by AJ Rose
“I’m okay,” Nate protested weakly.
“You’re going to let them take you down with as much care as they can,” Mitch ordered. “And then you’re going to the hospital to let doctors do all their tests to see if you’re okay. When they say you’re fine, I’ll believe it. Until then, shut up and do what you’re told.”
“You’re bossy,” Nate said, but he had no fight in him and let himself be strapped to the backboard with no resistance.
“What about the possible back and head injury?” one of the Ski Patrol guys asked.
Nate swallowed and stared at Mitch, who waited with bated breath for what he would say. Something unspoken passed between them, and Nate closed his eyes.
“That would be me,” he said.
“You called for your own help? That guy said they just dug you out.” He pointed to Morgan.
Nate said nothing.
He’s not used to lying about this stuff, Mitch thought, stepping forward. “I called. He tossed his radio to me when he went to dig someone out after the first avalanche. He got buried in the second.”
The patrolmen looked around. “Where are the other clients?”
Morgan stepped in. “The second avalanche buried them all. We got him out just before you arrived.” Two of the patrolmen moved off, pulling out their beacons to begin search and rescue of the others.
The patrolman who’d mounted the snowmobile that would take Nate down to safety pointed to Mitch’s head. “Need that looked at? Hop on.”
“He already checked it.” Mitch pointed at his brother, but he still got on the snowmobile. “He’s a paramedic from New York. It’s just a small cut, bled a lot.”
The guy looked at Morgan with new respect. “Okay. We’ll get more help up here. You mind staying until the critical are moved down? I’m not supposed to suggest civilians help, but you’re not a civilian, are you?”
Morgan gave a small smile Mitch could read like his own reflection. He would help, but he knew there was no rescue. It would all be recovery. For the first time, Mitch wondered how his uncle and father were faring.
Morgan waved them off and turned to the others to make himself useful, two of his souls already trailing behind him. Mitch saw him turn and say something unobtrusively to his new charges, taking advantage of the snowmobile motor to cover his words from the hearing of the living.
“Isn’t two avalanches a lot for one mountain?” he asked, gripping the back passenger handles on the snowmobile as they slowly turned and pointed the nose downslope, glad all four of his souls were already with him so he didn’t have to abandon Nate to wait for them. He kept looking back at his boyfriend, who was covered in a crinkly aluminum-type blanket, his eyes closed. Mitch worried there was more going on with him when they passed over a few bumps, and Nate winced.
He’s hurt somewhere else. He concentrated on the patrolman’s response to keep himself from panicking again.
“Three. The rumble and vibration of the slide on this slope triggered another one just to the north. There’s another class there, but we’re having trouble locating them.”
Mitch shivered as the wind pierced him like shards of glass. “But two on the same slope is crazy, right? How does that happen?”
“Best guess is the first one started lower down. Unusual but not unheard of. That slab was the foundation of the snow up top, and without it, the higher slab became the second slide.”
They were going too slow. Mitch wanted to ask why they weren’t going faster, but he figured he’d piss the patrolman off if he got too pushy. So he kept talking, turning to check on Nate and his four souls. Explanations to them would have to wait until they stopped.
“How big was that other class?”
“Eleven students and an instructor.”
“Eleven? I thought a full class was ten.”
“The eleventh guy is a resort employee, so he gets a pass.”
Twelve people total, and ten dead, his father and uncle being the two survivors. To keep from triggering alarm bells in the rescue team, Mitch turned on his acting skills.
“Who’s the instructor? My dad and uncle took another class because ours was full.”
“I can’t give you that information, but the resort director will have information on the remaining classes.”
They arrived at the medic building. He dismounted as an ambulance crew descended, getting the patrolman’s assessment of Nate’s condition and the number of other expected injured.
With assurances they’d call their dispatcher to get more help, the ambulance crew loaded Nate into the back of their rig. Noticing Mitch hovering nearby, one of them spoke.
“Are you with him?”
“Yes.”
“Hop in the back.” She turned to Nate. “Is there someone you want us to have them call when you get to the hospital?”
Nate grimaced. “No, I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine, but you will be.” She soothed him with a pat and then jumped from the back to take her place in the cab with her partner.
Mitch settled on the bench seat opposite Nate’s gurney and stripped off his gloves, putting a hand on Nate’s arm because his hands were buried somewhere beneath the Mylar of the thermal blanket.
“How are you feeling?”
“Can’t think well. I saw you. You looked dead.”
Mitch swallowed and looked away. He was almost startled when he realized the four souls with him were crowded by the doors. With Tate hovering beside her brother, there were seven people in the back of this ambulance. It was almost a party, except for the four newcomers watching the proceedings with worried faces. Shit. He was totally neglecting his duties.
“Can you give me some time to figure out how to explain? I have something I need to do first.”
Nate closed his eyes, the movement of the ambulance rocking them both from side to side. There was no siren, for which Mitch was thankful, though he could have used the noise to drown out his next words.
Scooting to the end of the bench seat, as close to the souls as he could get, he spoke as low as he thought he could get away with.
