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 nodded, stoic as ever. “You mind giving me some pointers with those pistols?”
She could have fallen in love right there. Not that she particularly cared about teaching him to shoot a gun, but because he had the balls to ask. She hadn’t known many men who’d feel comfortable taking shooting lessons from a woman, and she’d known a hell of a lot of guys who couldn’t shoot half as well as she could.
“Of course I don’t mind,” she told him, handing Moss’s bag of guns down to him in the skiff. “We get to the island, I’ll set you up with some targets. We’ll make an Annie Oakley out of you yet.”
Lucy wasn’t sure about the rowboat, but they got her aboard. Jess hoisted her up to the gunwale, forklift style, and passed her off to Burke as she squirmed and snorted her complaints, Burke nearly swamping the boat, the whole process extremely undignified.
Jess laughed as Burke set Lucy down and the dog struggled to the bow of the boat, where she collapsed in a heap and stared back at them, traumatized. Burke steadied the boat, stood and held out his hand for her, and Jess rolled her eyes and passed down the oars, slipped into the boat while he was stowing them away.
“Don’t go getting chivalrous,” she told him, untying the line from the troller.
“No, ma’am,” Burke said. “I wouldn’t presume.”
She couldn’t tell if he was being serious or sarcastic. Figured that was going to be an ongoing problem.
She let Burke row anyway. Sat in the bow and comforted Lucy, the dog a lot less secure with this rowboat than she’d been on a vessel with a kitchen and bunks. She trembled the whole way to shore, cuddling up against Jess and licking at her face and staring out at the island in the distance like it was the very jaws of dog hell awaiting her there, instead of a nice patch of forest to sniff and a bunch of new places to pee.
But the dog’s fear disappeared when they hit the beach, Jess jumping out into water to her calves, pulling the bow of the boat in to the narrow patch of shingle on the western side of the lagoon. Lucy leapt off as soon as the boat scraped the bottom, landed on the beach, and immediately set to exploring, dashing off between the trees and vanishing into the forest, her collar jingling with every step, the sound diminishing but never quite disappearing.