A dark musical score ran through his head; it had begun with the mention of diabetes. He untied Aker’s feet and wrestled to bring his unwilling body out of the chair. Aker fell sideways and the chair crashed to the floor. Aker thrashed, and landed a kick to the man’s left ear, before he was restrained. The man unfastened Aker’s belt and pulled his pants down.

Aker’s left buttock was riddled with circular bruises, the result of insulin shots.

“Motherfucker!” the man shouted. He snorted and paced the small area angrily.

“I need insulin, Coats,” Aker said.

During the ruckus, the hood had come off.

Roy Coats heard his name spoken. He stared at his hostage. How in the world?

“R. Coats, right?” Aker said. “And she would be Dimples,” he said, referring to the dog, now by the fire. The dog had gotten close enough earlier for Aker to see down through the opening at his neck. And he’d recognized her. “Front right paw bitten by a rattlesnake… what, two years ago? You owe me a hundred and eighty bucks for that, Coats. I tend not to forget the customers who don’t pay.”

“Shut the fuck up.”

“What are you going to do, kill me?” he said, amused. “I’m going to die here, Coats. And let me tell you something: it won’t be pretty.”

“You’re not going to die. You’re going to write your report.”

“Would if I could, but I don’t think so. I don’t remember how you got me here. I don’t even remember how you found me. Ketamine?” he asked. “Headache tells me it’s ketamine. But there’s not a sound anywhere near us. Not even planes going over. So I’ve got to think we’re a long way from anywhere. And that doesn’t bode well for me. Challis? Salmon? The Pahsimeroi? Stanley? You’re never going to get the insulin in time.”

Coats paced between the stove and back again, his head hanging, the fingers of his right hand tugging at whiskers in his beard. Then he stopped and addressed Aker, who remained on the floor. “The islets of Langerhans,” Roy Coats said.

Aker couldn’t conceal his astonishment.

“My mom was type 1,” Coats explained. “I know all about acidosis.”

Aker’s focus changed as he took in the cabin walls, all floor to ceiling with books. Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of them.

“The second coming of Ted Kaczynski?”

“I’d watch my mouth, if I were you.” Coats began searching the stacks for a particular title. “There’s a cow, two pigs, and some chickens out back.”

“I’m a little old for a petting zoo. I’ll pass.”

“Last warning about that mouth.”

“What exactly do you think you’re holding over me, Coats? Without insulin, I’m on my way out.”

“Bovine and pig insulin kept diabetics alive for decades. It wasn’t until the nineteen fifties that they synthesized it.”

“You cannot be serious,” Aker said. “Oh, I get it: you’re Frederick Banting, not Ted Kaczynski.”

“Both the pig and the cow have a pancreas, and that’s all we need.” Coats pulled a book from a shelf, returned it, and selected another. “All I’ve got to do is keep you alive until the next radio check. We stay off the airwaves. Only check in once a day. You’re the vet. You want to live, doc, you’re going to have to earn your supper.”

23

TWO MOUNTAIN PASSES THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN AVAILABLE to Walt in the summer months were closed by snow for the winter, forcing him to travel southeast around the ends of three mountain ranges that pointed like fingers into central Idaho’s vast, arid plain. He and Brandon said little on the two-hour drive that took them through Carey, Arco, and, finally, the tiny town of Howe, which consisted of a Church of Latter-day Saints, a post office, and a general store. He drove northeast into the Pahsimeroi Valley. With long, subzero winters, and only enough surface water to support a dozen ranches, the Pahsimeroi existed in a time warp, virtually unchanged for a thousand years. Majestic mountains surrounded a valley floor of rabbitweed and sagebrush. Aspen and cottonwood trees lined its few streams and creeks. Herds of antelope flashed their white tails like garden rabbits while red-tailed hawks sailed effortlessly on the steady winds that made this place so inhospitable to man.

A two-lane road, dead straight, plowed through a tablecloth of white, splitting the valley in two. It was as breathtaking a piece of Idaho scenery as could be found, and Walt never grew tired of looking at it.

“You get over here, it’s like another world,” Brandon said.

“My father used to hunt here.”

“You don’t hunt,” Brandon said, as if it had just occurred to him.

“No.”

Brandon tracked a handheld GPS, the topo map unrolled on his lap, his actions awkward due to the sling. He cross-checked the map with the device, occasionally glancing over to the right, where he imagined the first of Mark Aker’s three pinholed locations.

“You think I’m nuts coming here,” Walt said.

“Did I say anything?”

“It’s all we’ve got to go on: three pinholes in a map.”

“Maybe it’s enough,” Brandon said.

Walt gripped the wheel more firmly. The tension he was feeling had nothing to do with the snow floor he was driving on.

“There was a time I wanted her back,” Walt said.

Brandon took the opportunity to check the GPS and then to look out the window for the umpteenth time.

“If I fire you, I look resentful. Maybe you sue me.”

Brandon reached for the door handle. “I could walk home from here; it’s only a couple hundred miles.”

“It’s the girls I’m thinking about,” Walt said. “First and foremost, it’s the girls.”

“Shit,” Brandon whispered. “Can we stop this?”

“You want to fuck my wife, that’s your business. Your risk. But you’re fucking me along with her, and you should have thought about that.” He glanced over at Brandon.

“You think I didn’t?”

“Ketchum has an opening for a deputy. Bellevue, maybe.”

The suggestion hung inside the car as it raced up the empty two-lane road. Walt felt insignificant and small.

“My guess is,” Brandon said too loudly, acting as if the recent exchange had not happened, “we’re not going to get in there because the road won’t be plowed.”

“It’ll be plowed,” Walt said. He answered Brandon ’s puzzled expression. “Mark visited here. He called on a client. And, in this valley, it’s either cattle or sheep. They’ll keep the road open in winter in order to feed. The satellite map had four or five pivots clustered out there. That’s a ranch, for sure.” Walt having said that, an interruption in the plowed bank appeared a quarter mile ahead. He slowed the Cherokee.

“She complains, I’ll bet,” Walt said. “About your trailer being so small, about your work hours.”

“Is that why you asked me along, Sheriff? Make sure I log in a lot of OT?”

“Yup.”

Brandon winced. He hadn’t expected the truth.

He was squirming inside, right where Walt wanted him.

“Did you notify the Lemhi sheriff?” Brandon asked.

“I might have forgotten,” Walt said.

“Because?”

“Lemhi’s a different kind of county. You can’t throw a stick without hitting someone’s nephew or cousin. It’s too cozy. I don’t want to give him a chance to rehearse anything.”

“What would he rehearse?”

“How would I know?”

“Then why say that?”

“Something got Randy killed. Maybe it was the poaching, but I’m not so sure. I think it was the coat he was wearing: Mark’s coat. And now that Mark’s been abducted, and we’ve found the same date-rape cocktail in Randy’s blood, I’m guessing Randy’s death was some kind of misfire. So it’s all on Mark and whatever he was hiding up in his cabin, which means one or all of these ranches are involved.”

“No shit.”

“What gets a vet in trouble? One thing keeps coming to me: mad cow. That’s something any rancher, and especially these good old boys out here, would make damn sure to keep quiet.”