“Okay.” She pulled out the keys and looked out the window at the garage. “One question. What’s a Sno-Cat?”
That got her a laugh. “It’s the big orange machine right inside the garage door that looks like a giant’s Tonka toy. Climb into it, put the key in the ignition, push in the choke, and turn the key while pumping the gas twice. Leave the garage door open so you don’t die of carbon monoxide poisoning. Sam’ll bring the Cat back later and drop the keys off with you.”
Okay…Katie pulled her jacket back on, ran down the steps and outside, sucking in a breath as the cold slapped her in the face. So different from the hot, sticky, non-winter of Los Angeles, for which she was eternally grateful.
She made her way on the trail around the lodge, the snow crunching beneath her feet, the breath soughing in and out of her lungs because apparently a week was not long enough to adjust to the high altitude. Luckily for her, the keys were labeled. At the equipment garage side door she eyed the huge sign that read KNOCK FIRST, and then did, hoping someone would be here to help her out.
No one answered, so she let herself in and flipped on the light.
A huge, orange machine stared at her, indeed looking like some giant’s Tonka toy.
She stared back, feeling some of her courage dissolve. Feeling other things dissolve, too, like oh, the bones in her legs as a flash came to her, one that usually hit only in the deep dark of the night. The Sno-Cat wasn’t anything like the crane that had been required to rescue her when the Santa Monica bridge collapsed, but apparently it was close enough.
It’d been a simmering hot day. The asphalt had been steaming by 8:45 A.M. She’d been late for work and knew her boss would be peeved, so she’d gotten on the bridge and sped up, only to be cut off by a semitruck. Stymied, she’d been stuck behind him, which in hindsight had saved her life, because when the bridge had collapsed, the truck had fallen into the void and she’d slid off the side instead of sinking. She’d flipped too many times to count, rolled down the embankment, coming to a horrific halt upside down, caught on a tree as her car burst into flames…
Sweating and shaking now, she blinked the Sno-Cat back into focus. “No.” Hell no. Not having a nightmare in the middle of the damn day. “Don’t be ridiculous,” she said out loud. Her doctor had taught her that trick, speaking out loud to snap her out of it. “You’re fine.”
Proving it, she lifted her chin and eyed the beast. “I’m doing this.” She climbed up and pulled herself in, landing on the big driver’s seat. Stomach quivering, still sweating, she wiped her brow and looked out the windshield. She was high up, sure, but she wasn’t upside down in her little car. There was no danger here. Repeating that to herself, she put the key in and turned it, already wincing-
But nothing happened.
“The choke.” She repeated Stone’s words back to herself, “Push the choke in.” She searched for and found the thing, then pushed it in and turned the ignition over while pumping the gas twice.
The Sno-Cat roared to life, the engine rumbling and shuddering and vibrating beneath her, around her. With that came a burst of heat from the vents, a blast that blew her hair back and burned her eyes, and with a shocked cry, she cringed, stomach revolting, violently, and without warning. Not rational and knowing it, but unable to care or stop herself, she flung her body out of the Sno-Cat, landing hard on her knees. Crawling out of the equipment garage and into the snow, the blessedly cold snow, she gulped for air, managing by the grace of God not to lose her breakfast.
“Goldilocks?”
Dammit. Not him, not now. She fisted her hands in the snow, letting it sink into skin, cold and wet, reminding her where she was.
The Sierras, taking that baby step on the way to the rest of her life.
Risking.
Adventures.
All of it, everything she’d never given herself pre-bridge collapse.
“Katie.” Cam crouched at her side putting his hand on her back. “Hey, are you okay?”
“Yes.” Please go away.
Instead, she felt his hand skim over her spine, as cool and soothing as the snow beneath her. “Are you sick?”
“I’m okay.”
“You’re green is what you are.”
“I just need a moment.” She pushed to her feet and headed back to the lodge, figuring he’d take the hint and leave her alone. After all, he seemed to like being alone.
But she could hear his boots crunching in the snow behind her. “I’m fine,” she told him over her shoulder. “Really.” To prove it, she sped up, and then what the hell, ran, wishing she could outrun her demons as easily. Inside the lodge, she raced up the stairs, and then at the top, ran out of gas, sagging against the accolades-laden wall.
Whew, this altitude was killing her.
That, or it was the panic attack, which sucked. While she concentrated on getting air into her overtaxed lungs, she tipped her head back and read Cam’s plaques for the hell of it. Slope-style champion. Overall champion. Gold medalist. Half-pipe champion. Winter X Games champion…It went on and on.
It was amazing to her, the guy who’d appeared at her bedside last night, the same guy who’d been at turns irritating, surprisingly kind, then irritating again, seemed to have won just about every single winter event there was over the past twelve years.
There was nothing for this entire year, though, which struck her as odd.
Since thinking about Cam was infinitely more appealing than facing the fact she’d just had a doozy of a panic attack, was still having if her near-hyperventilating breathing was any indication, she kept at it. She had to wonder why, after the incredible career outlined in front of her, had he suddenly stopped placing in events. Had he retired? “I could get behind retiring,” she muttered, “if I wasn’t so fond of eating.”