Chilled (A Bone Secrets Novel) (7 page)

Ryan gave a grim smile, slowly shaking his head. “I don’t know how you do it, Brynn.” He blew out a tense sigh and dug his GPS out of his pocket.

Alex had been quiet since the river, but Brynn had caught him staring at her a few times. Sometimes with confusion, sometimes with anger. Understandable after what she’d put her team through. She was still vacillating between terror and disgust herself.

But his confusion told her Alex wasn’t the unfeeling, silent soldier who’d first joined their team. His emotions had been thrust out in the open along with everyone else’s.

He’d acted without thinking of his own life.

She briefly closed her eyes and saw his determined, furious expression as he yanked at her jacket on the bridge. He’d literally shocked her into moving. She’d already accepted that she was headed for the water. Why had he risked so much for two people he barely knew?

And he’d demonstrated no aftershocks. No unsteady legs or breathlessness from adrenaline. An untypical reaction to nearly dying. Was it his marshal’s training? Or didn’t he care that he’d nearly become a Popsicle? He’d been more upset that she’d turned into a statue.

Alex’s hair was black and his skin was a light tan color that came from genes, not the sun. Under his jacket and layers of pants, she couldn’t get a look at his body, but something told her the physique was rock solid. She’d heard marshals had to work out daily and meet rigorous physical requirements. She watched the lean muscle flex in his neck and jaw as he turned his head toward her and guessed he was older than her twentyeight years. Ten, maybe even fifteen years older. About the same as Jim.

“I still don’t get why anyone volunteers for this shit.”

Brynn didn’t think Alex meant anyone to hear him as they trudged through the trees.

She dug deep for a lighthearted tone to answer his rhetorical question.

“For the fun and games.”

He looked over his shoulder and gave her a pointed look. “No, really. What keeps you going out time after time?” His eyes were a cool gray that made her cheeks heat oddly as he looked at her. He’d rattled her during their introduction that morning. The pleasant rush of blood in her head during his stare had surprised her. In a good way. The other men had fumed at the length of Alex’s look, and she’d rolled her eyes at their protective testosterone. They had done a dozen rescue trips together, and now her team had become surrogate fathers.

She let her thoughts wander over the rescues she’d done, grateful for the distraction. Nothing glorious. Nothing newsworthy. Not like those two men who found the seventyyear-old grandmother who’d been lost in the wilderness for ten days. Everyone had assumed she was dead. But the men had wanted to look one more time. On their own time. And found her.

But that incident reflected the heart of her own motivation.

She could make a difference in an impossible situation.

Convincing Alex Kinton that she liked what she did wasn’t going to be easy. Contempt for the outdoors oozed from him. He’d been keeping his mouth shut about the weather and woods, but everyone could read it in his eyes.

“People need help. I like to do it, and I believe I do it well. I might be the reason somebody survives. That is incentive enough for me to put up with any weather or discomfort. And sometimes we have a lot of fun.”

“Like today?” More sarcasm.

“It hasn’t been so bad.”

His stunned gaze shot to her eyes, the water incident clearly in his mind.

She ignored him and continued, “There’s something about being out here with these guys. There’s an adrenaline rush and camaraderie that you can’t find anywhere else. Getting tired just makes us goofy. We rely on each other to stay sane and that leads to ridiculous games, stories, and challenges. Trying to keep each other from total boredom and worry is a challenge. What do you do for fun?”

He was quiet for a second. “I write software in my spare time. Some computer games. Some security programs. I have a knack for it, and it’s a good side business.”

She waited for him to continue, but he said nothing else.

“That appeals to me about as much as cross-country skiing probably would to you.”

He gave her a half smile. “Cross-country skiing? You mean jogging on skis? I’ll pass. I like to downhill ski. I don’t mind a little snow for that, the rush and speed is totally worth it. And I like to run, but not in the rain or snow.”

“And you live in Oregon?”

“My gym has an indoor track.”

