Shared by the Mountain Men Read online

  Shared by the Mountain Men

  An MFM Novella

  Eddie Cleveland

  Contents

  Acknowledgement

  1. Caitlin

  2. Ace

  3. Razor

  4. Ace

  5. Ace

  6. Razor

  7. Caitlin

  8. Ace

  9. Caitlin

  10. Razor

  11. Ace

  12. Caitlin

  13. Razor

  14. Caitlin

  15. Ace

  16. Caitlin

  17. Caitlin

  18. Ace

  19. Caitlin

  20. Razor

  21. Caitlin

  22. Ace

  23. Caitlin

  24. Caitlin

  Epilogue

  Riding Double

  Three’s Company

  Virgin For The Woodsman

  Edited by Proofing with Style.

  Website: http://www.proofingstyle.com/

  Photo Credit: The Reed Files

  Website: https://thereedfiles.photoshelter.com/index

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  Copyright © 2018 by Eddie Cleveland

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  1

  Caitlin

  My father always said he had two girls, me and this plane. I’ve always loved flying in her, the way the wind whirrs around me, the way she shivers in my hands as I lift her from solid ground. She takes me above the earth to where the sunrises kiss my face and my worries are left in her dust below. I’ve been flying in this exact plane my entire life, first as my father’s enthusiastically drooling passenger, with a pacifier in my mouth to help with my ears. Then as a student, spending hours learning all the tips and tricks Dad knew about takeoffs, landings and keeping her steady. Now, as her owner.

  When Dad passed, he willed her to me. Her name is Qilaq, it means sky or heaven in Inuit. My grandmother was a strong Inuit woman and my father told me he named his plane that because whenever he went up for a flight he felt closer to his mama. Like he was just grazing the heavens that she was resting in. He’d often smile when we flew, just this random grin and tears would crest his bottom lids. Whenever I asked him what was wrong he’d brush them away with the back of his hand and tell me, “I swear I saw my mom waving to me from that cloud there.”

  I never found it scary or weird. Not when I saw the comfort it brought him. Qilaq brought him closer to his mother the same way she brings me closer to him now. I never feel his presence stronger than when I’m flying high above the earth in her.

  “Watch out, Cait!”

  I know I don’t really hear his voice. Dad passed two years ago. A massive heart attack took him from me in an instant and I’ve never heard his voice since. But I swear on my life I just heard him now.

  “Get her on the ground, baby. Drop Qilaq down.”

  I sit up straighter and see some fast moving, dark clouds in the distance. Damn it! I checked the forecast at least ten times, there was nothing about any storm rolling in. Still, there’s no arguing with the black, billowy promise of death up ahead.

  Trying to do my checks, the plane begins to hit air pockets and turbulence ping-pongs me around like a cat battering a toy. My focus lasers in as I struggle to bring Qilaq under control. Descending toward the snowy earth, I struggle so hard to keep her steady that beads of sweat cover my body like a rashy heat.

  The yoke trembles violently in my hands, I grit my teeth together and use every muscle in my body to hold on tight. Snow streaks by my windshield as I hit the weather I’m trying so hard to avoid. With the speed of the plane, every heavy snowflake blends together in a white blanket of confusion. I’m doing my best to navigate a safe landing, but it’s hard to tell up from down.

  “Prepare yourself for the impact, Cait. You know what to do.” My father’s voice is calm and stable, it’s everything I’m not feeling right now.

  No matter how hard I try, I can’t contain the icy wave of panic splashing around in my guts. It’s freezing me from the inside, making me stiff and cold like this snow squall will when I hit the ground.

  No. I won’t give up. Dad’s right, I know how to deal with this. I’ve been flying this plane since I was twelve years old, if anyone can do this, it’s me.

  “Come on, girl, let’s go down easy. I want us both to come out of this alive,” I whisper to the Cessna. To the only remaining link I have to my family. To my sister.

  I push my anxiety down, swallowing it into a lead lump and breathe deep. There’s still time to fix this. Outside, the ground coming up at me too fast. Fear threatens to choke me out before the crash can ever kill me. My heart is pounding so hard it’s whooshing in my ears. I can feel it beating in tiny pulses in the tips of my fingers as I try to bring the nose up a bit. Not too high. Just enough to even out this landing a bit. Luckily, the land below is barren and white. I’m in no danger of hurting anyone.

  Just myself.

  Finally, the wheel touches down on the earth. The entire plane howls in protest, shaking like a dog just freed from the bath. I feel like Qilaq is trying to fling me from inside her as she crashes into the endless carpet of white. I can’t hold on. My hands fly from the yoke, instinctively covering my face as we crash across the icy tundra. It’s an eternity of ear-splitting shrieks, from both Qilaq and me, as she spins around in a dizzying blur. I’m spinning free from my body. Spinning free from my mind. There are no thoughts. There are barely breaths as we spiral out of control together.

  And then it’s over.

