The aftermath of an avalanche was jarring. What once was violent and explosive became impotent and peaceful.
Even if you managed to survive, those first couple breaths made you question if you were dead. The silence. The endless white. The momentary detachment to everything around you.
But then it came back just as violently as it all left.
The silence is interrupted by the sound of your pounding heart, the pain in your limbs, and the ragged way you draw in a breath.
“Bellamy!” I roared, launching up. The speed in which I sat up made me woozy, and I threw out a hand to steady myself on something.
There was nothing.
Nothing but a sea of white, a blanket spun by winter, covering everything as far as the eye could see.
“No.” I gasped, forcing myself to my feet. My knee gave out and I fell, but I pushed back up just as fast.
“Bellamy!” I screamed. My voice echoed through the air.
I hoped it had been enough. Please, let it have been enough.
The second I knew that avalanche was going to overtake us, I hit a natural bump in the mountain, getting some air as the white reached out its claws.
I hoped I had enough air to not get pummeled completely. I hoped it gave us a shot of not being buried under tons of snow that packed down like concrete.
After thirty minutes, the chances of being found alive in an avalanche decreased drastically.
After three hours, you were as good as dead.
“Bellamy!” I roared again.
I had to find her. The clock was ticking. I wasn’t coming off this mountain without her. If she died up here, then by God, I would, too.
Ignoring the searing pain in my knee, I jogged forward. My board was long gone. I’d probably never see it again.
“Bells!”
I staggered around, scanning the white, looking for something… anything.
A sound, muffled and almost lost, brought my head around. I froze and looked in the direction I’d heard it come from.
Cupping my hands around my mouth, I called out, “Bellamy?”
A muffled yell replied.
I took off, the sound below me. My knee gave out again, but I kept moving, rolling down toward the sound.
The second I sprang to my feet, a slim, colorless hand poked free of the white. It wiggled and moved like a flag against the backdrop of night.
A strangled sound forced up the back of my throat, and I croaked as I lunged, falling onto my hands and knees and clawing at the snow around that hand.
She kept moving, her hand forcing down, coming back up, down again, until I could see her wrist and her other fingers poke free.
I grabbed her hands and pulled, releasing a yell into the sky.
Bellamy’s body burst up from the packed white, and I fell back, bringing her with me. She collapsed across my chest. Her gasping for air was the best sound I’d ever heard.
“Thank you!” I rasped up to the sky. The stars blinked down at me. “Thank you.”
Bellamy began coughing, and my focus shifted. Taking her face in my hands, I glanced up. “You okay? How bad are you hurt?”
“Liam.” She wheezed. “Liam.” Her eyes became misty and a tear fell over her cheek. “I really tried to hold on.”
A small laugh bubbled up in my chest. The pressure of it coupled with the profound gratefulness that she was alive hurt, but it was a pain I would carry the rest of my life if I had to. “I got you,” I said, collapsing back into the snow with a heave. “I got you now.”
“You saved my life.”
I lifted my head, meeting her eyes. “No, sweetheart. I got us pummeled by an angry mountain.”
She shook her head. “You told me to swim. It kept me from getting stuck under there, right? You told me to swim.”
In a burst of energy, I sat up to clutch her against me. “Yes,” I said, pressing a kiss to her forehead then to her nose. “Yes,” I murmured again and kissed her lips.
It was one of the things always drilled into my head. If ever in an avalanche, swim. The snow, once packed, was nearly impossible to move. You had to swim to get out.
Bellamy ripped her lips from mine with a gasp and sank into my chest. Her body was scarily limp.
“Hey.” I pulled her completely out of the snow. “Tell me where you’re hurt.”
“I-I’m not sure,” she replied.
“Okay, let’s stand up. Take stock of how you’re doing.”
“Liam?” She clutched at my arms before I could move.
“Yeah?”
Her eyes were so wide when she glanced up. “They tried to kill me. They were going to kill you.” Her lower lip wobbled, and I was lost.
