Character Bios
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Steve Curry and his dad, Lane Curry, arrived in Cuchara in the middle of a blinding snow storm when Steve was eleven years old. Steve becomes an accomplished horseman and outdoorsman and avid skier. After graduating from LaVeta High School, Steve attends Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colorado. His roommate and best friend there is Taylor Youngblood. After graduating from college, Steve works for the U.S. Forest Service, managing Blue Lake, Bear Lake and Purgatory campgrounds during the summers. Later, he’s hired full time by the Forest Service and eventually is recruited to become a Law Enforcement Officer (LEO) for the service.
Lane Curry, after losing his wife in a tragic accident, packed up his son, Steve, and headed to Cucahra, Colorado where his grandfather, Sven Curry, had planted family roots years ago. Lane gave up a lucrative university teaching position and a well-connected political consulting business to move. He helped put together the deal that transformed the vacant and deteriorating ski resort into a world class conference center with a hotel and a newly energized ski resort. Along the way he met artist Mary, who rejuvenated Lane and Steve’s lives.
Sven Curry, the patriarch of the Curry family, was born in Cuchara after his Swedish family settled near the Cucharas River, not far from Father Miguel’s Spanish settlement. Sven’s father was killed as the result of a heartbreaking misunderstanding involving a young Ute brave. His death brought the Utes and the Spanish settlers perilously close to all out war. When Sven’s widowed mother decided to return to Sweden, Sven ran away. Sa′i-ar, The same Ute medicine woman who had raised Towaoc, helped Father Miguel take care of Sven. Sven eventually married Towaoc’s daughter. Years later, as an old man, Sven Curry led the search and rescue team to Captain Ben Curtis’s crashed B-24 on West Peak. Fighting the elements and fleeing Nazi assassins, Sven desperately hid the crash survivors in the Ute’s secret cave behind Chaparral Falls.
Mary was also running away; away from an awful and abusive marriage. She settled in Cuchara because something about its enthralling beauty and peace spoke to her artist’s soul.
Taylor Youngblood, a Ute Indian who grew up on the Ute Indian Reservation in Ignacio, Colorado became Steve’s best friend while attending Fort Lewis College. When a financial disaster reared its ugly head over the Reservation, Taylor asked Lane Curry for help. Picking through Taylor’s and Steve’s family trees reveals some very interesting historical associations.
General Ben Curtis, who’s son was the object of the search and rescue mission near Cuchara, flew bombing missions over the Ploesti oil fields during World War II. As a young Captain, he was the object of another search and rescue mission after crashing his B-24 on West Peak. Sven Curry came to the rescue that time and they barely escaped with their lives.
Towaoc, a young Ute Indian boy, was kidnapped from his Comanche family. His Ute captors traded him to Father Miguel in exchange for a lame horse. The Spanish priest nursed him back to health and became his surrogate father. The young boy grew into the Ute’s greatest chief. His Ute band always spent their summers on and around the Wahatoya. Towaoc’s and Sven Curry’s lives became immutably intertwined.
Amache became Towaoc’s wife after he kidnapped her in a daring foray into a neighboring Ute tribe’s camp.
Mack Garrett is a private investigator in Denver. He retired as a Special Agent for the Diplomatic Security Service of the U.S. Department of State. He helped Lane sort out a bogus offer to buy their Cuchara property and along the way discovered a “golden” opportunity. Later, he came to the rescue of the Ute Reservation and Taylor Youngblood when a Korean counterfeiter took up residence in the Ute’s casino. He also played a pivotal role in helping capture the Somali terrorist who set up camp near Cuchara.
Arndt and Dietmar were Nazi assassins sent to snatch a nuclear physicist, who was also a German spy, at Los Alamos during World War II. When Captain Ben Curtis crashed his B-24 on West Peak, he and the spy were the only survivors. Little did Ben know that surviving the crash and getting down the mountain were the least of their worries. The Nazis had been sent to bring the spy back to Germany or kill him (and any witnesses).
Additional Cast of Characters
Derek Daniels was a genuine American hero; heroically saving four of his Army Ranger buddies at the military operation in Mogadishu, Somalia. He was last seen being dragged away by one of the Somali warlords. A frantic search by the Army rescuers was too little, too late. His body was never recovered.
Ron Daniels, Derek’s younger brother, followed in his brother’s footsteps as an Army Ranger. He was obsessed with avenging his brother’s death. But the Army and the CIA had other plans for Ron and he became the world’s most important figure in the war on terror. After leaving the Army he was recruited by the CIA, who cloaked him with a new identity, Hakim. In this deep-undercover role, Hakim comes face-to-face with the Somali warlord believed to have killed his brother years before. Ron’s (Hakim’s) journey ends in the most unimaginable location and manner.
Aidide (the supposed killer of Derek Daniels) was the CIA’s number one target of the terror network dangerously gaining momentum in Somalia. The CIA hoped to use Ron Daniels’ considerable skills and knowledge, not to mention his passion for redressing his brother’s death, to search out and eventually thwart Aidide’s campaign. But there was a deep secret, shared by only two men at the CIA, that bound Aidide and Ron (Hakim) in a perverse and astonishing bond. Steve Curry, Aidide and Ron Daniels each come face-to-face with violent death in the remarkable conclusion in Cuchara.
Maggie Bell, daughter of a legendary Texas Ranger, is the prim and accomplished Special Agent-in-Charge of the Secretary’s detail when she and other Diplomatic Security agents travel to the Cuchara Wilderness Center, along with the U.S. Secretary of State and the U.S. President and hundreds of Arab dignitaries, to attend an important Arab Summit.