Chapter Thirteen
Day one of the county fair was finally here, and to Hanson’s surprise, everything looked good to go.
Food trucks lined the north end, the smell of fried everything drifted across the grounds in a way that made it impossible to walk past without stopping.
Vendor booths stretched in two long rows down the center.
Kids ran between adult legs with the focused energy of people who understood exactly how much daylight they had left and intended to use all of it.
At the far end, anchoring the whole operation like a beacon, the Ferris wheel turned slow and steady against the cloudless sky.
Around him the Sweet family moved through the fairgrounds the way they moved through everything—together, loud, and entirely at ease.
Preston argued cheerfully with Carson about something involving the livestock judging.
The kids pulled in four directions simultaneously.
Garret had found the corn hole courts within seconds of arrival, which surprised nobody.
But the most important person—Kat—was beside him.
Walking hand in hand, he’d never been happier.
“Looks like the fair company knew what they were doing after all.” Jillian’s gaze darted across the expanse of the busy grounds.
“Seems like it,” Rachel agreed. “So far everyone’s having fun.”
Hanson glanced up at the Ferris wheel. He was more surprised than anyone that this whole event had finally come together.
Between the lack of communication and last-minute scrambling ensuring everyone had access to the right areas, including the local attendees, his money would have bet that none of this would have happened even close to on time.
“Ooh. I love kettle corn. Let’s get some.” Kat pointed to the nearby vendor, almost dragging him in that direction.
Though everything smelled terribly tempting, besides not wanting to let go of her hand, he had his doubts. “Last time you offered me food at a public event I was on fire for twenty minutes.”
“That was jalapenos. This is kettle corn.”
“You understand why I’m cautious.”
She laughed and he felt it somewhere between his ribs, the same place he’d been feeling it for weeks. He was beginning to understand that the feeling was not going away, and that he had stopped wanting it to.
“Look at those two.” In line with Rachel and Jillian and now Sarah Sue, Kat nodded toward the Ferris wheel.
Alice and Clint stood at the boarding platform.
Clint had his hand at the small of her back, his head bent toward hers, and even from this distance, Hanson could read the love in the couple’s eyes.
It was the same with the whole family. They would blow national divorce statistics out of the water.
Alice waved a hand without turning around and stepped into the gondola.
Clint followed. The operator latched the bar.
The wheel moved them up and the next gondola came around for boarding.
A harsh, metallic screech shattered the cheerful noise of the fair.
The Ferris wheel jerked, shuddered, and came to a dead halt.
Above them, the gondolas swung wildly back and forth.
A collective gasp rippled through the crowd, followed immediately by the murmurs of confused onlookers pointing toward the sky.
His grip tightening on Kat’s hand, Hanson scanned the massive structure.
Down at the control booth, a teenager in an oversized polo shirt frantically yanked at a pair of metal levers.
Another horrific grinding sound echoed from the center hub of the wheel, sending a visible vibration down the steel supports.
Hanson dropped Kat’s hand. “Stay here.” He moved quickly through the gathering crowd.
His boots kicked up dust as he bypassed the low chain-link fence separating the operator from the public.
Hanson kept his voice flat and authoritative. “Stop.”
The teenager froze. His eyes were wide and panicked. “I didn’t do anything. It just locked up.”
“Take your hands off the levers.” Hanson stepped up to the control panel. He studied the gears and the smoking brake housing near the primary drive motor. “You’re stripping the gears. Where is your maintenance crew?”
The kid swallowed hard. “The engineer isn’t supposed to get here until tomorrow morning. I’m just supposed to run the start and stop sequence.”
Hanson looked up at the massive central hub.
His mind automatically broke the machinery down into its component parts, the same way he used to diagnose damaged transport vehicles in the desert.
The primary brake assembly had seized. Unless the pressure was manually released from the catwalk behind the hub, the wheel was not going to move an inch.
Footsteps crunched heavily in the dirt behind him. Hanson turned. Kat rushed up to the control booth. Her face had drained of all color, and her phone was clutched tightly in her hand. She stopped, catching her breath. “Alice just called Sarah Sue.”
His gaze automatically shot up to the top of the wheel where Clint and Alice’s gondola had stopped and then back to Kat. “Are they okay?”
Kat shook her head. “It’s Clint. Alice says he’s sweating profusely and breathing hard. He’s flexing the fingers on his left hand and rubbing his left arm.”
A cold, sharp clarity dropped over Hanson. “Heart attack.”
Kat nodded quickly. “Sarah Sue already called her dad. He’s on his way.”
Whirling around, Hanson shouted at the kid. “Cut the power.”
“But—”
“No buts. Where is your emergency harness and climbing gear?”
The kid blinked, pointing a trembling finger at the box. “In there, but you can’t—”
“Open it. I’m going up.” Hanson cut him off.
Just as quickly, he spun to face Kat. “Get a hold of the first aid station. Tell them we have a cardiac emergency trapped at the top of the wheel. I need an AED, oxygen, a Stokes basket, and a medic ready on the ground in case the doctor isn’t here soon. ”
“But…” Her gaze drifted up to the gondola. “You can’t…”
“I’ve got this. Clint needs help sooner than later. Go.”
