The rider behind me is less fortunate. I hear a shout, glance into the mirror, and see the nearest sled sliding away as if on a greased sheet. Its picks, if it has them, can’t find anything to grasp. I can’t hear above the sound of my own engine the metal-on-metal screech of the runaway snowmobile colliding with the machine behind it, but I can imagine it.

Two down.

For an instant, I congratulate myself on having caught a break.

Then I see vaporous cones of light through the trees beside me. A blue Ski Doo has swerved around the pile-up and is slaloming uphill through the oaks and pines. It’s got to be the Backcountry model, built for busting a trail through deep powder. These mountain sleds aren’t built to carry two people, but this one is. It helps that Tori weighs so little, but still it’s a precarious position, and the engine is laboring under the added stress.

The driver is skilled and experienced, though. Past the slippery stretch, he or she returns to the boat launch trail. The powder being kicked up by my track forces them to hang back or be blinded. It’s not like a car chase where they can accelerate and ram me from behind. They can only hang as close as they dare to my tail and wait for me to mess up.

Fortunately for me, Tori literally has her hands full, holding tight to the driver’s waist. Otherwise, she could easily shoot me, assuming (as I have to) that she has access to a firearm.

The driver keeps pressing, then falling back the moment airborne ice pellets begin striking his windshield.

I touch the brakes, hoping that’ll back them off, but they’re not fooled.

That’s when I see the chain ahead. In the snow-blown beams, a sagging silver line stretches across the trail. When the town closed the launch for the winter, someone must have locked off the entrance. As powerful as the engine is of my stolen Arctic Cat, it can’t snap chain links made of zinc-plated steel. If I don’t stop or turn aside, the impact will send me somersaulting onto the road beyond. I wouldn’t survive even if I were wearing a helmet.

I don’t think my situation can get any worse. Then I spot the snowmobile waiting for me beyond the chain. Those stuttering lights I’d seen along the hillside—they belonged to a sled shooting along the road to cut me off at the literal pass.

Nearing the chain, my headlights illuminate a dismounted figure dressed in black coveralls and a black helmet. The size and shape of the rider suggest it might be Tori’s sister, Tiff. She points a scoped rifle down the trail. A red light flickers atop the rail of the AR-15. A laser sight.