Of every human emotion Cabrillo detested pity most of all. The looks of cheerless sympathy passersby had given him the day Julia Huxley had wheeled him out of a San Francisco hospital with one pants leg neatly pinned had enraged him. He vowed from that day onward no one would ever look at him like that again. So since losing his leg he had undergone three surgeries and literally thousands of hours of physical therapy so he could run without the slightest trace of a limp. He could ski and swim better than when he’d had both limbs and was able to balance himself on the prosthesis with ease.

He had a handicap, but he wasn’t handicapped.

However, there were still things he couldn’t do as well as when he had both legs and one of those was skydiving. Keeping your body arched and stable while falling through space required minute adjustments of your arms, but mostly it was the legs that kept a diver steady. Juan had made dozens of practice jumps in the past couple of years and no matter how he tried he couldn’t prevent himself from going into a slow rotation that quickly turned into a dangerous spiral.

Unable to feel the sensation of wind pressing against his ankle and foot he couldn’t correct the spin without a jump partner grabbing and steadying him. It was a rare defeat that Juan hated to admit and Max knew it.

“It’ll be fine,” Cabrillo said, and continued to fold his chute.

“You sure?”

Juan glanced up with a smile. “Max, you’re acting like an old woman. Once I’m out of the plane I just need to arch my back. We won’t be in free fall long enough for me to start my Dervish impersonation. HAHO, old friend. High altitude high opening. If this was any other kind of jump I’d be in the op center watching the monitors with you.”

“All right.” Max nodded. “Just making sure.”

A half hour later Juan handed his chute and gear to one of the riggers to carry to the chopper hangar near the Oregon’s fantail. Before heading to his cabin for some long-overdue sleep he stopped by the medical bay to check up on Sloane. Doc Huxley wasn’t at her desk or in the adjoining operating theatre so he searched the three recovery rooms. He found Sloane in the third. The lights were turned down to a muted glow as she slept propped up on a hospital-style bed. She’d pushed aside her blankets and Juan could see the dressing covering the wound under her arm. There was no indication the gunshot was still bleeding.