Return to the Black Hills

by Debra Salonen

  Cade threw up his hands. “So, where’s the operator? There must be a key, right?”

  The young one let out a low groan coupled with a colorful string of cusswords. “I forgot. He told me he’d seen this kind of thing a hundred times and was going into Rapid with friends. He won’t be back here until three.”

  “Let’s try the fire department. Come on.” The dark-haired guy took off like a sprinter.

  As he surveyed the situation, Cade heard murmurs of doubt and concern coming from the audience. Were they finally starting to understand this wasn’t part of the show?

  Then another sound came to him. A cry of pain—muted, but unmistakable. He stepped directly below where Jessie was hanging. The rope that had at one time been her salvation was now knotted around her ankle. She’d managed to grab on to a bright purple knob a couple of feet to her right, but he could see her fingers desperately working to maintain her grip. A second later, she lost hold and swung, pendulum-like, in the opposite direction, the back of her head connecting with at least two of the climbing knobs.

  His stomach turned over. No wonder she’d been so adamant about Shiloh climbing with protective gear. This was even more dangerous than he’d imagined.

  “Jessie,” he called out. “Your friends went for help. What can I do?”

  The minute she stopped thrashing, her body dropped like a plumb bob on the end of a string. Her ankle, the part visible above her shoe, had turned an ugly shade of purple. He could see on her face how much pain she was in. “A knife. Somebody get me a knife.”

  His hand automatically went to the small leather holster at his waist. “Could you catch it, if I tossed you one?”

  With what he knew had to be a Herculean effort, she wrapped her right leg around the rope and arched her back to look down. “I’ll try.”

  Cade heard others approaching. He looked around, hoping it was Jessie’s friends and half a dozen firefighters. No such luck.

  “I can climb up and give her the knife, Daddy,” Shiloh said, sitting down to take off her boots.

  “No,” Jessie cried. “The rope has some kind of oil or lubricant on it. That’s why I slipped. Everything I’ve touched is slick. You can’t come up here, Shiloh. Nobody can. It’s not safe.” To Cade, she reached out both hands. “Throw me your knife. I’ll catch it. Throw it now. Hurry.”

  “Stand back, Shy. I need room to move.” His heart was racing and he prayed his sweaty hands didn’t screw this up. “Here it comes.”

  He braced to dive for it when she missed, but somehow Jessie managed to catch his much-too-small pocketknife, midair while dangling upside down.

  “She did it,” Shiloh yelled. “Oh, my gosh, she did it.”

  “Now what?” Remy asked. “Jessie, you do know that if you cut the line, you’re going to fall, right?”

  Jessie didn’t answer. She was already pulling herself upright. She used the other rope for leverage, but whether due to her slippery hands or something on the rope itself, each handhold required her to loop it around her fist. Cade had no idea where she found the strength and grit, given her obvious pain.

  Finally, she reached an angle that would allow her to cut into the line.

  Remy, he noticed, was still filming. He didn’t know whether that was a good thing—there would be an investigation, he figured—or slightly sadistic. He looked toward the fire station, relieved to see the massive door opening, and the red light above the door flashing.

  He waited, expecting to see a truck to pull out. Instead, two men—the stuntmen—raced out, carrying a large yellow extension ladder. Where the hell was Mac McGannon? They’d talked at his sister’s wedding. Cade knew his old friend was one of the town’s first responders.

  “Nobody was there,” the surfer said.

  His pal positioned the ladder and quickly dashed upward. The rough surface made it bounce.

  “Ouch. Stop.” Jessie looked up from her intent sawing. “Marsh. Don’t. You’re making me swing again. I need to stay still until I get this cut.”

  “Sorry. What can I do?”

  She glanced down. “I don’t suppose you have a bounce pad on you.”

  He shook his head. Needlessly.

  “If we can find a blanket,” Cade called out, “we could catch you.”

  “Oh,” Remy cried, suddenly. “I know where one is. In Yota. I’ll be right back. Here,” she said, shoving the camera into Shiloh’s hands. “Keep rolling. She’s going to want to see this.”

