Chapter Two
Don’t freak out.
The worst thing a solo hiker could do was panic in situations like this.
The mixed-breed rescue dog who’d nestled beside Nick during the five-minute breather whined in consolation.
Nick ran his hand down Riot’s short, spotted coat. “It’s all right, bud,” he assured him, his voice rough. The feel of the coarse hair beneath his palm quieted some of the doubts in Nick’s mind over whether they would make it back to the trailhead before dark.
They were already a day behind. They didn’t have the supplies to make it another night in Dark Canyon Wilderness.
Nick cursed himself silently. Their situation wasn’t dire, but it wasn’t encouraging, either.
Nick had let Riot drink the last of their water hours ago.
Nick knew dehydration was becoming a problem for himself.
His lower lip had cracked down the middle.
His mouth felt as dry as the loose-sand trail.
A small headache bored at his temples, and he was feeling more and more sluggish.
He and Riot had come several miles from the last water source.
They hadn’t been able to use it, thanks to the buildup of moss and the risks of giardia, cryptosporidium and E.
coli. Nick had chosen not to boil the water and purify it, knowing how far he and Riot were behind schedule and how many miles they had to go before dark.
Nick knew they wouldn’t meet another water source before he got back to his truck.
Despite recent snowmelt and the plentiful pools they’d found closer to the canyon deep in the wilderness, Dark Canyon was notoriously dry.
Pools and streambeds were widely separated.
Many had dried up, thanks to droughts in previous years.
Nick was an experienced hiker. He was no stranger to Dark Canyon Wilderness and its challenges.
Thanks to rising insurance costs, the bills for his mother’s treatment and the facility he’d chosen for her had soared, so he had been taking extra shifts as a Dark Canyon paramedic.
As a result, his preparations for this year’s hike had been rushed.
He’d thought he’d brought enough liters of water to last him and Riot the entire hiking trip.
Clearly, he’d been wrong.
His pace, normally a decent two and a half miles an hour, had slowed. The sun had started its steady crawl toward the horizon.
He would not panic. Riot would pick up on Nick’s negative feelings. He probably already had. The low whine continued in the back of the canine’s throat. Nick picked up the rhythm of his petting to comfort him. “Not much further, boy,” he murmured, scratching Riot behind the ears.
It felt like a lie. Ten miles wasn’t much. Usually. But with the threat of dehydration-related sickness lurking, those ten miles to the trailhead seemed like twenty.
Nick had taken more time at the ruins this year.
Too much time. His father, Dr. Lincoln Malone, an archaeologist who had settled his family in Dark Canyon, Utah, after his retirement from the field, had loved nothing more than exploring the Ancestral Puebloan Indian structures and uncovering artifacts that had not been touched by human hands since the time of the Ancestral Puebloan people.
He was the leading expert on ancient American rock art and petroglyphs.
Or, he had been. Until one morning in March fifteen years ago when he’d said goodbye to Nick’s mother, Margot, and left for his and Nick’s annual hiking trip to celebrate his son’s twelfth birthday.
Far into the canyon, they’d been set upon by thunderstorms, followed by a flash flood.
The rushing water had scoured the canyon floor.
Nick’s father had gotten caught in the surge.
Once the water levels settled, his body washed up amid a debris pile of ponderosas and aspens.
Nick had barely survived the ordeal. His father’s last words to him had been for Nick to stay on the small, slippery ridge where he had been safe from the floodwaters.
He’d hugged the canyon wall as the rain fell, frozen with fear.
He’d been terrified he, too, would slide off the ridge and get swept downstream.
Days later, Search and Rescue had found him in the same spot. He’d been so weak, he hadn’t been able to walk away from the canyon on his own.
Fifteen years. It wasn’t enough time to forget his father’s quiet laugh or the contemplative lines around his mouth or the light in his eyes when he’d made an archaeological discovery.
Nor was it enough time to forget the towering wave of terror he’d felt at seeing his father plunge from the ridge where they’d taken shelter or the sight of him flailing, helpless to fight the unstoppable current.
He could remember too much of the intervening years. His mother’s sorrow, her mental breakdown and later decline. He could remember the self-blame that had lurked in the heavy, dark corridors of depression.
It had taken him a long time to pull himself out of that depression. It had taken even longer to learn to live with what had happened to his father.
