Chapter One
Calder
“You seriously won a whole house? Man, you are the luckiest fucker I know.” Max’s voice crackled over my car speaker. My signal kept fading in and out the farther outside Seattle I drove, but his skepticism came through loud and clear.
“Cabin. And yeah, it’s probably my biggest score yet.” I couldn’t help doing a little bragging as I navigated a curve on the country highway that kept advising travelers of their elevation and the distance to Mount Rainier. “I lucked into the invite for this high-stakes poker party, and this one jackass kept going all-in. Totally out of his league. But he wasn’t drunk or otherwise impaired, so his loss is totally my gain.”
“Hell, yeah. So when do we get to come for a ski weekend?” Max sounded predictably eager to get away from base. “Cards and ski bunnies sound pretty damn good right now. Not that you have anything left to play for.”
“There’s always something to play for.” I had to slow for an RV plodding along. I was relying on some sketchy directions and my GPS to get me to this place. Now that I’d left the suburbs behind, the terrain had turned decidedly mountainous, little towns with folksy names fewer and farther between long stretches of evergreen trees marching up and down scenic vistas. “You can come soon, but I need to check the place out first. For all I know it’s a shack inhabited by a family of elk. This guy wasn’t especially high on the place, but I figured what the hell. Even if it turns out that calling the place a ski chalet is pushing it, property is property.”
“Yup. And knowing you, you weren’t about to walk away from the table with a winning hand either.” Max snorted.
“Too true.” I wouldn’t take bets I couldn’t win, but I also wasn’t one to back down from a challenge either. A passing lane finally opened up, and I seized the chance to pass the RV. “If the cabin is too much of a dump, I’ll unload it in a quick sale as soon as I get the paperwork straightened out. But in the meantime, having my own getaway sounds pretty sweet.”
“Sure does. And hell, the way Seattle real estate prices are going, some sucker’s gonna be willing to buy it to attempt the long-ass commute.”
“Exactly.” Those same ridiculous prices were a big reason why I kept living in the barracks. As a chief I had options, but in the Seattle area all those options required more bread than I was willing to part with. For all that I loved the thrill of winning a bet, I was also notoriously tight with my money. My brothers liked to joke that getting a loan out of me required three signatures and collateral, and they weren’t that far from the truth. Saving cash by staying in the barracks made sense, but all the regulations, cramped spaces, and constant drama of other sailors got damn old. Having a place to escape to and bring my buddies was going to be awesome.
As long as the place wasn’t falling down. Even I wasn’t enough of a risk-taker to bring the crew to a cabin that wasn’t structurally sound. I’d take this weekend, inspect everything, make it as clean as possible, and draft some to-do and to-buy lists. Then I could set a date for the weekend away I’d been promising my crew. Traveling alone wasn’t usually my style and my car had felt too quiet until I’d dialed Max, but I didn’t want anyone around to laugh if it turned out I’d been had and the key didn’t even work.
“So, how’s the new duty assignment going?” Max asked, voice too careful to pass off as totally casual. Fuck. Maybe calling him hadn’t been so smart after all.
“Awesome,” I lied. “Shouldn’t be too much longer before I’m out from behind a desk.”
“Good to hear it. Couldn’t pay me to get chained to an office.” Max was a crane operator at the pier and possibly even more outdoorsy than me. Another reason to not have him along. If there were things I had to figure out, like lighting a tricky woodstove or something, I preferred to get it right before I had an audience eager to swoop in and help.
“Quit reminding me how much I wanna be back out there,” I grumbled right as the phone crackled again. “Damn it. Signal’s dropping again.”
“No worries. I should probably run anyway. I’ve got a date tonight. Maybe you’re not the only one with some recent luck.” Max’s warm laugh made me a little less grumbly. “This hottie swiped right and slid into my DMs with some killer pics.”
“Have a good time. Hope they’re not actually some pimple-faced kid.” I kept my tone light, the sort of ribbing we gave each other all day.
“Hey, that only happened one time.” The static increased, garbling whatever else he was trying to say until the call dropped completely. For once though I wasn’t cursing the trees and lack of cell towers. Max had been wandering into territory I didn’t want to think about, so I cranked the stereo rather than attempt a call back.
Without passengers I could indulge the musical tastes my brother the composer called hopelessly basic. Whatever. I liked what I liked, but I’d barely gotten two songs in before the GPS bleated that it was time to turn onto an even smaller side road and then another, each road more narrow and less maintained than the last. They’d been plowed at least, but not well. My sports car had all-wheel drive and was rated decent for winter, but I was still glad the forecast called for only a light dusting this weekend.
A rogue flake danced across my windshield. Probably an escapee from a nearby snowbank and not an omen. Here’s hoping. Finally, the GPS led me up a gravel drive to a red mailbox beside a large carved wooden bear holding a cheery sign that read Dutch Bear’s Hideaway. Hmm. Hideaway could be anything from a shed to a tree house, and a weird Christmas-morning-level excitement gathered in my gut as I made the turn. The house wasn’t immediately visible from the road, and when the driveway turned to reveal a red Swiss-style cottage with white trim hidden among the trees, I couldn’t help grinning.
This I could work with. It was older, sure, probably fifty years at least, and humble, but it looked sound, no saggy roof or missing windows. Its footprint was a basic rectangle with deep eaves, and a little white balcony indicated there was a second story tucked under the sloping roof. I followed the drive around back to where it ended at a little outbuilding painted the same red as the house. Tim, the guy at the poker party, had made it sound way shabbier than this.
True, it was remote, with no neighbors that I could see, but as long as that chimney worked and we had something resembling electricity, this could be a nice bro hangout. Like the little clubhouse we’d had in the backyard at one of Dad’s duty stations. Man, I’d loved that place. Maybe I’d change the sign to something more me. Keep the bear. He was cute and homey, kind of like the place itself.
After I parked, I started exploring on foot. A little fire circle with carved wooden benches and an ancient hot tub on a deck lurked behind the house. The hot tub might have to be replaced, but there was plenty of firewood in the little outbuilding, and lo and behold, one of my keys opened the white door to reveal snow shovels and other winter supplies. Not a bad start.