Page 7 of One Last Shot

“You got that faster than most!” Mike was grinning. He pointed to the bag. “Here’s your cutaway, and here’s the reserve chute. But if you run into trouble, I’ll be there. I won’t deploy until you’re good to go.”

They had climbed, the bushy green forest below, shadows between the trees, left Denali to the north behind, and now flew east, into the smaller Copper Mountain range. Still rugged. Still deadly.

But brutally gorgeous. He took a breath, the air thinning as they rose, fragile and frigid. Mike leaned out, then came back in, grinning at him.

Below, a river jagged in and around granite walls, trees, even muddy washes where it chipped out snow. Alaska, in the throes of awakening.

Maybe it wouldn’t be terrible. So he’d tromp around nature, learn some skills, and maybe even get out of his head for a while.

“There’s our drop!” Mike said, pointing to a clearing far, far below. He grabbed a pack that sat between them, stood, and then heaved itout of the chopper.

It fell, and in a second, the chute deployed. For some reason, a fist released in Oaken’s chest.

Alrighty then.

“We’re going to climb down onto the chopper skid and drop from there,” Mike shouted. “You’re going to love this! Don’t worry—you’re in safe hands. There’s nothing like jumping out of a plane to figure out what you’re made of!”

Okay, maybe. Cool. Oaken almost wished the other chopper had stuck around, because he felt like Jack Powers, the action hero that Winchester Marshall played onscreen, as he climbed out after Mike onto the skid, then dangled off it.

“Don’t let your rigging catch on it!” Mike strained his voice over the wind. “Live big! Live wild! The best is yet to come!”

Whatever. Out here, the air turned brutal, frigid, thunderous in Oaken’s ear.

“Release!”

He let go, falling, and in a moment, found his rip cord. Pulled. His chute deployed, jerked him up, and suddenly he was floating.

His heart still hammered, nearly in his throat, but the rushing died to a whisper, and only the glorious frontier beauty of the Alaskan wild remained. He spotted a cabin to the west, settled on a lake, and recognized it as where they’d taken off. And to the south, the gray-blues of the river that Mike wanted to cross. He even caught a glimpse of a fire tower. The road ran perpendicular to the river, and along it, he spotted a lodge.

But mostly, towering pine, rugged cliffs and rushing mountain rivers, the snow-topped granite mountains. So much wild beauty it swept him up, hollowed him out.

Dumped out of him everything from the past eight months, just like that.

Who knew that breaking free of his past simply required leaping out into nothing?

He looked around for Mike and spotted him,higher, his chute white against the pale sky. The chopper had veered away, now disappearing into the horizon in the east.

So maybe he shouldn’t have pushed against Goldie so hard. Clearly his manager knew what she was doing.

He could almost, maybe, hear a tune forming in the back of his?—

Mike simply fell from the sky, right in front of him. What?—?

The lines tangled around Mike’s pack, and he fought to cut them away from his ripped and flapping chute. The trees had begun to take shape, the forest coming into focus even as Mike struggled.

C’mon, Mike!

If he had a clue what he was doing, maybe he could cut away and... what? He had no time, no air?—

Mike’s torn chute spun away, and in a second the emergency chute flared.

Not enough. The chute arrested his corkscrew into the ground but only enough to slow it to a bone-crushing landing.

He landed in the field but lay motionless, crumpled, as Oaken fought with his chute handles. He’d learned to jump solo on a dare from the guys in the band during a tour in California; certainly he could figure out how to maneuver into the field.

Pulling down on the right toggle, he got the chute to move left. And then right, and suddenly he was driving, the earth rushing up at him.

Fifty feet. Ten. Five.