Saving Shelby

by Nicole Taylor Eby

  “Don’t fight the current, let it do the work. Angle yourself at 45-degrees and let the current push you towards the edge. You can’t fight the river. You have to work with it.”

  Elation buoyed her energy. She could do this. Angling her feet towards the bank, she gathered all her strength, but it wasn’t working. The bank kept flying by. She wasn’t getting free of the current. Hope quickly drained away. She was going to die in this river, and her legacy was going to be proving her family right. She obviously needed someone to look after her.

  Shelby closed her eyes, letting go of the fight. And then, like it had been waiting for her to truly surrender, the river spat her out just shy of the bank. One minute she was careening downstream towards the ocean and death, and the next she was bobbing at the edge like nothing had happened.

  Relief flooded her, and she began laughing wildly, as she scrambled up onto the sandbar. She collapsed on the ground, laughing and breathing in great gulping mouthfuls of air.

  CHAPTER 20

  When the river finally spat her out, and her manic laughter had abated, Shelby was left deflated. She was too tired and cold to really feel any relief at having escaped the river’s power. She didn’t need someone to tell her that getting out of the river was only the first step. She still had a long way to go to safety.

  As she lay there, resting on the wet, rocky ground, waiting for her breathing to return to normal, her body began to shake uncontrollably. Shelby clenched her teeth to try and stop their chattering, but she was powerless against the shivering.

  Knowing instinctively that she needed to move, Shelby sat up. As she took in her surroundings, fear coiled itself into a ball deep in her stomach. She was alone, with no clue where she was. While she had been at the mercy of the river, she had known she was lost, but now that she wasn't busy fighting the water, it really hit home how precarious her situation was.

  It would take strength, she wasn’t sure she had, to get out of here alive.

  Powerless to fight the looming despair, she let her head drop to her knees and gave herself over to her body’s violent tremors. Her mind and her body were both fighting against her. One voice told her to quit fighting and just rest; there was nothing she could do and fighting the inevitable would change nothing. The other voice screamed that she couldn’t just give up; if she wanted to see her kids again, she needed to take control of the situation. She couldn’t just sit idly waiting to be rescued—her survival depended on taking decisive action

  Ignoring the voice telling her to rest, Shelby worked to get her panic under control. If I just take care of each part of the Survival Pattern, I’ll be fine. It had the steps she needed to keep herself alive until they came for her. If they can find me— She cut her thoughts off abruptly. She couldn’t afford to be undisciplined in her thinking and let the fear overwhelm her.

  They would come for her—Ian would come for her—she just had to keep herself alive until he did.

  Survival was based on the Rule of Threes: three minutes without air, three hours without warmth, three days without water, and three weeks without food. She could do this.

  She fumbled in her pocket for Ian’s survival packet, her stiff and trembling fingers struggling to release the button on her sodden pants. She opened the packet and pulled out the bright orange whistle. She needed to get warm, but she needed help even more.

  She would signal her position, then she could figure out her fire, because if Ian came to rescue her, she wouldn’t need a fire. She was vaguely aware that her thoughts weren’t making sense. They were too tangled up with Ian, but she couldn’t dwell on it—not if she was going to survive.

  The likelihood someone would hear her whistle was miniscule, but she felt compelled to follow the Survival Pattern to the letter and the first thing to do was signal for help. She put the whistle to her lips and began to blow. She blew three long blasts—the signal for help. She blew the pattern over and over, until she didn’t have any breath left. Finally, she let the whistle fall from her shaking hands, and she pushed herself wearily to her feet. She had to allow for the time it would take Ian and the others to mobilize. It could be some time before they got to this part of the river.

  It was time to get warm. She needed a shelter or a fire or both, and she was going to have to do it alone. She looked around. The narrow sandbar was nothing but rocks and sand, too narrow to be safe. All it would take was one big rainfall for the river to swell and swallow her up. She needed to get up the steep bank and into the protection of the forest.

