Virtuality

by H. L. Wegley

  “Thought I’d try andele instead.”

  Jess pressed her lips together until all the blood was gone.

  Pale lips were not a good sign.

  “When climbing rocks, it’s never andele. Everything you do is controlled and calculated, even if that means retardo. Got it?”

  “Jess, did you just call me a retard, or did you mean retardar?”

  The look she gave him came full of ambiguous, but threatening nuances.

  He needed to stop the word games. He’d given Jess enough grief this morning.

  She had already shed some mysterious tears. A lot of tears. It was time to please Jess and gather up the guts to climb this rock.

  And pray some EMT doesn’t have to gather up yours, dude.

  Forty minutes later, Vince stuck a hand above his head and laid it on top of the ledge that would complete the first pitch of a rock column that Jess called Choss Master. But the top of the rock ledge didn’t feel like rock. The surface had a different texture than anything he’d felt so far. If he were to describe it, he would call it—no. Something like that couldn’t be up here. That wasn’t possible, was it?

  He pulled his hand back down and wiped it on the rock. What kind of goo had he encountered?

  When he looked up at Jess, perched on the ledge belaying him, she grinned. “It’s bird poop. There’s too much to avoid. But don’t worry. By July, most of it is baked so hard you can just pretend it’s part of the rock.”

  “Gross. I just stuck my hand in a pigeon’s outhouse. Jess, it wasn’t all baked hard.”

  “You don’t sound like the little boy who gave Mr. Potts a beautifully wrapped Christmas gift full of cow manure … that you packed in by hand. Climb onto the ledge, clip on your anchor, and rest. In a few minutes, you’re going to belay me up the second pitch.”

  As Jess made her way up the second pitch, Vince was careful to feed her rope while keeping his brake hand ready. They had watched this on video last night, but now he understood the reasons for carefully following the procedure. He had to be ready to catch her in an instant if she came off the rock, especially since the last bolt she clipped into would be below her. As the lead climber, her fall would be farther than his. The quicker he reacted, the shorter her fall.

  Everything considered, it was a good excuse to watch a nicely shaped body and a sexy pair of legs. Not that he would tell her. But Jess knew he liked what he saw. She just didn’t know the rest of the story, and he didn’t know if he had the right to tell her, because Paul, even after his death, still blocked the door to her heart. Jess may not think so, but Vince knew the truth. And he would never make an incredible woman like Jess settle for second best.

  The air warmed rapidly as the sun broke the inversion in the small valley at Frenchman Coulee. At 6:35 a.m., Choss Master’s north-facing wall still stood in shadows. And Vince still stood in pigeon poop as he belayed Jess to the top of the second pitch.

  He watched as Jess scooted onto a ledge at the top of the rock.

  “Off belay.” Jess’s smooth, alto voice echoed softly off the surrounding rocks. She stood and pointed down at him.

  Vince cleared the rope from his belay device. “Belay off.” He sighed like a deflating tire, releasing the pent-up emotion of having Jess’s life in his hands. He had accomplished the most important thing Vince van Gordon could do, keep Jessica Jamison safe.

  She disappeared for about thirty seconds then returned to the rock’s edge. “Vince, one of the bolts up here is loose. I’m going to rig up something else so our anchor has redundancy. It might take five minutes or so.”

  “I’ll wait here in the birdie outhouse. I mean, it’s not like I had any other plans.” Clipped on his personal anchor, Vince sat on the ledge in an area of dry pigeon poop and studied the rock cliffs near him.

  Jess said July was one of the least popular months for climbing Frenchman Coulee. Too hot. In the sun, the rocks grew hot enough to fry fingers. They hadn’t seen anyone since arriving, only a helicopter that flew by an hour ago.

  Only a few minutes more and Vince could say he had mastered Choss Master.

  He waited a while longer then glanced at his watch. 6:45 a.m. Why was Jess taking so long? Well, better safe than sorry. And sorry, near the top of Choss Master, could mean dead, like the guy Jess told him about.