His mother had never learned how to live without her husband. Nick had had to in order to take care of her. The idea of losing her, too, was intolerable. Watching her mind begin to slip away and her constant care wasn’t easy, but she was still a big part of his life.
He threw himself into work helping others. Saving lives. It wouldn’t bring his father back. It wouldn’t erase what had happened to his mother as a result. But he thought if he could save enough people…maybe he would be forgiven for not saving his father.
Maybe he could forgive himself.
Nick stood from the boulder he and Riot had been resting on. He picked up his pack and slung it on his back, making adjustments.
Riot sprang to his feet, panting and looking a good deal more ready than Nick felt.
Nick wrangled an encouraging smile onto his face. “Back on the trail.”
Riot bounded forward, leading the way.
Nick squinted against the sun. He preferred to hike west to east in the afternoons to keep the low-hanging sun out of his eyes. Lowering his chin so the bill of his ball cap cut the angle of the harsh rays, he followed his dog.
Riot’s past was as linked with Dark Canyon Wilderness as Nick’s.
Three years ago, Nick had been camping near the Ancestral Puebloan ruins when he’d seen the dog loping across the canyon floor.
At first, he’d thought he was a coyote. But as the animal crept closer to Nick’s tent and the smell of food, he’d realized that he was a young mutt with a gray face, a white speckled coat, one brown ear and bicolored eyes.
Riot had been skin and bones. Nick had shared his dinner with him.
The dog had eaten like he hadn’t seen a scrap of food in days.
He’d lingered at the campsite long after moonrise.
When Nick woke the next morning, the dog was still there. As Nick had cooked breakfast, he’d waited patiently, tail wagging. When it came time to pack up and head out, the animal had followed.
Nick thought he would branch off to hunt or search for pack members somewhere along the trail.
But when he reached the trailhead days later, the dog had been with him still.
After Nick had loaded his gear into his truck, he and the dog had engaged in a brief staring contest with Riot’s tongue lolling out the side of his mouth, eyes round with expectation, and Nick’s restraint had crumbled like a rock ledge.
C’mon, he’d said, opening the passenger door of the cab.
Riot had had no qualms about leaping into the seat.
He’d spent much of the ride back to the town of Dark Canyon with his chin propped contentedly on Nick’s free arm.
I guess I’ve got a dog now, he’d thought. His grin hadn’t been forced then. It wasn’t often he drove away from Dark Canyon Wilderness after his annual hiking trip smiling. That year, it had been as inevitable as his and Riot’s connection.
But by rushing to get ready for this year’s trip, Nick hadn’t just potentially endangered himself. He may have endangered Riot, too.
Shame coated his parched throat and he struggled to swallow. He kept walking at a steady pace, following the tracks Riot left on the narrow, sandy path.
They trekked another half hour before the nosebleed started. It began as one drop of blood in a slow crawl from his left nostril. Then the other joined in. Riot whined as Nick stopped again to dig out his handkerchief. He dropped his head back, trying to stanch the flow.
Nosebleeds happened in dry climates, particularly when the subject lacked hydration. Nick knew that. Still, his pulse knelled ominously against his eardrums. He could feel it in the back of his head.
He looked up to see that Riot had wandered off the path into the sagebrush to sniff the remains of a dead elk.
“Riot!” Nick called. “Get away from there.”
Riot reluctantly padded back to him. He planted himself at Nick’s feet, resting his rump in the space between Nick’s well-worn hiking boots.
“Stay,” he instructed, trying not to look at what remained of the elk.
He and Riot had passed it on the way into the wildlife zone.
It’d been there for some time. There were patches of fur and skin left in places, but the line of its stark white jawbone and the ladder of its ribs jutted out in distinction.
Another casualty of the wilderness. A reminder that nature took everything back eventually.
“We should move on,” Nick said, wiping the space beneath his nose once more with the handkerchief. He sniffed wetly.
Riot let out a low woof. He rushed forward with a cadence of barks.
“No!” Nick cried, sprinting after him. “Riot! Come back!”
Riot ran full tilt up a small rise and stopped, tail wagging madly.
Nick raised his hand to block the sun. A figure stood at the top of the rise, small and slender.
The figure raised a hand. Then a voice called out to him, “Yá?át?ééh!”