A Matter of Trust(29)

He pulled the phone out. The area code looked familiar.

Recognition slid into him a moment before he answered. He dove right in. “Oliver, you’d better be calling me to tell me you’ve called off—”

“It’s Ella.”

Her voice came through the line wobbly, and it was the tiny gasp of breath that made him stop, slow down.

Listen.

“Oliver is gone.”

His tirade had alerted Ty, who turned around, listening.

“What do you mean, Oliver is gone?” Gage asked. He sent Ty a look, a shake of his head.

“We went out looking for him, but we didn’t find him. When we got home, he was already in his room. I know he took the semester off to be a ski bum, but I thought for sure he was just kidding about skiing Heaven’s Peak.” She paused, and her breath caught. “Oh, Gage, I think he did it.”

He closed his eyes, her voice tunneling through him, finding root. He imagined her pacing, wrapping a finger around that beautiful red hair, staring out the window at the mountain.

He found himself walking to the window and also staring at the mountain. The skies overhead arched blue, but in the western horizon, dark, gunmetal-gray clouds hovered, slowly rolling in.

“All his gear is gone, and Bradley’s is gone too,” Ella was saying.

“Maybe he’s come over to Blackbear?” Gage said.

“You took his ski pass.”

“He could go over to Big Mountain.”

“There are no bowls there. No powder.”

In other words, no danger.

“Calm down, Ella. Just take a breath here. In order to get up to Heaven’s Peak, they’d have to get a chopper ride. Going-to-the-Sun Road is closed past McDonald Lodge. And there just aren’t that many heli-ski pilots around. I’ll get on the horn and see what I can find out.”

“Seriously? Oh, Gage, thank you so much! I know”—she swallowed—“I know this isn’t your problem, and I appreciate it.” Her voice pitched low. “Thank you. I meant it when I said you were a good man.”

He didn’t have any response to that, feeling suddenly raw, wounded. He took a breath, kept his voice cool, unaffected. “I’ll get back to you, Ella. Don’t panic yet.”

He clicked off.

Ty had sat on the picnic table. “That kid is gone?”

“According to Ella, she woke up and found her brother missing.”

“Who’s missing?” Jess asked, coming to sit beside Ty.

“This kid who Gage chased down yesterday. Gage had to take away his ski pass, and that’s when the kid recognized him. Apparently Gage is his hero.”

The way Ty said hero, with a little singsong lilt, sent a smile up Jess’s face. See, Ty was a charmer—he just didn’t know it.

But a guy didn’t have to be a charmer with the right girl. No, the right girl made him say the right things, feel like he could stand on top of the world. The right girl laughed at his jokes and met his eyes with a smile that said he could do no wrong.

The right girl turned a guy into a bona fide hero.

“I’m no hero,” Gage said. “And if this kid follows in my tracks, he’ll get himself—and his buddy—killed.”

“What tracks?” Kacey said and stuck a spoonful of yogurt in her mouth.

“Gage’s epic run down Heaven’s Peak. Some kid he met yesterday wants to duplicate it,” Ty said, neatly leaving out their visit to the kid’s condo last night and Gage’s connection to his sister.

“I saw that run on YouTube, Gage.” Kacey raised an eyebrow. “Scared the air out of me.”

Gage allowed himself a smile. “I was younger, dumber, and braver. It’s a bad combination.”

“And exactly the combination of this Gage wannabe,” Ty said. He slid off the table. “But before we jump to conclusions, let’s check the lodge, see if he’s simply slunk back here and tried to get his hands on a new ski pass.” He thumped toward the door.

Gage followed him and pulled out his phone to scroll through his local heli-pilot contacts. All three of them.

Because he’d once been Oliver Blair. And without a doubt, Gage knew the kid was up on the mountain.



Brette Arnold could spot a great story. Especially when it appeared in the lip-biting, pacing, muttering form of her former housemate and best friend, state senator Eloise Zorich Blair.

“Are you okay?” Brette said as she poured herself a cup of coffee.

Ella glanced at her, her lips a tight, grim line.

Yep, there was a story behind those tired eyes, that wan look. And it most likely had a great deal to do with a handsome, long-haired ski patrol. “It’s my fault he’s a has-been, working ski patrol, chasing down hooligans like my brother instead of winning national championships. I wrecked his life.”