“I know,” she repeated. What else could she say? She wasn’t going to make excuses. Maybe she would have a few years ago, but she wasn’t a kid anymore. If she expected to be treated as a professional, she knew she had to act like one.

He continued to scowl at her.

Cassie felt her face redden, but she forced herself not to look away. She refused to be intimidated by him.

Dad sighed. “Report,” he said.

“There’s something unusual about this bear.” Taking a deep breath, Cassie plunged into a description of how she had tracked him and how he had walked into the ice. She told Dad about searching the pressure ridge and failing to find tracks leading out of it. She told him how she had searched the surrounding area, crossing miles of pack ice, with no further sign of the bear. Finishing, she braced herself, waiting for Dad to tear apart her report.

Instead, she saw the anger drain out of her father’s face. He dropped his clipboard to the table, and he hugged her. “I could have lost you,” he said.

This was new. “Dad,” she said, squirming. Anger she had expected, but hugs? They were not a hugging family. “Dad, please, I’m fine. I know what I’m doing. You don’t have to worry.”

Dad released her. He was shaking his head. “I should have known this day would come,” he said. “Your grandmother was right.”

Awkwardly, she patted his shoulder. “I’ll bring backup next time,” she promised. “I’ll catch the bear. You’ll see.”

He didn’t appear to be listening. “It’s too late for application deadlines for this year, but some of my friends at the University of Alaska owe me favors. You can work in one of their labs and apply for undergrad next year.”

Whoa—what? They’d agreed she would take courses remotely. She wasn’t leaving the station. “Dad…”

“You can live with your grandmother in Fairbanks. She’ll be thrilled to say, ‘I told you so.’ She’s been pushing for this since you were five, but I selfishly wanted you here,” he said. “I’ll contact Max to fly you there.”

She stared at him. “But I don’t want to leave,” she said. She loved it at the station! Her life was here. She wanted—no, needed—to be near the ice.

He focused on her, as if seeing her afresh. “You’re leaving,” he said, steel back in his voice. “I’m sorry, Cassie, but this is for your own good.”

“You can’t simply decide that—”

“If your mother were here, she would want this.”

Cassie felt as if she’d been punched in her gut. He knew full well how Cassie felt about her mother, how much she wished she were here, how much she wished she’d known her. To use that as a weapon to win an argument… It was a low blow. Cassie shook her head as if she could shake out his words. “I’m not leaving,” she said. “This is my home.”

Her father—who shied away from feelings so much that he had delegated her childhood to her grandmother and had left her puberty to a stack of bio textbooks—her father had tears in his eyes. “Not anymore,” he said softly. “It can’t be anymore.”

CHAPTER 2

Latitude 70° 49’ 23” N

Longitude 152° 29’ 25” W

Altitude 10 ft.

Cassie blinked at her clock: three a.m.

What were they doing? It sounded as if the whole station staff were stomping around outside her door. She could have sworn she’d even heard a plane engine. She tossed off her covers and raked her fingers through her hair. She knew she looked like a redheaded Medusa, and she was sure she had bags under her eyes the size of golf balls. She was wearing long johns, mismatched socks, and an oversize T-shirt that read: ALASKA—WHERE MEN ARE MEN AND WOMEN WIN THE IDITAROD. Cassie yanked on pants and a sweater over her long johns and T-shirt before she stuck her head out her door. She spotted Owen scurrying down the hallway. “Hey,” she called to him. “It’s three a.m.” She nearly added, And it’s my birthday.

“Max’s plane is here,” Owen said. “Just landed. We’d have had more warning if you had fixed the antennae instead of going off to chase trouble.”

She winced. She deserved that. After all, she’d wrecked his equipment. His crankiness was justified. But what did he mean that Max’s plane was here? Max wasn’t scheduled for a visit… Oh.

He’d come for Cassie.

Her heart sank. How had Dad convinced him to come so fast? Before the budget cuts, Max had been on the station’s staff. He’d flown his Twin Otter for them when Cassie was little; he’d been her earliest babysitter, practically an uncle to her—but now he worked for a commercial runway in Fairbanks. He couldn’t take off on zero notice. She hadn’t imagined Dad would call for him immediately.

Cassie brushed past Owen and headed for the research lab. She had to put a stop to this right now. She had to talk sense into Dad and convince Max to return to Fairbanks without her.

Before Cassie reached the lab door, she heard boxes scrape across linoleum, and the door flew open. “Cassielassie!” Max bellowed. He strode down the hall and scooped her up into a bear hug. He swung her in a half circle, then thumped her shoulder blades as if he were burping her as he set her down. “Did you find the Abominable Snowman?” he asked, their old routine.

“Stuffed and mounted,” she said, on cue. He grinned at her, his white teeth startlingly bright against his dark skin. She automatically grinned back. She’d forgotten how much she’d missed seeing him.

Maybe this is a normal visit, Cassie thought as Max beamed at her. Maybe it’s unrelated to my argument with Dad. Maybe it’s just a coincidence.

And maybe there really is an Abominable Snowman. She shook her head at herself. Max wasn’t here by coincidence, not within mere hours of Dad’s pronouncement. She shouldn’t bother trying to fool herself.

“Got a surprise for you,” Max said.

“Yeah?” He hadn’t said it like it was a bad surprise, but her stomach knotted as if it knew this couldn’t be good.

Cassie heard a familiar tap from the doorway—a cane. Gram. Max had brought Gram. Cassie wished she could be happy. She hadn’t seen her grandmother in months, and now she was here. Ordinarily, this would have been a wonderful surprise: Max and Gram, her two favorite people in the world, were here. But now she was going to have to tell her grandmother face-to-face that she didn’t want to live with her in Fairbanks.

She shouldn’t have told Dad about the bear walking into the ice. If she had simply left that detail out of her report…

Gram hit her mahogany cane sharply on the floor. “I haven’t shriveled to nothing. Come hug me.” She held out her arms.

Forcing herself to smile, Cassie bounded the remaining steps to the lab door. She wrapped her grandmother in her arms. It was like holding a bird. Gram was almost as tall as Cassie, but her bones were tiny. She felt breakable. Cassie released her quickly.

“You’ve grown,” Gram said.

“You’ve shrunk,” Cassie responded automatically.

Gram frowned and shook her head. Like Cassie, she had a fierce frown. Both of them had strong faces, but Gram’s skin hung loose over hers, and her hair, once as thick and red as Cassie’s, rustled like an old curtain. “Nonsense. I’m as beautiful as the day your grandfather met me. First time in the back of his pickup, do you know what he said? ‘Ingrid,’ he said. ‘Ingrid, God himself could not have more perfect breasts than you.’”

Cassie couldn’t help laughing. “I’ve missed you.”

“Oh, my Cassandra.” She hooked her arm around Cassie’s waist. “Let me look at you. So grown-up. Such a fine young woman now.”

Cassie swallowed a sudden lump in her throat. “Gram…,” she began. She stopped. How did she say this without hurting Gram’s feelings? The last thing in the world she wanted to do was hurt her grandmother. “How… How was your flight?”

“Idiotic FCC almost didn’t let us lift up,” Max said. “No Fed can tell me how to fly safe. Thirty years flying in the bush, and I can smell ice. It’s not like flying in the lower forty-eight… ”