“No,” Ty said, as if reading Gage’s mind.
Skye had the good sense not to argue.
However, “Skye, you have climbing experience, right? Can you run the rappler?” Gage asked.
She nodded.
“Ty, you lower him down, Skye can brace against the pole and make sure the slack doesn’t go out too fast. I’ll take Hunter down to the bottom.”
Ty glanced at the sled, up to Adam. “You sure you can handle the sled alone? Technically we’re above the snow guns—it’s too steep. You sure you won’t get yourself—and this kid—hurt?”
Maybe it was the bright blue sky, the onlookers, the taste of adrenaline, but in Ty’s question, Gage heard the past rise. Heard the voice, quiet, pleading. Female. “Please, Gage, don’t do this. You’re going to get somebody hurt.”
It jarred him.
Then, Hunter groaned, and Gage came back to himself.
“Yes,” he said. He hiked over to his board, glancing up at Adam. “My friends are going to get you down. Don’t worry, kid!”
He happened to look at the onlookers just then. Yes, cell phones were tracking his movements.
Once upon a time, he would have waved; even now he felt the old habit stir inside him.
Then, three chairs down he spotted the T. rex.
And behind him, the buddy with the GoPro.
“You’ve got to be kidding me.”
Ty glanced at him, but Gage shook his head. His rant would have to wait.
Skye was climbing into the belay harness when Gage snapped his boots into his board. He stepped between the brake handles of the sled, and Ty helped him out with a push.
Don’t lose control. Don’t overcorrect.
Don’t get anyone killed.
He glanced up again at the T. rex and shook his head. “Hang in there, Hunter. We’ll be down in no time.”
The colder it got up here on top of the mountain, stalled on the Timber Bowl chair, the more the T. rex next to her threatened to jump.
“I could make it. The only reason that punk missed was because he didn’t have enough launch.”
“Are you kidding me?” Ella Blair curled her fingers into a ball inside her mittens. She already couldn’t feel her toes, and she’d snugged her nose into her neck gaiter, a film of fog covering her goggles.
Three chairs ahead, at the tower, the two ski patrollers had anchored themselves around the pole and were using a kind of belay system to lower the skier. She still couldn’t believe the bravery of the first responder—climbing up four stories on the pole to fix the kid into the sling. For a second there, she thought the terrified teenager might just leap into the patrol’s arms.
She turned, looking down behind her, and spied him, attached to the bright red sled, sliding through the powder and down the bowl toward the base.
His thighs had to be on fire, shredding the hill at first one angle, then the next.
Now that was the kind of hero she wanted to be—someone who actually helped people with real problems.
Not tracking down her delinquent brother.
Now her fingers had gone numb, and save for the adrenaline of watching the ski patrol lower the idiot teenager hanging from the lift, she would be a frozen, hypothermic ball.
She wanted to get off this mountain, and fast. The bright, sunny day had deceived her into believing that heading west to hijack her brother’s ski vacation was a brilliant stratagem for getting him turned around and headed back to Vermont, and more specifically, his sophomore year at Middlebury. She still didn’t understand why her parents seemed okay with his ski-bum sabbatical.
But the longer they sat here, the longer she despaired of having a real conversation with Oliver. After all, clearly he wasn’t taking anything she said seriously. Not dressed in that ridiculous costume.
More, he hardly seemed rattled that his sister had flown across the country, tracked him down, and boarded a ski lift with him nearly out of the blue.
Not so much out of the blue, because she’d been watching him, trying to figure out how to pin him down for a come-to-Jesus chat since arriving at their parents’ resort condo this morning. No, actually since she’d gotten the semi-drunk pocket call from him three nights ago. Slurred speech and muffled raucous laughter in the bar around him, something about Montana and skiing down Heaven’s Peak.
She’d yelled into the phone at the top of her lungs before finally giving up.
And booking a flight.
“No, really, it’s not that far,” Ollie said, clearly still fixed on his ludicrous stunt. “I can reach it.”
He reached out, swinging the chair, and she screamed and grabbed the bar. “Stop! You’re going to push me off.”
“Look, I can almost reach the pole.” He strained toward the rungs on the tower, trying to hook one.