And stared at their cell phones.
At eight o’clock, the Nextel radio squawked.
All three of them lunged for it, but T.J.’s arms were the longest.
“We’re socked in,” came Nick’s voice over the radio. “We started back down. We’re in a cell hole halfway up Desolation. We have a big problem-”
His voice broke up.
“Repeat that,” T.J. said. “Nick, repeat.”
Nick tried, but whatever he said was unintelligible. T.J. let out a breath, then pushed the Talk button again. “Nick.”
Nothing but static. T.J. looked at Annie. “You know where halfway up Desolation leaves them.”
“Forty-five miles from here,” Annie said grimly. “What do you suppose the ‘big problem’ is?”
Katie prayed it wasn’t Cam. Annie gripped her hand tight, but before she could say anything more, Nick was suddenly back.
“T.J., can you hear me?” T.J. grabbed the Nextel again. “Yes, go ahead. Your problem?”
“We have a missing guest. Two went out for a leak and only one came back. I think he slid down the west side. Cam went after him, but neither have come back.”
Katie’s heart jerked to a painful stop.
“Fuck.” T.J. pushed the Talk button again. “Stone and I are coming. We’ll get S and R-”
“No one will fly you here until morning,” Nick responded. He said other things, too, but he faded out and never came back into range.
T.J. stood up and headed to the door. Annie leaped up and just barely caught him. “No, T.J. No.”
“I’m going to find a pilot who will fly me there.”
Annie was shaking her head, her eyes wet. “You can’t even get Stone back from town. You’d never make it there in this.” She gripped him tight. “I’m not risking two more of you. No way, no how. You’re not going anywhere until the morning, at least.” She threw her arms around him. “Promise me.”
T.J. hugged her back, then moved to the window alone, his back to them, stiff and tense as he stared helplessly out at the storm. “I should have gone instead. He didn’t need this.”
“Cam is stronger than you think,” Katie told him quietly. T.J. turned and looked at her.
“He is. He’s strong enough for this.” Her voice broke, but she nodded with resolve. “He really is.”
“Because of you.”
“No, I-”
“It’s true,” Annie said. “You gave him something we couldn’t. You gave him himself back.”
Maybe. But as far as Katie was concerned, she’d gotten a whole hell of a lot more than she’d given.
She slept with Annie in front of the big fireplace in the living room, and when dawn came, the sky was clear as a bell, making it hard to believe that a storm had been raging for days.
Except for the eight feet of snow blanketing absolutely everything. T.J. took the Sno-Cat into town, met up with Stone and Search and Rescue, and took off for Desolation. They arrived at the base of the peak by mid-afternoon and literally ran smack into Cam just as he climbed back up from where he’d slid down the night before. Uninjured but frustrated, he was happy to have the additional help because there was still no sign of Scott Winston, their missing client.
At the news about Cam, Annie and Katie hugged and cried in relief and went into the kitchen to eat an entire batch of fudge. Then Annie went to check on the fire in the living room and the radio squawked. Katie jumped on it. “Go ahead,” she said, heart in her throat.
“Where’s Annie?” came Cam’s unbearably familiar voice.
Emotion flooded her. She wanted to say how very glad she was that he was okay, that she hoped he was warm and dry. That she’d discovered one last thing-he was right about her being willing to take risks on adventures but not with her heart.
Never with her heart.
She wanted to tell him all that, and she wanted to hand her heart over to him and risk it all.
Right now.
But most of all, she wanted to tell him that she loved him. “She’ll be right back. Cam-”
“I don’t know how long you’ll be able to hear me. Tell Annie to call the clients’ families. The contact info is in the files.”
Nothing else. Nothing personal. No “Hey, you’re still there,” or “I miss you.” Much as that hurt, she understood. A man was still missing, his life in jeopardy. A life Cam was responsible for. He couldn’t let down his guard or be weak, not now. Probably not ever again, at least with her. It broke her heart, but she got it. She was gone, or would have been except for the storm.
And in truth, this had all been a fluke, a fantasy. A really great fantasy, but a fantasy none the less.
And it was time to move on.
Word came in at ten o’clock that night that Scott Winston had been found. He’d slipped down a snowy ravine on the opposite side of where Cam had done the same thing. Unable to climb back up, and equally unable to make himself heard over the wind, he’d decided to walk around and try to climb up another way.
And then had gotten himself lost.
He’d been picked up three quarters of a mile from where Cam had ended his search. He had frostbitten toes and fingers, but other than that was uninjured.
In her cabin, Katie was alone with Chuck, who’d shown up for the last of the cheese in her refrigerator. They sat together looking out the window at the stars.
And then, one fell. Katie looked at Chuck. “Did you see that?”