Primal Threat - Earl Emerson [73]
“I know you don’t have a heart monitor,” added Zak, “so just try to go hard, but not so hard that you can’t carry on a conversation. You get to that point, you’re overdoing it.”
“I’ll try,” Stephens said. “Thanks for the pointers. And I’m sorry about getting pushy.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
The hills were beautiful this morning, Zak thought, as he caught a sliver of a view out over the valley cradling the towns of North Bend and Snoqualmie, and as he felt the warm winds wafting down from Snoqualmie Pass forty miles distant. It wasn’t yet eight o’clock, but the temperature was in the high eighties.
Giancarlo rode at the end of the train almost out of habit now. He was the tallest and heaviest rider in the group, and total weight of rider and bicycle was the most significant factor in how fast a person could ride uphill, so he would most likely be last all day. As it circled Lake Hancock, the road flattened. Other than that, all of these old logging roads shot upward with a vengeance.
“I sure as heck wish I had my gun back,” said Giancarlo.
“A gun’s not going to solve anything,” said Stephens. “We need to talk to them.”
“It was that second shot that shocked me,” said Giancarlo. “The first one could have been a mistake. But after he went down, Morse was clearly incapable of harming anyone. That second shot was pure spite.”
“They waited on that second one,” said Zak. “Like they were taunting him. Or us.”
“There has to be some legitimate explanation,” said Stephens.
Zak had been worried about so many other things, he barely had time to recognize the charcoal tang of smoke threading through the wind. Whether the smoke was traveling over the mountains from eastern Washington or from someplace closer, he had no way of knowing.
Muldaur, who had been riding in front, emitted a loud fart, then another, the latter lasting as long as any fart Zak had ever heard. Zak, who was directly behind him, moved over. “Thanks for the warning. Jesus, that was ripe.”
Muldaur’s reply was another fart. “Oh, my God,” said Giancarlo.
“Christ!” said Stephens.
“Hey,” Muldaur said, in Hugh’s best voice. “I’m up here breaking wind for you guys.” He laughed moronically. The phrase had a special context in cycling, for the riders in front did the most work—and it was called “breaking wind.” Still laughing, Muldaur turned around to grin at them. This was so like Muldaur, Zak thought, to make infantile jokes while they were riding for their lives. As Hugh, he would sometimes visit the other shifts at Station 6 and cut the cheese loudly, giggling as they escorted him and his battered old Schwinn Varsity bicycle out the front door. “Oh, fuck,” said Muldaur.
“What?” said Zak.
“Look behind us.”
Fearful of losing his balance, Zak waited until he reached a pitch on the road that was slightly less steep before turning his head to scan the road. The four of them were near the top of a long, straight stretch, one of the steepest they’d traversed this morning, and had maybe fifteen more minutes before the Lake Hancock plateau. An animal was coming up the road behind them. A bear? No, it was moving with too much agility for a bear.
“It’s Dozer,” said Muldaur.
31
“Shit,” said Stephens, revving up his rpms. Muldaur took the lead, Zak second, Stephens a distant third, and behind him Giancarlo.
“Fucking dog,” said Muldaur.
“Is he catching us?” asked Zak.
“I can’t tell.”
“He wasn’t running when I saw him.”
“That’s because he had his nose to the ground.”
“Is