged granite backbone was already covered in snow and ice.

Her parents had hiked Cold Ridge in November and died up there when she was three. Thirty years ago that week, but Carine still remembered.

Gus, her uncle, had been a member of the search party that found his older brother and sister-in-law. He was just twenty himself, not a year home from Vietnam, but he'd taken on the responsibility of raising Carine and her older brother and sister. Antonia was just five at the time, Nate seven.

Yes, Carine thought as she climbed over a stone wall, she remembered so much of those terrible days, although she had been too young to really understand what had happened. Gus had taken her and her brother and sister up the ridge the spring after the tragedy. Cold Ridge loomed over their northern New Hampshire valley and their small hometown of the same name. Gus said they couldn't be afraid of it. His brother had been a firefighter, his sister-in-law a biology teacher, both avid hikers. They weren't reckless or inexperienced. People in the valley still talked about their deaths. Never mind that weather reports were now more accurate, hiking clothes and equipment more high-tech-if Cold Ridge could kill Harry and Jill Winter, it could kill anyone.

Carine waited until she was deep into the woods before she took out her digital camera. She wasn't yet sure she liked it. But she wouldn't be able to concentrate on any serious photography today. Her mind kept drifting back to fleeting memories, half-formed images of her parents, anything she could grasp.

Gus, who'd become one of the most respected outfitters and guides in the White Mountains, would object to her hiking alone. It was the one risk she allowed herself to take, the one safety rule she allowed herself to break.

She'd climbed all forty-eight peaks in the White Mountains over four thousand feet. Seven were over five thousand feet: Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Monroe, Madison, Lafayette and Lincoln. At 6288 feet, Mt. Washington was the highest, and the most famous, notorious for its extreme conditions, some of the worst in the world. At any time of the year, hikers could find themselves facing hurricane-force winds on its bald granite summit-Carine had herself. Because of the conditions the treeline was lower in the White Mountains than out west, generally at around 4500 feet.

It was said the Abenakis considered the tall peaks sacred and never climbed them. Carine didn't know if that was true, but she could believe it.

Most of the main Cold Ridge trail was above four thousand feet, exposing hikers to above-treeline conditions for a longer period than if they just went up and down a single peak.

But today, Carine was content with her mixed hardwood forest of former farmland. Gus had warned her to stay away from Bobby Poulet, a survivalist who had a homestead on a few acres on the northeast edge of the woods. He was a legendary crank who'd threatened to shoot anyone who stepped foot on his property.

She took pictures of rocks and burgundy-colored oak leaves, water trickling over rocks in a narrow stream, a hemlock, a fallen, rotting elm and an abandoned hunting shack with a crooked metal chimney. The land was owned by a lumber company that, fortunately, had a laissez-faire attitude toward hikers.

She almost missed the owl.

It was a huge barred owl, as still as a stone sculpture, its neutral coloring blending in with the mostly gray November landscape as it perched on a branch high in a naked beech tree.

Before Carine could raise her camera, the owl swooped off its branch and flapped up over the low ridge above her, out of sight.

She sighed. She'd won awards for her photography of raptors-she'd have loved to have had a good shot of the owl. On the other hand, she wasn't sure her digital camera was up to the task.

Aloudboomshatteredthesilenceoftheisolatedravine.

Carine dropped flat to the ground, facedown, before she could absorb what the sound was.

A gunshot.

Her camera had flown out of her hand and landed in the dried leaves two feet above her outstretched arm. Her day pack ground into her back. And her heart was pounding, her throat tight.

Damn, she thought. How close was that?

It had to be hunters. Not responsible hunters. Insane hunters-yahoos who didn't know what they were doing. Shooting that close to her. What were they thinking? Didn't they see her? She'd slipped a bright-orange vest over her fleece jacket. She knew it was deer-hunting season, but this was the first time a hunter had fired anywhere near her.

"Hey!" She lifted her head to yell but otherwise remained prone on the damp ground, in the decaying fallen leaves. "Knock it off! There's someone up here!"

