We head back down the slope and out to the right, along the top of the cliffs and toward the black run that leads back down to the valley. I doubt Dale would have come all the way out here, but Curtis points to another crevasse ahead. The wind buffets me, blowing me off-balance.

Curtis slows as he nears the crevasse. And stops dead.

My stomach lurches. No. Please, no.

CHAPTER 56

TEN YEARS AGO

Odette lies crumpled and still in the bottom of the half-pipe. People rush up the pipe toward her. I stare at her, willing her to move.

“And Milla Anderson is up next,” the commentator says, far more subdued than he was a minute ago. “But we’ll suspend the action until we see how Odette is.”

I want to go down to her, but they’ll call my name as soon as the pipe is clear.

An official speaks into his radio, and not long afterward two men ski across from the midstation towing a sledge between them—the Blood Wagon, they call it. I watch them check her. This is all my fault. If I hadn’t opened my stupid mouth, she’d never have fallen. I distracted her at a crucial moment.

They’re strapping her down in preparation to load her onto the sledge. Nausea rises up my throat. If I hadn’t spent the night with her girlfriend, she wouldn’t have fallen. I have to go to her. I sideslip down the center of the pipe.

Blood is gushing from her nose. I reckon she’s broken it. The men are busy, so I pull my glove off, hunt in my pocket for a tissue, and clamp it to her face to try to stem the bleeding.

Odette’s gray eyes flutter open. “I can’t move.” There’s panic in her voice. Her speech is funny—sort of woolly.

“Are you in pain?” I say.

“No. I can’t feel anything. I can’t move my legs.”

“Don’t worry. They’re strapped down.”

I stand back to let them secure her in a neck brace. I need to get back up there but she’s holding my gaze as though I’m the only thing stopping her from falling into an abyss.

The men are saying stuff to her but she doesn’t seem to hear them. “I can’t move my arms.”

“They’re strapped down, too,” I say. “Just relax.”

The men talk into their radios.

Her eyelashes flap like the wings of a trapped bird. “My fingers. Are they strapped down?”

I glance down the length of her body. Her green pipe gloves lie still at her sides.

They’re not strapped down.

CHAPTER 57

PRESENT DAY

There, in the depths of the ice, lies Dale. He’s on his back, face gray, eyes closed. Still as a marble statue.

Curtis swears softly.