Page 88 of Capture the Moment

“I think she’s learned some valuable lessons about wildlife photography this week.” Tim paused, gathering his thoughts. “Anyway, Kate thought you were aiming for the bear—”

“I fired a warning shot.”

“Right, right, of course.” Tim felt foolish for not realizing it sooner. Sally Janus would never have missed her target. “I just wish you would’ve told me.”

“Tim, this has been in the works for weeks. When I went to the Yellowstone conference, Tony Feldmann approached me. Offered me a bundle of cash if I’d help his client out.”

“Why didn’t you tell me about it?” That’s what he just couldn’t get his head around.

Sally sighed, resting her elbows on the desk. “The more people who knew, the greater the risk for a slipup.”

“I didn’t think I was just ... anybody.”

“Maybe not.” Sally leaned back and crossed her arms against her chest. “But it sure didn’t take much for you to assume I’d gone to the dark side.”

“Sally, you sacrificed a gray wolf for this ... this scheme.”

She held his eyes. “That wolf had already been identified to be culled. It had been harassing a rancher’s livestock. I knew what I was doing.” She leaned forward in her chair. “And that’s the problem, right there. All along, I knew what I was doing.”

“Sally—”

“Look, Tim. Right now I need to get back to work.”

From the expression on her face, she was in no mood to see his side of the story. And maybe she never would. She turned her attention back to her work, the conversation already a distant memory, leaving Tim to wonder if they’d ever truly known each other at all.

Kate sat at the small desk in her room at Jackson Lake Lodge, carefully examining her Sony Alpha camera, which had spent the night in the high country, its motion detection capability activated. She’d never actually used the motion detection capability. Now, she prayed for it to yield something useful.

“Lord, let there be something. Anything,” she murmured as she inserted the memory card into her computer. “Please, please, please.”

Hours passed as Kate scrolled slowly through the footage,her anticipation building with each passing moment. A chipmunk examined the camera up close, its curious eyes staring directly into the lens. A family of raccoons shuffled by. A deer cautiously approached, its ears perked up, before darting away, startled by something.

But so far, everything was useless. It was during the dark of the night when the motion detection had been activated, as the animals moved about in their nocturnal activities. Then, as dawn began to break, she saw something that caught her eye. She slowed down the speed of the footage and watched it again and again, using the still photography feature to extract shots from the video. She examined every frame meticulously, searching for that one perfect shot. And then she found it.

Her camera marked it at four thirty in the morning. The sky was starting to lighten, though the sun wouldn’t be up for a while. In the soft light of dawn, a bear emerged from her den and sniffed the air. Slowly, she ventured out a few more steps. Standing on her hind legs, she lifted her paws in the air.

Freeze the frame.

Kate stared at the shot for the longest while, transfixed, a mixture of exhilaration and satisfaction coursing through her veins. She had the shot. The one that could change everything.

This was it. The one-in-a-million shot that she had come to get. Stunning.

She knew just what to call it: “Morning Stretch.”

On her computer, she searched for theNat Geoeditor’s email address. Back home, she had meticulously studied their strict guidelines: no fabrication, minimal post-processing (all she had done was to crop the photograph), no staging, complete transparency, and respect for the wildlife. Check, check, check.

She crafted an email to the editor, explaining the picture, the circumstances, and the famous subject. Hands shaking, she attached the photograph.

She breathed another prayer—this time, it was “Thank you, thank you, thank you, Lord.”

And just like that, her email bounced back with the message:“Undeliverable.”

She went to theNational Geographicwebsite, to the staff directory, and searched for the woman’s name. Nothing.

She dropped her chin against her chest.

Oliver. Another setup.

In a bleak room at the Jackson Police Department, Wade Schmidt sat defiantly, a cold metal chair beneath him and stark fluorescent lights buzzing above. The game warden seated across the table kept asking him questions, but Wade didn’t answer a single one. He folded his hands together on the surface of the table and stared down at them.

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