Lost in the Wild by Leigh Mayberry (i am malala young readers edition txt) 📕

He waited until Meghan turned on her LED flashlight before he removed his from a pocket. He scanned the exterior of the place. Everywhere around the muddy earth, empty whiskey bottles. Meghan saw a few broken beer bottles among the trash heaps.

“This is a place used by a lot of people,” she said. “How am I just finding out about this?” She flashed the light over Lester and Oliver’s face.

“You never asked before,” Oliver said innocently.

“Well, I’m asking now. Is there anywhere else that either of you know where they like to come to drink?”

Far off, they heard the snowmachine revving as it cut across the landscape. By the time the police got back to town, the culprits had a few hours head start.

Meghan went inside. It had a low ceiling. She saw the wallpaper was layers of nude magazines. The place had been around so long, men used print media as wall covering. She saw Oliver looking sheepish when he saw the interior. She kicked around more empty bottles. The ones inside the shed had residue. Under the ragged blankets and nylon torn sleeping bag, Meghan found a new container, unopened, still sealed. She picked it up. Lester eyed it cautiously like it was a wild animal in her hand.

“This is state land?” she asked.

Lester nodded.

“No one owns this place as far as either of you knows?” she asked.

Both men shook their heads.

Meghan left the shed. She took her time to walk around the shell of the hut. Meghan kicked away the four-wheeler tires stacked against the back wall. She cleared away anything that looked like rubber or plastic. It took a few minutes. Lester and Oliver waited, watching her.

“I’m sending a message tonight, gentlemen. We need to face these assholes. I am tired of the bootleggers in my town.”

Meghan broke the seal on the unopened bottle. She saw Lester’s nostrils flash in the dark. Meghan returned to the interior of the hut, poured the whiskey over the fabric and newspaper and piles of urine-soaked junk. She tossed the bottle on the collection. Before Meghan left the shelter, she used the tip of her boot, the same boot tip she kicked Eugene Tuktu, and knocked over the glass lantern filled with seal oil. The spilled accelerant flared and claimed the rest of the debris.

Meghan marched back to the boat as the area illuminated in erupting firelight. Lester and Oliver cast off. Lester pull-started the motor as Oliver pushed away from the shore with the oar. Meghan sat in the center of the boat, snug in her life vest, watching as the flames climbed into the sky. She knew it was a fire they’d see for miles. It was a fire that meant she had enough. Meghan wanted to show the occupants of her city that the police weren’t interested in extorting people. They weren’t bullies, they were law enforcement officers, and that’s precisely what she intended.

There was a sense of relief, as if burning the shack on the edge of Hotham Inlet not only sent a message to the bootleggers and the residents of Kinguyakkii, it cleansed Meghan of doubt. For the first time since she accepted the job and took up the shield, Meghan felt like she wasn’t an outsider anymore. She was part of the community, and she belonged there. Moving forward, Meghan knew it was a different game. She wasn’t afraid of stepping on toes or worrying about what the mayor thought of her performance. Meghan had a lot more people on her side than she realized. It felt good to come home again.

“They can see that fire in town,” Oliver said.

“I know.”

“You think someone will call Rowland?” he asked.

Meghan winced. Rowland Searson, the fire chief and only paid member of the volunteer fire department, wasn’t a proactive man. “I think we’ll be okay,” she said.

“What’s your next plan?” Oliver asked. She saw the delight on his face, even in the dark.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Duane Warren arrived at City Hall a little after nine on Tuesday morning. Meghan, Lester, and Oliver only returned to Kinguyakkii within the hour after sunup. They smelled like tundra and oily smoke. Meghan sat in the office at the conference table with Oliver and Lester. She had bottled water in her grimy hands. Showering had to wait. They still had another matter to handle before she went home to shower.

Ten minutes after Duane pulled the pick-up into the reserved spot between City Hall and the contractor trailers that made up the police department, he stormed into the office.

“You can’t do that,” he said. “What happens when the tourists show up?”

“I’m sending a message.”

He looked like a man caught between the pit and the pendulum. Meghan knew whatever authority he had over her ended the moment they had the last conference call with the Borough.

They spent a few minutes devising the sign they wanted to use to broadcast Meghan’s return to the police department. Oliver had leftover spray paint and had relatively good penmanship when it came to writing on a slice of plywood they claimed from under the trailers.

“It sends the wrong message,” Duane said. She knew he held back. He wanted to say more to her, but the look suggested he knew better.

Meghan stood up from the table. Lester and Oliver followed her through the archway and swinging door to the lobby and out the front door. The new sign was a temporary fixture. A far as Duane knew, there wasn’t a time limit on how long they left the makeshift sign.

“You can’t do this,” he said.

Duane followed them outside where the sign began attracting attention from morning commuters. People traveling on foot and four-wheeler slowed long enough to absorb the message.

“I can do this, and I am going to keep it up as long as it takes,” Meghan said.