Running Wild(Wild #3)(46)

I grit my teeth as I climb into my truck. With a standard wave out the window—I’d prefer to flash a middle finger—I edge my truck along the pothole-riddled driveway. It’s in desperate need of some fresh gravel. The property has fallen into disrepair since Earl’s death. I don’t know if that’s Harry’s inability to focus on more than the dogs, or if the money situation is worse than I suspected. Given this rehearsed speech he just delivered, it could be money related, but it could just as easily be Harry’s ineptitude.

I’m fuming by the time I reach the end of their driveway. The fastest way to the clinic is to my left.

I turn right instead, hoping the extra fifteen minutes I’ve just tacked on to my drive will clear my head.

The driveway one over from the Hatchetts’ looks the same as when I last stopped with a handwritten letter in my grasp, only without the blanket of winter to veil the bramble on either side of the gate. I’ll bet that barrier has proven more useful with his newfound fame. The trespassing signs still hang prominently from the trees.

But the personalized one for me has been taken down, I note, as I slow to a stop in front of the lane.

It’s been three months since the race, and I’ve done my best to push out all thoughts of Tyler.

After spending several days scouring the internet to read everything about Mila Rask and Tyler Brady’s life together, of course. It wasn’t hard to find information and pictures. Rask Huskies has an entire section dedicated to Mila—to her life, her achievements, which were impressive in the mushing community. She was gorgeous. Tall and slender, with sharp cheekbones, brown eyes, and jet-black hair rather than the more common to Scandinavian blue eyes and blonde hair. She styled it in various lengths, from pixie cut to a chin-length bob. And their life together looked perfect, living in Finland’s northernmost region of Lapland, on the family’s farm with a full staff of handlers and two hundred sled dogs trained to run tourist expeditions in the arctic wilderness.

The disappointment that overwhelmed me when Tyler and I parted still lingers, a dull nuisance that reminds me every so often of those brief moments at the checkpoints—the looks, the smile, that kiss. All parts of a man who is still very much in love with his dead wife.

If he wasn’t, it might have gone somewhere.

I would have at least liked the opportunity to find out.

I throw my truck in gear and continue, rounding the bend in the dirt road.

A lone figure approaches, jogging in the middle of the road. These roads are so seldom used, it’s not surprising that a jogger wouldn’t use the shoulder, but the man isn’t making much effort to move, shifting only a few feet to his right, forcing me to slow to a crawl.

I’m twenty feet away when I recognize Tyler.

A curse slips out even as my heart races, my eyes sizing up the soft gray T-shirt that clings to his torso, and the simple black track shorts that highlight lean but muscular calves and thighs.

A second curse slips when I realize he’s recognized me, and he’s coming to a stop.

“Thought that was you,” he says through pants, giving his sweat-soaked T-shirt a tug away from his stomach, drawing my attention to cut biceps. “Here to see Harry?”

“I was. I’m on my way back to the clinic now.”

He points in the opposite direction. “Isn’t it that way?”

“I have a stop to make,” I lie smoothly. He knows where my clinic is, which means he must have looked it up. I push aside the little spark that pricks me with that awareness. “Congratulations. You know, on winning.”

He nods but doesn’t say anything more. Is this as awkward for him as it is for me?

I swallow against this uncomfortable feeling that swells in my chest, torn between wanting to stay but then remembering our last exchange and thus desperate to leave. “So, what have you been up to? Besides polishing all your trophies.” It wasn’t enough that Tyler won the race and the purse that comes with it, and the halfway gold nuggets, but he also walked away with the Rookie of the Year, the sportsmanship award for helping Larry in the gorge, and the coveted humanitarian award.

He offers a lazy smile. “You gave me one of those, didn’t you?”

I shrug, though he likely already knows that the vote by the trail veterinarians for the Leonhard Seppala was unanimous this year.

“I heard an animal control officer did an inspection of Zed Snyder’s kennel and jammed him up with a bunch of fines. Not having up-to-date rabies vaccinations, that sort of thing.”

Good ol’ Howie. “That’s unfortunate.”

“It is.” He studies me. “You haven’t come by to see the kennel at all. Why is that?”

“I’ve been busy.”

He reaches up to wipe a smear of mud off the top of my side-view mirror. “Really? Couldn’t come by once in three months?”

“You have a gate.”

He smirks. “That’s never stopped you before.”

“I’ll be sure to bring my bolt cutters next time I’m out this way, then.”

His eyes narrow on the empty road. “Or you could just follow me back now.”

His offer is tempting, for all the wrong reasons.

Far too tempting.

But what am I even doing? What’s the point? I already know where this leads—grave disappointment. “I can’t. I have a patient waiting.” That I’m already going to be late for.