For some reason when we got to the park entrance Coyote and Gary both looked at me like they expected me to pay the fee for all three of us. I'd paid it at Olympic, but Mandy'd been doing me a huge favor. This time we were all in it together, although Gary was more all in for fear of missing something than for standing the line. Not that he wouldn't. He was a good guy to have at my back when things got rough, a fact I knew from experience.

Somehow that talked me into paying the fee, and we drove into the park with me feeling like I'd been Jedimind-tricked. "Wait a minute, where are we, anyway? Which entrance was that?"

"Nisqually." Coyote looked over his shoulder at me. "Weren't you listening? The body was found near the Longmire museum."

"Wouldn't the pickings be richer at Paradise?" That was the only section of the park I'd ever really heard about, mostly thanks to the occasional news story about the visitor's center. It looked like a flying saucer, and the roof kept threatening to collapse under the snowfall. They were going to build a new one any minute now.

"There's a lot of old growth forest around Longmire. The wendigo's probably drawn to it."

I said, "Ah," then squinted at him. "You're from Arizona. How can you possibly know this?"

He held up a PDA with a Wikipedia entry visible on its little square screen. "Oh. That's not very mystical of you."

"No, but it's handy." He flashed me a grin underscored by Gary's chuckle, and we fell into a companionable game of glimpse-the-mountain wherever there was a gap in the trees. Not too much later we pulled into the parking lot of what a sign proclaimed was the National Park Inn, which, from the outside, was a genuinely gorgeous rustic-looking building with the mountain serving as a dramatic backdrop.

Gary whistled. "Damn, that's something."

I said, "It is," except my eyes had fallen right off the vista and landed on a black 1967 Chevy Impala. It didn't belong up here in the woods any more than Petite might've, but it was a beautiful car. Gary parked a few spaces down from it and I got out to walk circles around it. Kansas license plates. I patted the Impala's hood and mumbled, "Long way from home, aren't you, baby?" before reluctantly turning away.

Laurie Corvallis, evening anchor for Channel Two News, stood right behind me with a smile as pointy as a crocodile's. "And so are you, Detective Walker."

In any other circumstances I'm sure I would've seen the news van another fifteen feet down the lot, and suggested to Coyote and Gary that we get the hell out of there. But I was weak in the face of classic cars, and truthfully, we couldn't have escaped anyway. This was where the job was, for us just as much as for Laurie Corvallis.

Which was hardly something I could say to her. I fished my best genuine smile out of somewhere and said, "Fancy meeting you here. You up for the Christmas break?"

"I'm not," she said, every bit as pleasantly. "And neither are you."

"Really? I thought I was. I'm going to be disappointed, then. So why am I here?" She didn't have a microphone, so I didn't much care that I sounded like a babbling idiot.

"You're up here following the Seattle Slaughterer, just like I am, Detective. And the fact that you're here makes me all the more certain I'm going to get my story. I'll be watching you."

"Ms. Corvallis." I rubbed a finger over my eye. I hadn't been smart enough to take my contacts out at the apartment. Three hours of staring out the window and forgetting to blink made me wish I had. Glasses were more forgiving of that behavior. "If I were up here on police business I'd be here with my partner, not friends. Call Captain Morrison, if you like. I'm here on my own."

"That doesn't mean you're not where the story is, Detective. I look forward to seeing more of you soon." She walked away, leaving me with an increasing pit of dread in my tummy.

Coyote caught up to me, carrying his own bag, but not, I noticed, mine. "Cute. Who is she?"

"The devil."

"Really. I thought the devil would be taller." He jogged into the lodge after Corvallis. I bent, scooped up a handful of snow, and caught him in the back of the head with it just before the doors closed behind him.

Gary, who was carrying my bag, stopped at my side. "What's the deal, Jo?"

"Nothing, it's just that woman is going to make this a lot more complicated."

His bushy eyebrows went up and he glanced after Coyote. I don't know how I knew he was looking at Coyote and not Corvallis, but I did. "Is that a that woman like a woman means it, or like a cop means it?"

I took my bag from him as an excuse to give him a hard, considering look. "Whoever said men don't understand women obviously never met you. It was a cop that woman. I don't care if Coyote thinks she's cute. She is cute. She's also going to get herself killed."

"Nah. She ain't the outdoorsy type." Gary, clearly satisfied with his line of reasoning, marched into the lodge. I stared after him, then, because there was nothing else I could do, shrugged assent and followed him.

Corvallis was at the front desk, trying to flirt with Coyote, who arched an eyebrow at me over her head. She looked to see who he was making eyes at, and her smile went flat. It went flatter still when I gave my name and the desk attendant pulled up our reservations. I saw no reason at all to tell Corvallis they'd been made from the phone on the drive down. Better to let her think we'd had them for weeks. Maybe it would throw her off the scent, although I didn't really think anything could.

Certainly she didn't fail to notice we were all staying in one room, which clearly, in her opinion, put the kibosh on any potential romance between me and Coyote. I sort of had to agree with her, but on the other hand, if we were going to fight monsters, I didn't want the team split up even for sleeping. That was how people got picked off in horror movies.

Corvallis, who wasn't privy to my line of thought, cozied up to Coyote a little more. I resisted the urge to drop my bag on her foot, but only because it was a soft-sided backpack that wouldn't do her any damage. Coyote gave me another look over her head. Gleeful, I said, "Cut it out, Corvallis. He's with Gary."

I couldn't decide which of the three looked more shocked, but it left me grinning as the girl behind the counter offered me room keys. "It's a bed-and-breakfast package. Just give them your room number in the morning. Welcome to the National Park Inn, and please let us know if there's anything we can do to make your visit more comfortable."

A blast of cold air dropped the lobby's temperature by about ten degrees. We all turned to see a petite park ranger with a grim expression holding them open. Her face was pale, cords standing out in her throat, but she lifted an extremely steady voice to say, "Ladies and gentlemen, I'm going to have to ask everyone to stay inside for a little while. I'm afraid we've had another incident."

Coyote, Gary, Laurie Corvallis and I all ran for the door.