  Pushing thoughts of rescue out of her mind, she surveyed the bank, leaving the whistle lying on the rocks where she had dropped it. Its orange a bright pop of colour against the grey landscape. It was useless; nobody would ever hear it. It had been a waste of energy to even try.

  Getting up to the top wasn’t going to be easy. The bank was just above her head, but it was steep and had been undercut by the river in some places, leaving few route choices. Her upper body strength wasn’t great at the best of times, and after her freezing cold plunge and ensuing battle with the river, she was even less confident in her ability to drag her body up over the ledge.

  How am I going to do this? Doubt twisted her stomach.

  Refusing to give in, Shelby closely inspected the bank and found lots of places to wedge her toes into the dirt and lots of exposed roots to grab onto.

  It’ll be just like climbing a ladder, she told herself dubiously, gripping the mud with her shaking hands and trying to wedge her feet into a crevice.

  As she climbed, she whispered, “I’ve got this,” over and over to herself. The words were comforting, making it feel like Ian and his strength were near by. She would give pretty much anything to see his dark eyes right now.

  After a snail’s crawl up the bank, Shelby finally made it to the top. With relief, she flopped over the edge onto her belly and lay breathing heavily. Her hands and arms ached, and the cold had crept further into her body, but she had made it to the top. All she wanted to do was sleep. Even her bones felt tired and weighed down with cold.

  I could just lie here and rest.

  “Come on, Shelby, you need to get up,” she said out loud, like she was a drill sergeant urging on the troops. “You need to keep moving.”

  She didn’t have the strength to do it. All her energy had been sapped, but she had to get up. She had kids waiting for her at home, and she couldn’t let them down. By focusing on Kevin and Bryan’s faces, she finally managed to force herself to her feet and begin gathering the firewood she needed.

  Shelby tried to work quickly, but it felt like the blood in her limbs was frozen and every movement took all her strength. She had gathered only a few pieces of wood when her energy flagged, and she dropped to the ground.

  “I just need a rest,” she mumbled. “Once I’m rested, I can get on with it.” Although, she couldn’t quite remember what she was supposed to do next. She wriggled out of her life jacket and lay down on the ground and closed her eyes.

  Just one moment, and then I’ll get up.

  She was just so exhausted...

  Just give it time. The magic will happen... I just need time... Ian’s making the hot chocolate... her thoughts drifted off.

  She knew there was something she needed to do, but her mind couldn’t quite lock onto it. She just needed to rest for a minute...

  Gravel crunched under the bow of the canoe, as Ian drove it hard up onto the sandbar. It came to a lurching halt, and he flung himself over the gunwales. He cursed, as the frigid water flooded his boot, but he ignored it and kept moving. He grabbed his pack, flinging it onto his back in one swift motion.

  Then, he was bending down to pick up the orange piece of plastic that had caught his eye. The tightness in his chest eased slightly, as he realized that he had been right. He held an orange emergency whistle in his hand, and there could only by one reason why there would be an abandoned whistle—this must have been where Shelby came ashore.

  If he had had time,
he would have stopped right there and given a prayer of thanks, but he didn’t have any time to waste. Shelby needed him, and she needed him right now.

  Fresh tracks on the sandbar had to be hers. The river had been running high for weeks and would have obliterated any other signs of people having been here. He didn’t really need the tracks to know that she had gone up over the bank; there was nowhere else to go, except back into the river, and that was too frightening to even think about.

  Ian paused at the bottom of the bank. The river rushed on behind him, reminding him that he was up against time. He needed to find her fast. Yet, he needed a second to collect himself. He knew what he might find at the top of the bank. The memory of Charlene’s pale skin and unseeing eyes kept reminding him that he might already be too late.

  Climbing the bank was nothing for Ian, and he burst over the top, like a soldier plunging into battle. He came to an immediate halt; his heart leaping into his throat, almost strangling him, and then he was surging forward—he had found her.