As if in answer, three quick, earsplitting shots cracked over her head, whirring, almost whistling. One hit the oak tree a few yards to her right.

Were these guys total idiots?

She should have hiked in the White Mountain National Forest or one of the state parks where hunting was prohibited.

Just two yards to her left was a six-foot freestanding boulder. If these guys weren't going to stop shooting, she needed to take cover. Staying low, she picked up her camera then scrambled behind the boulder, ducking down, her back against the jagged granite. The ground was wetter here, and her knees and seat were already damp. Cold, wet conditions killed. More hikers in the White Mountains died of hypothermia than any other cause. It was what had killed her parents thirty years ago. They were caught in unexpected freezing rain and poor visibility. They fell. Injured, unable to move, unable to stay warm-they didn't stand a chance.

Carine reminded herself she had a change of clothes in her pack. Food. Water. A first-aid kit. A jackknife, flashlight, map, compass, waterproof matches. Her clothes were made of a water-wicking material that would help insulate her even when wet.

Her boulder would protect her from gunshots.

The woods settled into silence. Maybe the shooters had realized their mistake. For all she knew, they-or he, since there might only be one-were on their way up her side of the ravine to apologize and make sure she was all right. More likely, they were clearing out and hoping she hadn't seen them.

Threemoreshotsinrapidsuccessionricochetedoffher boulder, ripping off chunks and shards of granite. Carine screamed, startled, frustrated, angry. And scared now.

A rock shard from her boulder struck her in the forehead, and her mouth snapped shut.

Good God, were they aiming at her?

Were they trying to kill her?

She curled up in a ball, knees tucked, arms wrapped around her ankles. Blood dripped from her forehead onto her wrist. She felt no pain from her injury, but her heart raced and her ears hurt from the blasts. She couldn't think.

Once again, silence followed the rapid burst of shots.

Were they reloading? Coming after her? What?

She tried to control her breathing, hoping the shooters wouldn't hear her. But what was the point? They had to know now, after she'd screamed, that she was behind the boulder.

They'd known it before they'd shot at it.

She couldn't stay where she was.

The low ridge crested fifteen feet above her. If she could get up the hill, she could slip down the other side and hide among the trees and boulders, make her way back to her car, call the police.

If the shooters tried to follow her, she'd at least see them up on the ridge.

See them and do what?

She pushed back the thought. She'd figure that out later. Should she stand up and run? Crouch? Or should she crawl? Scoot up the hill on her stomach? No scooting. She'd be like a giant fluorescent worm in her orange vest. Take it off? No-no time.

She'd take her day pack. It might stop or impede a bullet.

Or should she stay put? Hope they hadn't seen her after all?

Every fiber in her body-every survival instinct she had-told her that she'd be killed if she stayed where she was.

She picked out the largest trees, a mix of evergreens and hardwoods, their leaves shed for the season, between her boulder and the ridgeline. The hillside was strewn with glacial boulders. It was New Hampshire. The Granite State.

Inhaling, visualizing her exact route, she crouched down racer-style, and, on an exhale, bolted up the hill. She ducked behind a hemlock straight up from her boulder, then ran diagonally to a maple, zigzagged to another hemlock, then hurled herself over the ridge crest. She scrambled downhill through a patch of switchlike bare saplings as three more quick shots boomed in the ravine on the other side of the ridge.

A whir, a cracking sound over her head.

Jesus!

They were shooting at her.

A crouched figure jumped out from behind a gnarled pine tree to her left, catching her around the middle with a thick arm, covering her mouth with a bare hand, then lunging with her back behind the tree.

"Carine-babe, it's me. Tyler North. Don't scream."

He removed his hand, settling in next to her on the ground, and she jerked herself away, although not entirely out of his grasp. "Was that you shooting at me? You jackass."

"Shh. It wasn't me."

