Chapter Thirty-Three
Liv looked around at the others, staring mutely at the not-Babette, at the tomb that was once a throne. A brittle, frenetic
energy—half shock, half fear—buzzed through the ragged cluster of guests. Money won’t protect you. Cross me and you’re dead too. Liv had assumed Mandy’s threat referred to her and Guy’s investment, and Charlie’s threat to Justine Long’s accidental death—both
ruthless ways of Babette asserting dominance over her partners. Now Liv wondered if she’d gotten it wrong. Who had really
written the threats? Who needed protection now?
When Big Pete signaled for them to hike back down to the river, Liv hustled to the front, falling into step behind the lead
guide.
“We should end the trip,” she whispered.
“Not my call.”
“We don’t know what happened, and we have to mitigate the risks,” Liv said. “We radio it in, and then we go back to the rim.
Maybe we’ll run into Marc. Either way, we’ll get back to civilization.”
“This group is not capable of safely hiking up to the North Rim.”
“My dad hiked down,” she said.
“So did Babette. And look how well that went.” Big Pete shook his head. “Putting aside the fact that it’s getting dark and
everyone is exhausted, the trail to the North Rim is a beast. It’s three miles longer than the trail you took from the south.
It climbs fifteen hundred feet higher. It’s tough even for the most seasoned hikers.”
“Then we helicopter out,” Liv said.
“Can’t do that from here either. We’ll call it in to the authorities. Later tonight, I can find out if Marc made it back to
the office. We’ll figure it out from there.”
“But—”
“This isn’t a democracy. Let’s go.”
Liv fell back and listened to the nervous bickering of the guests behind her. Big Pete was still in charge of the backcountry
side of this trip. But who was in control of Babette’s company now? By the time they reached the boats, Liv had a partial
answer. No one was in charge, but most everyone wanted to be. While Thor explained the situation to Katy on the beach, Charlie,
Devon, Stefan, PK, and Guy huddled around Big Pete like eager benchwarmers, each jockeying to direct what should happen next.
“I’m calling it in,” Big Pete kept repeating. “And then we’ll make camp.”
“Don’t call it in,” PK said. “Not yet. She deserves—”
“Camp where?” Charlie asked.
“Failure to report is a crime. And wherever we camp, we’ll all stick together.” The guide sounded as exhausted as he looked.
“But you said we could go back up to where she—”
“I lied,” Big Pete said. “It isn’t safe to hike back up there at night.”
“You . . . lied?” Devon looked shocked.
“You cannot call it in,” Guy said. “If we’re camping, we’re stuck here at least another day. The least you can do is let the
information stay with us. If you alert the authorities that Babette is dead while we’re trapped in this valley of media black
holes, there’s no way we can craft the message around it. Babette Sauvage is an international icon. Not to mention CEO of
one of the biggest private companies in her industry. The news is going to get out—and out of control.”
“True,” Stefan said. “This is a problem.”
“Not my problem,” Big Pete said.
“How much money would it take for it to become your problem?” Guy asked.
“Excuse me?”
“Just a little delay. Until we get back to the rim. We’ll pay you for it.”
The guide looked disgusted.
“This isn’t about business,” Guy insisted. “It’s about honoring Babette. She worked so hard to share her truth with her fans.
We owe it to her to take the time to tell her story properly.”
Stefan nodded. “It is our responsibility.” He turned to the guide. “And your responsibility is to guide us safely through
this chasm.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Big Pete said.
“You’re part of the narrative, too,” Guy said. “When it gets out who died, everyone and their brother is going to scrutinize
the particulars. I’d hate to see you report something prematurely that gets twisted to paint you or your tour company in a
bad light.”
Big Pete stared at Guy and Stefan for a long moment, his mouth opening and closing like a dying fish. Then he turned, took
off down the beach, and leapt onto the supply boat. For a moment, it looked like he was going to paddle away and leave them
to their squabbles about criminal conspiracy, which would probably serve them right. Instead, he drew back a tarp and hauled
out a beat-up lockbox. He clicked the hasps open, and the green metal lid swung up to reveal a radio that looked like it had
spent the Cold War hunkered down on a Russian submarine. He started flipping switches and turning knobs to bring the thing
sputtering to life.
“Park police!” the box shouted. “What is your emergency?”
The head guide scrunched his face closer to the buzzing radio, as if he were trying to keep the conversation between just
him and the machine.
“This is Wild Adventures trip leader Pete Otaro. I’ve got a private rafting group at mile one thirty-six, Deer Creek Falls.”
“Your emergency?”
“There’s a dead body.”
“Where?” The box squealed and popped, like a toddler with a megaphone. Even over the rushing water, everyone could hear.
