The Last Lone Wolf by Maureen Child

buildings, the tiny scraps of sky you could see were never that beautiful. It made even the relentless walking more enjoyable. When she fell, landing face-first on the cushiony ground, she could only blame it on not watching her step.
    “Ow!”
    Nikki jumped from her grasp instantly and darted into the undergrowth before Daisy could call the dog back. Then Jericho was at her side in an instant, grabbing hold of the shoulder of her red sweater and pulling her to her feet in one smooth motion.
    “Are you all right?”
    “I’m fine,” she muttered, more embarrassed than hurt. She brushed pine needles, dirt and who knew what else off the front of her sweater and the knees of her jeans. “I was watching the sky, and— Nikki honey, come back here!”
    “Keep your eyes on where you’re going, all right?”
    “I will, it was just pretty and— Nikki!”
    The dog barked from somewhere nearby and Jericho muttered a curse.
    “I scared her when I fell,” Daisy said in defense of her dog. “I think I tripped on a rock or something.”
    “You sure you’re all right?”
    “I’m fine. Just humiliated.” The little dog raced toward her then and hopped on its hind legs as if doing a celebrational dance. “There you are, sweet girl! You scared Mommy running off like that.”
    “Mommy?”
    “She’s all mine,” Daisy said with a grin as she bent down to attach a bright-red leash to the chest halter the little dog wore.
    “Right.” Jericho shook his head. “Can we go now?”
    “Sure.” She was determined to be upbeat and positive through this entire experience. She’d earn her place on this mountain if it killed her. “I’m sure I can walkanother ten miles no problem. We’ve already come about that far, right?”
    He raised one eyebrow. “We’ve gone about two miles so far.”
    “Really? Well, that’s disappointing,” she said, silently acknowledging the aching burn in her thighs and calves. “It really seemed longer.”
    “You’re telling me,” Jericho muttered, then started walking again. Daisy fell into step behind him, keeping one eye on the trail and the other eye on Nikki.
    Though being at that altitude made talking, climbing and breathing all at the same time a little difficult, Daisy struggled on.
    “I looked you up, you know, before I came here,” she called out.
    “Is that right?”
    She frowned when he kept walking without so much as a glance at her. He couldn’t have let her know any more clearly that he wasn’t interested in what she was saying. But that didn’t silence her.
    “Well, not just you, but this place. The mountain itself. Did you know that grizzly bears used to live here?” Just saying that aloud had her checking the tree line warily even though she knew the animal was mostly extinct in California now.
    “Yep,” he said, “I knew.”
    “And,” she added, “did you know that King Mountain is the largest piece of acreage bordered on wilderness area that’s still in private hands?”
    “Knew that, too.”
    She frowned and chewed at her bottom lip. Of course he knew, it was his land after all, but he could at leastpretend to be polite about listening. “I saw a waterfall, too, on one of the maps I looked at. Are we going to see that on this trip?”
    “Might.”
    Aggravating man, she thought as her temper began to simmer. He was deliberately not talking to her. Probably trying to make her be quiet by his lack of response. Clearly, he didn’t know her very well. Her mother used to say that Daisy could talk to a stump. Which, she mused, she actually was doing.
    “I still can’t believe you own your own mountain,” she said, shaking her head, as if trying to wrap her mind around it. “I mean, did you know your name is on actual maps? King Mountain.”
    “Yeah,” he muttered, “I know. Did you know that you shouldn’t talk so much on the trail?”
    “Really? Why?”
    He turned and glared at her over his shoulder. “There are wild animals out here. You might want