weather gear in the midst of a pack of Alaskan huskies. He had his arms around two of the dogs and was grinning widely. “Dogsled tours,” Allie read out loud. “These dogs are gorgeous.”
“They’re gorgeous,” Nancy agreed. “And our bread and butter.”
“The clinic takes care of these dogs?”
“Those dogs and all the dogs of all the other mushers around here,” Nancy confirmed, sliding the file drawer shut.
“You can support a whole clinic just on sled dogs?” Allie asked.
“We do other animals too,” Nancy said. “But around here? Yeah, we can support the whole clinic just on the mushing dogs.”
“There’s a lot of them?” Definitely not something seen in Massachusetts.
“It’s the official sport of Alaska,” Nancy said.
“It’s a year-round thing?” Allie asked. The flyer advertised summer hours.
“Definitely. Besides competing, there are tours year round and there are several people around here who prefer dogsled for local transportation. It’s cheaper than cars and trucks, cleaner than gas and keeps their dogs in shape.”
“Gavin’s been dogsledding, I bet,” Allie said. Gavin had always liked the outdoors, and there was very little not to like about Alaska from what Allie had seen so far.
“All the time. And he loves it. Obviously.”
Allie turned. “Obviously?”
Nancy pointed to the picture on the flyer. “Doesn’t he look happy?”
Allie swung back to look at the bulletin board. Now that she looked closer, she realized the smiling man on the front of the flyer was Gavin. “Yeah, he does look happy.”
Which made her heart feel heavier. Stupid. It wasn’t like she thought he was going to pack his stuff and hop on the next plane to Massachusetts with her. But it did emphasize that he’d successfully established a life here in Alaska and hadn’t spent too many nights pining for her. When would he have had the time?
“Tell me about the town,” Allie said, pulling her eyes from the huge grin on Gavin’s face.
“Which town?” Nancy crossed to the coffeepot and poured a cup.
“This town.”
Nancy leaned back against the counter. “Denali or Bend?”
It had to be Denali, right? That’s what the brochure said. But then why did Nancy ask it that way? “The one we’re in right now,” Allie said stubbornly.
“Technically we’re not in a town right now. We’re about four miles north of Bend, on Gavin’s twenty acres.”
Allie huffed out a breath. “Okay, you got me. I don’t know which town we’re in or near or whatever. What’s Gavin’s official address?”
Nancy chuckled. “Bend. Denali is the national park.”
Allie rolled her eyes. “Okay, tell me about Bend.” She’d Google Denali later.
“What’s to tell? It’s named because the very creative people who settled it noticed we sit at the bend of the river. It’s a tiny town in Alaska that caters primarily to climbers and outdoorsy tourists. We have lots of hiking, fishing and, of course, the mushing. We’re laid back, can guzzle beer with the best of ’em, and we all really like Gavin.”
“So we have one thing in common.”
Nancy grinned. “You can guzzle beer?”
“Nope.” Tequila was a different story, of course. She most definitely wasn’t laid back either. “But I’m crazy about Gavin.”
“Huh.” Nancy rifled through the folder in front of her.
“Huh?” Allie repeated. “What’s that mean?”
Nancy looked up at her and just paused for a moment. She evidently decided to go ahead with what she was thinking. “You haven’t been around. I’ve never heard of you. You didn’t even know the name of the town Gavin lives in.”
Yeah, okay, that didn’t seem like someone who was crazy about him. At least Nancy hadn’t mentioned the almost-marrying-someone-else thing.
“And you showed up in a wedding dress that I assume wasn’t for Gavin.”
Damn.
“Things with Gavin and I are complicated,” Allie said, hoping that would be enough. She didn’t owe Nancy an explanation, of course, but her comment sent Allie’s mind spinning back to the last time she and Gavin had been together.
They’d agreed that a complete break—no phone calls, emails or texts—was the easiest, safest way to go. If they weren’t going to make a life together, they needed to work on making two lives apart. As painful as it was to say good-bye, repeatedly saying good-bye after occasional phone calls or visits was worse.
“Well,” Nancy said, moving to the file cabinet. “Gavin’s life here is pretty simple.”
And the implication was clear: he liked it that way.
Allie could understand the temptation for simple, that was for sure. “Complicated” had been the main word to describe her life for a long time now.
“He’s only been here for a year,” Nancy went on.