  My Cessna is shredded around me. The cold wind attacks my body and it takes a second to realize that it’s because my plane isn’t protecting me from the elements. Everything looks like a photograph taken out of focus, even though I’m pretty sure I’ve stopped moving. The world is fuzzy and white, like a big, comforting blanket on a chilly morning. All I want to do is snuggle in and sleep.

  Wait, I try to blink my eyes into focus, are those people? My hand flops around, searching for a radio that’s somehow just out of reach. The world narrows, a tunnel of darkness surrounds me on all sides, all I can see is a big black bear and a couple blurs running in the distance. I must be hallucinating.

  “Help.” I try to scream it, but it’s nothing more than a hoarse whisper lost in the wind. I fight so hard to open my heavy eyelids, I know I need to stay conscious. I can’t give up. I’m not a quitter. But my choice is taken away, just like my father was. Just like my plane was. That all-encompassing blackness must have followed me down from the stormy clouds because I fall into it, and soon all I see is dark.

  2

  Ace

  “See, Adam?” Gramps burned the plastic fish bait with his lighter until it melted a bit at the spot where it snapped in half.

  I nodded, watching closely as he stuck the two halves back together, holding them for a moment before tossing it my way.

  “Now that’s just as strong as if it never broke at all. A penny saved, right?”

  “Right.” I smiled up at the old man and he tousled my golden hair. He looked so impossibly tall. At five everyone towered over me, but my grandfather was the tallest of them all. To me, he was a giant.

  I snap the lid to my Zippo shut, extinguishing the flame, and press two broken halves of my fake grub back together, just like Gramps taught me. A shiver runs through me and I squint off into the distance.
/>   How is it that we always think ghosts stay put? If you believe in that sort of thing, we have this idea that ghosts stay put wherever they died. Of course, that’s complete and utter bullshit. I learned with my grandfather and then again with the SEALs that they’re always wandering around in the background of our lives, oblivious to the fact that they aren’t home anymore.

  The idea of haunted castles and houses is kid stuff. Just scary stories to tell around a campfire with your friends to freak them out before bed. Not reality. In real life, it’s not places that get haunted, it’s people. And it doesn’t matter where they go or how far they run, those ghosts just follow them. They compete for attention, flitting around just outside your line of vision, where you can feel them more than see them. Nowhere does that feel truer than out here in the Alaskan wild. This place, full of people who fled their lives and usually never for a happy reason, must have more ghosts roaming the dry, icy patches out there than just about anywhere on earth. Hell, my ghosts alone keep it pretty busy here.

  “Man, you are so cheap! Just grab a new one,” Razor calls out to me, interrupting my thoughts, but I just shake my head.

  “Hey now, a penny saved, right?”

  “I guess.” He shrugs. “Someday you’ll have to tell me your big plans for all those pennies,” he mocks me.

  “I’m saving up for a big trip, and you ain’t invited now that you’re calling me cheap.”

  “Oh yeah? Where you think you’re gonna go?” His half-cocked smile tells me he doesn’t believe a word of my bullshit.

  He’s right not to.

  “I dunno, someplace warm. Maybe Hawaii.” I secure the bait back onto my hook and get ready to head back over to the fishing hole. “Gotta save my pennies so I can offer to buy a pretty girl some drinks, oh, and one of those Hawaiian shirts the guys wear too.” I grin.

  “Oh yeah, for sure man. You’ll have every chick in Hawaii drooling if you wear one of those.” He snickers.

  “That’s what I figure.” I smirk. “Anyway, I was going to save up enough for you to come along. Maybe even enough to get you one of those shirts too, but now I’m going to go it alone.” I walk back to his side.

  “Well, someone’s got to look after Gunnar, don’t they, boy?” Razor calls over to our huge Newfoundland dog. He lifts his heavy head from the snow and wags his tail a bit but plops it back down when he sees that we’re just shooting the shit and there’s no treat in any of this for him.

  “True.” I walk over and give our big pup a scratch behind the ears. “Besides, I don’t need you cramping my style with the ladies anyway.”

  “Yeah, well, let’s hope there’s a lot more of them in Hawaii than here.” Razor waves at the eternal frost and ice.

  I study the landscape, remembering how when we first moved up here after leaving the SEALs, it nearly broke my mind to see so much white, endless snow in one place. It just went on as far as the eye could see, and then even further than that. I guess it struck me as enormous and unending, like space, like time, like the pain of loss—my gaze flickers from the overwhelming snow to Razor—or like the love you have for a brother you were never born with, but that you chose.

  “Holy shit! Look at that.” Razor points behind my head and I smirk.

  “I’m not falling for that one, come on you can do better than that,” I scoff and push his hand down.

  As if I’m dumb enough to fall for the whole “look over there” bit. Just another dumb trick guys play on each other when they’re bored. And, judging for how little fish this trip has net us, boredom is definitely a struggle.

  “No, seriously,” he tries again. I roll my eyes, but Razor shoves my shoulder and I scuff around in time to see metal hurling down toward the snow.

  It takes too much blinking and too much thinking to figure out that what I’m witnessing is a plane crash. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen anything like this, combat was a couple years back now, and this tiny Cessna falling from the sky just looks so foreign out here.

