Page 10 of Protecting the Flame

Chapter 5

On the way to the charters’hangar, she spotted an airport shop that sold sweatshirts with bison logos, ball caps, magazines, newspapers, candy, gum, buttons, aspirin, and anything else a traveler might need so long as she was willing to cough up an obscene amount of money. The muffin was a stone in her gut, but at least it hadn’t reappeared, so she might as well stock up because who knew when they’d get to Lone Ridge Airstrip, a place so tiny the charter pilot said there was no control tower and all flights were VFR only. Visual flights rules, he’d said. It’s one thing instrument flying in clouds. We can do that, but it’s another trying to land somewhere, at night, with no tower or landmarks. She’d already called Kuntz to let him know she wouldn’t be landing at Billings. Thankfully, Kuntz—he kept telling her to call him Kujo, and all she could think of was that rabid dog—knew the airstrip, which was east of Lonesome, and said he’d get in touch with Hank Cooper so she wouldn’t have long to wait for a pickup.

Maybe Kim was right. Maybe this was going to be okay after all, she thought, as she pulled two Gatorades from a cooler. She debated about a third Gatorade because hydration was important then thought that since she’d also gotten another piping-hot-but-tasteless herbal tea for her travel mug, she might live to regret that decision. She doubted the charter would have a john. Instead, she selected two sandwiches, egg salad and tuna. She wasn’t the least bit hungry, but she was trying to be optimistic.

As she passed the shelves with various toiletries and over-the-counter meds, she looked for one particular item even as she told herself that a) she was being a nut and b) nothing would change. It was almost a relief when she didn’t find what she was looking for but then, as she eyed a couple with two kids in tow wandering through, she considered that everything in a place like this had to be completely G-rated.

At the checkout, she threw in a bag of trail mix, Tic-Tacs, M&Ms, another travel-sized mouthwash, gum, and, finally, an Almond Joy because sometimes you just feel like a nut. The total bill came to thirty-five dollars before she also added a New York Times to the pile because there was something about the smell of newsprint and a real paper she liked. The downside was she’d wind up with blackened fingers. But, hey, beggars.