  Cade quickly organized the three volunteers who rushed forward, along with the two stuntmen—after they moved the ladder out of the way. They made a circle below Jessie and all looked up expectantly. He gave her credit for sheer focus and strength of will. This was no simple task and the swaying movement had to be extremely painful.

  “Here it is,” Remy called, racing toward them.

  The blanket wasn’t huge—twin-size, at best. The baby-blue fleece with a stylized panda design seemed more appropriate as a child’s blankie, but it would have to do.

  “Everybody grab a hunk and hold on tight.”

  “I’m almost through,” she called. “Are you ready below?”

  Cade widened his stance and braced his shoulders. “As ready as we’re ever going to be.”

  Keeping his focus completely on her, he held his breath. In an effort to land on her back, she used her free foot to push off at the very last second before the rope gave. The timing was critical. She did everything right, but, regardless, the impact knocked Cade and two of the other volunteers off their feet. His knees hit the pavement hard, but he barely felt the sensation because he was concentrating intently on keeping her from crashing to the ground.

  She rolled his way. His arms scooped her up as if he were catching a grounder in the biggest game of the year. He pulled her close and then leaned sideways, colliding with another man. The surfer. The three of them landed in a heap on the street with Jessie on top.

  Breathing hard, adrenaline pumping through his veins, he held on tight. Half-afraid to let go. In the chaotic seconds before reality fully sank in, a stupid thought passed through his mind. She’s softer than she looks. An even stupider thought followed. I like the way she feels in my arms.

  “CAN I GO, NOW?” JESSIE asked. “What’s it been—four hours?”

  Cade, who had been sitting beside her on the park bench practically the whole time, checked his watch.

  “One. One and a half, max.”

  His tone was a bit too cheerful for her taste.

  “Yeah, well, nothing is happening, so why can’t I leave?”

  She leaned down to adjust the cooling pack the EMTs had given her. The ambulance with its red flashing lights was still parked across the street; the two EMTs were filling out forms and talking to the sheriff’s deputy.

  “The sheriff said he wanted to talk to you again. Besides, I think everyone is hoping you’ll change your mind and go with the paramedics.”

  “Hospitals are for sissies,” she muttered, risking a peek at her swollen ankle. Purple and red. Not a pretty sight, but she was certain it wasn’t broken. Wrenched and possibly sprained, but nothing permanent. Thank God. It could have been worse. Much worse.

  “I thanked you, right? For catching me and throwing the knife so accurately? You kept your cool under pressure. That’s not typical. I do appreciate it.”

  He gave her a look she’d seen several times in their short acquaintance. Patient. She’d classified it as a dad look. “You thanked me. And you’re welcome.”

  “Are you sure I’m not keeping you from something?”

  He shook his head. He had great hair, she’d noticed. Sun-streaked wheat—not the bleached-blond color of Eerik’s. “Shiloh texted me a few minutes ago. She’s playing video games with her cousins.”

  The only time Cade left her side was to make arrangements to send his daughter with her aunt and cousins. Kat, a familiar face around the Sentinel Passtime set, had stopped by to extend her sympathy and concern for what happened. />
  “This sucks, Jessie. I hope your ankle is okay. I called Libby right after it happened. She said Shane and Jenna are somewhere over the Rockies. But I know they’ll want to hear all about the accident when you’re feeling up to a call.” To her brother, she’d added, “Let me know if there’s anything Jack and I can do to help.”

  The accident. That was what everybody was calling it, but Jessie wasn’t so sure. In fact, she was almost positive the ropes had been tampered with. She couldn’t prove that, of course, but she planned to keep asking questions until she got some answers.

  “Shouldn’t the C.S.I. people be here by now?”

  Cade’s laugh seemed to originate deep inside his chest. He immediately apologized. “Sorry. I forgot. You’re from L.A. I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for a bunch of lab guys to show up.”

  She’d guessed as much the moment she heard the semi driver start the truck and engage the hoist to collapse the tower.

  “You’re afraid someone is going to blame you for what happened, right?”

  She didn’t like it that he could read her so easily. “Wouldn’t be the first time,” she muttered.

