by Adira August
“Is it terrain interference?”
Avron tried to not look surprised. “I expect it is. The walkies go pretty good through trees and such. Not so much with mountains.”
“Isn’t your battery dying?”
To distract them both, Avron told Brian about spending the night in his truck. “I took the battery out and kept it warm in my pocket. Should have a couple hours left.”
Brian looked toward the hole, but winced. His hand went to his neck. “Hans is your dog, right? You’re Avron?”
“Yup, Avron Coulter.” He shook the boy’s hand.
“Cam told me all about things. But it was Hans who found me. I don’t know how.”
“Were you yelling for help?”
Brian’s face crumpled up but he held his breath and blew it out and didn’t cry. “For a while. But the wind came and I knew no one would hear me. But then later, I was singing.”
“Were you?” Avron shifted around before his hip locked up. It gave Brian a view toward Vargas and the hole in the snow.
“Sounds stupid, but, see, after it started to snow I was pretty alone and scared and ... I was crying and had to stop because it dehydrates you and makes you tired and … and anyway ... I started to sing. My dad says if you sing you can't feel scared. And then he found me so … so he kept me warm and only my toes were really numb or anything …”
“Hans found you,” Avron said.
Brian nodded. “You should put a walkie-talkie in his backpack.”
“Good idea.”
“He just laid down right on me. I was … I keep crying.” Brian wiped at his eyes.
“‘S’okay. You’re supposed to now you’re safe. Washes out all the bad feelings stored up inside.”
“Hans had other stuff in his pack. The space blankets. I put them over him, too. He was so warm, we were both okay. But he kept pushing up and like, howling. Like, for help.”
“Yeah.” Avron’s voice got thick. “He was calling for me.”
“Grown-up men cry too?”
“Some. Mostly we punch things or drink whiskey. Doesn’t work as good, though. So Cam heard Hans yowling?”
“I don’t know. The snow came so fast, we were getting buried. I tried to keep the snow off him, but … Anyway, then Cam came and I thought he was like a dream or an alien.”
“That silver suit and those goggles? I thought so, myself.”
“He didn’t say anything but ‘Can you breathe okay?’ I said I could, and he—I never saw anybody do stuff like that, so fast like that. He made the shelter and made stakes with a knife he had and had more space blankets and then we were underneath in the dark. I held his cellphone with the flashlight on and he fixed my neck. He laid next to me in the dark and held onto Hans’ harness thing with one hand to keep us all pushed together and used the other arm to move the pole.”
“What pole?”
“A ski pole,” Brian said. “Cam says you have to keep an air hole open while the snow’s going on.”
“He did that all night long?”
Brian’s voice finally broke. “I fell asleep. I fell asleep and all this snow fell down on Hans and Cam tried, he tried and tried. I didn't know snow could be hard like concrete. He saved me and I couldn't help him no matter what I did …”
Avron pulled the sobbing boy into his arms. The man didn’t know if “he” was Hans or Cam or maybe both. But he did know what it was like to be helpless when someone you cared about was in danger.
“Sometimes,” he said, “we do everything we can, but superheroes are only in movies and we can’t do much at all. We just have regular heroes. Hans and Cam, well, they’re heroes here. But so are you. You fought. You fought hard to live and you did.”
“Now!”
The shout came from the hole. Avron scootched around with the boy in time to see Lonny straining at some rope and Camden Snow’s head appear. He was lifting something—Big Hans.
The dog scrabbled with his front legs for purchase to get onto the surface. Cam got underneath Hans’ torso and heaved him up. Lonny Vargas got the dog’s front half onto the litter.
“I guess you don’t drink and punch stuff,” Brian observed.
Avron just nodded. He had the boy; he couldn’t go to Hans.
Han’s back legs were useless, bound together around two halves of a ski pole for stability.
Vargas let go of the rope and clambered down to the animal. Cam slid up and out of the hole, lying between Hans and the tree. Somehow—powerfully but still gently—he lifted the dog’s hips and legs while the deputy used the harness to pull the dog all the way onto the litter.