  Trying not to stumble on the coil of rope at his feet, Vince stood to call out to Jess, but a raspy sound came from above.

  He looked up toward the source of the noise.

  The upper end of the rope slid through the quickdraw attached to the topmost bolt.

  Had Jess dropped the rope?

  Fifteen feet of rope now dangled from the second bolt from the top. Though the end of the rope was more than ten feet above his head, the reason it had fallen was obvious. It had been cut.

  The incident with the car. Patrick’s mysterious, hostile behavior. Now a cut rope. It all sent his heart galloping at a presto tempo.

  He cupped his hands around his mouth. “Jess!”

  “Jess, are you okay?”

  Silence.

  Chapter 14

  If Jess could have come back to belay Vince up the remaining forty feet of Choss Master, she would already have appeared on the top ledge. Only two scenarios made sense. Either she had been injured or someone was keeping Jess from returning. The cut rope indicated the latter.

  Vince craned his neck and looked up the column of basalt rock recessed two feet into the wall of the cliff and lined with a crack up the left side. A dull, nauseating ache formed in his gut as he considered what a solo climb up the increasingly smooth rock face would mean.

  Maybe he should pull the rope down, anchor it to the bolt in front of him, and lower himself to the bottom. But, even if he made it down safely, it was a long hike around Frenchman Coulee to reach the top. And Jess was up there, somewhere, only forty feet above.

  She needs you, man.

  Thoughts of Jess in danger drove out all vestiges of fear. He scanned the column up to the top again. Maybe not quite all the fear.

  Vince stretched his right arm upward to the limit of his reach. The quickdraw suspended from the bolt above him dangled only six feet above his hand. If he could climb to where he could clip on to the quickdraw, or the bolt to which it was attached, he could reach the cut end of the rope. But he would be climbing unattached for a few feet.

  Jess’s catchphrase since she began instructing him had been, “Always, always, always stay clipped to the rock.”

  He would have to violate Jess’s cardinal rule of rock climbing to reach the rope. Once there, if he attached to the other end of the rope, he would have some measure of safety as he climbed to the second bolt from the top. But the remaining fifteen feet to the ledge on top—he could think about that later.

  Lately, Vince’s prayers were about as frequent as a Mariner series sweep at Safeco Field. But, as he unclipped his sling from the bolt in front of him, words slipped out in a hoarse whisper. “Help me get to Jess and I’ll do anything you want me to do.”

  Like trying to bribe God, dude?

  Vince clipped back onto the bolt, while his hands shook. Somehow, he had to do this, and his right brain screamed the message that every second he delayed meant more danger for Jess.

  He studied the handhold for a couple of seconds, unclipped from the bolt, and climbed several feet to the next bolt, where he clipped back on and waited for his pulse and quivering stomach to settle down. When Vince looked up, the cut end of the rope dangled within reach. He grabbed it and prepared to do something Jess would think was really stupid.

  Belaying himself—if one could even call it that—by tying a knot to form a loop near the cut end of the rope, clipping onto it with one of his slings, and then hoisting himself up using a quickdraw for a pulley, would probably have drawn an endless string of insults from Jess. But it worked.

  With fifteen feet left to climb, Vince stopped and clipped onto the bolt where the rope hung from the quickdraw.

&nb
sp; Now what?

  He studied the rock above him. The crack in the seams between the two columns of basalt widened near the top. The last ten feet formed what Jess had called a dihedral. Or was it a chimney?

  Regardless, she had told him about the technique of climbing between two rock faces, and she’d called it stemming. Jess said it took a different kind of strength to push feet and hands against rocks on either side of a climber while they worked their way up a rock. And it took a different rhythm.

  With only that bit of information, he would have to free climb to the top. One mistake, one slip, would be one too many. Maybe there was a way to partially mitigate the risk.

  Vince slid the rope through the quickdraw until he had created a fifteen-foot loop of rope that he could use as a crude sling by clipping the slack end of the rope onto his harness. After he’d pulled enough rope, Vince doubled a three-foot section and tied an overhand knot, forming a small loop that he clipped onto his harness.

