Gray, Ginna

by The Witness

  She wanted to argue that point with Sam, but she didn't dare. The look in his eyes when he'd threatened her with brute force had told her that he wasn't bluffing, and she didn't relish the idea of being coldcocked and carted off like a sack of feed.

  A few yards into the trees, the ground began an upward slope that made the going even more difficult. Constantly nudging and prodding, Sam hustled Lauren through the spruce and aspens at a punishing trot. All along the way, as they ran he reached out to either side and behind them and shook the snow off tree limbs to cover their tracks as best he could. "C'mon. Move it! Move it! Get the lead out!"

  "I'm going as fa-fast...as I ca-can in these sho—"

  She stopped abruptly when the woods ended and she found herself staring at a steep rocky slope. Bending over, she braced her hands on her knees and struggled to catch her breath and shoot Sam an annoyed look over her shoulder. "Now...what?"

  "Now we start climbing." He bent and started untying his snowshoes. "First, though, we take these off. Use the bindings to tie them to the duffle bag." He looked up at her and scowled. "Don't just stand there. Get busy."

  "You can't be serious. You expect me to... cl-climb up there?"

  "It's not as bad as it looks. There's an old trail hacked out of the rocks that leads to the mine shack. Above that is a fairly level bench of land that we can follow around to that cut west of here."

  Lauren straightened and craned her head back to look up. About a hundred feet above their heads an abandoned mine building clung to the mountainside, its broken flume dangling out in air. The bench he wanted to reach was another hundred feet or so above that. "All the way up there? That's almost straight up. We'll never make it."

  "We'll make it. We have to. Quit wasting time worrying about it and just do it. And get those shoes off. And take off your gloves, too. You'll need to get a good grip in places."

  "Why are we doing this? Wouldn't it be easier to go that way?" she asked, pointing to the south, where the mountain sloped downward toward a high open meadow.

  "That's the point. They'll expect us to take off that way. I even left a false trail before I came back to the cabin. It won't fool an experienced tracker for long, but it may give us a little extra time. We need all the breaks we can get.

  "Anyway, that meadow is farther away than you think. Before we could get across that open stretch they'd have us lined up in their crosshairs."

  Lauren winced. Now there was a pleasant thought.

  "They won't be expecting us to go this way, and tracking someone over rock is more difficult—even rock with snow on it. I'm hoping, by the time they figure it out, we'll have bought ourselves even more time."

  Still unconvinced, Lauren bit her lower lip and looked doubtful. Nevertheless, she did as she was told.

  Sam already had his snowshoes tied to the backpack by the time she stood up, and he took hers from her and quickly secured them to the bag she carried. When done, he pulled a short length of nylon rope from the pack and tied one end around her waist and the other around his. "Okay, let's move out."

  The trail had long since grown over with scrub, and in places it had been altered by rock slides and was mostly covered with snow, to the point that Lauren couldn't make out a path at all. Sam, however, had no such difficulty. He set a grueling pace, climbing with the speed and agility of a mountain goat. Tethered to him, Lauren had no choice but to keep up as best she could.

  Huffing and straining, she clambered over boulders and struggled up steep grades on which the merest toeholds had been chipped out by some long-ago miner. More than once she slipped on icy spots and loose rocks. Each time she cried out in terror but somehow she managed to grab hold of a nearby bush or tree branch and arrest her slide. Even so, if it hadn't been for the safety line she knew she would have probably tumbled down the mountainside.

  Another slip was followed by a shriek, and Sam scowled at her over his shoulder. "Keep it down, will you? Sound carries a long way in these mountains."

  "I can't...help it," she gasped. "Nearly falling to my death tends to frighten me."

  "You're not going to fall. The rope will prevent that. Just watch where I step and do what I do and you'll be okay."

  He turned back before she could answer, and Lauren ground her teeth and aimed a blistering look at a spot between his shoulder blades. What did he think she'd been doing? She'd been trying to mimic his every move, but the difference in their heights, and therefore their strides, did not always make that possible.

