CHAPTER 4
Riggs
Ash looks like I feel—totally wrecked.
We’ve been on this mountain for seven days now.
Ash’s off-trail route through a remote part of the Sierra Nevada mountain range here in Yosemite National Park wasn’t supposed to be like this.
And that’s not the worst of it. Elsie is going to kill us, and I don’t mean figuratively.
This time, I think she’s actually going to have us murdered.
Our sister set up a week-long event for us to entertain some of her biggest clients and their families with a series of fun outdoor activities.
That was supposed to start today at some ritzy lodge east of Los Angeles at Big Bear Lake, a good six-hour drive south from our current location.
Not only are we not going to make it, but as of right now, we have no idea where we are, so there’s no telling when we’ll get off this damn mountain.
It’s been a month since we left the jungle, a month since I found out Veronica dumped me for a boring hedge fund manager. I never met the guy, but I think it’s safe to assume that someone who manages money is boring. He’s probably perfect for her. Fuck my life!
Anyway, it had been a month, so we were itching for another trip, only one without all the weight of the camera equipment, batteries, and, unfortunately, the satellite phone we usually carry. This one was supposed to be different, just us, just for fun and with the absolute bare minimum gear.
Admittedly, I needed this trip more than Ash.
I’m still reeling from Veronica’s last words, any girl deserves better.
She never was one to mince words, and her message couldn’t have been more clear, any girl deserves better than someone like me.
I wonder if she realized that would cut me to my core.
Knowing her, probably. If I had to guess, she knew exactly what she was doing when she pointed out the obvious, that I’m destined to be single for the rest of my life.
Ouch. But maybe I deserved it after what I put her through.
The interesting thing is, I don’t miss her.
I thought I would, at least a little, but I don’t.
Regardless, I thought this trip would take my mind off her little jab. It hasn’t.
When we started out, the promotional event at Big Bear wasn’t scheduled to begin for another week. That meant we had plenty of time to explore this mountain range. And we would have had time if it hadn’t been for the most epic storm either of us has ever experienced.
For six days we couldn’t see a thing in the worst whiteout conditions imaginable.
We’ve been in plenty of storms, but never one that lasted so long.
And to make matters worse, trees kept falling all around us.
The deafening cracks of giant sequoias crashing down to the snow-covered forest floor less than twenty feet from us got my blood pumping for sure.
I nearly had a stroke at one close call.
And on top of that, temperatures have been dropping to twenty below at night.
We’ve been able to stay dry and warm, the two most important things in the wild, but we couldn’t move forward the way we wanted to. It’s been brutal.
Now that the storm is over, and the sun is out, we’re not exactly sure where we are.
All we can see is white. When the weather first turned on us, we made snowshoes out of some evergreen limbs.
We’ve made them plenty of times, so we’re good at it, and they’ve worked well.
But we ran out of food yesterday. We’re tired—exhausted, really—but at least the weather is surprisingly warm, in part because we’ve come off the peak and are at a much lower elevation.
Still, I’m pretty sure this is unusually warm for May, even at this altitude.
In fact, it’s so warm Ash and I are down to our T-shirts. At least we have that going for us.
Up ahead, a large boulder covered with snow looks like a good place to stop and try to get our bearings.
Worst-case scenario, we’ll just pick a direction and start heading down the mountain.
But that could put us in the middle of nowhere, so we’re hoping it doesn’t come to that.
Better to figure out our position and what direction civilization is in.
As we’re making our way to the boulder, I can’t stop thinking about that damn satellite phone.
We should have brought it, but at the time we were thinking we didn’t want to be bothered by anyone.
Some might call that flawed reasoning. I call it being stupid, plain and simple.
Regardless, what’s done is done, and I’m sure my voicemail is full.
Elsie has probably been leaving messages, first asking if we’re okay, then asking where we are, and I’m pretty sure the last hundred or so have been along the lines of, “You better be buried alive, because if you’re not, I’m going to kill you! ”
Yeah, we’ve gotten those messages before.
I’m six-four and two hundred and forty pounds with about eight percent body fat.
Ash is almost as big as me. Elsie is five-two and about a hundred and twenty pounds, but that doesn’t change the fact that Ash and I are afraid of her.
Right now, I’m downright terrified of her. We really screwed up this time.
We reach the boulder, and Ash starts building a fire to melt some snow for water. I’m hungry and wonder if there’s anything to forage in the area, but with all the snow, I doubt I could find anything.
Feeling defeated, I want to sit and rest for a moment, but I worry that if I do, I won’t be able to get up again. I’m that tired. Trudging through the snow takes a lot out of you. Truth is, I’m so tired I can barely think. That’s not good. Ash and I need to keep our wits about—
“You see that too, right?”
I was just about to ask my brother the same thing. For a second, I was sure I was imagining it.
“I don’t think fires are allowed here,” says the most stunning girl I think I’ve ever seen.
She’s with another girl, also beautiful, but in a more exotic way—if either of them is real.
My brows pull together with total bewilderment as I question if I’m not right in the head.
There’s altitude sickness where you can hallucinate.
It’s terrifying and extremely dangerous, deadly even.
But Ash said he sees them too. Beyond confused, my gaze bores into the blond with so much intensity I’ve lost the ability to blink.
Ash did say he saw them, right? Or was I imagining that as well?
Trying to make sense of it, I scan the horizon looking for a helicopter because I can’t think of any other way they could have gotten here.
Maybe it’s some kind of modeling event or photoshoot for something like one of those beer commercials, but there’s no film crew or anyone else for that matter.
Where the hell did they come from? And the bigger question is, how the hell are they out here in the middle of nowhere, and wearing bikinis no less?