  Though clipped to the topmost bolt, he had enough rope to reach the top and, if he fell, it would be at most fifteen feet down to the top bolt plus the fifteen feet of his improvised rope sling. But could the combination of rope, quickdraw and bolt absorb the shock and stop his two-hundred-twenty pounds after a thirty-foot fall?

  Best not to think about it. Even better not to put his unorthodox safety measures to the test. But it wasn’t like he had a choice.

  Vince had wasted too much time. He spread his feet and hands to span the gap between the two rock columns, leaned hard on his right hand and unclipped from the bolt using his left hand.

  He was stemming, either to the top of the rock or down to his tomb, and that’s how it—

  A shout rang out from somewhere over the top of the rock face. It echoed through the gorge.

  Vince’s name. Jess’s voice.

  He’d only heard desperation in her voice three times in his life. This was the fourth time.

  She wouldn’t have voluntarily gone so far away, leaving him on the rock face. Jess was in trouble and she needed him. Nothing else mattered.

  Vince switched sides with his hands and feet in rapid succession, climbing two or three feet every few seconds. Could he do this all the way to the top? For Jess he was willing to die trying.

  Three feet from the ledge on top, with feet pressed into the sides of the chimney, Vince reached for the ledge. His fingertips slid over it, but his left foot slid.

  He jammed his left hand into the rock, tightening the wedge to stop his slide. Pain shot up his arm from wrist to elbow. The muscles of his left forearm spasmed.

  Vince groaned against the pain and pushed even harder with his left hand. But his hand began a skin-shredding slide down the rough rock.

  Desperate now, he stomped his left foot into the basalt column and pushed with all his leg strength.

  His slide slowed, nearly to a stop. He added his injured hand to the stemming mix.

  With his left arm screaming its complaint, he pulled it from the rock and pressed outward with both legs.

  The slide stopped.

  Vince looked at his position. He’d slid downward only a foot or two. But the price had been steep.

  With his feet holding him in place, he turned his left hand palm up. Blood ran down his wrist. It had come from the heel of his hand which was now missing most of its skin.

  He’d sprained a wrist in football. That seemed to be what he’d done to his left wrist when he jammed it into the rock. He’d probably injured it further by jamming it again.

  It didn’t matter. None of it mattered if he couldn’t reach Jess. If he couldn't save her, it wouldn’t matter if he fell. Without Jess, life would lose its appeal to Vince van Gordon.

  His legs shook. His groin muscles had stretched to their limits. Vince snorted and shook his head to clear it and regain his focus.

  If he could only get his fingers on that ledge four feet beyond his reach. If …

  His legs felt like they’d been manufactured by Goodyear and his left hand screamed a nerve-shattering complaint about being skinned alive. As he held his jammed body in place, the last bit of strength drained from Vince’s leg muscles. He had only seconds left until they would no longer respond.

  Shaking, sweating, panting, and with his left hand and wrist shrieking obscenities to his central nervous system, Vince tried to think.

  He could stem his way to the top, if only he hadn’t ripped most of the skin from his left hand and sprained his wrist. He looked at his hand again and saw the pigeon poop ground into his raw flesh. That sent his stomach quivering as if he might add its contents to the pigeon poop on the rock.

  Just concentrate on what you need to do, dude. You can do this.

  Vince pressed his injured hand into the rock on his left, gritted his teeth and stepped up the rock with his right foot. Nerves stressed to their limits sent flashes of light through his eyes and into his brain, the precursor to passing out.

  He jammed his left foot into the rock and pulled his left hand off, breathing deep, controlled breaths through the pain to ensure he didn’t lose consciousness.

  Vince needed one more combination of two steps to try for the ledge.

  Stemming with his left foot and right hand, Vince took a step up with his left foot and pressed it into the column on his left.

  Every muscle in his body quivered now, begging for the torture to stop and threatening to send him downward.

  He couldn’t let that happen. But, in two or three more seconds, there would be no way to stop it.

