The plane was vibrating and increasing speed as it plummeted. The men in the cabin began shouting. One had reached for his cell phone and was attempting to call his family.

The man behind Yacine recited the Lord’s Prayer. The gum-snapper’s knuckles whitened as he gripped the armrests of his seat and choked back tears. Through the downpour, Yacine glimpsed alpine slopes and forests rushing toward them and embraced death.

Fortin’s heart filled with regret.

Is this the way I am going to die? Falling from the sky without making things right?

Fortin’s stomach lifted and his ears popped.

Blinding, wind-driven rain pounded the plane.

It nosed downward, increasing in speed.

Cockpit alarms bleated.

Banner strained to pull the plane out of its dive as the surviving engine screamed. The nose was lifting, ever so slightly, it was lifting.

Leclair shouted a cheer.

Relief was emerging on Banner’s face in the instant before they slammed into a mountainside.

-Chapter 40-

Lost Wolf Trail, North Cascade Mountains, Washington

The trail riders were tourists from Denmark and Germany.

They’d paid to experience the adventure of horseback camping in the Rocky Mountains and were on day three of a five-day guided trip deep into the North Cascades.

Today, their horses had been sure-footed, scaling the side of a mountain spiraling up the narrow trail reaching several plateaus until they’d come to a ridge. They continued the climb until they conquered the summit and were rewarded with the sweeping, panoramic view.

Then the storm caught up with them.

Everywhere before them were eternal snow-capped peaks as far as they eye could see, blanketed with oceans of forests, grassy meadows, valleys and glacial-fed lakes, rivers and streams.

It was breathtaking, even in the steady rain.

Thunder boomed like artillery. Lightning flashed.

Nature’s display awed them.

They hitched their horses and got their cameras out to record the vista as the rain pelted their ponchos.

“Oh my God!” One of the riders pointed.

A plane, flames licking from one of its engines streaked downward miles in the distance, skirting one mountain but disappearing into a line of rugged peaks miles away.

The tour guide, Lloyd Palmer, consulted his GPS locator. Then opened one of his saddlebags, yanked out his satellite phone and called 911.

His call went to the IceCom Dispatch Center in Jade Falls.

“What’s your emergency?”

“I want to report a plane crash!”

“A plane crash. Where?”

“It was a small plane, maybe a twin-prop!”

“Where sir? Can you give me an approximate location?”

“Yes, across the lake from us. We’re a charter trail riding group. We’re on Lost Wolf Trail on the side of the Orion Summit. We just witnessed the plane go down, due south by southwest of us. I would put it near Ghost Ridge. But it’s too far from us, mountain miles from us. We can’t get to it!”