  It took perhaps twenty minutes of hard scrabble climbing to reach the old mine shack. By that time Lauren was winded and her palms were scraped and stinging. She had assumed they would take a rest break at the abandoned mine shack, but Sam forged on without so much as a pause. She wanted to protest but pride kept her silent. That and a lingering wariness of his black mood.

  For the first seventy-five or eighty feet above the mine shack the going was arduous, even more so than on the so-called trail they had followed the first half of the climb. At various times, Lauren found herself clinging to the mountain by her fingertips and climbing up impossible grades, often pulling herself up by grabbing onto bushes and small trees.

  The higher they went, the more difficult the ascent became, especially for Lauren. Sam's moccasins seemed to give him a surefooted grip, but her heavy boots, though they protected her feet from the sharp rocks, made the climbing awkward for her.

  Lauren was concentrating so fiercely she hadn't realized that Sam had stopped until she climbed up onto a ledge beside him.

  "We'll never make it up this," he said, craning his neck back to look up.

  Pressed as flat as she could get to the rock-face, Lauren clutched the granite slab in a death grip. Carefully she tilted her head to follow Sam's gaze and saw that above them, all the way to the bench, was a perpendicular cliff face. To her eye, there didn't appear to be so much as a fingerhold in the smooth rock.

  "We'll have to make our way around this outcrop and find a better spot," Sam announced.

  "What, on this?" Lauren looked down at her feet. The shelf of rock on which they stood was no deeper that her boots. The heels of Sam's moccasins hung over the edge a good two inches and all there was to hold on to was this smooth, curving rock. It had been scary enough climbing up here, but the thought of edging sideways on this tiny ledge made her blood run cold. "No. No, we can't. That's suicide."

  "We don't have a choice. Before too much longer we're going to have company, and we're sitting ducks up here. C'mon, let's go." Extending his left arm, he ran his hand over the rock-face until he found another fingerhold, then, slowly, carefully, sidestepped to his left, pushing the snow off the ledge with his left foot as he inched away from her.

  Lauren hugged the cliff-face, too terrified to move, watching him. Her cheek was flattened against the icy rock, the hardness of it grinding her flesh against her cheekbone, but she bore the pain rather than loosen her grip.

  The tether grew taut, and Sam looked back, surprised to see that she hadn't budged. "What are you doing just standing there?" he snapped. "Move."

  "I...I can't."

  "Yes, you damn well can," he growled. Then he must have seen the hellish fear in her eyes because when he spoke again the timbre of his voice had dropped, become deeper, gentler, more persuasive. "You're a strong, intelligent woman, Lauren. A survivor. You can do this."

  "No, I—"

  "Lauren, listen to me. These past few days you've done a lot of things you probably never thought you could do. You can do this, too. Just reach out and find a fingerhold, then slide your left foot over. C'mon, Lauren," he coaxed. "You can do it."

  He held out his right hand, and his dark eyes locked with hers, willing her to come to him. "C'mon, baby," he whispered.

  Maybe it was his tenderness, or the mesmerizing quality of his stare, or the steely strength he exuded. Lauren didn't know, but something in her responded. Trembling, hesitant, she did as he instructed.

  "That's it. You're d
oing fine. Just take it nice and slow. Atta girl."

  She inched along, hugging the cliff, her heart pounding like a jackhammer against the rock, a knot of ice lodged in her chest. Her insides were trembling like gelatin.

  Then she made the mistake of glancing down.

  Spread out far below them was a sea of treetops and a bird's-eye view of the cabin, which, from there, looked like a child's toy.

  Her head spun and her stomach dropped. With a cry, she froze and squeezed her eyes shut and clung even tighter to the cliff-face. "Oh God. Oh God. Oh God."

  "Don't look down! Don't look down!" Sam ordered.

  Now you tell me, Lauren thought, biting her tongue to keep from screaming.

  "Look at me. C'mon, Lauren, open your eyes. That's it, that's it," he encouraged when she reluctantly obeyed. "Now focus on my face and don't look away. Just look at me. And don't think about where you are," he ordered in a velvety voice.

  Screwing up her courage, Lauren stared into those dark eyes and moved ever so slightly to the left again.