  Operator error. That had been the final verdict on her rollover despite her claim that she’d done everything exactly according to plan.

  “Well, if it’s any consolation, I think Mac is bagging the ropes.” He gestured toward the now-lowered tower.

  “Mac,” she repeated. “Libby’s brother, right?”

  The burly guy in a black Sentinel Pass Volunteer Fire T-shirt had been the first “official” responder to appear. He’d come unglued when he found Cade lowering Jessie to a park bench beside the community center. “Holy shit, Cade,” he’d cried. “You don’t move an accident victim. You could have made her injuries worse. If she had a broken rib, carrying her could have punctured a lung.”

  “My ribs are just peachy, thank you,” Jessie had insisted. “It’s my foot that hurts, and Cade didn’t do anything to make it worse. In fact, if it weren’t for him, those paramedics might be dealing with a self-inflicted amputation. That’s how bad it feels to hang upside down by one foot.”

  “Mac was right about one thing. You really should get your leg X-rayed.”

  She made a negating motion with her hand, as if brushing away a pesky fly. “I thought he was a miner, not a doctor.”

  She knew she was being a pain in the ass, but she hated being told what to do almost as much as she hated sitting around doing nothing. And the longer she sat here, the less likely the police would find out who tampered with her ropes.

  “Is she being a grouch?”

  Remy. Jessie had almost forgotten her sister was still there. She’d brought Jessie a bottle of water, then disappeared. “Where’s the video camera?” Jessie asked. “I want to see the tape.”

  Remy made a face. “I gave it to the deputy. He said he’d return it in a day or two.”

  Jessie jumped to her feet without thinking. The pain was instantaneous and she hopped on her good foot, cussing under her breath. “What? No. You should have asked me first. You know perfectly well they aren’t going to take this seriously. Cops always think people who do Parkour get what’s coming to them. If we’re dumb enough to vault off a building, we shouldn’t complain when something winds up broken, right?”

  Her rant apparently fell on deaf ears, because Remy looked at Cade and said, “Obvious deflection. She hates hospitals. Perfectly understandable, of course, given all the time she spent—”

  “Damn it, Rem, shut up,” Jessie snapped. She could use her toe for balance only if she avoided putting any weight on the limb. That was not good. She knew that, but a person who failed to make it to the hospital in time to save her mother’s life had no business hauling her sorry butt into one for a bruised ankle.

  Cade stretched out an arm to pick up the ice pack that had fallen to the ground. She glanced down but the movement made her dizzy. She had no choice but to steady herself using his broad, substantial shoulder. His head lifted and a second later, he was standing with one arm around her back.

  “This is foolish. If your foot is hurt worse than you think, you could be causing permanent damage.”

  “But if it’s not hurt that bad, then I will have wasted my money for nothing.”

  Remy and Cade exchanged a look. “Don’t you have insurance?” he asked.

  “Of course I do. But I carry a superhigh deductible.”

  “Because of your line of work,” Cade said.

  Because of my so-called preexisting condition. But she was happy to let him believe what he wanted. “The average stunt person probably gets injured on the job less often than the average bus driver or mail carrier, but stuff happens. I was involved in another incident a few weeks ago and had to spend the night in the hospital for observation. They might cancel my policy because of this.” She was pretty sure her union wouldn’t let that happen, but it seemed like a valid excuse.

  “What happened the last time?” Cade asked.

  She looked at Remy. He didn’t know? Her rollover had gotten a million or so hits on the internet. The video might not have made his radar, but she was willing to bet Shiloh had seen it.

  “She rolled a car,” Remy answered. “The video was a big YouTube sensation. If you saw it, you would have sworn nobody could have walked away alive.”

  Jessie involuntarily touched the tender spot near her temple. “It wasn’t that bad. A couple of stitches and nurses waking me up every hour or so to flash a light in my eyes.”

  Lack of sleep hadn’t been the worst part, of course. No, the smells and the noises brought back memories she’d worked most of her life to forget. Phantom pains had made lying on her back impossible. But the very worst was the desolating sense of loneliness and fear that made her want to curl up in a ball and disappear.

