Dawn tries to kick the snow away, but she’s uncoordinated and graceless and she nearly slips and falls onto the scrap of yellow jacket that may or may not be a body, so she stops trying to kick the snow away.

She looks around the bottom of the cliff as though someone is going to show up to make this any easier.

As far as she can tell, she’s alone.

She crouches down in the snow beside the scrap of yellow jacket that, let’s face it, is probably attached to a body. Holds her breath. Reaches out with a fair amount of, you know, trepidation, and wipes some snow off the jacket.

There’s enough give underneath the jacket that she knows it’s not rocks under there. Someone or something is wearing this jacket.

Dawn brushes more snow off, and there’s a zipper and a couple of pockets, which really sucks because it means she’s touching the front of the jacket, which means somewhere above where she’s touching, well…

There’s going to be a face.

Chapter 64

IT TAKES SOME TIME, but she does it.

It takes a lot of breathing through her nose and trying not to be sick, and trying to tell herself that even if this is Alex under all of this snow, he’s dead now, completely dead, and he can’t do anything to her.

She wraps her hand in the sleeve of her jacket. Holds her breath again and kind of looks away. Reaches out to where she imagines the face should be, and as, lightly as she can, brushes the snow clear.

She lets out her breath.

Tries to well up her courage. Be a damn Grizzly.

Dawn forces herself to look at the body. At the face.

It’s Alex.

At first glance, he looks normal.

Dawn tries not to do more than glance at him; she looks just long enough to see that it’s Alex, and he’s dead.

(His eyes are open. He’s not moving. He’s buried under snow. He’s dead.)

This should be enough. She’s done her job. She’s found the body and confirmed that it is in fact a body.

That it’s Alex’s body.

She can go back to the others and report this with her head held high, feeling like a Grizzly Bear and not a Bear Cub, and she can tell Warden and the others and they can all as a group decide what to do next.

But some sick side of Dawn is actually curious. She can’t not look, now that she’s gone to the trouble. She glances back at Alex. Brushes a little more snow off.

And now she can see how not normal he really looks.