At least they weren’t chaining Sybilla to her bed. “I’ll be back often.”

“Good.” Liz stood back and waved her off.

Halfway to Sourdough her phone sounded the opening bars of “He’s So Fine” and she pulled to the side of the street. “Hey.”

“Hey, yourself. I need a ride.”

“Where to?”

“Across the Bay. Kapilat.”

Wy remembered the tiny community, half old, half new, perched on the edge of the fjord. “Usual rates?”

“Usual rates,” he said grimly.

She didn’t laugh. “Meet you at the tie-down.”

Seventeen

Thursday, September 5

HE WAS STANDING NEXT TO THE CESSNA when she pulled up. “Hey,” she said.

“Hey.” He looked glum.

“I fueled up when I got back from Anchorage. Let me do the walk-around and we should be good to go.”

He grunted. Monosyllabicy, if that was even a word, was his chosen means of communication when he was forced to fly.

She did the walk-around, noting that he’d already untied the lines and coiled them neatly next to their cleats. Poor Liam. He did what he could. “Okay, climb on in.”

In the left seat she moved the yoke and the rudder pedals with her chin on her shoulder to check that the control surfaces were still working per spec. Next to her Liam buckled on his seatbelt and with both hands took a firm grip on his seat, preparatory to him helping her get and keep the aircraft in the air. Because she loved him she pretended she didn’t notice.

Five minutes later they were in the air and following the Spit out into the Bay. He had yet to move a muscle.

“Hey,” she said.

He sounded tense even over the headset. “Hey yourself.”

“Did you feel like this when I took you up as my spotter during herring fishing?”

She couldn’t see his eyes behind his sunglasses when his head turned but the tension in his jawline said it all. “Every second.”

She was silenced for a moment. “God. I’m sorry, Liam.”

“I’m an Alaskan. Worse, I’m an Alaska state trooper. What am I gonna do?”

The three islands guarding the entrance to a pair of narrow fjords slid beneath them before she spoke again. “If I’d known…”

“Can’t be helped, Wy.”

What was courage, again? Being terrified of something and doing it anyway? By that definition Liam Campbell had to be the bravest person she’d ever met. “What does it feel like?”

“What?”

“Being afraid to fly.” She was genuinely curious, and a little ashamed that she had never asked him before. “Is it only mental or is it physical, or what?”

He thought about it, and out of the corner of her eye she noticed his grip relaxing on the edge of the seat. He didn’t go so far as to let go but his knuckles were less white. “It starts with the physical. I get this, I don’t know what to call it, this white flash up the back of my legs and up my spine when we lift off. It’s debilitating, like I’m not sure if I could walk if I stood up. Or even if I could stand up.”