Chapter 2      

“Chase!” Moira shouted as he careened into the fence.

The sound of him thudding into—and then through—the wood slats made every hair on her body rise up. His skis flew off in opposite directions and then one of his poles vaulted through the air like a spear before sinking into the snow yards away like a punctuation mark.

“Oh my God!” she heard people saying around her.

Shaking off the shock, Moira dug her poles into the ground and skied toward him, crouching lower as she passed the broken part of the fence. It was a dangerous fifty-foot drop, and possibly a stupid move on her part, but she had to do something. Chase was down there, and she was a good skier. She took it slow, using steady mogul-like maneuvers down the hill. When she reached him, he was lying at an odd angle on his stomach.

“Chase!” 

His head was turned to the side, and with his goggles on, she couldn’t see if his eyes were open. Scared to touch him should it hurt him, she gently placed her hand on his back.

“Chase! Are you okay?”

She scanned his body, and that was when she noticed his leg twisted under him, something that made the gorge rise in her throat.

“Get a medic!” she shouted to the skiers up the hill.

“Is Chase okay?” Evan shouted down to her. 

“He’s hurt,” she yelled back. Badly.

“I’ll get help,” he called back.

She watched him ski off and then turned back to Chase. He hadn’t moved. Hadn’t so much as groaned. Fear drove an ice pick into her belly. Was he unconscious? A fall like this could certainly have caused it. Goodness, how she wished her brother were here. Andy was a doctor—he would know what to do. 

“Help will be here soon, Chase,” she told him, deciding her best course was to take off her skis and sit beside him.

His right arm was turned underneath him in a way that made her queasy, but his other hand was palm down in the snow.

“Wake up, Chase,” she told him, laying her hand gently over his. She took off one of her gloves and touched his jaw. He didn’t stir. She checked her watch, thinking it best to keep record of how long he was out. Minutes passed, and with every single one of them, she grew more afraid for him. What if he didn’t wake up?

He groaned then, and she jerked her hand back before resuming their connection.

“Chase, it’s Moira,” she told him. “You’ve had a bad fall. Try not to move. The medics will be here shortly.”

She looked up the hill. There was still no sign of Evan or a red-suited medic, but more people were gathering. Time continued to pass, heedless of her worries, as Chase lay there unmoving. She found herself rocking in place, offering up snippets of prayers.

“Oh, Christ,” he finally said, sucking in a breath. “What…happened? Where?”

He sounded completely disoriented. “You had a skiing accident. Help is coming. Lie still.”

“What? Fuck, shit, damn. This…hurts.”

When he tried to roll to his side, he cried out in agony. She fought off a shudder at the raw pain in his tone.

“Don’t move,” she made sure to say in a gentle voice, noting his right leg was lying listless and…bent like a broken stick. Oh, God. “I think you broke your leg.”

“Ah, fuck,” he groaned. “My arm too, feels like. Jesus Christ.”

She was unfazed by his language. “Just lie still,” she repeated. “Evan went for help.” She stood up and cupped her hands against her mouth so the sound could carry. “Where’s the medic? Any sign?”

“Your friend said he’d get them,” a tall snowboarder shouted back. “Do you want me to come down and help you?”

“No,” she shouted back. “There’s nothing you can do. He’s broken his leg, we think. And his arm maybe. We’ll need a stretcher.”

“Fuck that,” Chase called out. “I’m not a goddamn baby.”

With two brothers, Moira was used to tough guys. She crouched back down beside him. “You think you can ski out of here with a broken leg and maybe a broken arm?”

He pounded his good hand in the snow. “I can fucking do anything I set my mind to. Help me up.”

From their very first meeting—her job interview at this very hotel—she hadn’t minced words with Chase. “Don’t be some stupid He-Man. Have you looked at that hill? I barely got down here.” Okay, that wasn’t completely accurate, but she didn’t want to encourage him.

He tried to lift his head and groaned. “What the hell were you thinking? Skiing down that drop after me? You should have left me alone.”

“Couldn’t do it.” Gently, she took off his ski goggles. “Does your head hurt?”

“Are you kidding?”

“I mean, do you think you can turn it?” She kept her gaze on him as he moved his head slowly to the right and then the left.

“It’s fun making snow angels with my face,” he quipped in a hoarse voice. “God, I feel like I took a few punches to the jaw. But yes, I can move my head. Satisfied?”

“Yes.” She dug out the snow near his head and then gently settled his head on her thigh. “You’ll be warmer without your face planted in the snow.”

“This doesn’t qualify as appropriate behavior,” Chase muttered. “Oh, Christ, I can’t believe I took a fall like this. I never fall.”

Something told her that he wasn’t only talking about a physical, time and space, disaster. Chase Parker didn’t fall down in life like most people, she imagined. He wouldn’t allow it. 

“Maybe the fire across the valley distracted you,” she said, looking over in that direction. Black smoke was still rising in the sky unchecked. She hoped the family was safe, if they’d been home.

“It wasn’t the house. I just didn’t fucking see that woman… Oh, fuck this hurts. Shit, damn…ignore my cussing. Not appropriate.”

“Oh, shut up about that already. I fucking wrote the human resources manual for Artemis. These are not normal conditions. You’re lying here with broken bones and likely a concussion.”

“I was out?” he asked, his head heavy on her thigh.

She was tempted to put her hand on his head in comfort, but felt it would be weird. Plus he probably had a huge robin’s egg under his black fleece ski cap. “Yes, and we both know how dangerous that can be.”

“Good thing I have excellent health insurance,” he quipped and then sucked in his breath again. “It’s like a hot poker is burning my right side and the left is freezing from the ice.”

“Let’s pray the medics bring blankets. And yes, you have great health insurance.”

“Negotiated the plan myself,” he muttered.

“Of course, you did,” she said agreeably, finally resting her hand gently on the back of his damp neck. “This doesn’t hurt, does it?”

He was silent for a moment. “No.”

His words were gruff, and she found herself blinking back tears—unusual for her. Must be the shock of the situation. Good thing she and Caroline were getting together tonight. She’d been looking forward to it, mostly because her sister had a mysterious lunch date with their great uncle and they were both dying to know what it was about, but now she had another reason. After the morning she’d had, she would need to vent. 

“You’re going to be okay,” Moira told Chase.

There was a swoosh of activity above them, and then she heard, “We’re coming down for you guys.”

Two red-suited medics skied around the wrecked fence. She spotted Evan at the top, his head bare now, peering anxiously down at them.

“Help is here,” she said.

Chase nestled his face more comfortably into her thigh and let out a pained sigh.

“About goddamn time. I’m turning into a popsicle.”

“Maybe we could market that,” Moira said, knowing she was rambling but unable to stop. “An executive popsicle—”

“Shut up,” Chase muttered. “I have something to say before those yahoos get here.”

She shut up.

“Thanks for coming after me, Moira.”

That shut her up even more.