Widowmaker (Mike Bowditch #7)(31)

Kat brought over a thermos and set it in front of me. “So what can we do for you?” she asked again, this time with less friendliness.

The main room included a kitchenette and table, a two-way radio, and a wall of stormproof windows overlooking the trails below. There were orange trail makers piled in the corners and stacks of sleds for transporting crash victims down to the bottom of the mountain.

I took a sip of the hot chocolate. “Is there anywhere Josh and I can talk in private?”

The young man blinked. “What? Why?”

“Josh is on duty here,” Kat said. “We might get a call at any minute.”

“It’s about Adam Langstrom,” I said.

The mention of the name caused Kat to scowl. “What’s going on here, Josh?”

“Adam skipped out on his probation,” he said. “Supposedly, I was the last to see him.”

“There’s a court order keeping him off the mountain. Why didn’t you call security?”

“Because it happened two weeks ago. We just ran into each other in the parking lot of the Snow Bowl.”

Kat looked puzzled. “Two weeks ago? This couldn’t have waited until the end of Josh’s shift?”

“I’m afraid not.” I took another sip of cocoa. “Adam’s probation officer has her hands full with other cases. I told her I was going to be in the area and that I would make some informal inquiries on her behalf. It would probably be better if Josh and I spoke privately.”

“Well, the only other room is the toilet,” Kat said.

“I have an idea,” I said, rising to my feet. “Elderoy, do you mind if Josh and I talk in your snowcat?”

Elderoy had begun to look anxious. He stroked the rabbit-fur lining of his hat the way a nervous person might pet a cat. “That’s a brand-new machine.”

“I promise not to touch anything.”

“In that case, you’re going to freeze your asses off.”

“I’ll only touch the heater.”

After a moment, Elderoy reached into his snowmobile suit. He pressed the keys into my open palm, as if afraid I might drop them.

Davidson smiled nervously around the room. “Is this really necessary? Can’t we just grab a beer after my shift?”

“The sooner we talk, the sooner Elderoy and I can get going,” I said.

“Just answer the warden’s questions, Josh,” said Kat.

“OK.”

As I slid my fingers back into my gloves, I remembered what Elderoy had told me at the bottom of the mountain. Crashing a groomer was how my father had gotten fired from Widowmaker all those years ago. No wonder the old dude was nervous about handing me the keys to his new ride.

*

It couldn’t have taken more than two minutes to cross the distance from the patrol shack to the PistenBully, but it was time enough to flash-freeze my face again.

Davidson climbed into the passenger seat beside me. I managed to start the engine but had trouble seeing the temperature controls. After a moment, Josh reached over and hit the button to blast the blower.

“I still don’t understand why you had to come all the way up here,” he said. “You could have just waited for my shift to end. You could have waited at the bottom.”

The rime ice that had formed on the windshield—the condensation that had frozen while we were inside—was already beginning to melt.

“You want to know the truth?” I said.

“Yeah.”

“I wanted to take a ride in a snowcat,” I told him. “My dad used to work at Widowmaker when I was a kid. He drove one of the old Tuckers. I remember him taking me up the mountain in that hunk of junk. Scariest night of my life. This PistenBully is pretty sweet, though. It’s still got that new groomer smell.”

Davidson leaned away from me with a puzzled look, as if he was considering the possibility that I might not be a game warden after all, but some crazed impostor. The haphazard nature of our conversation was clearly unnerving him, just as I had intended.

“So you’re from out west,” I said. “Seattle, right?”

“Vail, too.”

“How did you and your sister end up at the Alpine Sports Academy?”

“My dad went to school here. He raced in the 1988 Olympics in Calgary. Then he blew out his knee.” He tried humoring me to hurry things along. “Elderoy said you’re a game warden. You must know Gary Pulsifer.”

“I know Gary all right.”

“I worked some searches with him—seems like a class act.”

It was not the description I would have chosen.

“So if you’re a warden, and you’re looking for Adam, does that mean you think he might be lost in the woods somewhere?”

“No.”

Trying to follow my train of thought had made Davidson confused, which was just what I had hoped. “Did you bust him for poaching or something?”

“Was Adam a poacher?”

“Not that I know of.” He couldn’t stop himself from smiling. “But who knows? He liked causing trouble, seeing what he could get away with.”

“Including with girls?”

“What are you getting at?”

“Like I said, I’m just making some inquiries because his probation officer has her hands full. You never know what information might be useful in finding someone.”