BRADY UDALL

It was there, gasping for air, on the narrow mesa, that she saw the rider. Just a silhouette rounding a bend about a quarter mile up, there and gone. This was where she normally stopped for water and a little rest, but as she slowed down she decided: not today. Water and rest could wait until at er the next ascent. And she liked having another rider within sight. It gave her motivation. She would overtake him — and she really hoped it was a man — or kill herself trying.

She coasted through a short dip, the scenery blurring pleasantly past, grasshoppers zinging into the bushes in front of her, before attacking the next rise. She was just cresting the next ascent, feeling for all the world that not only would she make Peregrine Point today — but make it easily — when she heard the skidding of tires, a short yelp, and then the distinctive sound of body and bike making contact with the ground, again and again.

She pushed hard over the rise, and saw a small cloud of dust rising lazily into the air. She rode until she saw a bike tire sticking out of a clump of sagebrush on the 7

slope below her, still spinning, spokes lashing in the sun. Throwing her bike aside, she glissaded down the rocky slope. Brush raked at her arms and legs, but she hardly noticed. She came upon the bike irst, then the man, who was laid out on his back next to a cluster or rocks, feet pointing toward her.

He lited his head. “Oh, hey,” he said, almost idly, as if were a friend who’d been waiting for her in a cofee shop and she was a few minutes late. He was covered in dust and nasty scrape painted his forehead.

She said the irst thing that came to her mind. “Why… why aren’t you wearing a helmet?”

He shrugged and gave her a big grin. “I like to live on the edge.”

She noticed he was wearing jeans, black boots, and some sort of concert t-shirt. His bike, its back fork folded almost in half, looked like something you’d buy at WalMart. What in the hell.

She knelt down next to him, her training kicking in. “Can you tell me where it hurts?”

“Oh, everywhere, pretty much,” he said, trying to heave himself into a sitting position. She tried to stop him, but he pushed her hand away and, groaning, he let himself fall back. Looking up at the sky, he said, “I’m ine, really, you can be on your way, lady.”

“I’m going up to my bike to get my phone,” she told him. “You’re hurt. I’ll be right back.”

He raised his head and gave her a hard look. “Don’t you go calling anyone, Abigail. Not a soul.”