  "That's it. Just take it nice and slow. You're doing fine. C'mon. It isn't far. Just a few more steps," he coaxed, moving to his left just out of her reach. "You're doing great. Keep going. A little more is all— No! Don't look down! Keep your eyes on me. That's it. Thata girl."

  It seemed to take forever, like some terrible nightmare that had her in its grip and would not allow her to wake up. As they inched along, with Sam coaxing and encouraging Lauren every step of the way, the ledge climbed steadily, making the going even tougher. Finally they maneuvered around the curve of the rock-face and found themselves in a V-shaped area where two formations met and the ledge ended. The juncture was rough and jagged, but mercifully it had an inward slant and offered handholds.

  "I think we can get to the top here," Sam said. He looked at Lauren. "Ready?"

  Ready? she thought on the verge of hysteria. Ready? Lord, have mercy, she would never be ready for this. Never in a million years. She was clinging to a steep cliff hundreds of feet above the treetops, for Pete's sake.

  Flattened against the rock-face, she clung to its rough surface like a limpet, so frightened she could barely breathe. Oh God, oh God, oh God.

  She didn't want to move. But she couldn't stay here. As though to emphasize that point, the wind kicked up, buffeting her cruelly, as though trying to peel her away from the rock's surface, bouncing the dangling snowshoes against the backs of her thighs. Left with no choice, she screwed up her courage and managed the merest of nods. "I...I'm ready."

  "Okay, here we go."

  Sam reached up and grabbed a jagged rock with one hand and started climbing, finding and testing hand and toeholds, working his way steadily upward. He was about ten feet above her when the rope began to tauten again.

  "C'mon, Lauren. We're almost there. Just a little more to go."

  Lauren tried to swallow, but her throat was too dry.

  "Reach up with your right hand. There's a rock you can get a good grip on above your head."

  Pressing her lips together, she drew a shuddering breath. With her arms spread wide to either side, she was barely holding on by her fingertips. The thought of letting go with one hand terrified her. She wasn't sure she could do it.

  "C'mon, Lauren. It's the only way."

  She whimpered and squeezed her eyes shut, but after a while she slid her hand slowly upward, and sure enough, about a foot above her head her fingers curved over a sharp edge. It was the most secure hold she'd had on anything since they'd started this climb, and she gripped the rock so tightly her knuckles whitened. Cautiously she slid her other hand up and found another handhold.

  "Pull yourself up and throw your leg over the edge," Sam encouraged, pulling up on the rope to take part of her weight and assist her.

  Straining with all her might, Lauren did as he instructed, and hoisted herself upward, trying not to shudder when her feet lost contact with the narrow ledge.

  "Okay, now grab that sharp rock just above you to your left."

  With Sam a few feet above her, directing her every move, Lauren slowly inched her way toward the rim. She concentrated on one move at a time, all her focus and energy zeroed in on what she was doing. She didn't notice how close they were to their goal until Sam gave an explosive sound somewhere between a grunt and a groan, and she looked up in time to see him drag himself over the top.

  Panic assailed her when he momentarily disappeared from her line of vision. Then he poked his head over the edge and grinned down at her, his face full of male triumph. "Made it. Now you. Hook your fingers in that crevice and step up on that slab of rock, then reach up and grab the trunk of that sapling."

  She did as he instructed, but no matter how hard she tried her fingers were a few inches shy of the tree. "I...can't...reach it," she gasped.

  "Try again."

  She rose up on tiptoes and stretched her body as far as she could, but it was no use. "I...can't. I'm too... short."

  "Damn."

  Lauren resumed her precarious fingertip hold on the crevice and scanned the six feet or so of mountainside between her and Sam. There was nothing else to grab hold of but that one scrawny spruce sapling.

  The wind still slapped at her and her fingers were beginning to cramp. She didn't know how much longer she could hold on. She whimpered without realizing it, and gazed pleadingly up at Sam.

  "Don't panic," he ordered. "You're okay. We'll just have to go to Plan B."

  Leaning out over the edge of the precipice, he wrapped the safety rope around his wrist, gripped it firmly and pulled it taut. "Now, I want you to grab the rope at about your shoulder level with both hands and at the same time brace your feet against the slope and lean back."