Hans whined deep in his chest, but closed his eyes in the bright sunlight and lay still.
Cam retreated for one last trip under the snow.
“Cam! Get your ass up here!”
Hans’ pack came flying out, followed by a small, silvery one. Cam yelled. “Hang on.”
Vargas held his breath. In the movies, this was where the makeshift shelter collapsed, bringing about the hero’s tragic end.
The only sound was the drip of melting snow in the tree branches.
The bolt cutter, held high, preceded Cam out of the hole.
He worked his way carefully over to the camera and cut it down. Following a power cable, he used his knife to cut free a portable power source taped to another branch. He stuck these both inside his jumpsuit and worked his way back around to the litter.
“That camera is part of the crime scene, Snow. I know you’re a civilian, but—”
“It’s a communication device, Deputy,” Cam said. “How about we all drive the hell away from here before something starts sliding downslope?”
Avron strapped Brian down, and Cam strapped himself and Hans down, lying beside the exhausted dog rather than take a seat behind Vargas.
And they drove the hell away from there.
THE DETECTIVES HAD been working quietly for the last few hours: writing reports, organizing the narrative, gathering what they needed for a move to the Unit offices.
Two other detectives who lived close to town had come in. They stayed at the front of the room, knowing what everyone was waiting for.
“DiMato? Take a look at this.” The picture on Chang’s monitor had changed. It was dark instead of white.
DiMato rolled back in his chair and eyed the screen. “Huh. Maybe it lost power.”
Each member of the team managed to walk by Chang’s desk and check out the dark monitor. After a few minutes, when nothing else changed, they went back to paperwork.
No one wanted to suggest to Brian’s father that it might be time to shut down and move the three blocks over well-plowed streets to the Unit.
“Chang! The feed's back up!” Merisi had seen it brighten suddenly.
They turned as one to Chang’s laptop. Hunter and Natani came out of McCauley’s office.
Things onscreen jiggled, incomprehensible. A fingertip wiped the lens. Bits of blue and flashes of a snow-covered house.
“Holy shit!” Merisi stood up.
Vargas' grinning face appeared, holding up his pocket notebook.
"GUESS WHAT WE FOUND?"
“Ben Trowbridge is in the captain’s office,” Hunter told Twee.
She jumped and ran, coming back in less than a minute leading Ben Trowbridge by the hand. And so Brian’s father was there when Vargas flipped the notepad.
"TA-DAAAA!"
Someone swung the camera around revealing Cam on a snowmobile with Brian in his lap—a boy with a big smile, giving a thumbs-up.
Amid the weeping and cheering and hugging, they almost didn’t hear him speak.
“Quiet down!” Hunter yelled.
Chang had given Ben Trowbridge his seat. The man had one hand on the screen, on his son’s body.
“Cam says my dad is there,” Brian said, speaking up. “I’m okay, nothing got broken or anything. My toes and stuff aren’t froze, okay? I just. ...”
Even heroes have to cry sometimes. He pressed hi
s face into Cam’s chest and strong arms surrounded him.
“Mister Trowbridge, whenever they let you watch this, we have him, all of us—Deputy Vargas and Avron Coulter and Big Hans. We’ll keep him safe and hug him for you. And he’s fine. Has a few scrapes, but mostly he just needs to go home.”
Ben Trowbridge stroked his son’s image over and over.
Merisi squatted next to him and took a shot of the monitor with his cell. “We’ll send this to his mom when you call her.”
Trowbridge nodded that he heard, but could not look away from the screen.
Cam spoke again. “Lieutenant, we’re going to need evacuation from behind eight-seven Big Horn Gulch Road. And we have an injured Greater Swiss Mountain dog, who needs stat evac to Fort Collins. His owner will go along and explain the injuries. They need to get ready for surgery. Hans kept us both alive. You know who to call.”
Hunter did know—Benedict Hart. The billionaire had financed the governor’s last campaign. Hunt suspected the governor had called Hart when Brian went missing, and Hart had made sure the Unit took this case.
“I wish we could tell him people are already on the way there,” Merisi said.