It took a moment but nibbling on her lower lip, Kat nodded, then inched forward, lightly kissed his cheek and softly muttered, “Stay safe.”
Two years ago, even a year ago, he would have laughed off her concern, but right now, he wished he had time to write up a whole lot of index cards.
Watching Hanson scale the iron wheel in front of them, Kat was sure of two things. She didn’t pray often enough, and she was definitely making up for it now.
The Sweet family had closed around her the way they closed around everything that mattered—without discussion, without assignment, just there, shoulder to shoulder, every face tipped upward.
Rachel’s hand found hers on the left. Sarah Sue on the right.
Nobody spoke. The fair noise continued somewhere behind them—the tinny music, the children, the smell of funnel cake—and none of it touched the circle of people standing at the base of the Ferris wheel watching the man in a thick canvas safety harness over jeans, with heavy carabiners clipped to the steel lattice of the ride scramble up to the sky.
He moved with a brutal, mechanical efficiency, navigating the steep angle of the support beams as if he were a kid on the school yard monkey bars with little risk of more than a broken bone if he fell off.
Her mind processed what she’d seen as Hanson took control of the situation.
Harness. Straps. Buckles. He’d shaken the webbing out once, stepped into it, pulled it up, tightened, checked, tugged.
His hands knew where to go. Clip. Pull. Test. Adjust. No wasted motion.
No hesitation. The teenage operator stood white-faced beside him, holding a helmet as if he’d forgotten what hands were for.
Now like the rest of them the kid stood silent, staring, no doubt praying.
Already Hanson was at least two or three stories high.
Squeezing her eyes shut for an instant, she said another prayer then dared to keep watching.
The double lanyard caught the afternoon light every time he reached for the next anchor point—one clipped, one moving, never both unattached, never a single second without something holding him to the structure.
As he’d secured the harness, he’d explained the procedure to her in quick but concise detail.
This was supposed to keep him safe. Lord, she hoped that was the case.
Carson leaned toward Preston. “Not sure even Kade could do that. Amazing.”
Preston nodded. Neither of them looked away from the wheel.
The wheel was massive, the steel painted a cheerful, mocking bright red.
From where she stood, Hanson looked terrifyingly small.
A gust of wind caught the gondolas, making them sway and creak.
Kat’s fingers clamped down hard on Sarah Sue’s.
From the ground Kat could make out the pale blur of Alice’s face at the bar.
The woman remained still, focused on the man approaching and the man beside her.
Her husband’s silhouette had the particular quality of a man trying very hard not to show how badly he needed help, which meant he needed it badly.
Not willing to take her eyes off the man she loved, Kat stared in near horror when Hanson stopped.
Didn’t move up, didn’t move down, he just…
stopped. Looked to his left, then up. He’d forgotten what he was doing.
Maybe. She couldn’t think that way. Another second and he moved a clip, only the clip missed the mark.
The watching crowd below gasped when the ring failed to latch onto steel and slipped past, dragging his arm and weight to a sideways position.
Her mouth went bone dry. The only thing she could hear was the rapid pounding of her own heart. “Please God,” she muttered to herself.
Another beat passed and his arm flung upward again, attaching the clip, moving again and again.
The Stokes basket waited at the base of the frame, strapped to a rope that ran up through a pulley the medical team had rigged to the frame’s lower crossbar while Hanson continued climbing toward the endless sky.
Two medics held the rope, their eyes also upward, their hands ready.
The AED sat open on a folding table ten feet away.
Oxygen beside it. Doc Conroy’s car had skidded into the fairground entrance three minutes ago and he now stood at the medical table.
Waiting like everyone else for a miracle.
Hanson reached the highest car. Even from the ground, Kat could see Alice leaning over Clint, her hands pressing his shoulders.
Hanson braced his boots against the outer railing, clipped his safety tether to the main bar, and swung himself into the suspended carriage.
At least he would be safe—for now. No matter how hard she craned her neck, it was impossible to see what was happening inside the metal bucket.
That high up, a giraffe couldn’t have made out what was going on.
Ropes dropped over the side, snaking down to the dirt where the fire rescue crew grabbed the ends.
The medics stood ready with the Stokes basket they had rigged to Hanson’s line.
“He’s got him.” Preston’s voice was a low, rough scrape of sound.
Slowly, the bright orange rescue basket breached the side of the gondola. Hanson leaned halfway out over open air, his arms straining against the heavy guide ropes.
“Lowering!” one of the firemen shouted from the ground.
The basket descended. Inch by inch. The rope groaning under the tension, the wind fighting the weight. Kat didn’t blink. She kept her eyes locked on the orange plastic until the basket finally hovered within arm’s reach above the dirt.
The medics grabbed the rails and guided it gently to the ground.
“Dad!” Sarah Sue broke from the huddle. Together they began working on Clint.
Oxygen mask on, BP cuff, the doc shouting orders at the EMTs that sounded like an episode of a medical drama, but it was the show on the wheel above that kept Kat’s attention.
With Clint receiving medical attention, it was up to Hanson to fix whatever had broken and get these people down.
Which meant, what goes up, must come down.
Swallowing hard, she watched one, then the other leg swing out from the gondola and onto the metal supports.
Heaving a deep sigh, she softly muttered, “Here we go again.”