“I’m so sorry about what happened to you,” he said to them. They all looked at him, confusion and fear on their faces. “I think you can guess what’s going on, but just to be sure you understand, you suffered fatal injuries in the avalanche.”
Naomi’s face hardened, obviously angry. Well, she had every right to be. Dammit, she’d had plans. They all had.
“I know,” he said as reassuringly as he could. “It was too soon, and none of you deserved it. But I’m here to help, okay? You won’t get lost on my watch. I promise.” He went on to explain how the process worked, that since they were on their way to the hospital, their families would likely be along as soon as they could, though two of them were from states on the East Coast, and their loved ones would be delayed finding flights. At least there wasn’t a storm closing the airport. “I’ll be with you until your time comes, okay? However long it takes. It’ll all be okay, I promise.”
Naomi turned her back on him, done listening. The others, a couple and their friend from Boston, Mitch remembered, hugged each other and simply waited until the ambulance stopped.
Before the doors opened, letting in a rush of light and sound, Nate stared at Mitch and said, “It’s true. You’re a reaper.”
Shock zipped along Mitch’s nerves. He opened his mouth, but nothing came out. He could confirm it, but he knew the consequences of the reveal. Whether he was the one to tell Nate or not didn’t matter. It was the knowing at all that decided a human’s fate.
Which meant one of two things.
Either he had to ask Nate to marry him, or the angels would wipe Nate’s memory.
Chapter 21
A Cold Slice of Life
Though visiting hours at Caperville Mercy Medical were still open for another hour, Nate could tell they were winding down as the halls quieted and his cadre of nurses changed shifts. The new one, a man who introduced himsel
f as Clark, brought him another warmed blanket and checked his pain level, making sure he was comfortable.
“As comfortable as I can be,” he quipped, smiling. It felt wooden on his face, but he determined to get out of medical prison as soon as possible.
“Just holler if you should need anything, okay?” Clark urged, then lowered the light so only the one on the wall behind the bed was lit. He nodded to Mitch, perched in the reclining chair beside the bed, then left.
“Don’t be a hero,” Mitch advised. “If you’re in pain, tell them.”
Nate resisted a shrug, knowing it would hurt his broken ribs and dislocated shoulder. The heavy cast on his arm already itched.
“No, you’re the hero.”
Mitch shifted, obviously uncomfortable.
“Are we gonna talk about what happened?” Nate pressed, knowing the painkillers they’d given him before shift change would kick in soon, and he’d be too looped to discuss anything other than his gratitude at being stashed in a private room.
Mitch had disappeared after Nate’s initial triage into the ER, and he wanted to ask him if the invisible people he’d been talking to in the back of the ambulance were on their way to wherever, but he didn’t have enough details to know what to ask. When Mitch returned after Nate was admitted and ensconced in his room, he’d looked drained but relieved. He hadn’t left Nate’s side since.
There was a knock on the door, and Wes poked his head in. “How’s our resident celebrity?” he asked, coming in and nodding politely to Mitch.
Nate scoffed. “Cold. Tired. Alive.”
“Well, thank God for that,” Wes said, stopping at the end of the bed and resting his hands on the footboard. “What’d the doctors say?”
“They’re keeping me overnight for observation since I stopped breathing. Two broken ribs, dislocated shoulder, three broken bones in my left hand.”
Wes whistled. “Hope you’re getting the good drugs.”
Silence descended, and Nate closed his eyes. Guilt thrummed in his chest for wishing Wes were gone so he could talk to Mitch before he couldn’t stay awake anymore, but he wasn’t ungrateful for the man’s presence.
“What’s the word?” he finally asked.
Wes knew what he meant. “Fourteen confirmed dead, four still missing, rescue operations will continue through the night if necessary. The other class on the mountain didn’t radio their coordinates to Ski Patrol, so they’ve had some trouble locating them.”
“Their beacons should work.”
“They are,” Wes said quickly. “It just took them a bit to get close enough to pick them up.”
“So most of the fourteen….” He swallowed. “They were my class, weren’t they?”
Wes pursed his lips, then nodded and looked away. “You and Mitch and Morgan Seeker were the only survivors.”
“What about the other class? Who was the instructor?” Nate braced himself to hear Troy’s name. Wes probably did have the names of all those missing, with his connections to first response teams.
“Someone named Dave Goldman.” Wes hesitated, eyes flicking between Nate and Mitch. “And your friend Connor. The waiter.”
“Dammit,” Nate swore quietly. Pain of a different kind stabbed him behind the eyes, the beginnings of a nasty headache seeping into his temples like ink in water.
“Nate, it happens to the best of us,” Wes murmured, squeezing his foot. “You do the best you can, but at the end of the day, you have to realize things are sometimes out of your hands.”
“Thanks,” Nate said, his sarcasm plain.
“You think I don’t know how you feel?” Wes asked, not unkindly. “I’m a cop, man. It comes with any job that has danger. You’re not special.” The corner of his mouth tipped up at a teasing angle. Nate sighed, trying to let it go.
“Why are you here?” he asked instead.