  "Lean back?" She glanced fearfully over her shoulder. "Are you crazy?"

  "You'll be okay, I promise. As I pull you up you 'walk' up the side."

  "Walk?" she said weakly. "I don't think this rope will support me."

  "Sure it will. Trust me, babe. I won't let you fall."

  She didn't have any choice. She closed her eyes and said a quick prayer, then began to count. One. Two. She took a deep breath. Three.

  She grabbed the rope with both hands and screamed as she felt her upper body tilt backward, but somehow the soles of her boots found purchase on the slope. Then she was being pulled upward.

  It wasn't easy. Her bare hands were so cold they hurt, yet the rope burned her palms. The strain on her arms and shoulder muscles was excruciating, but she set her jaw and forced her feet to move.

  "You're doing great. Just a little more," Sam grated out.

  The muscles and tendons in his neck stood out and his face was red from exertion, but, hand over hand, he pulled her steadily toward him. When her head was within three feet of the top two things happened—the thin rope began to fray and she lost her footing.

  There was no time for more than a gasp of fright from Lauren before Sam's hand whipped out and clamped around one of her wrists. The next thing she knew she was dangling in space by one arm.

  "Be still," Sam snapped. "Don't kick. I've got you." He frowned. "Jesus, woman, you can't weigh a hundred pounds soaking wet. It's a wonder you don't blow away."

  In one quick, continuous motion, he plucked her up and over the top as though she were a sack of feathers and rolled with her away from the edge. When they came to a stop Lauren lay sprawled on top of him.

  For a moment she clung to him with her face buried against his chest, gasping and shuddering.

  Sam rubbed his hands up and down her back. "It's okay. You're safe now. You made it. Shh. Shh. You're all right, little one. It's over."

  He had only a second's warning. A low rumble started deep inside her, almost like a cat's purr, but the sound increased steadily in volume and intensity as it rose in her throat. When it erupted in a shriek of pure rage she hauled off and socked him.

  "You jerk!"

  Eleven

  "Hey!" Sam yelped.

  Lauren pummeled him wi
th both fists. "Idiot! Imbecile! You nearly got me killed! Again!"

  "Dammit! Will you knock it off and listen to m— Oof!"

  "No! I won't listen to you! You got me into this mess! You and your brain-dead friends in Denver." Lauren rammed her fist into his gut, too furious and shaken to do anything but lash out. "You risked my life. And for what? Those men were probably here to...rescue us...just like I said," she gasped out between blows. She struck out blindly with both hands, slapping and pounding with all the pent-up fear and anxiety that had been building for days. "We could have flown...out of here in...a helicopter if you would just...listen to...reason! But, no. You don't...trust anyone, so we had to climb this...stupid mountain!"

  "Hey! Cut it out, before I have to hurt you."

  "Ha! Just try it!"

  Sam grabbed her wrists, but then Lauren began to kick and thrash. When her knee came too close for comfort, he wrapped his legs around hers, scissor-fashion, and rolled her onto her back. Pinning her hands deep in the snow on either side of her head, he held her down with the weight of his body.

  "You little hell-cat." He glared down into her furious face. "Will you calm down for a second and let me—?"

  "No!" She bucked her hips. "Get off of me, you oaf! I don't wa—"

  His mouth closed over hers, swallowing the rest of the tirade.

  Shocked to her core, Lauren froze, her eyes wide, as though the touch of his mouth on hers had short-circuited her brain. The stunned reaction lasted only a moment. Then all the raging passion still churning inside her came boiling back to the surface. Her heart took off at a thundering gallop, and she kissed him back, matching the punishing kiss with a fury and ardor that equaled his.

  The kiss was hot, greedy, devouring—an eruption of emotion and need. Their mouths plundered, giving no quarter, each taking what they wanted, demanding more.

  Sam released her wrists to cup one hand around her face while the other slid downward to her breasts. Encountering the bulky parka, he made a frustrated sound.

  Lauren grasped his head between her palms, knocking aside his parka hood and knit cap to winnow her fingers through his hair and explore his scalp, the shape of his head. The thick, ebony strands felt like warm silk slithering through her chilled fingers.