“Running around in circles, staring at the same plain walls. Joy,” she teased. She liked the light banter with him. It lightened his cheerless eyes.

“Gives me time to think. Develop game programs in my head.”

She rolled her eyes. “Dear Lord. You’re lucky you ended up out here. This adventure is going to show you how much is missing in your life.”

His eyes almost twinkled. “Adventure is
Pirates of the Caribbean.
This is more like watching an endless documentary on making concrete while I’m tied to the chair.”

Ryan and Jim looked back as her laugh rang through the snow.

“Alex Kinton.”

“Alex Kinton?
He’s out with your team? And he told you I sent him?”

At Whittenhall’s shout, Patrick worried about the marshal’s blood pressure again.

Stewart, the younger agent, whipped his head in their direction, his cell conversation arrested at Kinton’s name. Whittenhall glanced at Stewart and roughly gestured for him to wrap up the call. Stewart nodded and refocused on the cell. Patrick saw Stewart swallow hard as his eyes darted from the media to the perimeter of sheriff’s deputies.

“If you didn’t send him, then who is he?” he asked Whittenhall.

Whittenhall was dialing his own phone. He wiped at a drip of sweat on his forehead; Patrick blinked at seeing the marshal sweat in the near-freezing temps.

“Who’s Kinton?” he repeated louder. His stomach was starting to churn. Who’d he sent out with his team?

“Former marshal,” Whittenhall muttered as he concentrated on his phone. “I don’t know how the fuck he heard about that plane.” Patrick caught a glimpse of widening eyes and dilating pupils as Whittenhall glanced at the reporters and lifted his phone to his ear.

Former
marshal?

“Hey.” Patrick grabbed at Whittenhall’s phone arm. “Is my team in danger? Why isn’t he a marshal anymore?” His voice
rose as Whittenhall ignored him. “Why would he go out in this shitty weather to get to that plane?”

Whittenhall shook off Patrick’s grip and stepped away, his gaze on the ground. Temper expanded in Patrick’s chest. He wanted some damned answers. Now. He stepped into the marshal’s view and fought the urge to knock the damned phone from his ear.

“Who’s on that fucking plane?”

Brynn leaned against a fir, watching the curtain of white fall from the sky. From under the boughs the view was utterly gorgeous.

“Remember the dude with the glasses?” Ryan took a long swallow from his water bottle during their brief break. He squatted on his haunches with his pack in the snow beside him. The group huddled under a group of firs, hiding out from the snow while grabbing a bite to eat and catching their breath.

Jim shook his head in exasperation at Ryan’s question, and Brynn saw Thomas crack the smallest smile.
Oh, yeah. How could any of us forget?

Alex studied Ryan’s big grin, but directed his question at Brynn. “Bad story?”

“One of those rescues where everything is going against you.”

Alex gestured at the snow. “More than this?”

“This is just Mother Nature. Try working against human nature.”

“It wasn’t his fault. The guy couldn’t help what happened,” Jim argued.

Ryan hooted, and Thomas shook his head.

Ignoring them, Alex raised a patient eyebrow at Brynn. “Could this be one of those stories to help me stay sane?”

She grinned. “Could be.” His eyes begged for a distraction.

“Then get on with it.”

She took a deep breath, enjoying the shock of cool air in her lungs as she thought back to that search. She closed her eyes and could almost see the blue sky. “It was almost two years ago. Summertime. Gorgeous weather. Must have been in the nineties that day.” She heard Alex grumble, and she hid a smile. “It was real hot that day. Wasn’t it, Ryan?”

“I don’t remember it being hot.”

She rolled her eyes. Ryan had totally missed her gibe at Alex. Spoilsport.

“Well, it wasn’t raining. Or snowing.” She watched Alex’s lips twist. He knew the heat remarks were meant to harass him. “Anyway, we were called out for a hiker who got separated from his group, and we had a huge area to cover. There were about thirty of us looking on foot. Thankfully we had helicopter help.”

