only fifteen of us signed up, so we’re bound to bump into him.”
“Cool,” Elise murmured softly, earning a frown from her father.
“We signed you up for it, Anne,” Sharon said eagerly. “Paul’s going, too. It should be fun. I love skiing at night.”
So did Anne, but the thought of racing down a dark mountain next to Brad Irving took the joy out of it. She smiled at her sisters. “I think I’ll pass. It’s been a while since I was on skis.”
“I think you should all pass it up,” Grandpa James muttered. “You’re all crazy if you go down that mountain.”
“You’ve got to go, Anne!” Elise cried in dismay. “It won’t be the same without you. There’s going to be a welcome-back party for the skiers and everything.”
“Not afraid of Brad Irving, are you?” Sharon asked slyly.
Anne felt her cheeks grow warm. “Of course not,” she said sharply. “If you really want me to go that badly, I’ll go.”
Grandpa James shook his head. “Crazy,” he muttered. “Every last one of them.”
“We’re bound to see Brad at the New Year’s Eve party, anyway,” Paul said, eyeing the huge tray of desserts placed on the table by an attractive waitress. “So we might as well meet the enemy on the slopes and beat the heck out of him.”
Carol looked alarmed. “You’re not going to fight that man, are you Paul? I despise the Irvings as much as anyone, but I wouldn’t want to see you fight.”
Paul grinned. “Relax, Mom. I just meant we’d all beat him down the mountain, that’s all.”
“That’s if you get down,” Grandpa muttered darkly.
Aware that no one was listening to him, as usual, Anne patted his arm. “Don’t worry, Grandpa,” she said softly. “I’ll keep an eye on them all.”
“Tell us about your plans for the new year, Anne dear.” Carol picked up a dish of cheesecake and offered it to her eldest daughter. “I’m dying to know what you intend to do next.”
“I thought I’d find an office to rent downtown,” Anne said, doing her best not to notice Brad and his mother seated at the opposite end of the room. Elise and Sharon might think that Bradley Irving was the sexiest man in town, she told herself, but personally, she couldn’t see it.
Trust Darlene Irving to mention her aborted wedding. The thought of Jason didn’t enter her mind anymore until someone mentioned him. Actually, compared to the suave, confident man across the room, Jason was a wimp.
The thought surprised her. She hastily reminded herself that, wimp or not, Brad Irving was just as much a womanizer as Jason, and infinitely more irritating. Then she deliberately put them both out of her mind for the rest of the meal.
By late afternoon the following day, the clouds that had been gathering all afternoon had gradually thickened to a thick gray mass above the slopes. By the time Anne and her siblings joined the midnight skiers at the chairlifts, the wind danced through the branches of the pines and tossed mounds of snow to the ground below. A fine mist hung over the lodge, obliterating the night sky.
Grandpa James had already retired for the night, but Dan and Carol had settled themselves by the fire to await the return of their family.
Elise and Sharon chattered endlessly as they waited for their turn on the lifts. Standing behind them, Anne listened to Paul’s account of his work as a computer analyst without really understanding what he was talking about. Her attention was on a tall, blond man at the rear of the line, deep in conversation with a redhead who laughed at everything he said. Anne wondered if they were at the lodge together, then told herself it was none of her business. Though she did wonder how romantic a rendezvous could be if Brad had brought his mother along.
Some of the guests had braved the cool night wind to cheer on the skiers, and would remain on the terrace to watch the descent. The team’s headlamps would provide a pleasing display of bobbing lights as they swooped down the mountain.
Anne clasped her ski poles as she stepped onto the line next to Paul and waited for the chair to swing in behind them. Tiny flakes of snow drifted down in the flare of the lights and danced now and again in a flurry of wind.
The faint smell of pine perfumed the clean night air, and Anne felt a stirring of anticipation as the edge of the chair closed in behind her knees. She settled herself on the seat, prepared to enjoy the ride to the top of the run. This was the part she loved—the moments before she launched herself into the wild, exhilarating journey down the still, silent world of the slopes.
She had never lost her thrill of the run—that rush of heady excitement as her skis swished through the smooth, white snow and the cold wind whipped her face. For a few brief minutes she could leave behind all the worries and stress of her workday world, and transcend to a calmer, more peaceful place where all that mattered was the frosty ground slipping away beneath her feet as she sped on wings to the earth below.
“The snow’s coming down pretty good,” Paul remarked, as they reached the end of their ride and slid gracefully from their chair. “If those clouds get any lower they won’t see our lights from the lodge.”
Anne glanced up at the black sky above her. “We should be down before the worst of the storm comes in.”
“I see our hotshot lawyer has found himself another candidate for heartbreak,” Paul muttered.
She followed his gaze to where Brad was helping the redhead out of the chair. The woman fell against him and he caught her, wrapping his arms around her to steady her. Anne watched her laugh up at him, clinging to him as if she were helpless to stand by herself. Heaven knew what the silly woman would do once she got on the slopes, Anne thought.
She tried to ignore the two of them as she took her place at the top of the run. Paul and his sisters lined up on her left, and she was relieved to see Brad and his giggling girlfriend at the opposite end of the line.
Their leader stood in the middle of the group, ready to lead off on his own. After a count of five, the person on each side of him would follow, then the person on each side of them, until all fifteen skiers were descending in a giant V formation.
Anne forgot about Brad as she poised on her mark, waiting for her turn. With a shout that echoed across the still mountain, the lead took off, disappearing into the eerie half darkness. Within seconds the beam of his flashlight sliced through the falling snow, which was the signal for the next two to go, then the next.
Anne waited for the flash of light to signal her turn, then launched herself forward. Her spirits soared as her skis cut through the snow, and she crouched to gain speed. Ahead of her the bobbing lights of the skiers guided her down a trail that was hard to see against the blowing snow. Thick flakes slanted across the wide beam of her headlamp, bringing her visibility down to a few feet ahead of her.
A quick glance back assured her that Paul and her sisters were close behind her, though it was impossible to distinguish their faces in the dark. She faced forward again, and as she did so, a loud crack echoed across the mountainside, followed by an ominous rumbling.
At first she thought it was thunder, but when the sound grew louder instead of fading away, she flicked a glance over her shoulder. Faintly she heard Paul’s shout above the ever increasing roar, but she couldn’t understand what he said. The next time she looked back he waved his arm frantically up and down. Her apprehension leapt to alarm when she saw her two sisters veer off sharply to their left.
Then the significance of the thundering roar hit her, and her heart seemed to freeze in fear. Just a few yards behind Paul, barely distinguishable in the dim light, a wall of snow loomed above him, bearing down on him fast.
Avalanche. The thing every mountain skier and climber dreaded. The tumbling, suffocating mass of snow and debris was hurtling down on the skiers, with the lodge itself directly in its path.
Instinctively,