As his eyes gradually adjusted to the dimness in the tent, he saw the blood. Large drops and a smear upon a rock, but there was no sign of Jamie. Stumbling back to his feet, Andrew ran several feet and scanned what he could see through the dense clouds. There was no sign of Jamie anywhere. Ears straining, he struggled to listen over the sound of the rain in the hopes of hearing her movement. Where had she gone?
Knowing that she could not have gone past where he had just traveled, Andrew stumbled several steps in the other direction. His shoulder screamed with pain, but he knew one thing. He had to find her.
“Jamie!”
Heedless of the rain chilling him to the bone, he refused to believe that she had taken the same route down as Adam. He would have known. He would have felt it in his heart. She had to be around there somewhere. However, try as he might, he could not hear anything over the rain.
His voice broke when he called again. “Jamie!”
He had just lost his brother, but he would be damned before he lost Jamie. He would not give up hope. Not now, not ever. He would find her or die trying.
***
Jamie had run like she had never run before. Though blinded by rain and frightened half to death, she ran as though her life depended on it. In fact, she realized her life may very well depend on it. If Adam had shot her by accident, he may spook even more and try to finish the job. She had to get away - and fast. They had camped close to the edge of the Flatiron, so she ran for the trail to the ridgeline instead. She had seen it before the rain began to fall and now placed all of her hope that it would be safe enough to follow until she found a spot to hide and shelter her from the rain.
Though her legs were exhausted from the difficult climb to the top, she approached the steep group of rock formations before the trail with a sudden burst of adrenalin that gave her the strength to run for cover. One quick glance behind her revealed only a thick fog. There was no sign of Adam in pursuit. Snatching the brief respite, she paused and scanned the horizon. Her eyes landed on a rock outcrop above, shielded by a small stand of pine trees. The three trees were only four or five feet tall, but considering the chill and the rain, Jamie knew it was her best chance for shelter.
She had to get out of the weather. Already the cold had made her fingers go numb, and her clothing was now soaked through. Her jeans clung to her legs, and her hair was plastered to her face in long, wet tendrils. The cold almost overpowered the burning pain in her upper arm, almost but not quite. She could still feel the hot blood trickling down the arm of her sweatshirt and realized that she needed to do something about bandaging that, too. A few more minutes out in this weather and she would be in trouble. She had to find shelter now.
Off in the distance, muted by the fog and the sound of the rain, she heard a call. It spurred her to move again, faster, away from the voice barely carrying in the wind. With the last of her strength, she scaled the slippery slope to the stand of trees. With her left arm useless, Jamie stumbled and fell to her knees several times, but she ignored the pain and pressed forward. She had to get somewhere safe.
Another call reached her ears, and she suddenly went still. The strength in her legs finally gave out, and she sank to the ground in the driest spot she could locate. She was shaking all over, from her teeth to her toes, and the pain in her arm was throbbing. Though not nearly as good a shelter as she had hoped, it protected her from the worst of the rain, and the higher location gave her a view of the Flatiron below. To her surprise, a tall figure emerged from the fog, still in shadow but unmistakably familiar. Blinking the rain away from her eyes, she reached up a hand and wiped them as dry as she could. Was she mistaken? Could it be?
***
Andrew made his way back to the trail, not sure which direction to start in. He had come down the trail from the north, and he knew from experience that only a sheer cliff lay to the south. He refused to go that way. There was no way she had gone over the edge. That left only the ridgeline trail. He headed that way, pausing at the intersection to call her name again.
This time he received a response.
Heart leaping in his chest, Andrew struggled to place it. Though he could have imagined the sound of her voice, his instincts told him that it was Jamie calling his name.
“Andrew?”
He heard it again, and his eyes squinted as he looked up at the rocks rising jaggedly from the Flatiron floor. Andrew took off at a steady jog, his urgency driving him up the slope to the only spot she could possibly be hiding. The small stand of trees pressed against the rock face of the peak, and he scrambled up to find her huddled almost in a ball.
“Jamie,” he breathed. He grasped her chin with his good hand and kissed her face all over. “Oh God, I thought I lost you.”
She was pale. So very pale. Dropping to his knees before her, he noticed immediately that she was shivering violently. Relief surged through him, a feeling so overpowering that he could not stop himself from pulling her against his chest with his good arm. Though trembling uncontrollably, he felt her lean into him thankfully.
“How are you here?” Jamie asked raggedly.
“Where else would I be?”
“You shouldn’t have come up here. You’ll be trapped.”
“I couldn’t leave you here,” he whispered.
He gripped her tightly, as tight as he could, relieved that she was safe. At least for the moment. He knew he had to get her out of the cold and into dry clothing. Getting her back to the shelter was his first priority. Adjusting his position, his arm lowered and grazed her arm. She inhaled sharply, and it was then that he noticed the blood. It was her blood he had seen on the rock.
He drew away. “What happened?”
She gripped his arm with her good hand. Her fingers were cold. “It was an accident. No matter what happens, please know that it was an accident. I grabbed for the gun and it went off.”
“He had a 9mm,” he said more to himself than to her. Then he frowned at her. “You’re lucky he didn’t kill you. You never should’ve tried to disarm him.”