Everyone glanced up at the low clouds. They knew the weather was supposed to clear sometime in the next forty-eight hours, but it wasn’t showing any sign of it. Until then there was no chance of support. It was simply too stormy.

“Two of the search groups had found single human tracks, but they were over a mile apart. Each group followed a set.”

“How’d they spot the tracks?” Alex raised a brow. Kiana had taken up residence at his feet, and he rubbed an occasional hand through her wet fur.

“There’d been a light snowfall the night before.”

“You said it wasn’t snowing.” He glowered.

“It wasn’t snowing during the day. It
was
sunny. And we were really high up. In the summer there’s usually snow on the ground all the time up there. Anyway, these tracks seemed to lead all over the place, no rhyme or reason to them. They trailed through valleys and around giant rock formations. Up and down and around in circles.”

“Two different people? Or was someone drunk?” Alex cut in.

“Neither.” Brynn raised one arched brow to admonish him for the interruption. “One team followed their set of tracks down to a creek where the hiker had apparently crossed the river within thirty feet of a footbridge.”

“He didn’t take the bridge? Why wouldn’t he cross on the bridge? Was he trying to throw searchers off his tracks?”

She continued as if she hadn’t heard him, enjoying his focused attention. “Then one of the teams heard someone responding to their shouts and whistles. But they were having a hard time locating him. The rough terrain was making it difficult with dead spots and echoes. But they could hear a human voice shouting back replies to their calls. They kept searching, expecting to find him just over a ridge or on the other side of the next peak, but no luck. They’d yell for him to tell them where he was, but he kept saying he didn’t know.”

“What the hell? He
was
drunk,” Alex stated.

“We had the chopper fly over the area. The lost man would shout that he could hear it and said he was waving his arms, but he couldn’t see the chopper. And no one in the chopper could spot him. Then no one on the ground could hear him anymore because the chopper was so loud. The chopper was nearly out of fuel and ready to turn around when they spotted him.”

“So what was his problem?” The marshal was impatient.

“He couldn’t see,” she said simply.

“What?”

“He’d lost his glasses. He couldn’t see a thing. That was why he didn’t take the bridge over the first creek. He didn’t know it was there. And he couldn’t describe his surroundings to searchers because it was all a big blur.”

“Jesus Christ. Something so simple…And it made your search a dozen times more difficult.” Wonder rattled Alex’s voice.

“But we found him. That’s all that mattered.”

Ryan coughed, giving his opinion of that statement. She saw him exchange a smirk with Alex.

“Let’s move out.” Jim slung on his pack and motioned for Brynn to take the point. Alex lifted her pack, motioned for her to turn around, and held it in place as she slipped in her arms. She nodded her thanks, briefly meeting his gray gaze. His eyes reflected a measure of relaxation she hadn’t seen before. She hid a smile, pleased she’d cracked that cold shell again.

Getting him to loosen up was a challenge. And she liked it.

She stepped out from the shelter of trees and caught a gust of snowy wind in her face. Her lungs shivered, protesting the icy air. At least it looked like the snow was easing up a little. It wasn’t falling nearly as thickly as when they started their break.

Her boots sank into six inches of snow. She glanced back at Ryan to get a heading. He’d already consulted his GPS and pointed toward two o’clock. The men fell into line behind her.

Along the makeshift trail, Ryan continued complaining about the blind hiker, telling Alex more details of the problems the man had created for the search teams. Brynn tried to tune Ryan out but soon glanced over her shoulder in irritation at the weird blowing noises he was making.

The noise wasn’t coming from Ryan. Ryan was looking backward over his own shoulder. Jim and Thomas had pulled out their guns and were pointing them to the left, at a dense area of rhododendrons.

“Brynn.” Jim’s voice was urgent. “Get back here.”

Heart speeding, Brynn spun around and darted the fifteen feet back to the group, her gaze trying to penetrate the dark of the underbrush. She knew that rough sound. It blew harder and louder.