Crave （Crave #1） by Tracy Wolff
For My Boys,
Who Have Always Believed in Me
and
For Stephanie,
Who Helped Me Believe in Myself Again.
0
If You’re Not Living
on the Edge, You’re
Taking Up Too Much Space
I stand at the outer tarmac door staring at the plane I am about to get on and try my hardest not to freak the f out.
It’s easier said than done.
Not just because I’m about to leave behind everything I know, though up until two minutes ago, that was my main concern. Now, though, as I stare at this plane that I’m not even sure deserves the dignity of being called a plane, a whole new level of panic is setting in.
“So, Grace.” The man my uncle Finn sent to pick me up looks down at me with a patient smile. Philip, I think he said his name was, but I can’t be sure. It’s hard to hear him over the wild beating of my heart. “Are you ready for an adventure?”
No. No, I am not the least bit ready—for an adventure or anything else that’s about to come my way.
If you had told me a month ago that I would be standing on the outskirts of an airport in Fairbanks, Alaska, I would’ve said that you were misinformed. And if you had told me that the whole reason I was in Fairbanks was to catch the tiniest puddle jumper in existence to what feels like the very edge of the world—or, in this case, a town on the edge of Denali, the highest mountain in North America—I would have said that you were high as a freaking kite.
But a lot can change in thirty days. And even more can get ripped away.
In fact, the only thing I have been able to count on these past few weeks is that no matter how bad things are, they can always get worse…
1
Landing Is Just Throwing
Yourself at the Ground and
Hoping You Don’t Miss
“There she is,” Philip says as we clear the peaks of several mountains, taking one hand off the steering column to point to a small collection of buildings in the distance. “Healy, Alaska. Home sweet home.”
“Oh, wow. It looks…” Tiny. It looks really, really tiny. Way smaller than just my neighborhood in San Diego, let alone the whole city.
Then again, it’s pretty hard to see much of anything from up here. Not because of the mountains that loom over the area like long-forgotten monsters but because we’re in the middle of a weird kind of haze that Philip refers to as “civil twilight” even though it’s barely five o’clock. Still, I can see well enough to make out that the so-called town he’s pointing at is full of mismatched buildings randomly grouped together.
I finally settle on, “Interesting. It looks…interesting.”
It’s not the first description that popped into my head—no, that was the old cliché that hell has actually frozen over—but it is the most polite one as Philip drops even lower, preparing for what I’m pretty sure will be yet another harrowing incident in the list of harrowing incidents that have plagued me since I got on the first of three planes ten hours ago.
Sure enough, I’ve only just spotted what passes for an airport in this one-thousand-person town （thank you, Google） when Philip says, “Hang on, Grace. It’s a short runway because it’s hard to keep a long one clear of snow or ice for any amount of time out here. It’s going to be a quick landing.”
I have no idea what a “quick landing” means, but it doesn’t sound good. So I grab the bar on the plane door, which I’m pretty sure exists for just this very reason, and hold on tight as we drop lower and lower.
“Okay, kid. Here goes nothing!” Philip tells me. Which, by the way, definitely makes the top five things you don’t ever want to hear your pilot say while you’re still in the air.
The ground looms white and unyielding below us, and I squeeze my eyes shut.
Seconds later, I feel the wheels skip across the ground. Then Philip hits the brakes hard enough to slam me forward so fast that my seat belt is the only thing keeping my head from meeting the control panel. The plane whines—not sure what part of it is making that horrendous noise or if it’s a collective death knell—so I choose not to focus on it.
Especially when we start skidding to the left.
I bite my lip, keep my eyes squeezed firmly shut even as my heart threatens to burst out of my chest. If this is the end, I don’t need to see it coming.
The thought distracts me, has me wondering just what my mom and dad might have seen coming, and by the time I shut down that line of thinking, Philip has the plane sliding to a shaky, shuddering halt.