Broken Trails

Scotch chuckled. “Okay, give me a minute.”

As she paused in contemplation, Lainey’s fascination grew. The aura of strength Scotch already held in abundance solidified and grew around her. The race or the dog sledding was the root of her confidence. Lainey’s heart thumped with the realization. Why? How? Not everyone carried themselves this way despite having raced; she had met many of the racers last year, including women, and had not seen it with any of them.

“You’re alone with sixteen dogs, crossing the tundra or weaving through trees and brush. It’s so cold and the air so crisp that you can actually see better than at any other time, crystal clear. There’s nothing but the dogs panting, their feet crunching in the snow, and the next turn of the trail. You feel so small and so insignificant, but the dogs rely on you as you rely on them. I can’t really explain it. It’s the ultimate high.”

They sat in silence for a moment, Scotch mulling over her memories, and Lainey soaking in the feelings those recollections invoked.

“My turn.”

Lainey bowed her head in a nod. She watched Scotch shift her gaze away, and begin chewing the inside of her cheek. A frown rippled across her fair features. Lainey braced herself for the next question, sensing it would not be an easy one.

“It’s been bugging me since you got here. I know it’s none of my business, but I can’t seem to shake it.” Scotch looked back at her. “Where were you shot?”

She stared blankly at her roommate. Here she thought she would have to answer something really tough like, “·¢Are you really drooling every time I walk by or do you just have an advanced case of rabies?” Scotch seemed to retract from the conversation when she did not immediately answer, so Lainey hastened to reassure her. “It’s all right. Really.”

Sitting up, Lainey dropped her feet to the floor, upsetting Scotch’s legs beneath her. They laughed nervously as they readjusted their positions. Lainey stood and turned so that her right side faced Scotch. “I was out with a US military patrol in Kosovo. They were ordered to do a standard sweep through a village for insurgents. Luck was with me then.” She lifted her shirt to reveal the scar on her side. “There was an ambush. I got a lot of really good photos of the action.”

Scotch grimaced at the jagged scar about six inches long. “Damn, that must have hurt.”

Unaccountably nervous, Lainey laughed. “Not at the time.” She peered past her shirt at the cause of her sudden career change. “I was prone on the ground behind cover. Nobody realized there was a flanking team until we started getting shot at from behind. The bullet came in at a very low angle.” She touched the bottom of the scar, and traced upward. “He was aiming for my heart. Instead it hit and shattered my ribs, poking holes in my lungs.”

“Ow,” Scotch said in soft sympathy, engrossed in the damage. She reached out and traced the upraised tissue with gentle fingers.

Lainey had not expected her to take the liberty. She swallowed against a desire to cry. What the hell? Shaking her head, she forced a chuckle. “Anyway, I hardly felt it; just a sharp sting in my side. When I tried to get up to follow the rest of the firing team to safety, I couldn’t. That’s when I passed out. One of them realized I was wounded and carried me out.” She stepped slightly away, and pulled her shirt back down. “I don’t remember much else until I woke in the hospital.”

“You were out for a year. Was most of it in the hospital?”

Despite the fact it was Lainey’s turn, she answered. “I was in Kosovo for about two weeks before I could be shipped back to the states. Spent another month in a hospital in Washington DC before being released as an in-patient.” She sat down, leaning her elbows on her knees rather than sitting back. “Had some counseling and some physical therapy, but got a clean bill of health after a couple of months. I guess I just needed some time to think about what happened.” She did not volunteer that she had spent a good portion of the rest of the year attempting to pickle what inner organs had not been damaged.

Scotch seemed to be at a loss for words, and they sat for a moment.

Lainey pushed away the sudden vulnerability that had reared up at Scotch’s touch. She did not know what that was, and had no time to investigate it. After a deep breath, she propped her feet on the coffee table, and relaxed. ‘my turn.”

Smiling, Scotch went with the change of subject, visibly easing.

“Have you ever been hurt on a race?”

“Oh, yeah,” Scotch agreed. “Though nowhere nearly as bad as you were. When I was seventeen, I was finally eligible for my first adult race. Ran the Yukon Quest 250 that year. It was my first overnighter that wasn’t on familiar territory.”

“What happened?”

“Frostbite,” she said. “I set my gloves down while feeding the dogs during a break. I haven’t a clue where they went. It was pretty warm out when I left the checkpoint, so I didn’t even notice they weren’t with me until it started to cool off.”

“Ew.” Lainey wrinkled her nose.

Scotch grinned, holding out her hands to study them. “Yeah. The 250 takes about two and a half days to run. I lost the gloves on the second day; had to go through the night and into the next morning to get to the finish line.”

“Looks like your hands survived.”

“They did. I was lucky that it was such a warm year. I had some leather work gloves with me. My sled wasn’t in the best of shape, so I was prepared to make repairs on it. Those and a couple of pairs of socks for mittens kept the worst of the frostbite away.” Scotch leaned closer, showing the side of one hand. “You can see where I lost a bit of skin there. The seam on the gloves was worn, and the damage was too much to recuperate from.”

Lainey shivered and shook her hands in excess empathy. “Yuck! That gives me the willies.”

Scotch leaned back and laughed. “Well, you asked.”

“Yuck,” she repeated.

“Your turn.”

“Anything I ask now will seem anticlimactic.”

“Probably.”

Lainey smiled. “How about we head over to the main cabin for dinner instead? I believe I have a date to beat you at Monopoly.”

Scoffing, Scotch said, “You wish. I am the Monopoly Kingpin in this family.” She stood and offered her hand.

Lainey accepted the assistance, enjoying the touch too much, and rose. “Time for me to topple your funny money empire, sister.”

They shared a look before bursting into laughter.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

August

LAINEY SAT AT the dining table in Scotch’s cabin. She stared at the blank legal pad before her, a pen rapidly waggling back and forth between her index and middle finger. Normally she would be typing her work into her laptop, but she did not want to run the battery down any more than necessary. Her computer stayed at the main cabin for the most part, keeping itself juiced up and available for the final copies and email correspondence.

Daylight poured in from the two windows above her, as well as through the windows in the loft, as it did almost twenty hours a day. It was August and Lainey was only now getting used to the constant sun. In a couple of months, she might even see darkness go beyond twilight before she fell asleep. The idea that January would find her sitting here with a lantern at three in the afternoon to ward off the constant night seemed almost as alien.

Her training was going well. She had eighteen dogs assigned to her to choose from for March. With Scotch and Rye’s help, Lainey had created an elaborate training schedule to keep all animals working together. She had graduated to driving eight dogs at a time now, and had to rotate between her canine companions to ensure each was getting the proper workout. Lainey was the only one to feed her dogs, the only one to spend any significant amount of time with them. Miguel Sanchez, the handler, helped with all the animals, of course, but those on Lainey’s team had to look to her as their pack leader.