Peak (Peak #1)

by Roland Smith

Getting a dozen clients to the summit could bring in as much as a million dollars, and if you were simultaneously mounting other expeditions on other 8,000-meter peaks, several million dollars. If an Everest wannabe was going to plop down a hundred grand (or several thousand to get to one of the lower camps) who were they going to give their money to? The company with the best success rate? The company with the best safety record? Or maybe, the company who put the youngest person in the world on the world’s tallest mountain, who also just happened to have the same first name as the company that put him on the top. And did you hear about him climbing those skyscrapers in New York? Don’t worry about the money. I’ll get my portion back. The film crew should be here later this afternoon. She’s here to cover Peak, not herself. I suddenly remembered where I had seen the name Holly Angelo. It was a byline under an article about me climbing the skyscraper. She was the reporter who broke the news about who my real father was. Did she dig up this information on her own? Or did Josh give her a call and spill his guts? The youngest person so far to reach the top of Everest was a fifteen-year-old Nepalese girl named Ming Kipa Sherpa. If I were one year older I might still be in . . . I stopped in midstep. “What’s the matter?” Sun-jo asked. “Nothing,” I said. Would Josh have bailed me out if I had already turned fifteen? I didn’t think so. Was he using me? Probably. Did I mind? I wasn’t...