From #1 New York Times bestselling author Devney Perry comes a gripping romance set in 1983 where a woman's search for the truth about her father's death entangles her with the small-town sheriff and a legend of lost Montana gold.
Living in Dalton, Montana, was not what I had planned for this winter. But after my father's sudden death, I uprooted my life to move into his tiny lakeside cabin and settle his estate. My friends tell me to sell his place and move on. But this winter is my chance to say goodbye. To remember a man who'd loved tales of Montana lore.
Taking a temporary teaching job seemed like the perfect way to keep myself busy on lonely days. Cleaning out the cabin should have been simple. Except the more I learn about my father's life, the more questions I have about his death.
The last thing I need is a crush on Sheriff Cosi Raynes. Not only is his son my student, but his life is rooted in Montana, while mine is headed...anywhere else.
Yet as I uncover a trail of strange clues Dad left behind about a lost legend of Montana gold, staying away from Cosi is not an option. Neither is denying the attraction between us. And my winter of healing becomes a race for answers.
I came to Montana to bury the past. Now I'm falling for the man who might just be my future. And either I'll solve this mystery, or the person in Dalton determined to hide the truth will make sure I die trying.
Once upon a time, I called this cabin on Cotters Lake home. As I spun in a slow circle, past swirled with present. Then and now. Then.
A crackling fireplace and the steady clicks from Mom’s knitting needles. The scents of cigars and sugar cookies. A small living room, but a clean, happy room. A little girl with dirt under her fingernails, curled on her father’s lap as he read her a story.
Now.
Dust motes floating past dirty windows. Stale air with the faint stench of a long-dead mouse. Clutter beyond clutter to the point of chaos. A tattered recliner and lonely, quiet rooms. Dad’s cabin was smaller than I remembered. The ceilings seemed too short, the walls too close.
Probably to be expected, considering the last time I’d been in this house, I’d been 16. A lot had changed in the past 10 years. Yet if I closed my eyes, I was that little girl again, curled on her father’s lap. My earliest memory was in this cabin. In this living room. I’d been three, maybe four.
There was a fire burning in the stove. Dad had built it for Mom before he’d left to go ice fishing on the lake because Mom didn’t like building fires. She got splinters from the wood. Frost trimmed the windows. The couch was pushed into a corner to make space for the Christmas tree. Mom and I were decorating it with ornaments while she complained about the insufferable snow.
That was the day I’d learned what insufferable meant. Mom was upset because we’d had to cancel our shopping trip to Missoula when they’d closed the roads. I’d been too young to remember her exact words, but the way she’d spoken about Montana had always been such a contrast to Dad’s feelings. He’d been sunshine. She’d been gloom. His lifestyle had been her misery.
Until the spring I’d turned six, when the snow melted, the daffodils bloomed, and Mom loaded me into her olive-green Oldsmobile and left Dalton. Left Dad.
Mom had been lighter after that. Happier. But her joy had been the death of his laughter. Their roles had switched. She’d blossomed. He’d withered. Daylight and despair. And somewhere in the middle: me. Always in the middle. Until now. Dad was dead and there wasn’t a middle to occupy.
A shiver chased down my spine. Goosebumps dotted my forearms. The fire I’d started in the hearth was rushing to a roar, but it hadn’t chased away the cold yet. It had been 20 years since I’d spent a winter in Montana. I’d forgotten just how bitterly cold it could get. I’d been back in Dalton for a week, and the temperatures had dropped lower and lower each day.
But despite the cold, the winters were beautiful. Even Mom couldn’t argue the splendor of Montana covered in snow. Beyond the filmy windows, the sun had dipped below the jagged mountain horizon. Its fading light tinged the world in blues and violets. The trees looked more indigo than green. Beneath their trunks, the yard was blanketed with snow. Past the boat dock, the frozen lake stretched from one icy shore to the next.
Once upon a time, I’d loved that lake. I’d spent countless hours swimming, playing on the gravel beach and floating on an old inner tube. Strange that I could remember a Christmas from decades ago, but I couldn’t remember who’d taught me to swim. Was it Dad? For as long as I could remember, I’d just known how to swim. He’d been a good swimmer too. Just not good enough.
My heart twisted, the pain a constant companion this week. I’d spent most of the past week avoiding this cabin, throwing myself into my new teaching job at Dalton High School. And when I was here, I’d hidden in my childhood bedroom, huddled beneath blankets, blocking out the memories and cold. But a week of surviving in this clutter was enough.
I’d come to Montana to settle my father’s estate. To clean this cabin and sell it in the spring. To say goodbye.
Yesterday, I’d tackled the kitchen. Tonight, maybe I’d find the living room couch. It was buried somewhere beneath a mountain of boxes and bags and whatever else Dad had been collecting over the last 10 years. When I’d arrived last weekend, I’d barely been able to get into the cabin, so I’d focused on cleaning the essential rooms. The bathroom. My bedroom. The spaces I’d needed to survive my first week in Dalton.
Everything else, well ... ignorance wasn’t bliss, but it was my favorite hobby. Except there was simply no more ignoring the hoard of junk my father had amassed in this tiny house. Dad had piled boxes nearly to the ceiling, leaving only narrow paths to move from room to room. The entryway was still overloaded, mostly from stuff I’d moved off my bed so I could sleep.
Was this mess my punishment for not visiting Dad sooner? How long had he been living like this?
I should know the answer. But Ike Poe had always been a bit of a mystery, even before I’d stopped coming to Montana for my summer vacations. That mystery would remain unsolved now that he was gone.
Maybe in this sea of boxes, I’d learn more about the man my father had been before his death. ...
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