  Vince twisted to his left and reached with both hands for the ledge.

  His fingers found it. He pulled with his arms and his legs pushed.

  His palms now lay on the ledge. But pain from his left palm sent more flashes of light through his vision.

  His right index finger lay on something hard and round.

  Vince reached an inch further and placed three fingers over a biner.

  Was it the end of the quickdraw attached to the bolt Jess had been unwilling to use?

  Strength gushed from Vince’s body like blood from a severed artery. The beginning of his fall.

  He bounced upward with his remaining leg strength and clamped his right hand around the biner. The rope portion of the quickdraw ran between his middle and ring fingers. Vince reached out with his left hand and grabbed the quickdraw, while he tried to ignore the pain.

  He needed the equivalent of one more chin up.

  His mind drifted back ten years to football training camp. Vince had gone for the team chin-up record. If he could pull himself up just one more time, he’d have something much more significant, a chance to find Jess.

  Vince pulled hard. With his arms shaking, threatening an unconditional surrender, his upper body slid onto the ledge.

  Sweating and nearly vomiting from exertion, Vince lay face down on the ledge, legs dangling over the edge, waiting for the strength to crawl forward to safety.

  Jess. He had to find her now.

  As Vince’s mind cleared, thoughts of his dangerous predicament came rolling in like a storm surge. To help Jess, he may need to go hand-to-hand with her abductors.

  He pulled his legs onto the ledge, crawled forward, turned onto his back and sat up. He scanned the area around him. Vince was on top of the rock and he was alone.

  Maybe his left wrist hadn’t been sprained as badly as he first thought. The pain had backed off a little. But, if he had to fight, his bloody, raw hand was a liability. Vince reached for the roll of tape Jess had clipped to his harness.

  He could temporarily replace the lost epithelium on his hand with tape. The artificial gray skin might not feel very good adhered to raw flesh, but it would prevent further injury. After all, isn’t that what the Army developed duct tape for, binding up battlefield wounds? The tape might even come in handy if he had to resort to hand-to-hand combat.

  He wrapped his left hand with two layers of tape and pushed from his mind all thoughts of the time when he would have to
pull that tape off. For now, the tape was his friend. It might save his life and Jess’s. When it became his enemy, maybe an emergency room doctor with nerve block and antibiotics could help him take it off … after he found Jess.

  Vince clipped the roll of tape onto his harness and took a deep breath. He had mastered Choss Master. But that was only the beginning of what he had to accomplish.

  His taped left hand throbbed from the tape sticking to the raw hamburger that comprised the heel of his hand. But Vince’s strength had returned. It was time to find Jess.

  He scanned the entire area visible from his position on top of the rock. No one.

  A thick layer of dust had blown in, coating the surface on top of the rock. The marks in the dust indicated that Jess had struggled with someone.

  He took a closer look. Not someone, multiple people. There appeared to be three unique footprints in addition to Jess’s. The intruders must have come from the south.

  A strip of duct tape lay on the ground behind the rock crowning this section of the Sunshine Wall. Vince picked up the tape and saw long strands of brunette hair stuck to it. Jess’s hair. He could draw only one conclusion. Jess had tape on her hands too. Someone had kidnapped her.

  Vince wadded up the tape and slammed it against a large boulder. “If Patrick has anything to do with this, I’ll kill the little twerp with my bare hands.”

  His left hand felt sticky and wet. Blood.

  He looked at the blood oozing from the edges of the tape. “Well, maybe I’ll kill him with my bare right hand.”

  A high-pitched whine echoed across the valley to the south.

  Vince ran by a rock outcropping to look southward.

  From the near side of the desert valley, a helicopter rotor revved. The chopper tilted forward and lifted off, flying southward. A few seconds later, it turned slowly to the right and headed west, toward Seattle.

  Vince had begun to suspect why Jess was on that chopper, but where would the kidnappers take her?

  Chapter 15

  As the chopper disappeared over the mountains to the west, an urge to vomit hit Vince full force. He had always protected Jess, but this time he had failed.