“I know,” she moaned. “Believe me, I learned my lesson. It hurts.”
“I bet it does.”
The look she gave him was slightly disoriented. He glanced down and saw the sweatshirt was almost saturated with blood, but she smiled at him wistfully. “I feel like I’m dreaming you. I saw you leave.”
“I’m really here, Jamie.” As much as he wanted to draw her into his arms and hug her tightly, he had to check her wound. “I need to look at your arm.”
“No, don’t. It hurts.”
“That’s why I need to look at it… I have to stop the bleeding. Then we need to get back down there and get you out of the rain.”
She nodded reluctantly, and he set to work as quickly but gently as possible. Though she winced, she remained brave when he helped her remove her arm from Adam’s oversized sweatshirt and eased her jacket off. She shivered even harder as the breeze hit her damp skin, and he hurried to get her covered again. Tearing a piece of his shirt free, he tied it around her arm as best he could with one hand and his teeth.
“It looks like it grazed your arm, but it’s not a pretty sight,” he said as he finished his makeshift bandage. Easing her wet clothing back over her arm, he lightly stroked her chin. “Nothing appears broken. Do you have any numbness or tingling?”
She shook her head. “No, it burns.”
“You might have muscle damage, too.” He sighed heavily, his shoulder throbbing painfully. “We need to get back down. Can you walk?”
Her fingers rose and covered his lips, stopping his conversation. “Where’s Adam?”
Andrew swallowed painfully. His voice broke when he spoke. “Adam can’t hurt you.”
Jamie frowned, confused. “Is he okay?”
“No,” he whispered. Understanding filled her gaze, and he watched the tears rise in her eyes.
“I’m so sorry.”
He avoided her gaze, avoided looking into her eyes for fear he would
lose it at any moment. “I need to call for help. My pack is down there. We have to go now.”
Her hand fell away, and she nodded slowly. Just knowing that she was safe was all the motivation he needed to help her to her feet once more. Though his shoulder was surely dislocated and possibly broken, he was able to aid her back down the outcrop and back to the shelter. Once she was safely under the canopy of the tarp, he backed out in search of his pack. Hopefully his phone was still functioning.
The cloud cover had thickened to a full blown fog, though the rain had eased to a light drizzle. The air was cold and stagnant, and he realized that he had started shivering as uncontrollably as Jamie was. He was soaked through, and the temperature had dropped dramatically. However, he could not think about that now. All that mattered was getting help to Jamie.
It took him several minutes to locate the spot where he had slipped out of the pack. It was sopping wet, but when he carried it back to the tarp and unzipped it he realized that most of the items were still dry. His phone was one of them. He pulled it free and pressed the speed dial for Ford while covering Jamie with the excess clothing he brought. She managed to smile her thanks, but her lips had taken on a bluish tinge and her eyes were glossed over.
A sharp ding echoed in his ear. Though working, the call did not go through. He looked at the sky and frowned.
Jamie shook her head. “Call failed?”
“The fog, I think.” He stared at her. “I’m going to help you get undressed and into warm clothes. Then I’ll try again while it blows over.”
She shook her head. “I can manage. Can you hike down?”
“It’s running off. I don’t think I could make it.” He did not tell her that he was pretty sure his shoulder was dislocated and virtually useless. The water rushing down the draw would surely kill him.
“You have to go. You have to get help for Adam.”
He leaned over her again. He needed to touch her, to see that she was still breathing, still there with him. Pressing his lips to her forehead, he inhaled the scent of her and thanked the higher powers that were for returning her to him. “I’m not leaving you, Jamie.”
An eerie silence fell around them, with only the sound of an occasional drip on the tarp. Feeling useless and frustrated, he glanced around the covered area, his gaze falling on the pile of kindling his brother had collected. “All right. You strip down. I’m going to try to start a new fire to warm it up in here. Then we can decide what to do. It may clear up a little faster than it would take me to get down.”
Nodding weakly, she turned her face away and closed her eyes. “I’m so tired.”
His hands paused in midair, and he stared at her over his shoulder. “That’s the hypothermia setting in. Just try to stay awake. I’ll warm you up in a minute.”
Certain she was watching, he hurriedly organized and lit the fire with the remaining dry timber and Adam’s lighter before returning his attention to what remained of Adam’s pack. The wood was damp and smoky, but the heat that rose felt heavenly to his frozen skin. He found some dry clothes, which he immediately handed to Jamie. She had struggled and groaned a couple of times, but after several minutes with his help they had managed to pull on a dry pair of sweats and a new sweatshirt hung loosely over her shoulders. As he helped her put her good arm through the sleeve, he checked her makeshift bandage. Her skin was cool to the touch and slightly clammy, but luckily no blood had soaked through his compress. He hoped it had just been a superficial bleed and not something internal that had been nicked.
Though he knew it was dangerous for him to stay in his own soaked clothing, he could not bring himself to take any of the extra garments for himself until he was sure she was dry. Jamie was his priority now; he had to protect her. With her still shivering, he worried that the cold would harm her more than the bullet wound. Shock was a very real danger.
