Page 42 of Mountain Shadow

Sarah nodded slowly. “I like your hands.”

“I like our hands together. Come. I want to show you something.”

“Not more kickboxing, I hope? I’m still sore from yesterday!”

“No. It’s just past that hill—”

His words froze on his lips as he looked at the field next to the road. She followed his gaze and saw a group of paragliders flying high, their colorful sails floating in the distance. One of them, however, was flying much lower than the rest.

“What’s wrong, Jens?”

“That red and green chute isn’t looking right. And it’s coming too close to that building.” His voice grew louder. “Attention!”

Jens started running towards the tall hedge that separated them from the field. He cleared it easily, jumping right over the top, then kept going, shouting, as it became clear, even to an untrained eye like hers, that the paraglider wasn’t controlling his descent.

Sarah looked around. There was no way she could do what he’d just done, but there was a spot in between two hedges that she might be able to squeeze through if she held her breath.

Ignoring the branches that scratched at her face and arms, she pushed forward until she was past the hedge—just in time to see the large, red and green paragliding sail crash to the roof of what looked like an old, abandoned barn. A man cried out sharply, and was then silent.

“Jens!” she shouted, running up to him.

Jens looked back, saw her, and tossed her his phone.

“4782 to unlock it, Sarah. Call Damien, tell him to get the team up here!”

“What are you going to do?” she asked, already out of breath.

“I’m going to get up there.”

Sarah unlocked the phone and searched for Damien’s name. While she waited for him to pick up, she kept an eye on Jens. He was standing on a window ledge. Even as tall as he was, the roof was too high up. There was no way he was going to be able to—

Jens bent his knees and jumped up, grabbing onto the edge of the roof with his fingertips. Sarah watched, her heart in her throat, as Jens pulled himself up on the strength of his finger tips alone. His arm and shoulder muscles bunched. Inch by inch, his body rose, until first one hand, then an elbow, made it over the ledge. From that point on, he made it seem almost easy to get his entire body onto the roof.

“Damien Gray,” her brother-in-law’s deep voice said.

“Damien, it’s Sarah. We’re out on a field, just up the road from Jens’s place. A paraglider spiraled out of control. He landed on top of a roof.”

“Jens is with you?”

“Yes. He’s up on the roof as well.”

Jens’s shout came loud and clear from the roof. “He’s alive but going into cardiac arrest. Tell Damien to hurry!”

“I heard that. Stay where you are.” He shuffled some papers. “Kat, Drake, and Gael are already in the helicopter. I’ll get them to head out your way urgently.”

Sarah ended the call and pocketed the phone. She looked up at the structure. There was no way she could pull herself up like Jens had done—except maybe she wouldn’t need to. Half-hidden under the tall grass, she saw a rickety ladder.

Is it even tall enough?

Before she could second-guess herself, Sarah grabbed the edge of the ladder. She pulled hard, lining it up against the barn wall and lifting. She shook it violently, relieved when it didn’t come apart, wondering if it would hold her weight.

The worst thing that can happen is it breaks.

It’s not that high.

She heard Jens shout something and started climbing as fast as she could. She couldn’t leave him alone up there.

Thankfully, the ladder held. The tricky bit was making it from the ladder onto the roof at the very end, but she managed by draping her upper body onto the roof first, and then scuttling along like a crab until her legs found purchase. The wooden shingles were cold and humid, and smelled faintly of decay.