Whispers of the Timber Line
When environmental analyst Hannah Prescott is found hypothermic and critically injured near an abandoned alpine timber sluice, her sister Julia uses her engineering expertise to prove the crash was staged to silence a corporate watershed cover-up.
Fictional story. Contains themes of corporate corruption, environmental hazards, physical trauma, staged accidents, and criminal investigation.Chapter 1: The Midnight Alarm
At 3:15 AM, the persistent chime of my county emergency radio broke the silence of my cabin on the lower slopes of Mount Rainier. As a structural safety inspector for the state timber authority, late calls usually meant a collapsed access bridge or a fallen ridge pine across a logging road. But the voice of Dispatcher Brenda Knox carried a rigid, formal tone that immediately set my nerves on edge. "Julia, we have a medical evacuation underway near the old Blackwood sluice basin. The victim is your sister, Hannah Prescott."
Rain mixed with sleet was plastering the windshield of my pickup as I navigated the winding switchbacks toward Cedar Ridge General Hospital. Hannah was a senior hydro-analyst assigned to conduct environmental audits for Kincaid Development, the multinational conglomerate constructing a billion-dollar luxury ski resort along the upper valley. She was meticulous, cautious, and possessed an intimate knowledge of mountain safety. The dispatcher had reported her off-road utility vehicle had plunged down a ravine, but Hannah never operated heavy field gear after nightfall without logging a flight path or buddying up.