  Ian threw himself down beside her, skidding to a stop on his knees. Her skin was so pale that it was almost translucent. He hesitated to touch her, knowing instinctively that there would be no warmth to her skin. He swallowed a howl; it couldn’t be happening again.

  He couldn’t survive it.

  “Shelby! Shelby, wake up!”

  Shelby smiled and clung to the delicious dream, where Ian was just on the verge of kissing her. Something was shaking her, but resisting it, she fought to stay in her fantasy.

  “Come on, Shelby, open your eyes.”

  “Don’t worry. I’ll be fine. Ian will warm me up. He always does,” she mumbled.

  A hand smoothed her wet hair back off her face. “I need you to open your eyes, Shelby.”

  Slowly, it seeped into her cold-muddled brain that it was Ian cajoling her to wake up. She tried to open her eyes, but they were so heavy, like something was weighing them down.

  “Come on, Shelby, don’t do this to me. You need to fight.”

  She forced her eyes open and found herself staring into Ian’s chocolate-brown eyes; He was there in the flesh and blood.

  He had found her.

  “That’s it, honey. I’m here, and I’m going to get you warmed up. I just need you to keep really still.”

  Shelby let her eyes drift shut again, as she felt him pull a toque over her head. She opened her eyes when Ian started pulling at her wet jacket.

  “We’ve got to get you out of these wet clothes. I have some dry things for you.”

  “Let me help you,” she murmured, struggling to rise.

  He pressed her back down. “You just keep still.”

  Once he had gotten her into some dry clothes, he slipped some mittens on her hands and helped her onto a blanket. “I’m going to check you over for other injuries. Do you hurt anywhere?”

  “I really don’t know. I’m just cold.” She couldn’t get her mind to focus beyond the fatigue that had wrapped itself around her and was trying to pull her under.

  “That’s okay, you just focus on staying still and awake. I’ll check you over.” His voice pulled her back to the present, and she was once again engulfed by the bone-numbing chill. Sleeping was really so much better. She let her eyes drift shut.

  She opened her eyes again, as Ian pushed his hands up under the toque, feeling through her hair.

  “You let me know if anything hurts,” he said softly.

  “Mmm,” she murmured. Her head felt like it had been wrapped in cotton, and she couldn’t concentrate on forming words.

  “Everything seems to be fine. Maybe a few bumps and bruises, eh?” he said, once he had checked her from head to foot.

  Her eyes kept flickering shut, as he pulled a down-filled blanket around her, tucking her in tight. Then, he pulled an emergency blanket out of its pouch, shook it loose and wrapped it securely around her too.

  “You rest here. I’ll be just over there getting things set up.” He pointed to where his pack lay abandoned a short distance away.

  Now that she was wrapped up like a burrito, she could feel how truly cold she was. The shivering started again, uncontrollably. “I’m getting colder,” she said, her shaking making her voice wobble.

  Instantly, Ian dropped what he was doing and came to crouch down beside her, helping her to a sitting position.

  “The shivering is a good sign. It means your body is trying to get you warm.” He pulled the mittens off and chaffed her hands between his. “I’ve got some water heating on my stove. Some hot chocolate will help. Then I’m going to get the fire going and set up the shelter. We have to stay here tonight. It’s too late to start hiking out.”

  “All night?” Panic threatened in the pit of her stomach.

  “It wouldn’t be safe to try to hike out tonight. I’ve already radioed Jade, and she agrees with me.” There was a tightness in his words, like there was something heavy brewing beneath his calm.

  Was he angry? After all this time was this when he would show his true colours? Where he showed her that his belief in her was fake. No, Ian wasn’t Blake. It was just the cold muddling her brain. He was probably just stressed about the rescue. Stressed about a student ending up in the river.

  Suddenly, Shelby felt fully alert. “What about Ginny? What happened to Ginny?”

  He squeezed her hand reassuringly. “Ginny’s fine. Luke grabbed her. We... I...” His voice broke. “I couldn’t get a hold of you.” He looked away, while he adjusted her toque, smoothing her hair up underneath it. “Here, you should keep this as a good luck charm.” He pressed the orange emergency whistle into her hand.