“He knows that,” Hunt told him. “He’s confirming the address for us. That’s his job.”
The camera swung back to Vargas. “I assume there’s a crime scene unit coming with the rescuers. I’ll stand by here until they arrive. The, uh, the camera we’re using is part of the scene. I’ll have it.”
The camera once again found the boy and the man who’d saved him with the help of another champion. Brian was cleaning his face with one of Cam’s wipes.
Cam’s wipes.
Hunter Dane spun around and strode back to the office. He got his back against the door before his legs gave way, and he slid all the way down.
Cam was coming home.
Epilogue
* * *
It took three days for Camden Snow to get home.
A search and rescue snowcat arrived within twenty minutes of Cam confirming their location.
Avron insisted they keep Big Hans on the litter, saying the ride would jostle him enough.
The driver insisted on a selfie with Brian. Cam leaned over to stay out of the picture.
When they reached a plowed portion of road, the plow crews and searchers cheered, but the snowcat didn’t stop to transfer them to an SUV. Instead, they continued for a few miles to a wide, flat intersection where a medical helicopter waited to airlift the boy to Denver Medical Center.
Cam carried Brian Trowbridge to the open door. But he didn’t place the boy on the stretcher, and no paramedic took him. Ben Trowbridge was at the door on his knees, arms outstretched.
“Dad!”
Cam placed Brian in his father’s arms before the boy jumped out of his. The young man behind Ben wasn’t a paramedic. He was a doctor, by the stitching on his navy blue jacket. He already had an IV bag set up by the stretcher.
Ben locked eyes with Cam over Brian’s shoulder. “Thank you for my son, Mister Snow.”
Cam nodded and backed away from the door. He saw Ben pivot around and place Brian on the stretcher, just as the door closed.
Ten minutes after the rescue copter had taken off, a black-and-silver ACH 160 Airbus with the Hart Industries logo—a red silhouette of a fourteen-point buck—took its place. Ben Hart’s top honcho, bodyguard, man-who-handled-things, Kevin Woodward, orchestrated the loading of Camden Snow, Avron Coulter, and Hans on the litter into the luxury helicopter.
Dr. Grady Hallenworth, D.V.M., examined Hans while Cam explained what position Hans was in when the weight of the drift collapsed the end of the lean-to and how long the dog had been trapped before help arrived.
“Wood, make sure the dog gets taken care of, first,” Cam ordered.
Then Cam sat back in one of the padded leather chairs and fell immediately to sleep.
The helicopter took off for Fort Collins to deliver Hans. Wood stripped Cam out of his sub-zero coverall and wrapped him in down-filled blankets, reclining his chair the slight amount it would go. He explained all this to Cam later on, because Cam remembered nothing that happened after he’d talked into the camera.
Cam didn’t stir through the landing and off-loading of Hans, Avron and Hallenworth into an animal ambulance, or the subsequent take-off. Wood decided Cam was more passed out than asleep and called Ben Hart.
HUNTER DANE HAD all Ferriter-related files, evidence and people moved to the Unit offices. It was quiet, unknown to the press, public and most of the police department. The team had decent coffee and tea and space to work. A certified evidence locker was attached to Twee’s small lab next to the elevator.
He went into his own office and shut the door. He sat in his own chair behind his own desk—safe from inquisitive cops and civilian personnel, from intrusive brass and politicians and noise. Hunter Dane had a few moments of privacy to thank whomever it was that watched over Camden Snow and one small boy for their deliverance.
A quiet knock. He opened his eyes. “Come.”
Natani stepped inside and closed the door.
“Listen.” She hesitated.
“Ferriter escaped? Hung himself in his cell? What?”
“I’m sending everyone home. Including you.”
She held up a hand to stop his objection but Hunter closed his eyes and his head fell back.
“Thank God.” He opened his eyes. “You too.”
“No. I’m staying for a while. I was least demanded of, and I slept pretty well. Now I want the whole case to myself for a couple hours. Twee got the evidence logged and locked. I need to read and organize and make assignment lists for … tomorrow noon?”
