Fortunately, the embrace of the cool night air and the thrill of freedom made it possible for him to walk almost three miles. At that point, he called a taxi and pulled up the hood of the sweatshirt he was wearing so the driver wouldn’t be able to see that part of his face was paralyzed.

He had a couple of things he had to do before he left for Alaska. He had to go to his safety-deposit box and get his ATM card so he could withdraw the last of the money he had in savings. Then he had to visit a store where he could purchase a Visa card with which to charge his flight. But once the bank opened, that wouldn’t take long, and, after he reached the airport and boarded his plane, he’d be looking at a five-hour flight.

Only those small hurdles now stood between him and Evelyn.

Normal people took for granted the ease with which such mundane things were handled, day in and day out.

But Lyman wasn’t normal.

Stroke or no stroke, he never had been.

Anchorage, AK—Thursday, 1:30 a.m. AKDT

When Amarok found three cop cars idling at various angles in the parking lot of The Landing Strip, lights flashing, he came to a skidding stop close by and jumped out, leaving the door open for Makita to follow him. “Did you get him?” he asked the cop who rolled down his window.

His heart was pumping like the pistons of an engine. As tired as he’d been before, he was wide-awake now, hadn’t felt a moment’s fatigue during the entire rush to return. He had only one thought in mind: Get Evelyn back.

Maybe that was why the blow was especially severe when the officer looked up at him and shook his head. “’Fraid not.”

The pain in Amarok’s injured hand, which he’d scarcely felt since Phil’s call, began to throb so badly it made him slightly nauseous. “What do you mean? I had someone, Phil Robbins, call you an hour ago. Don’t tell me you just got here.”

“We got here about thirty minutes ago, but by then he was already gone.”

Amarok could’ve sworn someone had just dropped an anvil on his chest. “What? Why?”

“I don’t know. He just wasn’t here.”

An officer walked out of the building with Dax O’Leary.

“There you are!” Dax exclaimed, and, staggering slightly, walked over. “Wow, that’s a big malamute. How is he with strangers?”

Amarok was so used to having Makita with him in Hilltop the thought hadn’t even crossed his mind that the dog’s presence might make anyone nervous. “He doesn’t do anything I tell him not to.”

“That’s good. But what the hell took you so long?”

“I was almost an hour away. I came as soon as I could.” He motioned to the other police officers. “They got here sooner.”

“Yeah, but not soon enough. After I called you and walked back into the club, that dude spotted me, and the jig was up. He made a beeline for the door.”