  Snow explodes from the where the plane hurls into the ground in a sparkling, cold mushroom cloud. The way it hangs in the air, glittering, it would almost be beautiful if it wasn’t a symbol of death and destruction. Gunnar leaps to his feet and barks loudly before heading off in the direction of the danger.

  “Fuck, let’s go.” Rushing over to our sled, I drop my rod on it.

  Razor grabs the harness Gunnar abandoned while I collect our other gear quickly. He begins hauling it over the crystalized, icy field.

  With an armful of the stuff we left behind, I catch up with the sled and toss it down before running to the front to help him pull the load. Gunnar is leading the charge ahead of us, guiding us straight to the crash site. Luckily, it’s not too far off, although I’m skeptical that anyone could have survived.

  We close in on the debris and I steel myself for the carnage. The plane has pretty much been obliterated. It looks like it took a missile hit. Still, the cockpit looks intact, even if it’s not protected by a windshield anymore, and we can see a body still strapped in. It’s slumped over and not moving, just hanging forward as the shoulder harness holds it still.

  Razor runs into action, just like he did a million times overseas. His medic training has come in handy for countless cuts and burns since we moved up here, but this is the first time he’ll really be tested with an emergency of this magnitude since we retired.

  “Gunnar, sit,” I command our giant, furry friend and he listens obediently. I know it’s his instinct to help in any way possible, but I don’t know if fuel is leaking or if a fire is going to erupt from what’s left of the engine. I can’t risk it. He gives an annoyed bark in protest, his way of telling me he’s not happy about being left out of this, but I ignore it and move to help Razor.

  “She’s alive!” he yells as a I approach. Two thoughts battle it out in my brain. The first is, how the fuck can anyone survive this? The second, I’m ashamed to admit is: she?

  I tug my knife free from my belt and he helps me cut the passenger loose and then together we yank her free from the wreckage. Her coat is open and her curvy body is exposed to the brutal wind whipping around us. Under my parka, it doesn’t faze me, but a long shiver runs through me as I imagine how painful the elements would feel if I were exposed.

  “Get her zipped up and covered up, I’m going to grab her stuff,” I yell and Razor nods.

  He gingerly picks her up and carries her to the sled and I turn my back to them, focusing on grabbing everything and anything I can. A couple of bags is all I manage to salvage. I drop them by my sides and rush over to the radio console I see ripped off about five feet away. Grabbing the handset in my palm, I push the button, but there’s nothing. It’s completely dead. I knew that, logically, before I even tried, but the seriousness of this situation made me hope for the impossible.

  I jog back to the remains of the plane and grab the woman’s bags before heading over to the sled.

  “Is that it?” Razor nods to my hands.

  “Yep. Here, lemme give you a hand securing her.” I lift her feet and Razor takes her head and shoulders. We lie her on the long sled and cover her up until only her face is exposed. It’s impossible to ignore her beauty. Her round cheeks are rosy and her pouty lips are so full, so pink, so… hypnotic.

  “Ready?”

  I blink as I snap out of my daze. Shame splashes over me and I refuse to look at her again. The last thing I should be thinking about is how gorgeous she is.

  “Ready,” I answer.

  “Come here, Gunnar,” he calls out to our dog.

  The big black dog springs to action, immediately running over and standing tall as we strap his harness onto him. We don’t have a huge sled team, but we don’t need one. A dog the size of Gunnar is always enough. Razor and I march alongside the sled as Gunnar pulls her in the direction of our cabin a couple miles off. We’re both walking in grim silence and both stealing glances down at the woman that we’re now responsible for.

 
She’s alive.

  Now, here’s hoping we can keep her that way.

  3

  Razor

  Crunch, puff, crunch, puff, crunch!

  The only noise is the snow breaking beneath our feet and our warm breath hitting the frosty air in heavy clouds. Not as heavy as the ones dropping more of the white stuff on us now. With two miles to walk, the initial endorphin rush of racing toward a plane crash and extracting a survivor has almost worn off.

  Now I’m just left wondering about who she is. Where was she going? How is it that a gorgeous woman just fell from the sky, almost literally into our laps? It feels easier to focus on that right now, to give her a story, to focus on her beauty rather than to think about her possible death.

  Giving people stories is kinda my thing. Ever since foster care, I spent hours making up tall tales for just about everyone I met. I even had a couple nice fairy tales about the amazing family that would one day adopt me. How they could never have kids, but always wanted a son. Then, one day, they went through the system and found me. The instant they laid eyes on my blue sparklers and cute freckles, they knew I was the one.

  Of course, the process of being adopted took like a day or two in my head, not like the endless red tape that it really is. Next thing I knew, I would be at their mansion, swimming in the in-ground pool and eating all the candy I could stomach. I wasn’t a monster, I didn’t imagine leaving my bud Ace, or as I knew him back then—Adam—behind. Sure, in my story he wasn’t adopted by the same people. I wanted to have some parents all to myself. But, he did get taken in by the family that lived right next door. So, we still got to hang out on the daily. We just got to dress better and sleep in our own rooms at night.