“I heard about the bear,” Dodge said. “You’re worried about Elsa.”

Charlie lifted a shoulder. “She’s a bear in the wild. I know things can happen. I just don’t want it to be by a couple poachers.”

Dodge nodded.

“I think George was killed a few years back, although I can’t prove it. His GPS collar stopped working, but when I went out to the last known location, I couldn’t find it. If he’d died of natural causes, the collar might have been with his carcass.”

“Honestly, Charlie, I can’t believe Elsa’s still alive. She’s nearly fifteen years old.”

“It’s not unusual for bears in the wild to live twenty, even twenty-five years.” Charlie glanced at Dodge. “I thought you were gone for good. Echo cried over you for years. Are you back in her life, or what?”

The words brought him up and he stiffened. But if Charlie was going to shoot straight, so would he. “I’m just in town for a few weeks, until my dad gets back in the cockpit, then I’ll be flying for Air One in Anchorage.” The words cemented inside him. Yes, now that he’d worked out the kinks, he’d call Moose and officially accept the offer. “So, no. I’m just here as a friend.”

Charlie’s mouth tightened into a knot. He looked away.

Cried for years?

“You stopped being her friend at age sixteen when I saw you two working that sled dog team together. I knew even then what your intentions were, son.”

Dodge glanced at him, but he didn’t argue. In truth, he didn’t know when friendship turned to love, to longing, to dreams.

“Just don’t hurt her,” Charlie said. “I can’t watch her go through that again. She’s had enough people leaving her.”

Bitterness laced his voice, and Dodge had nothing as he crossed the bridge over the Copper River and headed north. The water was angry, gray, and frothing up cold chunks of ice and debris.

He turned up the windshield wipers. Behind him, the lights on his truck carved out two blades in the deepening storm. The flakes came thicker now, like the shooting stars hitting the Millennium Falcon.

His grip tightened on the steering wheel. “Charlie, I haven’t told anyone this, but I was shot down in Afghanistan. Got pretty banged up. Did some time at Walter Reed. Lots of rehab. I know about pain.” He looked at him. “I also know how it feels to drink it away. I warmed a stool at a local bar near the base for a while after the accident, trying to forget. I just ended up with a headache and more regrets. There are other ways.”