  “Jessie? Are you okay? You’re shaking.”

  “Okay, this is silly. You need to get checked out,” Cade said firmly. “No more arguments.” Without giving her a chance to respond, he called to the men across the street, “Hey, guys, your patient is ready for you now.”

  She leaned into him. It was hard not to, and besides, his strength offered a tiny respite. She could allow herself that. For the moment. Nobody could be strong all the time. She’d learned that the hard way.

  The clatter of the gurney wheels bouncing over the pavement made her turn her face against Cade’s shirt. Fabric softener and sweat. A very male smell that made her wish for something she couldn’t quite name.

  “Where are your keys, Jessie?”

  Jessie looked up, blinking to get her bearings. “They’re in the mailbag. That’s the only prop we borrowed, but somebody has to take that back to the studio. Where are Marsh and Eerik?”

  “They left. The blond—Eerik, right?—said they had to check out of their motel and get to the airport.”

  “Are you kidding? They left without saying goodbye?” She gave a snort of exasperation. “Did they even talk to the cops? I mean, come on, they’re witnesses.”

  “To an unfortunate accident,” a deep male voice said. “Isn’t that what you told me when I first talked to you, ma’am?”

  Jessie swallowed hard and looked at the deputy. Miller, the little nameplate above his breast pocket said. “I’m not sure what I said. I was pretty shook up and in a lot of pain.”

  He looked at Cade, then the two paramedics. “But you refused care.”

  That might have been a mistake, she realized. She’d called her fall an accident and downplayed the severity because nobody in her field enjoyed filling out the paperwork that followed a stunt person around after a stunt went sour.

  But now that she’d had time to think about what happened, she could honestly say she’d done nothing to cause this. She could also say with some conviction that somebody else did.

  Before she could answer the man, Cade asked, “Have you looked at the video, Hank?”

  It irked her that Hank seemed to put aside his skepticism the moment Cade opened
his mouth. She knew all about the good-ol’-boy network. Hadn’t she been fighting for a place in it her entire career?

  Hank held up the camera her sister had given him. “We were just looking at it. Seems to me, you’re damn lucky to be alive. If I hadn’t seen the look on Cade’s face when all this was happening, I mighta thought it was kind of a publicity stunt.”

  “What? No. I would never do something that stupid or dangerous on purpose. And the dismount pole was never my idea. Ask Zane. Zane Whorley. He was supposed to be on the ropes with me, but he didn’t show up, so I had to do it alone.”

  “Where is he now?”

  “I don’t know. Marsh said he took off on his bike. I tried his phone…” She wondered if that excuse sounded as lame as she thought.

  “Listen. People—especially insurance investigators—love to blame the stunt artist when something goes wrong. But I should have been perfectly safe doing that dismount alone. Zane and I practiced on those ropes less than an hour earlier. Everything was fine. But when I got to the top and grabbed my rope, I knew instantly that something wasn’t right.”

  She held out her hands for them to inspect. Small, functional hands, calloused from years of gymnastics. Hers were not girly hands. Outlining the heels of both hands and along the edges of her fingers was a white ring. “Somebody put something on the rope. It felt like I was holding on to an icicle.”

  The cop frowned. He rubbed one spot with his finger then sniffed and tasted the sample. “Salty. Like sweat. But you’re alleging someone tampered with your rope.”

  She hesitated. Did she really want to open this can of worms? Must you always make such a fuss, a voice in the back of her mind questioned. Her mother’s voice. “Yes.”

  “Any idea who? Or why?”

  “No.”

  “And you didn’t see anyone hanging around the tower?”

  She shook her head.

  “Unfortunately, she was talking to me immediately before the show started,” Cade told the man. “Jessie and Remy are going to rent my dad’s place for the summer.”

  “Where’s Buck?”

  “That, my friend, is anybody’s guess.” Her future landlord—she’d almost forgotten about that part of this strange saga—sounded resigned and a little bit pissed off. “You know Buck. Got a mind of his own, and, now that I’m here to run the ranch, he decided to take off for a few months.”