State Of Emergency

“Hold it,” Jordan said.

“Why?” Emily halted and turned toward him. An evil grin spread across her lovely face. “Are you tired?”

Damn right! But he’d never admit weakness to her. “Pookie sees something.”

The hairs on Pookie’s back stood up, then he charged through the trees. His bark was different, deeper. “Whooo-whoo-woof.”

“What’s that mean?” Jordan whispered. “Why’s he making that kind of noise?”

“I don’t speak dog,” she said archly.

He directed her toward the cover of a prickly shrub and ducked down. Clumsily, he retrieved the gun from his backpack. Truly, this pistol was a peashooter. With a.22 caliber automatic, he couldn’t trust his aim at any distance. But it was better than nothing.

“Moof.” Pookie bounded back toward them, almost strutting. The pup looked real proud of himself.

“What was it, boy?” Emily grinned at the dog. “A vicious chipmunk? An evil deer?”

Pookie gave a full-body wiggle.

“Nothing to worry about,” she said. “Unless you’re afraid of being recaptured by an army of rabid tree squirrels.”

Easy for her to say. Emily wanted to be found.

Jordan thanked his lucky stars for her momentary lapse into kindness when she’d waved the helicopter away. His escape could have been over at that moment, but she’d saved him. He didn’t expect that sympathy again.

“Ready?” she challenged.

“Let’s make tracks.”

She set out at a fast pace, and he was hard-pressed to match her speed. Her energy amazed him. Surefooted as a bighorn sheep in Kletter boots, she hiked higher and higher on slender, almost nonexistent forest trails. Uphill, dammit, always uphill.

He wished he had a pair of hiking boots like hers. Jordan’s shoes were cheap, canvas, prison-issue sneakers that offered little traction and no protection against the rocks he constantly tripped over. But there was another lack in his mountain climbing gear that worried him more. He didn’t have a jacket.

Though Emily owned a warehouse of camping supplies, including two sleeping bags, she wasn’t prepared with a parka in his size. Come nightfall, Jordan was going to be mighty chilly. By God, he hated these mountains. The climate was cold and arid, inhospitable to human life. Rugged terrain gave him no pleasure. The jagged spires of rock were teeth waiting to tear into his flesh.

Stumbling again, he stared down at the dry bed of pine needles below his feet. In the fall, there wasn’t much green in these forests, and it wasn’t the brilliant tropical green he was accustomed to seeing in Florida. Colorado’s palette ranged from khaki to the army drab of pine and spruce.

A tug on the rope told him they were headed uphill. Again. He glanced up toward Emily. Since she was leading the way, he should’ve had ample time to admire the fit of her snug Levi’s, but Jordan was denied even that small diversion. From the rear, she looked like a big red backpack with legs.

Finally, they reached a pinnacle on a high ridge. There was no more up. Finally, they’d be hiking downhill.

The first few steps felt good. The change in muscle groups refreshed him. After they’d covered a couple hundred yards and entered an aspen grove, his legs turned to rubber. He couldn’t control his momentum. The space between them shortened. He was only an arm’s length away from her backpack.

Then, inexplicably, Emily stopped short.

“No!” He barely dodged around her. But he couldn’t stop. His equilibrium was off. Flailing, he crashed through the slender white tree trunks. The rope pulled taut, and Jordan went down flat on his back.

Emily followed, almost tumbling. In an amazing display of agility, she stayed on her feet.

Half-stunned and totally exhausted, Jordan looked up through the aspen boughs. His wounds throbbed, but he willed the pain away. In the fading light of dusk, the air took on a golden hue. The leaves trembled delicately like a shower of golden coins, nature’s wealth. Numbly, he said, “It’s beautiful.”

She squatted beside him. “Don’t tell me you’ve never seen an aspen before.”

“Only from a distance, and I never understood why you people get so excited about a couple of yellow trees.”

“You don’t really appreciate Colorado, do you?”

“’Fraid not.” Jordan was a southern boy, born in Atlanta where the lush hardwood forests were far more forgiving than the stern, rugged Rockies. Even then, Georgia’s hilly terrain had been too much for him. All those trees felt claustrophobic. On the Gulf coast of Florida, he found wide vistas and open space, palm trees and sultry, ocean-scented air.

He inhaled a deep breath. The cool breeze smelled fresh and earthy. And the gold shimmered all around him.

When he looked up at Emily, hovering over him like an angel, her face seemed to glow. Her curly blond ponytail glistened like warm honey. She wasn’t strikingly beautiful, not like Lynette. Emily was the sort of woman who might be overlooked in a crowd, but when you noticed her, you knew you’d discovered a hidden treasure.

She clambored to her feet and dusted off her jeans. Disdainfully, she said, “If you think you can make it that far, there’s a stream up ahead.”

“Okay.” He forced his legs to move.

Beside the trickling stream which was only a few feet wide, they shed their backpacks and sat side by side on a wide weathered rock. Though Jordan was still enjoying the golden leaves, he felt a warning chill in the air. The sun was about to dip behind the mountains. He started to pull off his shoes, thinking how good the cold, clear stream water would feel on his ten stubbed toes.

“Don’t,” she said.

“Why not? My feet are killing me.”

“On a hike, it’s always better to keep your feet dry. Besides, putting your shoes back on again will be sheer agony.” She groaned. “I don’t know why I bothered to tell you. You deserve the pain.”

Her job was healing. He didn’t think she’d willingly allow suffering. “What’s that motto for S.A.R.?”

“…That Others May Live.” She glared at him. “But I don’t think it applies to escaped convicts.”

He called on her wisdom again. “I know you’re carrying a little water purifier in your pack. Is it safe to drink from the stream?”

She shrugged. “You take your chances.”

But Jordan followed her example, taking a swig of lukewarm liquid from the canteen in his backpack. Not as satisfying as scotch and soda, but it was liquid. With all this exertion, keeping hydrated was important.

Pookie, on the other hand, seemed to think the Rocky Mountain spring water was just fine. The pup splashed through the glistening ripples.

“Pookie!” Emily reprimanded. “Get out of there.”

“Moof, woof.” He slipped on a rock and got completely drenched.

“How am I ever going to train him?” Emily asked.

“Leave him be. He’s just a pup.”

“But he needs to start learning now or he’ll never be any use as a rescue dog.”

“I understand about working dogs,” Jordan said. This was the closest they’d come to a conversation, and he wanted to prolong the moment, to win her trust. “When I was a kid, I had a bluetick hound that I trained for weeks to be a good hunting dog.”