Part 3
Luna’s paws broke through the crust where the mouse had been. Snow closed cold around her legs, and for a terrible second there was nothing in her mouth but ice and air.
Then the mouse moved again under her chest.
She struck by instinct, too weak to be graceful and too hungry to stop. When it was over, she dragged herself beneath the porch and ate in the shadow, shaking from effort. It was not enough to fill her. It was enough to keep her alive that day.
Three weeks later, in a downtown Minneapolis title office warmed too high for winter coats, Daniel Mercer sat across from Grant Whitmore and tried to make sense of the man’s calm.
The closing had been simple. Too simple, maybe. Daniel and his wife, Hannah, had been looking for a small lake cabin for years, but every decent property within a few hours of the city had either needed a fortune in repairs or sold before they could tour it. Pine Hollow had come through a friend of a friend. A seasonal cabin, fenced lot, old pines, two bedrooms, screened porch, woodstove, lake access down the road. The price was low because, Grant said, his wife’s medical bills were piling up and he needed cash quickly.
Daniel had believed that. He still believed it. But compassion had started to feel different the more Grant spoke.
Grant slid a folder across the conference table. “Keys, gate code, utility shutoff notes, everything’s in there.”
Daniel put his hand on the folder. “Thank you. I know this can’t be easy, with your wife still in care.”
Grant looked at the window, where melting snow ran in thin lines down the glass. “There’s one more thing. Better to tell you now.”
Daniel waited.
“My wife had a cat,” Grant said. “It’s at the cabin.”
“At the cabin,” Daniel repeated.
“On the property.”
Daniel’s hand stayed on the folder. “Who’s feeding it?”
Grant adjusted the cuff of his coat. “No one at the moment.”
For a second, the hum of the fluorescent lights seemed louder than the room.
“What does ‘at the moment’ mean?” Daniel asked.
Grant’s expression closed, not with shame but with annoyance, as if Daniel had focused on the least important line in a contract. “I was last up there in November. I left food.”
Daniel leaned back. “November.”
“My wife had a brain bleed,” Grant said. “She’s been in ICU, then long-term care. I’ve had other things to handle.”
“It’s March.”
Grant stood and buttoned his coat. “Then I guess you should check on it. It’s your property now.”
Daniel had dealt with difficult men before. Contractors who lied. Clients who dodged bills. People who wrapped selfishness in paperwork and expected politeness to protect them. Still, there was something in Grant’s tone that left Daniel without a quick answer.
Not regret. Inconvenience.
Grant picked up his leather briefcase. “Do what you want with it.”
Daniel watched him walk out through the glass door. Then he looked down at the keys lying on top of the folder. One was tagged in Claire’s handwriting, a careful blue label taped around the ring: Pine Hollow gate.
He did not go home.
He called Hannah from the parking ramp. She answered on the second ring, breathless from the classroom noise behind her; she taught third grade and was probably between dismissal and after-school pickup.
“Did we get it?” she asked.
“Yes,” Daniel said. “But there’s a cat out there.”
“A cat where?”
“At the cabin. Grant left it. Since November.”
The background noise on Hannah’s end shifted, then quieted. He could picture her stepping into the empty reading room, one hand pressed to her forehead.
“Danny.”
“I know.”
“You’re going up there.”
“I’m going now.”
“Roads?”
“He said the seasonal road isn’t plowed.”
“Then you need gear.”
Daniel was already thinking of his father’s garage. The old cross-country skis hanging from ceiling hooks. The heavy poles. The wax tins that still smelled faintly of pine tar and cold mornings.
“I’ll call you when I get close,” he said.
“No,” Hannah said. “Call me before you leave the paved road. And take the emergency blanket from the trunk. Take food. Take a flashlight. Take whatever you think you won’t need.”
Daniel almost smiled because fear had made her practical. “I will.”
He drove to the small detached garage behind his mother’s duplex in St. Paul, found the skis under a film of dust, and checked the bindings with hands that moved faster than his thoughts. His father had used them on winter fishing trips, back when Daniel was young enough to think men could fix anything by preparing properly.
By late afternoon, he was north of the city, following a highway between snowbanks taller than the sedan. The March sun had started to soften the top layer of snow, but the forecast warned of another hard freeze after dark. Daniel kept seeing Grant’s face in the title office. The clean coat. The mild irritation. The words no one at the moment.
Near Pine Hollow, the paved road was clear until the last turn. Then it simply ended.
Daniel stopped at the edge of a white trackless lane that disappeared between black trees. The GPS on his phone said the cabin was less than two miles in. Beyond his windshield, no tire marks, no footprints, no sign of anyone having entered the seasonal community since the last storm. He turned off the engine and listened to the sudden quiet…
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