Big Pete glanced around nervously. Stefan, Guy, and PK were basically shooting lasers at him. For that matter, so was Liv.
But she wanted him to do the right thing.
“We encountered the body up past Deer Creek Patio. In the Throne Room.”
“Was anyone else there?”
“We encountered her alone.”
“No other injured parties besides the body?” It was ugly, that word “body,” the way it reduced Babette to an inert object.
A discovery, not a person.
“No.”
“Any indication of how she died?”
“No. You’ll need to send someone down.”
Big Pete’s answers were coming out faster now, as if obfuscation was easier once he’d committed to this course. He hadn’t
lied exactly, but he was leaving out a boatload of information.
Like the hiking guide. Liv wondered again what had happened to Marc. Had he headed up to the rim, as Big Pete suggested? Was
he missing? Hurt? Was it possible Guy was lying about when Marc had separated from him and Babette?
The radio coughed, and Liv prayed it would press Big Pete for more information about the dead woman. But the box had other
priorities. “Where are you now?”
“We came back down to the beach to make camp before dark.”
“You can’t camp at those falls.”
Charlie looked up, hopeful. Maybe they’d go back up to Babette’s Throne Room after all.
Then the box shouted again. “You’ll have to cross the river.”
“What?” Charlie said. “But she—”
Big Pete cut him off. “I know the rules,” he said into the box. “Just wanted to call you first. As per protocol.”
There was a long staticky pause from the box, and Big Pete flashed a glance at the group on the beach. Much to Liv’s annoyance, her dad nodded approvingly.
“Here’s the thing,” the box shouted.
Another pause. Now it really did look like Charlie might take a running leap for the boat, current be damned.
“There was a rock slide this morning below Lava Falls, near Hell’s Hollow. All emergency personnel have been deployed to that
site, and both our copters are fully engaged. Until we know the extent of the damage and injuries, I can’t divert resources
for a nonemergency situation.”
“What about the body?” Big Pete asked. “If you can’t send someone, it could get . . .”
Disturbed. Degraded. Eaten. Everything Liv could think of meant more indignity for Babette and her family, and less chance
of the park police—or anyone else—ever finding out what really happened to her.
The box had other priorities. “You have provisions to stay in the area another day?”
“Yes.”
“Cross the river and make camp,” it yelled. “Keep this radio on. We will be in touch by noon tomorrow with an ETA on getting
someone out to you. If you don’t hear from us by then, reach out.”
The box snapped silent. Still, Big Pete stared at it for a spell, as if it might yet provide him a magic solution he could
offer the rest of the group.
Then he rose and stood on the edge of the supply boat, facing them. Everyone had inched forward during the radio drama, and
they were all clustered there, a pack of scared, tired, angry sheep. Liv was surprised to notice she was clutching Mandy’s
hand.
“Well,” Big Pete said. It was as if he didn’t want to come back down to the beach. “Suppose you heard all that.”
“You did well,” Guy said.
PK shot him an angry look. “Not well enough. No one is coming to help her.”
“Or us,” Fiona added.
“I want to go back to her,” PK said.
“I want to go home,” Imogen said. It was a quiet admission, perhaps the most radically honest thing she’d said yet.
Lucinda patted Imogen’s arm. The older woman looked exhausted, worn through by the intensity of the day.
“I still do not understand what happened,” Stefan said. “You”—he pointed to Charlie—“came upon her, and she was alive? And
then, so quickly, dead?”
Charlie squeezed his whole body shut, fists clenched, eyes closed, arms pressed tight to his sides. Then he opened his eyes.
“She was delirious. She didn’t recognize me.”
“Which is a sign of heatstroke, no?” Stefan asked.
“Her skin was too pale for heatstroke,” Fiona responded. “It’s not my area of expertise, but it looked”—Fiona flashed an apologetic
face at Charlie and Devon—“violent.”
“Something made her suffer,” Liv said. “Something made her die. Something, or someone.”
“Snake bite, perhaps?” Stefan turned to Thor. “Your pink friend?”
“Grand Canyon rattlesnakes are docile,” Thor said. “They don’t bite unless seriously provoked. And the reaction Charlie described . . .
that’s not how venom hits people.”
“Could it have been poison?” Stefan turned back to Charlie. “You said she was seizing when she died, yes?”
“Do we need to talk about this now?” Charlie set his eyes on Devon. “Please. Can we just . . .”
“My brother’s right. She’s gone. Let’s just . . .”
It was as if the Sauvage siblings had fallen in the river again, gasping for air in the surging waves. Liv could only imagine
how she’d feel if it were Mandy they’d found up on that throne.
