Breaking the Ice Read Online Free Page A

And was she even still in Fairbanks? The letter was written thirteen years ago. Maggie Rasmussen could be anywhere by now.
    Karla stood, still clutching the letter, and went to fire up her computer. You could track down almost anyone on the Internet these days. Couldn’t you?

    *

    October 21, evening
    Bettles, Alaska

    Despite the early winter snowstorm raging through interior Alaska, twenty-six of the twenty-seven residents of Bettles were happily enjoying dinner, drinks, and an evening’s entertainment in the Den, provided by four of their own: Grizz on bass, his wife Ellie on piano, Bryson on drums, and Lars Rasmussen on alto sax.
    The place was a typical Alaskan roadhouse, one large room with dark oak paneling and a wood floor dotted with peanut shucks. A stuffed grizzly bear greeted customers at the door, and the walls were decorated with mounted moose heads and caribou antlers, neon beer signs and dogsled paraphernalia. A bar ran along one side, booths ringed the walls, and a scattering of tables with mismatched chairs filled the rest.
    The Bettles Band, as they called themselves, sat on a small raised platform in the back corner. Their performances were usually impromptu, dictated mostly by the weather and the number of tourists in town. If the sky was clear and clients ample, Bryson was usually flying and Lars was guiding some fisherman or hunter to their quarry. But oftentimes when a whiteout or fog stranded the two of them in town, the call went out that the party was on. And tonight was jazz night, always a popular favorite.
    Bryson and Lars were the only far-flung homesteaders present. It was too early in the season for snowmobiles or dogsleds, and the weather was too poor for boats, so those hardy souls who lived off in the bush somewhere were unable to make it in. But a handful of Athabascan Indians from the nearby native village of Evansville were here, along with a half-dozen Japanese tourists who’d come to the Arctic Circle hoping for a glimpse of the aurora borealis, or northern lights. The only other outsider in town, Bryson’s photographer client, had spent a long while at the bar before he stumbled upstairs to his room hours earlier.
    The band finished a rousing rendition of “All Of Me” to wild applause before pausing for a break. Bryson was stowing her drumsticks when Geneva De Luca, a waitress at the Den, appeared at her elbow.
    “Heya, Bry. You guys are really cooking tonight.” Geneva was a curvaceous brunette with flawless olive skin, smoky gray eyes, and full, pouty lips that invited kissing. Bryson had succumbed to them for three months before she decided it was best to keep their relationship platonic. Six months had elapsed since then, but Geneva never missed an opportunity to try to change Bryson’s mind.
    “Good easy crowd.” Bryson got to her feet to stretch. “Not hard to please,” she added with a smile.
    Geneva laughed. “Neither am I, but that’s beside the point, right?”
    “Gen, we’ve talked about this, and—”
    “Yeah, yeah. I know. Anyway, Ellie’s getting better. She’s in here all the time practicing.”
    “It shows,” Bryson said. “Her repertoire’s growing. Bet by spring breakup she’ll be pretty damn good.” All of the players got exponentially better during the long winter months when they often didn’t have much else to do but practice. Ellie had only been playing for about a year. She’d taken up the piano when their last player, a wilderness guide, had packed it in for easier work in Yosemite.
    “Pity there’s so few outsiders in town, though.” Geneva scanned the crowd before returning her gaze to Bryson. “I was kinda hoping we’d be full up and you’d have to stay with me tonight.”
    “Let it go,” Bryson said, not unkindly. “You know that’s not going to happen again.”
    Geneva let out an exaggerated sigh and pursed her lips in disappointment. “You can’t blame a girl for trying. When I think back to that last