  She stared at it for a second and then peered up at him questioningly.

  “It’s yours. It’s how I found you. I spotted the orange on the sandbar.”

  Shelby curled her hand around the whistle and brought it to her chest like he had given her the most precious gift instead of a piece of plastic. Apparently, her efforts to signal for help hadn’t been useless.

  “Here, drink this while I get things set up.” He handed her a thermos lid filled with hot chocolate.

  She nursed the steaming drink, savouring the sweetness and the warmth. The memory of the first time Ian had shared his hot chocolate with her came rushing back to her with the first sip, and suddenly, despite her deep chill and her shallowly buried fear, she didn’t want to race back to Base Camp; she wanted to linger in this moment alone with Ian.

  Ian was so different from Blake, and she had been slow to fully realize that. Blake would have used this accident to remind her that he had warned her that she couldn’t do it, whereas Ian seemed only to care for her welfare. She felt safe and connected, a feeling she would savour right up until the moment it was ripped from her—because it would be torn from her the second they returned to Base Camp, and Celeste got her claws back into him.

  She pushed those thoughts aside. For now, she was here with Ian, and she was safe. She needed to avoid thinking too deeply, because if she did, the terror of how close she had come to dying just might overwhelm her.

  Once the shelter was up, and a pile of wood had been gathered, Ian knelt beside her and started laying out the fire. “I’ll have the fire going in a minute. Are you getting any warmer?” he asked, placing a gentle hand on her shoulder.

  At his touch, warmth bloomed inside her. Her body might be wracked by a bone-numbing cold, but it still leapt in response to the slightest contact with him.

  “Um... I... I don’t know.” She was too cold to think coherently.

  He held her gaze for longer than was necessary, and it pulled at her core, drawing her even further under his spell. When he finally broke the connection and turned to finish building the fire, she felt like she was reeling backwards.

  She watched him; her body a chaotic symphony of sensation. The situation was so intimate and yet so professional that she couldn’t bring her emotions under control. She couldn’t even understand them. Ian was here. He had come to find her, and that
had to mean something. But it was also his job. He was just doing his job. But then why did his eyes say something different when he looked at her?

  The fire flickered to life, and Ian turned, moving closer to her, so close their legs were almost touching. His heat and scent wrapped around her.

  “How are you doing?” he asked, his voice low and husky.

  Her heart raced and her nostrils flared, breathing in his earthly fragrance. “I’m okay,” she whispered back, completely under his spell.

  “Still cold?” He placed the back of his hand on her cheek to check her temperature, rendering her unable to form words. “You know...” A gleam lightened the corner of his heavily lidded eyes. “Body heat is highly recommended for warming hypothermic patients...”

  Caught off-guard by his sudden levity, she giggled, and then she raised her eyebrows, as what he was offering her with his shameless cliché sunk in.

  “And I think maybe, in this situation, we can’t afford to take risks by ignoring such solid advice,” he said, keeping his face perfectly straight. Only the glimmer in his eyes gave away that he was anything less than a serious professional making a critical assessment.

  “I think maybe you’re the reason my mother always warned me about strange men in the woods,” she said coyly.

  “Strange men in the woods, eh?” He pulled one edge of the down-filled blanket away from her and sidled up behind her, settling her between his legs. “Let’s see if we can’t get acquainted then.” He laid a kiss on her neck, so tender that it was barely more than a warm breath on her skin.

  Shelby trembled both from surprise and from something that wasn’t the cold. Unable to control her body’s reaction, she moaned softly, leaning back against his chest. She was playing with fire, but right now she didn’t care.

  There might be big challenges and hurt ahead, but at this moment, she felt sheltered and safe.

  As if sensing her thoughts, Ian wrapped his arms more tightly around her, and she melted against his muscular chest, embers of pleasure gathering in her core, as he began to gently rub his hands up and down her arms, almost idly, like his mind was focused elsewhere.