Tamarack County (36 page)

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Authors: William Kent Krueger

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On the morning of her departure, Skye let Cork walk her to the rented Escalade parked in the drive. A gentle snow was falling, flakes that caught in her hair like cloud shavings, that kissed the bare skin of her face and melted into drops and hung like tears on her cheeks. She was in every respect, Cork thought, a lovely person. If Anne’s decision had been to be with her, he would have approved and been happy for them both.

“Would you say good-bye to Stephen for me?” she asked. “And please let me know how his recovery goes and when he walks again.”

He appreciated her hopefulness.

“You’re always welcome here,” he told her.

“Thank you.” She looked up toward a sky invisible behind snow clouds. “But I don’t think there’s any reason for me to come back.”

Cork said, “If you’ll accept the advice of an old fart, it’s my experience that when you leave the door open to it, love just keeps coming.”

“Maybe,” Skye said. “But Annie was special.”

“Isn’t everybody?”

“No,” she said. “Not like Annie.” And what ran down her cheeks now was not from the melting snow. “I feel like my heart’s been carved out of me. Not her fault, I know. But I don’t want to hurt like this again.” She hadn’t put on her gloves yet, and with a cold, bare knuckle, she wiped at her eyes. “I swear that I will never knowingly hurt someone else this way. Why would anyone?” She looked at him as if she expected an answer. But he knew that, whatever he offered, it would not be good enough.

“Good-bye, Cork,” she said.

She got into her Escalade, started the engine, backed out of the drive, and headed away down Gooseberry Lane. He watched until she turned the corner and was gone. Gone forever from their lives, he suspected, and it saddened him.

He stood alone in the falling snow. The street he’d lived on most of his life was quiet and lovely in the way of winter in the North Country. He hoped that Skye was returning to a place she loved as much as he loved Tamarack County, because he knew that there were places that could heal, and home was one of them. Looking down the empty street, he thought about her final comment to him and understood that his heart already knew the answer to a question that his head had been puzzling endlessly.

He pulled his cell phone from the holster on his belt, and he called Rainy Bisonette. A small wind rose up around him and sighed past as he listened to the ring of the phone on the other end. At last Rainy answered.

Cork felt himself smile, and he said to her, “Hello, love.”

WILLIAM KENT KRUEGER
is the
New York Times
bestselling author of twelve previous Cork O’Connor novels, including
Northwest Angle
and
Trickster’s Point
, as well as the novel
Ordinary Grace
. He lives in the Twin Cities with his family. Visit his website at
WilliamKentKrueger.com
.

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A
LSO BY
W
ILLIAM
K
ENT
K
RUEGER

Ordinary Grace

Trickster’s Point

Northwest Angle

Vermilion Drift

Heaven’s Keep

Red Knife

Thunder Bay

Copper River

Mercy Falls

Blood Hollow

The Devil’s Bed

Purgatory Ridge

Boundary Waters

Iron Lake

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ATRIA
BOOKS

A Division of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

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New York, NY 10020

www.SimonandSchuster.com

This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2013 by William Kent Krueger

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Atria Books Subsidiary Rights Department, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020.

First Atria Books hardcover edition August 2013

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BOOKS
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Designed by Davina Mock-Maniscalco

Jacket design by John Vairo Jr.

Landscape © Sverrir Thorolfsson/Flickr/Getty Images

SUV truck © Matthew Wakem/Aurora/Getty Images

Author photograph by Diane Krueger

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Krueger, William Kent.

Tamarack county : a novel / by William Kent Krueger.—First Atria Books hardcover edition.

pages cm

1. O’Connor, Cork (Fictitious character)—Fiction. 2. Private investigators—Minnesota—Fiction. 3. Murder—Investigation—Fiction. 4. Minnesota—Fiction.

I. Title.

PS3561.R766T36 2013

813'.54—dc23

2013004349

ISBN 978-1-4516-4575-0

ISBN 978-1-4516-4578-1 (ebook)

C
ONTENT

Acknowledgments

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48

About William Kent Krueger

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