Watching him half-heartedly, she attempted a smile. Her voice sounded faint when she spoke, and it concerned him more than the wound itself. “I can’t believe you really came all the way up here.”
He blinked in surprise, wondering how she could have doubted he would leave her. “How could I not?”
“I love you, Andrew,” she said with a soft sigh.
He leaned over her again and touched her cheek. Though he was not sure why she loved him, he did not doubt her words. Her love shone in her eyes, and he once more felt the emotion rising in his heart. Busying himself with removing her saturated and muddy clothing and laying them on in a pile as close he could get them to the fire, Andrew paused when her hand reached out to rest on his thigh.
“Kiss me, please?”
Her voice was fading, but he pressed his lips lightly over her face and gently over her lips. Once he started kissing her, stopping was not an option. Over and over again he pressed his lips to her cold skin, loving the feel of her and the fact that she was there with him. When he finally raised his head again her eyes were closed, those large dark orbs that always seemed to mesmerize him now hidden by her pale lids. He could see every small vein in the dim light under the tarp. How he loved her eyes. Hell, he loved her - more than anything in his small, shattered world.
Suddenly it all made sense. His curse in life was to hold the best of the world in his hands and then lose it all like some sort of eternal punishment similar to the suffering of Prometheus. Grasping his phone, he checked the bars and typed a text before pressing the send button. As he watched the phone do its work, he hoped with all his might that Ford would know what to do. The single word held what was left of his entire world in it.
“Help.”
Gripping his phone in his hand, he waited. He waited and prayed for the best.
As he had predicted, the cloud cover moved off a lot faster than he would have made it down. In the distance, he could hear the water coursing through the Basin, and he knew then that leaving Jamie’s side would have been tragic. He lay beside Jamie, gently stroking her hair and staring into her pale face as she slept. She was so beautiful, that for the first time in years he felt the emotion overwhelm him. Lowering his face to the crook of Jamie’s neck, he finally gave in to Jamie’s request and sobbed. He allowed the tears to fall, embraced them, felt the emotion of the last ten years of his life rise in one long sob of pain. If she heard his anguish, she did not respond, and although he did not expect her to he wished she could see that he finally had opened up.
Blazing hot tears dripped to the cold, damp rock beneath him as he lay in the growing darkness. As the minutes passed, he realized that he did not feel the discomfort of the chill any more. He had stopped shivering some time ago, leaving him with just the feel of Jamie. Soft and loving Jamie. He remembered the last time he heard her laugh. It mingled in his mind with that of Adam’s laughter. Both of them happy and able to enjoy life in a way he had never been able to. Until he met her. Until she had saved him.
He had no urge to move, not even when he heard the low deep rumble of the helicopter motor. Too weak and cold to rise, he did not even try to greet them. He could not leave her.
She had never left him.
***
A touch on the top of his head brought Andrew awake with a start. At first the events came rushing back as though another of his night terrors, but when he sat up abruptly and swiveled in his chair all the confusion and panic flooded back and mingled into one jumbled mess. Disoriented, he glanced around him. The room was dim, but he could see a light in the hallway beyond the partially closed door. It illuminated the foot of the metal bed, the off-white blankets, and the two legs underneath them. Turning slowly, his gaze followed the legs up to the monitors. The LCD display showed everything had stabilized, so his gaze continued to the prone woman in the bed.
Large brown eyes met his. They blinked, bewildered and muddled.
He gasped. Jamie was awake.
Her hand rested near where she had touched him. He wanted to grab it and press it against his lips over and over again, but he resisted the urge. The IV line was
still attached in the crook of her elbow, and she was obviously groggy from the anesthesia they had given her prior to the surgery to repair the muscles in her arm. All he could do was gaze at her stupidly.
“You’re awake,” he whispered.
In answer her hand went to his shoulder, which was encased in a sling. Her eyes questioned silently.
“I’ll be okay,” he said in an attempt to shrug it off. In fact, he would be out of commission for three to four months. “I’m fine.”
Her look was skeptical.
“It’s dislocated and my collarbone fractured, but I’m okay.”
She nodded, but her brow crinkled sympathetically.
“Don’t worry about me. You’re the one who just had surgery.”
Swallowing hard, she managed a slight shake of her head to dismiss his concern.
“How are you feeling?” Andrew glanced around anxiously. “Can I get you anything?”
She shook her head again and closed her eyes. After several minutes of silence, he feared she had fallen asleep again, but then she opened them again. Her voice was rough when she finally spoke. “Adam?”
Reaching for the water resting on the tray beside her, he pressed it to her lips and waited while she took a sip. As he did so, he opened his mouth to answer even though no sound escaped. While he struggled to find the words, a tear slipped free from his eye. Tears of relief, joy, hope, and most especially sadness over losing the brother he had loved. Everything seemed to have crumbled with Adam’s devastating final admission.
“Oh, Andrew,” Jamie whispered.
Her fingers were gentle when she wiped the tear away. However, more followed, so many that she could not keep up. He allowed them free rein; he did not care that he was crying like a child. Replacing the water on the tray, he offered her a definitive shake of his head instead.
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