He couldn’t imagine being alone at three, even inside a house. But here? In the untamed Alaskan wilderness that had claimed more than one adult life?

It was hard not to imagine a three-year-old version of Elsie, alone, scared.

“And there happens to be a missing person here now?” He raised his eyebrows.

“I know.” Elsie shook her head. “When I knew where we were heading, I wondered.”

“What if it’s a trap?”

“What if it’s not? I can’t leave someone here. Lost people need to be found, Wyatt. Someone has to do it.”

Couldn’t someone else, though? As though she heard his thoughts, Elsie shook her head. And he understood—no one else around did K-9 search and rescue, and in rugged terrain like this, having a dog to help search was a huge advantage.

Still, anxiety wouldn’t release its grip on him. “Let me help you. Please.”

She seemed to be considering him. Studying him. What did she see?

“Okay.”

Okay?

“I could use another searcher. Willow is the star of the show here. I read her cues and help her know what areas to search. I could use someone else with me. It’s better to be in pairs and those guys were just telling me that they had planned to stay together. If we split up, we will be more efficient, but I’m not eager to be alone here.”

Honest. Vulnerable.

“Whatever you need. I want to help.”

“Thank you.”

Any man who could listen to her insist she didn’t need his help and then graciously offer it when it became apparent that she did need it couldn’t be too bad.

Elsie reached down and petted Willow, took a deep breath. She was distracted today, too in her own head and her own past to go through the motions like she usually did. She felt out of the cone, and not sure how to get herself mentally back to where she wanted to be.

Desperate, she closed her eyes, took a couple of breaths and tried to let them out slowly.

Nothing to do now but focus on what needed to be done. The thought of someone dying because she had been distracted was unacceptable to her. They were counting on her to find them.

She wondered if the troopers would have asked for her and Willow’s help if they’d known that this was so close to the island where she’d been abandoned as a kid.

Who had abandoned her was still a major question. Foul play had to have been involved somewhere, especially in the absence of a missing-person report that could have shed light on her identity. But it all remained a mystery.

“Ready?” she made herself turn to Willow and ask, desperate to move past this.

Willow looked up at her, ice blue eyes focused.

“That’s my girl,” Elsie said with a smile and a small laugh. There was something reassuring in knowing that Willow was ready to work, even if her handler was struggling today. She had to do her best for the dog. It was amazing to Elsie how when people and dogs worked together, the humans were usually the weak link. The dogs knew what they were doing and did their jobs well.

She gave Willow the command to search and the dog ran ahead of her, though Elsie knew she wouldn’t go far. She and Wyatt would trail, waiting and hoping for Willow to pick up a scent.

“How will she know who to search for?”

“She won’t this time,” Elsie answered as they moved onto higher ground, trading the dark gray rocks of the coastal beach for the larger rocks and grassy area that made up the higher part of the shore. Willow had already headed into the woods, and they followed her. “I gave her instructions to search for any humans at all, since as far as we know, the four of us and whoever’s missing are the only people on this island.”

“Won’t she just find the troopers?”

Elsie shrugged. “She may. But without a strong scent item from the missing person, this is the best option.”

“They didn’t have anything for you?”

Elsie shook her head. “No.” She hadn’t been told much about the person they were searching for, which wasn’t her preference. While the dog was the strongest member of any K-9 search and rescue team, Elsie was also a valuable member. Her human brain could synthesize information that Willow’s couldn’t, and Elsie took pride in the number of trainings she’d attended. She always wanted to learn and work better.

Without more information on the victim, she couldn’t make a very good profile to help her search more intelligently. She’d have to talk to the troopers later and get more information. For now, she just knew the missing person was a female in her midtwenties. She and a friend had come to the island to hike and became separated. Only the friend had made it back to town and had reported the other woman missing. There would be a record of her name and presence on the island, at least, even if the friend hadn’t made it back. Because of its remote location and the fact that it was owned by the forest service, they kept a log of all visitors.

It was an isolated place to hike, but Elsie knew that Midnight Ridge, the mountain that made up the high point of the island, was a destination for some hikers who wanted an incredible view.

They and the missing woman should be the only ones here. At least legally. They continued through the woods, Elsie watching the ground under her feet, the thick trees around her, for any sign that someone else had been here recently.

“So what made you want to work with search dogs?” Wyatt asked, apparently trying to start a conversation.

“I’m a little busy right now. No time for that.” Elsie blew out a breath of frustration. Didn’t he realize she was working?

“So what do you do right now? I thought you just followed Willow.”

He got points for remembering her dog’s name, she would give him that.

“I’m observing, trying to see evidence someone may have left behind. Watching Willow’s behavior... She has an alert bark when she’s found what she’s looking for, and I like to pay attention to her overall attitude and see what I can read from that.”

“Like what?”

It was harder for her to explain than she would have thought, and for a moment Elsie almost wished she were alone. Then she remembered that she had been alone on an island like this once, and that someone might be after her now.

Willow was following some kind of scent trail, made by either a hiker or game, rather than just blazing through the woods. That implied to Elsie that their missing hiker may have come this way.

She needed to ask the troopers for more information about the missing woman if the search lasted longer than today, which her gut was telling her would be the case.

Willow’s ears perked suddenly, and Elsie’s vision tunneled in on the dog. Willow looked to the left, ran off at a sprint.

“She’s got something!” Elsie tossed the explanation behind her and took off at a run behind her dog, not looking back to see if Wyatt followed. The job took first priority, and she couldn’t afford to ask Willow to slow down. Any number of things, even a shift in the wind, could make the dog lose the trail.

They hadn’t been hiking for long. The chances of the missing person being this close to the edge of the woods didn’t seem likely to Elsie, but she could be wrong. Willow had probably caught a heavy patch of scent, and it would still take some determination and patience to reach where the missing person actually was.

Willow stopped. Elsie stopped, too, then crept slowly toward the dog.

A low growl echoed from Willow’s throat.

Elsie’s heartbeat caught in her chest. This shouldn’t be happening. Willow was trained to find people, and search dogs typically displayed enthusiasm and joy when they’d succeeded. Chills chased down Elsie’s spine.

She looked back.