Chapter 2
1008 Words
Ethan was the man I loved. I could not bear the thought of watching him haul emergency gear through the snow for me ever again.
He was the person I had planned to protect for the rest of my life. I would never let him risk himself for me again.
The moment Ethan told me to carve left, every instinct in my body screamed that something was wrong.
But I was already going too fast. In the middle of a blizzard, with visibility down to nothing, even knowing the entire course by heart was not enough. If I could not pinpoint my exact position, all that knowledge meant nothing.
Then Ethan's voice burst back through my earpiece, frantic and breathless.
"Race Control! Bib Seven, Sienna Vale, is losing control at Falcon's Crest Jump! Get a helicopter in the air now! Nothing can happen to her!"
My heart went cold. I dug my edges hard into the ice. He had already decided I was going to crash.
Within seconds, reporters with no knowledge of the situation were already pushing alerts: "Triple Winter Crown Champion Sienna Vale Crashes at Falcon's Crest Jump."
He was rolling out the red carpet for Vivian Lane.
I would not let his script play out.
A second later, I closed my eyes.
"Be a good girl. Close your eyes. It won't hurt as much that way."
Ethan's words echoed in my ears.
I squeezed my eyes shut, but I was not accepting my fate.
I closed my eyes to recall every vibration that had traveled up through my skis the last time I ran this section. I retraced the exact distance I had covered and rebuilt the course inside my mind.
No one knew this course better than I did. I had covered two thousand yards since the last gate.
With my eyes closed, I mapped the terrain in my head.
Eighteen seconds had passed since Ethan gave the wrong call. With my current speed factored in, I knew exactly where I was.
Even with the blizzard swallowing every trace of visibility, I knew exactly where my skis were on the course.
Falcon's Crest Jump was right ahead. I still had a chance.
I shifted my weight and dug my edges in, bleeding off speed as I leaned right and set myself up for the turn.
The distance closed fast, shrinking from ten yards to nine, then to eight.
Behind me came the sharp screech of skis slicing through the snow. Someone was closing in, and the sound grew faster and louder, bearing down on me through the blizzard.
With my eyes still shut, I followed the sound of the skis behind me and traced their line in my mind. It was not just one racer.
Only three yards remained before the turn, and then there were two.
At the last possible second, I dropped my center of gravity as low as I could and drove my edges hard into the inside line.
I was gambling with my life, but I had no other choice. If I did not fight for this turn, I would be carried off this mountain.
A sharp c***k exploded beside my ear. My right shoulder slammed into the steel gate pole, but I bit through my lip, dug the edge of my right ski into the ice, and forced my entire body into the turn.
The impact was brutal. My body skipped across the snow, and my right shoulder went numb on contact.
I opened my eyes. Cold sweat had soaked through my racing suit, and I dragged in a breath like someone who had just crawled out of a grave.
I had successfully made the turn.
I had sacrificed speed to cut onto the inside line, using the other racer's closing speed to force myself through by a hair.
The racer behind me clipped the tails of my skis, carved cleanly through the turn, and vanished into the distance.
Pain tore through my right shoulder as if the bone had cracked. My body tumbled across the snow several times before finally coming to a stop.
At almost the same moment, a heavier crash echoed behind me. Someone had missed the turn and flown off the jump.
It had been too close.
My heart pounded so hard it felt as if it might burst. I lay sprawled across the snow, trembling uncontrollably.
Only then did I realize my collar had come undone. The snowflake gold necklace I always wore against my skin had been thrown out from under my racing suit.
The delicate pendant had shattered the moment my right shoulder hit the steel gate pole. All that remained was a small scrap of gold still tied to the red cord.
I gripped the cord I had once called tacky. My heart turned to ice.
"Tacky?" Ethan had said at the time. "I had this custom-made for you. The snowflake is your course. What you do is dangerous, so you have to wear it against your skin. It will keep you safe."
Five years ago, on my birthday, Ethan had fastened the necklace around my neck as if he were handling the most precious thing in the world.
He tied the knot with painstaking care, as though he was afraid I might take it off one day without telling him.
When I complained, he pretended to be annoyed and flicked my forehead. But the next second, he was rubbing the spot gently, as if he was afraid he had actually hurt me.
"Sienna," he said, "from now on, as long as this is around your neck, it will be like I am with you every second. I will be with you as you conquer one mountain after another. You are going to become the brightest ski queen of your generation."
I yanked the red cord from my neck. The thin skin there scraped raw, leaving a sharp red welt behind.
I stared at the shattered gold pendant and let out a bitter laugh. Then I threw it into the snowbank.
- Writer