But she also wondered at Charlie and Devon’s desire to avoid detailed talk of Babette’s death. She cursed herself for not gathering up the smashed glass from Babette’s water bottle, the one Charlie had dropped to the ground. Was it possible he’d done that intentionally?
“It matters,” Liv blurted out. “It matters how she died.”
Devon looked at her. “Of course it matters. But at this moment, I really don’t think—”
“If someone intended to hurt your sister, they succeeded. And they could still be down here with us now.”
“With us?” Mandy asked. “Like, one of us?”
“Or two,” PK said, flashing dark eyes at Charlie and Devon.
“Or the guide,” Liv said. “Don’t forget about Marc.”
“Don’t forget your darling daddy,” Fiona said.
“Now I really want to go home,” Imogen moaned.
“Enough,” Guy said. He snapped his fingers at Big Pete. “Hey! Boatman! How much to get a helicopter out of here?”
Big Pete shook his head. “Private aircraft can’t land in this stretch of the canyon.”
“For the right price they can.”
At that, Big Pete exploded. “You people don’t get it, do you? Your money, your connections, they can’t help you down here.
All we can do is follow the rules. Which means we cross the river. We make camp. We eat dinner. We go to sleep. We talk to
the park police again tomorrow. We don’t split up or hail helicopters or play medical examiner or build a pop-up spa by the
waterfall. We wait. That’s it.”
Clearly Liv wasn’t the only one who was tired.
“I don’t want to cross the river,” Charlie said. His voice was petulant.
“Not your call,” Big Pete said.
“I think it is,” Charlie said. “I’m the client. And I want to camp here.”
The two men glared at each other. Liv couldn’t decide why Charlie was taking this stand.
Maybe he’d seen how Big Pete had capitulated to Guy’s suggestions, and Charlie wanted to assert some control over the situation, too.
Or was it possible he planned to sneak back up to Babette’s body in the night?
Was there someone else on this side of the river—perhaps Babette’s killer—with whom Charlie was trying to connect?
Liv looked around the rocky beach, considering their options. Wondering if she had any weight to throw around, and if so,
where to pitch it.
“I think we should camp across the river,” Liv said.
“Why?” Devon asked.
“There’s a wide, flat beach over there. Here it’s cramped with rocky caves, and the waterfall is shooting spray everywhere.”
She hoped she wouldn’t have to spell out why these things mattered. Why it might be not only unpleasant but dangerous for
them to stay in a place where they’d have to bed down in individual little coves, where the noise of the pounding waterfall
would make it difficult to sleep or hear if someone sneaked up on them.
Lucinda looked at Liv. “If someone killed Babette, then aren’t we putting ourselves at greater risk if we isolate ourselves
across the river?”
“If one of us killed Babette, perhaps. But if someone else hurt her and then took off, they’ll be on this side.”
“What if they have a boat?” Imogen asked.
“Do you see a boat?” Liv said.
“It could be, like, in a backpack.”
“Then we’ll see them when they paddle across,” Liv said. She turned to her father. “Marc didn’t have a boat with him, did
he?”
Guy shook his head. “Just one of those camel packs that holds water.”
“Good,” Liv said. “And there’s one more thing. Lucinda is also right. If one of us is the one who hurt Babette, we need to
find a way to stay safe.”
“We were all in groups when she died,” Imogen said.
“Not all of us,” PK said. “Charlie was alone when he found her.”
“The damage had already been done,” Charlie protested. “And I wasn’t the only one alone out there.” He narrowed his eyes at
Stefan. “You said you wanted time on your own at the junction.”
The Dutchman looked surprised. “I just needed some water.”
“But you didn’t catch up with me,” Charlie continued. “And it sounds like you didn’t immediately double back to Lucinda and Fiona either.”
“What about you and Tarzan?” Fiona said, looking at Mandy. “You took a totally different path. Were you together the whole
time?”
“Of course,” Thor said quickly. “Stayed close as shadows.”
“I think we’re ignoring the person who spent the most time with Babette,” Devon said. “Him.”
Everyone turned to look at Guy.
“How many times do I have to tell you? She was alive and well when I last saw her.”
“I thought you said she was overheating,” Liv said.
Guy frowned. “Not in a going-to-die way. She just needed water, and a rest. Why are you cracking my nuts on this, Livvie?”
“This is Dad,” Mandy said. “He wouldn’t—”
“I’m well aware of what he’s capable of.”
“Enough,” Big Pete said. “We’re going across the river to make dinner and camp. Katy, Thor, get the PFDs. Everyone else, make
sure you have your things.”
“Are we taking the mule?” Imogen asked.
The animal had wandered into one of the pools fed by the waterfall and was wallowing in the mud.
“The mule will be fine,” Big Pete said.
If only he could say the same for the rest of them.