She eased her way along the road that ribboned around the long, wide lake. All those places would need someone to fetch and carry and clean, especially now that the spring thaw was dulling the sharpest edge of winter.īut since her car was now sending out thicker, more desperate smoke signals, the first priority was a mechanic. There’d be at least one hotel, likely a couple of B and B’s, maybe a dude ranch within a few miles. A place like this-the signpost had said the population was 623-probably ran to tourism, exploiting the scenery and the proximity to the national park. If nothing else, she’d take a few days to enjoy the lake, the mountains, and pick up enough money to get back on the road again. And all the hours between.Īnd here was another fresh start, another blank slate in the bunched fingers of Angel’s Fist. To be fair, she supposed the therapy had given her the base to face herself every single day. These past months of living with herself, essentially by herself, had done more to smooth her out than the full year of therapy. There was a freedom in the system she’d developed, and often-more often now-a lessening of the constant hum of anxiety in the back of her mind. Pick up some work, scout the area, then move on when those signs, those impulses, pointed in a new direction. She might settle in for a few weeks, or, like she had in South Dakota, a few months.

If she liked the look of the light or the weather vane, she’d follow, until she found what seemed like the right place at the right time. Other signs might be a peculiar slant of sunlight aimed down a back road, or a weather vane pointing south. It was nice that someone took the time and effort to post those kinds of warnings. Over the past eight months, she’d developed a strong belief in following signs and impulses. So something must have been pulling her to this spot. She hadn’t had a clue where she’d end up when she started out that day before dawn, but she’d bypassed Cody, zipped through Dubois, and though she’d toyed with veering into Jackson, she dipped south instead. She’d been meandering her way toward them, through the Ansel Adams photograph of peaks and plains for hours. It had the openness she needed-all that sky with the snow-dipped peaks of the Tetons rising into it like sober, and somehow aloof, gods. The little Wyoming town huddled around the cold blue waters of a lake was as good as anywhere else. No worries, no problem, she told herself.

She took the plumes of steam puffing out of the hood as a sign it was time to stop traveling for a while and find a job. Then, even by the most optimistic calculations, she’d be broke. If luck was on her side, and the car wasn’t seriously ill, she’d have enough to pay for a room for the night. She had two hundred forty-three dollars and change in her pocket, which might be enough to cure the Chevy, fuel it and herself. REECE GILMORE smoked through the tough knuckles of Angel’s Fist in an overheating Chevy Cavalier.

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