Page 7 of Double Exposure

Chapter Three

Carter Weston

You can't outrun an avalanche.

The fastest I can ski is about thirty-five miles per hour. Avalanches crash at over a hundred. All you can do is watch in either awe or in horror, depending on where you and your loved ones are standing.

What was this guy doing?

Ice spray is dangerous and I try to steer Ryan away from the wake of the crash. Hunched down for speed, the wind catching my ski mask, I’m suddenly pissed. Someone is here illegally. Doing God knows what and now the avalanche will crush them in seconds.

I watch as the guy makes it to the ledge, disappears behind it, and then snow crashes all around him, tumbling over the rock like churning water. He disappears from sight just as the wave of snow crests over the ledge.

Smart move. At least this person’s not an idiot.

Ryan yells, “No sign, no sign, no sign, no sign . . .” as we fly down the mountain. He means no sign of a person in a light-blue jacket caught up in the snow. Whoever that person is, they must be flat up against that rock or they’ll be buried so deep we might never find them. Bile burns the back of my throat.

Jesus fucking Christ.

If we’re held responsible for anyone's death, even people without permits, two families will be destroyed, theirs and ours. Lives, wrecked. Our business, over. It all flashes in staccato in front of me.

Then a sound from behind forces a glance above.

It’s a second wave. This often happens with avalanches. There are minor breakaways on either side.

But even minor ones can be major.

“Ryan, hard right!” I yell and to his credit the kid bends his knees and leans into the hill. Skimming over the ice is rough going, though. Snow is hard and compact after a slide, like frozen rock.

We jettison out of its path, but Ryan is too close to the crash of snow. He’s going to lean into it if I don’t pull him back.

“Ski around this,” I say. “It’s too hard.”

I can’t read his face at this speed and with his mask in place, but I know he’s not happy. Maneuvering around the new slide will take precious time. Within fifteen minutes a buried avalanche victim has a chance of surviving. After thirty, most victims have died.

Ryan knows this firsthand.

We need to get down the mountain to that wedge of granite as fast as possible.

“I'm going straight down,” he shouts.

“If you wipe out it’ll be like falling on concrete.”

“Yeah, but look,” he says and jerks his head toward the mountain top. There’s a twelve foot long sheath of snow that’s opened up and ready to topple next.

I make a quick decision.

“You stay. I’ll go,” and I pull into the lead and shoot straight down the face of the mountain.

This time, he doesn’t listen. I hear him right behind me. I hunker down again and hope my skis will be able to handle the compacted snow.

It’s more like skiing on a tilted skating rink of solid, bumpy ice. In another minute we’re both nearly at the destination. Snow skitters and dances as Ryan flies past me, sliding into a wide “C” just past the rock. He slams to a stop. I slow down and circle around the ledge.

Or where the ledge used to be.

Now it’s just a mound of dense snow.

We immediately kick off skis and grab our pick axes. Waves of ice and snow have wrapped around the wedge of rock from either side in a tight clasp, like two waves colliding at the same time and then frozen. If there wasn’t someone possibly buried underneath, it would be a sweet effect.