“Great.” He was already up and around the desk. “I’ll get a ride with Twee to headquarters and pick up my unmarked unit.”
“First, I should probably tell you—”
He stepped out of his office into his completely empty bullpen.
“—I already sent them home.”
“Natani, Cam had my Bronco.”
She crossed the bullpen to the door and held it open for him. “There’s a car waiting for you out front.”
“You called a car?”
“Not exactly.”
A FAMILIAR SILVER Escalade waited at the curb. A man taller than Hunter exited from the driver’s door and came around to open the back passenger door for Hunter.
If Kevin Woodward was Hart’s head honcho, Henry “Hank” Eustace was his first officer. Taciturn, professional, a servant and killer who served a man Eustace had chosen as worthy of his devotion. He still kept his blond hair military short and himself fit. Duty was his personal god and Avia Rivers—Hart’s fiancée and Hunter's best friend—his queen.
“It’s good to see you, Hank,” Hunt said. “Be aware I’m not in the mood for any bullshit today. Do you know where Cam is?”
“I’ll take you directly to him.” Eustace closed the door and opened the front passenger door instead, knowing Hunter always preferred to ride in front. The bodyman waited for Hunt to get in but didn’t hold the door. He kept his hands free and his eyes moving over their surroundings.
Both inside and belted in, Hunter asked, “Taking me to him, where?”
The onboard computer beeped, and a message popped up onscreen. “He’s landing now,” Eustace said, pulling away from the curb. “Wood’s with him. Mister Hart offers you both his hospitality tonight. Mister Snow is being taken to the Coloradan where we’ll join them.”
“Being taken? This isn’t because the roads aren’t plowed, is it?”
THE AIRBUS LEFT Woodward and Cam on the roof of a bank building in downtown Denver, a block and a half from the Coloradan Hotel. EMTs waited with a stretcher. They transported Cam by ambulance down through the parking garage to the street and along the few hundred feet separating them from the private underground parking of the hotel and the secure elevator to the penthouse.
Benedict Hart owned the hotel.
Wood took Ca
m to the penthouse himself, wanting to get him into a shower and wash him with warm water and dress him in Hart’s silk flannel pajamas.
Veronica Flay, M.D. nixed that idea. She wanted Cam admitted due to his dehydrated state, low body temperature and extreme torpor.
“He’s hibernating,” Wood said. “IV fluids, warming blankets, sleep.”
“Where’d you get your M.D., Mister Woodward?” She used her stethoscope on Cam’s back while Wood held him up. “You know he can slip into shock? People die from this.”
“Camden Snow won't.”
“I’m not playing odds with someone’s life.”
“Are you going to get fluids into the man, or are you courting a lawsuit?”
“You aren’t his husband, are you? Brother? Anyone legally designated to make medical decisions for him?”
“I am.”
Hunter Dane strode into the bedroom with Hank Eustace close behind. Hunt’s face was a mask, his eyes only for Cam. He leaned over and kissed him briefly.
“Strip him all the way,” he told Wood.
Hunt rounded on the doctor, a weather-beaten woman in her late thirties who looked like she’d been on more than a few bitter winter rescue operations. “Do you have what you need for the IV?”
But she didn’t hear him, distracted by Hunter stripping off his own clothes and Wood rolling Cam’s briefs down over his hips with Eustace’ help.
“Doctor?”
She faced him with spots of color on her cheeks. “Mister Hart is very thorough.” She pointed to an assortment of medical equipment. “But your husband needs a hospital.”
“He’s been in enough hospitals for a lifetime,” Hunter told her. “We have him now.” He climbed into bed and took Cam into his arms pressing their bodies together. Wood covered them up.
Eustace lifted up the blankets at the end of the bed and felt Cam’s feet.
“We need socks and heat,” he told Wood. He kicked off his shoes and got onto the huge bed, sitting cross-legged at Cam’s feet. With his shirt and undershirt pulled up, he placed Cam’s icy feet flat against his stomach and pulled the shirts down over them, then reached under to cover them with his hands.