She blinked, as if he might not be real, but she was sprawled against him, his body warm, solid. Tyler… Tyler North. He was at his most intense and focused. Combat ready, she thought, feeling a fresh jolt of fear. He was a PJ, an air force pararescueman. PJs were search-and-rescue specialists, the ones who went after pilots downed behind enemy lines. Carine had known Ty since they were tots. She'd heard he was home in Cold Ridge on leave-maybe the shooters were firing at him.

She tried to push back her fear and confusion. She'd been taking pictures, minding her own business. Then someone started shooting at her. Now she was here, behind a tree with Ty North. "Where-where did you come from?"

"I'm hiking with a couple of buddies. We saw your car and thought we'd join you for lunch. Figured you'd have better food." He frowned at her, peeling hair off her forehead to reveal her cut, and she remembered his search-and-rescue skills included medical training above the level of a paramedic. "Piece of flying rock hit you?"

"I think so. Ty, I don't know if they were aiming at you-"

"Let's not worry about that right now. The cut doesn't look too bad. Want to get out of here?"

She nodded, thinking she had to look like a maniac. Bloodied, twigs in her hair. Pant legs soaked and muddy. She was cold, but a long way from hypothermia.

Ty eased her day pack off and slung it over his shoulder. "We're going to zigzag down the hill, just like you came up. That was good work. Hank Callahan and Manny Carrera are out here, so don't panic if you see them."

Hank Callahan was a retired air force pilot, and Manny Carrera was another pararescueman, a master sergeant like North. Carine knew them from their previous visits to Cold Ridge. "Okay."

"All right. You got everything? If you're woozy, I can carry you-"

"I'll keep up."

North grinned at her suddenly. "You've got the prettiest eyes. Why haven't we ever dated?"

"What?"

As much as his question surprised her, he'd managed to penetrate the fear that seemed to saturate her, and when he took her hand, she ran with him without hesitation, using trees and boulders as cover, zigzagging down the hill, up another small, rounded hill. They ducked behind a stone wall above the leaf-covered stream she'd photographed earlier. Carine was breathing hard, her head pounding from fear and pain, the cut on her forehead bothering her now. They were getting closer to the main road. Her car. A place where she could call the police. She had a cell phone in her pack, but there was no service out here.

Leaves crunched nearby, and Hank Callahan joined them, exchanging a quick smile with Carine. He was square-jawed and blue-eyed, distinguished-looking, his dark hair streaked with gray. He had none of the compact, pitbull scrappiness of tawny-haired Tyler North.

"Christ, Ty," Hank said in a low voice, "she's hurt-"

"She's fine."

"I'm scared shitless! Those bastards were shooting at me!" Carine didn't raise her voice, but she wasn't calm. "Yahoos. Hunters-"

Hank shook his head, and Ty said, "Not hunters. A hunter doesn't take a three-shot burst into a boulder, even if he's using a semiautomatic rifle. These ass-holes knew you were there, Carine."

"Me? But I didn't do anything-"

"Did you see anyone?" Hank asked. "Any idea how many are out there?"

"No, no idea." Her teeth were chattering, but she blamed the cold, not what Ty had said. "There's an old hunting shack not far from where the bullets started flying. It looked abandoned to me. I took pictures of it. Maybe somebody didn't like that."

"I thought you took pictures of birds," North said with a wry smile.

"I'm just most known for birds." As a child, she'd believed she could see her parents as angels, soaring above Cold Ridge with a lone hawk or eagle. Ty used to tease her for it. "I was just trying out my digital camera."

But she was breathing rapidly-too rapidly-and Ty put his hand over her mouth briefly. "Stop. Hold your breath a second before you hyperventilate."

Already feeling a little light-headed, she did as he suggested. She noticed the green color of his eyes. That wasn't a good sign. She'd never noticed anything about him before. She couldn't remember when she'd seen him last. Fourth of July fireworks? They were neighbors, but seldom saw each other. His mother had moved to the valley just before Ty was born and bought the 1817 brick house that Abraham Winter, the first of the Cold Ridge Winters, had built as a tavern. She'd called herself Saskia, but no one believed that was her real name. If she had a husband, she'd never said. She was a weaver and a painter, but not the most attentive of mothers. Ty had pretty much grown up on his own. Even as a little boy, he'd wander up on the ridge trail for hours before his mother would even realize he was gone. She died four years ago, leaving him the house and fifty acres of woods and meadow. Everyone expected him to sell it, but he didn't, although, given the demands of his military career, he wasn't around much.

