Deadly Currents by Beth Groundwater

save both of them, but I don’t think I would have been so confident.”
    Mandy slumped in her chair. “So I screwed up.”
    “No, you pulled it off.” Steve steepled his fingers under his chin. “But if you hadn’t, and she got hurt, we might be having a different conversation. You made a judgment call, based on what you thought you could do. And it worked. I can’t fault you for that. I’m only saying my call would have been different. Neither approach is right or wrong, Mandy, and our manuals can’t possibly cover every situation that can arise on the river. That’s the lesson. You trust your gut and go with it.”
    Mandy bit her lip and nodded. Problem was, she and her gut hadn’t been sure she could pull it off. “Tell me, how did you feel after your first death on the river?”
    “Lousy.” A troubled, faraway look came into Steve’s eyes. “The first time someone died on me wasn’t while I was a ranger. It happened while I was still guiding. I pulled an older guy out of the river after our raft flipped, and he couldn’t get a breath. Sure, cold water can shock someone, but this was weird. He was gasping like a fish out of water.”
    “Was he having a heart attack?”
    Steve shook his head. “The guy hadn’t listed any medical problems on his release form, but I pressured his wife as he lay sputtering in her lap. I said there must be something medically wrong with him. She admitted he had emphysema, but he hadn’t wanted to divulge it because he didn’t want to be kicked off the trip. He’d left his oxygen tank in the car.”
    Pulled in by the tale, Mandy leaned forward. “What did you do?”
    “We paddled like heck to the next takeout, and I called 9-1-1. By the time the ambulance arrived, two of us were doing CPR, but the old guy didn’t make it.”
    “Bummer.”
    “Yep, but there was nothing I could have done differently, just like you.” Steve shook his shoulders, as if shaking off the bad memory, and resumed a businesslike tone. “You need to start writing your incident report today, before your memory gets fuzzy. And you need to review the outfitter boat accident report your uncle dropped off yesterday. If he left anything out, I want you to include the missing information in your report. We’ll be briefing the park managers at the end of the day, and I want both of us to be as prepared as possible.”
    Like most of the rangers, who chose the occupation for the opportunity to work in the great outdoors, Mandy hated reports. And she could bet she would be pinned behind a desk all day working on them. She downed the rest of the coffee in her cup. “Anything else?”
    “Yeah. King’s widow filed a complaint against your uncle.”
    “I’m not surprised. I guess filing a lawsuit wasn’t enough.”
    “She mentioned that in the complaint. Sorry to hear about it. Look, I’ll address the complaint myself, but I want you to look it over for any factual errors.” Steve held up a hand. “Now don’t go ballistic when you read it. You know I’ll investigate it fairly.”
    “Is that why you took a urine sample from Gonzo?”
    Steve nodded. “Partly. Gonzo’s got a rep for packing the booze away, but I’d try to get one from any rafting guide who had a customer death. I’m kind of surprised Gonzo did it, frankly, because most of the outfitters’ legal counsels advise the guides not to honor our requests.”
    Mandy rubbed her forehead, which had started aching again. “Good God.”
    Peering at her, Steve said, “You don’t look so hot. Should you have taken another day off?”
    “No, this I did to myself. Got victimized at the Vic last night.” She glanced at the bottom of her empty coffee cup. “If I could mainline a pot of this stuff into my vein, that might help.”
    “Relaxing with friends last night was probably a good thing—stress reliever. Though I know the hangovers afterward are no fun.” With a wink, he turned toward his desk.
    Mandy refilled her cup and returned