Bennie straightened, drew one last drag on his cigar, then dropped and stubbed it into the snow. “Jen, I know what you think of Matt.”

“Bennie…” Warning entered her tone.

“Hear me out. I know how much you lost…both of you.” He took off his oil-stained cap and swiped his thinning hair. “But you gotta remember. You’re both young. Another child could—”

“Don’t.” The single word was a bark, a knee-jerk reaction. As soon as she said it, she remembered Matt cutting her off just as abruptly. But she could not hold back her anger. How dare Bennie presume to know how it felt to lose a child? To think another child could replace a lost one!

Bennie stared at her, one eye squinted, judging her. When he spoke next, it was in a calm, measured voice. “Jen, we lost a child, too…a baby girl.”

The simple statement stunned her. Her anger blew out like a snuffed candle. “My God, Bennie, when?”

“A year ago…miscarriage.” He stared out into the dark snowy plains. In the distance the few lights of the seaside village flickered. A heavy sigh escaped him. “It nearly crushed Belinda.”

Jenny saw it had done the same to the man in front of her.

He cleared his throat. “Afterward we found out she would never be able to bear a child. Something to do with scarring. Docs said it was secondary to—” His voice cracked. He shook his head. “Let’s just say, it was secondary to complications from her old job.”

“Bennie, I’m so sorry.”

He waved away her sympathy. “We move on. That’s life.”

Through the window, Jenny watched Belinda laughing as she refilled Matt’s coffee. Not a sound was heard but the whistle of wind across the tundra.

“But you and Matt,” Bennie resumed, “you’re both young.”

She heard his unspoken words: You two could still have another child.

“You were good together,” he continued, kicking snow off his boots. “It’s high time one of you remembered that.”

She stared through the window. Her words were a whisper, more to her own heart than to her companion. “I do remember.”

She had met Matt during an investigation of poaching in the Brooks Range. A conflict had arisen between native rights and the federal government over hunting for food in parklands. He had been there representing the state, but after learning of the subsistence level of existence of the local tribes, he became one of their most vocal advocates. Jenny had been impressed by his ability to look beyond the law and see the people involved, a rarity among government types.

While working together to settle the matter and make new law, the two had grown closer. At first, they simply sought work-related reasons to get together. Then, after running out of fabricated excuses, they simply started dating. And within a year, they were married. It took a while for her family to accept a white man into their fold, but Matt’s charm, easygoing nature, and dogged patience won them over. Even her father.

Benny cleared his throat. “Then it’s not too late, Jen.”

She watched a moment longer, then turned from the window. “Sometimes it is. Some things can’t be forgiven.”

Bennie met her gaze, standing in front of her. “It was an accident, Jen. Somewhere in there you know that.”

Her anger, never far from the surface, flared again. She clenched her fingers. “He was drinking.”

“But he wasn’t drunk, was he?”

“What the hell does that matter! Even a single drop of alcohol…” She began to shake. “He was supposed to be watching Tyler. Not drinking! If he hadn’t been—”

Bennie cut her off. “Jen, I know what you think of alcohol. Hell, I worked with you long enough in Fairbanks. I know what it’s done to your people…to your father.”

His words were like a punch to the belly. “You’re crossing the line, Bennie.”

“Someone has to. I was there when your father was hauled in, goddamn it! I know! Your mother died in a car accident because your father was drunk.”

She turned away, but she couldn’t escape his words. She had been only sixteen at the time. Epidemic alcoholism was the coined term. It was devastating the Inuit, a curse winding its way down the generations, killing and maiming along the way — through violence, suicides, drownings, spousal abuse, birth defects, and fetal alcohol syndrome. As a native sheriff, she had seen entire villages emptied from no other cause than alcohol. And her own family had not escaped.

First her mother, then her son.

“Your father spent a year in jail,” Bennie continued. “He went to AA. He’s been on the wagon and found peace by returning to the old ways.”

“It doesn’t matter. I…I can’t forgive him.”

“Who?” His voice sharpened. “Matt or your father?”

Jenny swung around, fists clenched, ready to swing at him.

Bennie kept his position before the door. “Whether Matt had been stone-cold sober or not, Tyler would still be dead.”

The bluntness of his words tore at the thick scarring that had formed in her own body. It wasn’t just around her heart, but strung in tight cords through her belly, in her neck, down her legs. The scarring was all that allowed her to survive. It was what the body did when it couldn’t heal completely. It scarred. Tears arose from the pain.

Bennie stepped forward and pulled her into his arms. She sagged in his grip. She wanted to dismiss Bennie’s words, to lash out, but in her heart, she knew better. Had she ever forgiven her father? How much of that anger had become a part of who she was? She had entered law enforcement in an attempt to find some order in the tragedies and vagaries of life, finding solace in rules, regulations, and procedures, where punishment was meted out in blocks of time — one, five, or ten years — where time could be served and sins forgiven. But matters of the heart were not so easily quantified.

“It’s not too late,” Bennie repeated in her ear.

She mumbled her answer to his chest, repeating her earlier words. “Sometimes it is.” And in her heart, she knew this to be true. Whatever she and Matt had once shared was shattered beyond repair.

The door swung open again, bringing with it the warmth of the diner, the smells of frying oil, and a bit of bright laughter. Matt stood at the threshold. “You two really should get a room.”

Jenny pulled out of the embrace and ran a hand through her hair. She hoped the tears were gone from her cheeks. “The plane’s all refueled. We can head out as soon as we’re done eating.”

“And where again were you all going?” Bennie asked, clearing his throat.

Matt scowled at him. For everyone’s sake, they had decided it best to keep their destination a secret. “Good try, Bennie.”

The man shrugged. “Okay, can’t blame a guy for trying.”

“Actually I can,” Matt said, swinging around. “Hey, Belinda, did you know your husband was making out with my ex-wife on the porch?”

“Tell Jenny she can keep him!”

Matt turned back and gave them a thumbs-up. “You two kids are in the clear.” He closed the door on them. “Have fun!”

Standing in the dark, Jenny shook her head. “And you want me to make up with him?”

Bennie shrugged again. “I’m just a mechanic. What the hell do I know?”

Admiral Viktor Petkov watched through the video monitors in the control station. The solid plane of ice spread in a black blanket overhead, lit from below by the Drakon’s exterior lights. The four thermal-suited divers had spent the last half hour securing a titanium sphere in place. The procedure involved screwing meter-long anchoring bolts into the underside of the ice cap, then positioning the device’s clamps to the bolts so the titanium sphere hung below the ice.

It was the last of five identical devices. Each titanium sphere was positioned a hundred kilometers from the ice island, encircling the lost Russian ice station, marking the points of a star. The sites of insertion were pinpointed to exact coordinates. All that remained was to establish the master trigger. It had to be positioned in the exact center of the star.