Hank Callahan shifted. "I don't know about you, but I'd like to put some serious mileage between me and the guys with guns."

Carine steadied her breathing. "What about your other friend Manny-"

"Don't worry about Carrera," Ty said. "He can take care of himself. What's the best route out of here?"

"We could follow the stone wall. There's an old logging road not far from the shack-"

He shook his head. "If the shooters are using the shack, that's the road they'd take. They'll have vehicles."

She thought a moment. "Then we should follow the stream. It's not as direct, but it'll take us to where we parked."

"How exposed will we be?"

"From a shooter's perspective? I can't make that judgment. I just know it's the fastest route out of here."

"Fast is good," Callahan said.

Ty nodded, then winked at Carine. "Okay, babe, we'll go your way."

She didn't remember him ever having called her "babe" before today.

Thirty minutes later, as they came to the gravel parking area, they heard an explosion back in the woods, from the direction of the shack and the shooters. Black smoke rose up over the trees.

Hankwhistled."Iwonderwhothehelltheseguysare."

Manny Carrera emerged from behind a half-dead white pine. He couldn't have been that far behind them, but Carine hadn't heard a thing. He was another PJ, a dark-haired, dark-eyed bull of a Texan.

"Good," Ty said. "That wasn't you blowing up. The shack?"

"That's my guess." Manny spoke calmly, explosions and shots fired in the woods apparently not enough to ruffle him-or North and Callahan. "There are two shooters, at least one back at the shack. I couldn't get close enough to any of them for a good description."

"I have binoculars you could have borrowed," Carine said.

He grinned at her. "But they were shooting at you, kiddo."

"Not necessarily at me-"

"Yes. At you. They just didn't want you dead. Scared, paralyzed, maybe. Otherwise, they wouldn't have missed, not that many times. They were using scoped, semiautomatic rifles." His tone was objective, just stating the facts, but his eyes settled on her, his gaze softening slightly. "Sorry. It wasn't an accident. It wasn't target practice gone awry. They didn't mistake you for a deer."

"I get it." She tried to be as clinical about her near-death experience as the three men were, but she kept seeing herself crouched behind the boulder, hearing the shots, feeling the rock shard hit her head. The bullets had been flying at her, not them. "Maybe they saw me taking pictures, but-" she took a breath "-to me it was just a hunting shack."

"That's enough for now," Ty said. "We can speculate later. You have a cell phone on you?"

Carinenodded."Idoubtthere'sanycoverageouthere."

She took her day pack from him and dug out her phone, but she was totally spent from dodging bullets, diving behind trees and boulders, charging through the woods with two military types, all after tramping around on her own with her camera. She hit the wrong button and almost threw the phone onto the ground.

North quietly took it and shook his head. "No service. Hank and Manny, you take my truck. I'll go with Carine." He turned to her, eyeing her pragmatically. "Can you drive, or do you want me to?"

"I can do it."

There was no cell coverage-there were no houses- until they came to a small lake on the notch road north of the village of Cold Ridge. Even then, Ty barely got the words out to the dispatcher before service dropped out on him.

He clicked off the phone and looked over at Carine. "I'm serious," he said. "Why haven't we ever dated?"

She managed a smile. "Because I've always hated you."

He grinned at her. "No, you haven't."

And she was lost. Then and there.

By the time state and local police arrived on scene, the shack was burned to the ground and the shooters were gone. According to various law enforcement officers, Carine had likely stumbled on to a smuggling operation they'd had their eye on but couldn't pinpoint. They smuggled drugs, weapons and people into and out of Canada and were, without a doubt, very dangerous.

Everyone agreed she was lucky indeed she hadn't been killed.

