Page 57 of One Last Shot

“I’m nearly there.” Oaken.

“Ten feet. Easy right, Moose. Hold there.”

Oaken reached out a foot and touched the rock.

“Stop, Shep.”

“I’m on the rock,” Oaken said.

“Careful, Oaken. You’re pretty precarious there. A wrong step could put you both in the water.”

What the cameras probably couldn’t pick up was the wetsuit under Riley’s clothing. Just in case he went in, she wanted some protection from the frigid water.

Oaken, however, wore a dry suit, a nonnegotiable. Now he braced himself on the rock and steadied the egg for Riley to climb into. It had a flat bottom, but the shape cocooned him in for extraction. Safe and efficient, it was used when the victim showed limited or no injuries.

“Give him a little slack,” Boo said to Shep, seeing the egg twist. Shep let it down, and it settled onto the ATV carriage.

Riley slipped inside.

“All right, let’s get some tension on the line,”Boo said, watching as Oaken snapped him into the egg. He looked up and gave her a thumbs-up.

“Going up in three, two, one. Power and controllability look good, Moose. Let’s bring it up and then over.”

Shep winched up the cable as Moose lifted the chopper.

“We’ve cleared the cliff. Bring the basket up easy, and forward. Now left.”

The wind caught the basket as the chopper drew it out of the gorge, and it swung.

“Not too fast, Moose.”

He eased the chopper over toward the cliffside.

Huxley, Beto, and the rest of the Air One crew, all dressed in bright red jumpsuits and helmets, waited, on the ready for their “patient.” They’d driven in on ATVs and would transport him to the rescue truck, then up to the hospital in Copper Mountain, which was closer than Anchorage.

And away from the scrutiny of the camera.

In truth, Dodge and Larke waited in Dodge’s truck on the other side of the river. Boo probably owed Riley a pizza, despite his begging to be the patsy.

“Almost there, Moose. Easy left?—”

The forecasted gust hit. Just swept down the canyon through the trees, and in a second, it slammed against the chopper, took the egg, and swept them askew.

Moose fought the controls, rising up, then righting the chopper, but below, the cable swung in a crazy, wide loop.

And then the egg began to spin.

Boo had been leaning out, and the sudden jerk had pushed her off the deck. She fell, slammed against the skid, her harness catching her but her helmet thwacking against the struts.

Heat exploded up her arm, and the wind burst out of her. She gasped, the worldspinning.

“Boo!”

Shep’s voice. It cleared out the clutter, and she blinked away the gray.

She was flopping against the struts, her feet missing the skids as the chopper pitched, spun. Looking up, she found the deck, and Shep’s hand.

Grabbed it.