At that, Wes looked surprised. “You made me your emergency contact, doofus. And you’re my friend. Can I not visit my friend in the hospital after he almost died?”
“Nate, be nice,” Mitch said, putting a hand on his uninjured shoulder.
“No, it’s okay,” Wes reassured. “I get it. He’s had a rough day, and I’m a good target. I may even deserve it.”
That got Nate’s attention. “Why?”
Giving an uncomfortable sigh, Wes ran his hands through his hair, then cast about for another chair. There was a plastic one beside the window, which he pulled closer and sat on.
“I made an executive decision.”
“About?”
After a brief hesitation, Wes came out with it. “I called your parents.”
“What?” Nate barked, trying to sit up and instantly regretting it. He groaned as pain reverberated up and down his left side, from his shoulder to his hip. “Why in the fuck would you do that? You know how they are, and you know I left them behind.”
With eyes pleading for understanding, Wes explained, “They lost their daughter just months ago in a skiing accident. It’s almost Christmas, and you’ve had no contact with them since August. Their son almost dies in another skiing accident but didn’t. I figured they’d want to know about this, Nate. And if there’s any chance at all of you getting things resolved with them, this would be the best possible time.”
Overhead, the TV, which Mitch had lowered to a murmur so the news anchors on screen were a mere buzz in the background, showed the mountainous landscape familiar to all three men. Nate, not wanting to bite off his friend’s head for overstepping his bounds, focused on it, trying to gather his wits. When he realized he recognized the terrain on the screen, he frowned.
“Turn it up.”
Mitch took the bed control containing the channel and volume buttons and did so, and the news anchor’s voice became audible.
“… struck today in the Colorado Rockies, where a series of avalanches has claimed the lives of several tourists and locals alike. Caperville Mountain Resort, one of the premier winter destinations in the country, has released a statement regarding the disaster. We go live to Dan Shepherd at the resort lodge. Dan?”
The picture cut to a reporter in front of the ski lodge, microphone in hand, ready to expound on the details. “Thank you, Sarah. Earlier today, three avalanches claimed the lives of several of the resort’s guests, who were part of two ski instructor-chaperoned classes in the back country. Not to be confused with skiing out of bounds, the resort assured the public in a press conference the areas where the avalanches occurred are still well within the safe skiing boundaries maintained by the resort. Skiing conditions were said to be good, though experts are speculating the snow base, well above average for this time of year, and today’s warmer temperatures, were a key factor in the avalanches.”
The screen cut to a man Nate recognized as the head snowmaker, though he couldn’t remember the guy’s name. He explained how winds blowing snow onto the leeward side of a mountain caused drifts, building up the base more so than on the windward side. Due to the multiple snowstorms in the region in recent weeks, the base depth was higher than average for the time of year, and temperatures were too warm to maintain the weight of so much snow this early in the season. Explaining the mechanics of avalanches to the reporter, the snowmaker described how one slope could have two slides within minutes of each other. After a few questions, the reporter stood alone in front of the camera once more.
“Boomer Hudson, the ski staff manager in charge of all instructor-led courses, had this to say during the press conference.”
Again, the screen cut to someone Nate knew, his boss, standing in the class meeting room, a nest of microphones pointed at him like snakes about to strike.
“At this time, our rescue efforts on behalf of the two classes directly involved in today’s snow slides are ongoing, and the families of the resort guests are being notified as quickly as possible. We won’t release any names until we know the status of the clients and all of their loved ones have been reached. I can assure you we had two of our very best inst
ructors conducting those classes today and are hopeful for a positive outcome for as many of our guests as possible. Unfortunately, we do know there have been fatalities, but Ski Patrol and the Caperville Fire Department are conducting rescue operations and will continue to do so until all guests of the resort are accounted for. Our thoughts and prayers are with the families of those involved in the avalanches.”
A reporter in the crowd shouted the question, “Is it true more than ten people have been confirmed dead?”
“I’m not prepared to release the number of injuries and fatalities until after the families of the victims have been contacted.”
“What did the avalanche report this morning say?”
Boomer took a deep breath. “It said conditions were moderately stable but with temperatures forecast to rise later in the afternoon and through the next couple of days, the prediction was for deteriorating conditions of the snow pack. The decision had been made to close all back-country trails tomorrow until Avalanche Control could determine the seriousness of the threat and the necessity of triggering controlled slides. Unfortunately, today’s forecast was not as accurate as we’d have liked, and the colder air moved out of the area earlier than anticipated.”
“Is it true one of the classes may have triggered the first slide?”
“We don’t know that at this time,” Boomer said, shutting that question down fast.
“How much longer do you expect the rescue operations to take?”
“We will be out there as long as necessary, until all the guests are accounted for,” he assured them.
“Is it true one of the instructors involved was former Olympic Ski Team alternate Nathan Koehn?”
“Oh, motherfucker!” Nate burst out, going cold all over again. He checked the corner of the screen. “This is a nationwide newscast.”
Wes grimaced. “So it doesn’t matter I called your folks,” he said under his breath, but Nate heard him anyway.