Even if the pictures she took of the shack were the reason the shooters came after her, they didn't tell her anything. She'd printed them out in her tiny log cabin while she and her military trio had waited for the police to get there.They'd been and gone, taking the memory disk with them. She still had the prints. A shack in the woods with a crooked metal chimney. It looked innocent enough to her.

Ty cleaned and treated the cut on her forehead. She kept avoiding his eye, aware of her reaction to him, aware that, somehow, everything had changed between them. She'd known him forever. He'd always been a thorn in her side. He'd pushed her out of trees. He'd cut the rope on her tire swing. Now, he was making her tingle. It had to be adrenaline-a post-traumatic reaction of some sort, she decided.

Hank and Manny built a fire in her woodstove. Hank, she learned, was a newly announced, dark horse candidate to become the junior U.S. senator from Massachusetts. He was a former air force rescue helicopter pilot, a retired major who'd received national attention on his last mission a year ago to recover fishermen whose boat had capsized.

As unflappable as he'd been in the woods, Hank Callahan was rendered virtually speechless when Antonia Winter walked into her sister's cabin. It made Carine smile. Her sister was a trauma physician in Boston, but she'd been drawn to Cold Ridge for the thirtieth anniversary of the deaths of their parents. She was a couple of inches shorter than Carine, her auburn hair a tone lighter, but Gus said both his nieces had their mother's blue eyes.

Antonia inspected Ty's medical handiwork, pronouncing it satisfactory. Ty just rolled his eyes. She was focused, hardworking and brilliant, but if she noticed Hank's reaction to her, she gave no indication of it.

Gus arrived a few minutes later and shooed out all the air force guys, glowering when North winked at Carine and promised he'd see her later. Gus let Antonia stay.

Their uncle was fifty, his dark hair mostly gray now, but he was as rangy and fit as ever. In addition to outfitting and leading hiking trips into the White Mountains, he conducted workshops in mountaineering, winter camping and mountain rescue. His goal, Carine knew, was to reduce the chances that anyone would ever again die the way his brother and sister-in-law had. But they did. People died in the mountains almost every year.

He brought in more wood for the woodstove and insisted Carine sit in front of the fire and tell him and her sister everything.

She did, except for the part about Ty saying she had pretty eyes.

Gus wanted her to head back to town with him, but Antonia offered to stay with Carine in her small cabin. Their brother, a U.S. marshal in New York, called and agreed with the general assessment that the shooters hadn't "missed" her. If they'd wanted her dead, she'd be dead. "Lay low for a few days, will you?"

Out of Antonia's earshot, Carine asked Nate what he'd think if she dated Tyler North.

"Has he asked you out?"

"No."

"Thank God for small favors."

The next day, Ty and his friends ended up rescuing a Massachusetts couple who got trapped on Cold Ridge. Sterling and Jodie Rancourt had recently bought a house off the notch road and set out on their first hike on the ridge, for what they'd intended to be a simple afternoon excursion. Instead, they encountered higher winds, colder temperatures and rougher terrain than they'd anticipated. Ty, Hank and Manny, prepared for the conditions, helped transport them below the treeline, where they were met by a local volunteer rescue team.

Jodie Rancourt had sprained her ankle, and both she and her husband were in the early stages of hypothermia, in danger of spending the night on the ridge. Given their lack of experience and the harsh conditions, they could easily have died if the three air force guys hadn't come along when they had.

An eventful weekend in the White Mountains.

After Manny went back to his air force base and Hank to his senate campaign, Ty and Carine were alone on their quiet road in the shadows of Cold Ridge.

Gus sensed what was happening and stopped by to tell Carine she'd be out of her damn mind to get involved with Tyler North.

She didn't listen.

Her uncle's warning was too late. Way too late. She was in love.

She and Ty set their wedding date for Valentine's Day.

A week before she was to walk down the aisle, he showed up at her cabin and called it off. He couldn't go through with it.

Enter Tyler North into her life.

Exit Tyler North.

As quick as that.