It's Christmas eve day and Constable Marco Trepalli of the Mendenhall Police Department can't wait to be off shift. He's planning a big surprise for his girlfriend, Amanda. Something special. Something romantic.

Then a kid doesn't return home after sledding and Trepalli forgets all about his plans in the mad scramble to mobilize search parties and interview the kid's friends. And as hour after hour slips by with no sign of the boy, Trepalli braces himself for what could turn into the worst Christmas ever… for him and the kid's family.

About Marcelle Dubé:

Marcelle Dubé grew up near Montreal. After trying out a number of different provinces—not to mention Belgium—she settled in the Yukon, where people still outnumber carnivores, but not by much. Her short fiction has appeared in a number of magazines and anthologies.