Chapters (78)
- Cover
- Title Page
- Copyright
- Dedication
- Epigraph
- Prologue
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-One
- Twenty-Two
- Twenty-Three
- Twenty-Four
- Twenty-Five
- Twenty-Six
- Twenty-Seven
- Twenty-Eight
- Twenty-Nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-One
- Thirty-Two
- Thirty-Three
- Thirty-Four
- Thirty-Five
- Thirty-Six
- Thirty-Seven
- Thirty-Eight
- Thirty-Nine
- Forty
- Forty-One
- Forty-Two
- Forty-Three
- Forty-Four
- Forty-Five
- Forty-Six
- Forty-Seven
- Forty-Eight
- Forty-Nine
- Fifty
- Fifty-One
- Fifty-Two
- Fifty-Three
- Fifty-Four
- Fifty-Five
- Fifty-Six
- Fifty-Seven
- Fifty-Eight
- Fifty-Nine
- Sixty
- Sixty-One
- Sixty-Two
- Sixty-Three
- Sixty-Four
- Sixty-Five
- Sixty-Six
- Sixty-Seven
- Sixty-Eight
- Acknowledgments
- Discover More
- About the Author
- Also by Owen Laukkanen
“He wasn’t always like that.” She continued like he hadn’t said anything. “High school, he was different. He was handsome, and he was smart, he was a smooth talker, always had some kind of plan or a scheme.” She laughed, humorless. “I guess he never lost that side of him, anyway.
“His daddy was a highliner, back when that meant something. You know what a highliner is, Burke?”
“I guess it means he was good at fishing,” Mason said.
“The best. He built a good life for Ty, and Ty’s mom, before the bottom fell out. Wound up drinking himself to death just about the same time the town died. But Ty and me, we were bound for something better, somewhere else. Even from day one, we had a plan.”
Mason didn’t say anything. He figured he would let Jess speak her mind, tell her story. Truth be told, he’d been curious.
“I joined the marines out of high school,” she said. “All I ever wanted.” She smiled a little bit, and there was real joy in it this time, mixed with a wistfulness Mason could feel in her words. “My dad was in the corps, fought in Iraq. He loved the marines, and I loved my dad, and so that was that, I enlisted, Ty and me got married, and off I went.”
“To Afghanistan.”
“That’s right,” she said. “Dad died midway through my first tour. They found cancer inside him, and it caught up to him quick. And then it was just me and Ty.”
Headlights on the road ahead. Mason pulled to the side of the logging road, crept the Blazer along slow. Beside him, Jess thumbed the safety off on the pistol.
It was a white pickup truck, a Ford Super Duty. The driver gave Mason a wave as he passed, didn’t look twice at the Blazer. Mason waited until the truck disappeared in his rearview. Then he continued down the road.
“What’d Ty do while you were overseas?” Mason asked.
“What didn’t he do? He tried to make a go of it fishing, made a little bit of money, but not nearly enough for what he wanted out of life. Then he was going to open a restaurant in town, cater to tourists, and then he was thinking about getting into the septic tank business, but I guess the smell drove him off that.”
She sighed. “Long story short, he must have run out of ideas. And I guess somewhere along the way, he ran out of patience with my being gone all the time.”
They’d reached the highway. Mason hit the blinker, left turn. “This girl, Shelby, she live in town?”
Jess nodded. “Behind the old cannery, a little white house.”
Mason turned left, toward Deception Cove, drove a ways. The wipers, back and forth, the tires in the rain.