“Shh,” I crooned, pulling her back into me. “They tried, but they failed. We’re okay now. We’re both okay.”
She gasped and shoved away from my chest. “Oh my God! They could still be looking for us. They’re still here!”
I held her when she tried to scramble up. “Calm down,” I insisted. “Everything’s okay.”
“No!” she cried. “Everything is not okay!”
She was in shock. Her eyes were wild. Her lips were taking on a hue of blue I didn’t like.
She had no gloves. No hat. And was dressed in a pair of soaking-wet jeans.
I pulled her in, rocking her back and forth, holding as tight as I dared. I was incredibly afraid I’d hold too hard and worsen something that was already injured.
Her teeth chattered and her body shivered.
“Up,” I said, feeling the same urgency as when I rushed down the mountain, trying to get free of the avalanche.
Without shelter and heat, she was going to die.
Ripping the hat off my head, I stuffed it down on hers, pulling it so far down it nearly covered her eyes. Next, I pulled off my jacket and wrapped it around her, zipping it all the way up. “Put your hands inside against the lining,” I ordered. When she didn’t automatically obey, I took her hands and shoved them into the coat myself.
“W-w-what about you?” Her teeth chattered.
“Don’t you worry about me.” I assured her. “I’ve got snow in my blood.”
Using my hands, I rubbed briskly up and down her arms, trying to get any kind of heat into her I could. She whimpered, and her body jerked back.
My eyes narrowed, hands hovering over her body. “What hurts?”
“My shoulder.” She looked toward her right shoulder. I glanced at it but couldn’t see anything because my coat was around her.
My eyes roamed over her face. Her cheek was split. The blood was frozen on her face. Her eye was darkening, and one side of her lip was swollen.
“He hit you,” I rumbled as my own avalanche of anger whipped up inside me.
“Could be worse,” she replied. A stricken feeling sliced me open. “The men!” She perked up, glancing around.
“They’re probably dead,” I answered flat. If by some divine act of God they were alive, I’d kill them myself.
“Try and walk,” I murmured, wrapping an arm around her waist. Her movements were stiff and wooden. Every step she took, I anticipated a cry of pain.
But as one foot slowly went in front of the other, I began to feel a little more hopeful.
“How are you?” she asked, glancing up at me.
How could I think about myself when half her face was swelling, her shoulder was wrecked, and second after second, she was more exposed to frostbite?
“Liam!” Her sharp voice cut into my thoughts. “Are you hurt?”
“Uh, don’t think so,” I said, shaking my head as we stepped. My knee buckled.
“Don’t lie!”
“My knee,” I told her. Slowly, I took stock of my body, actually turning my thoughts inward, fighting myself to keep them there. It was hard to think about me, especially when I had her to think of. Especially with the splitting headache sawing through my skull.
“You’re bleeding!” She huffed.
“What?”
Her fingers poked out of the coat I’d put around her, reached up, and fingered behind my ear. I winced. They came away red.
“You hit your head, Liam.”
Well, that would explain the headache.
I grabbed her exposed fingers, ignoring the blood smearing them, and pulled my jacket down to cover them. “Keep your hand covered.”
“But your head!”
“The cold will slow the bleeding.” I really wasn’t concerned. I’d had worse.
“We need to get back to the resort.” She worried. “You need to a doctor. We both do.”
“It’s too far,” I replied, shaking my head. “We won’t make it. Not without my board.”
She grabbed the front of my shirt, her fingers curling into it even through the sleeves of my coat. “We don’t have a choice.” Her forehead wrinkled. “Where is your coat?” As if finally understanding what was happening, she glanced down at her own body, and a noise of alarm ripped out of her.
Bellamy started tearing at the coat, trying to get it off. I knew she would. I grabbed her arms and pinned them to her sides as she struggled.
In her haste, she jolted, and a bolt of pain struck through her eyes. She bit back a whimper and went still. I let go of her right wrist instantly, afraid I’d pulled her shoulder.
“I’m not wearing your coat!”
“Yes, you are.”
“You need it!” she demanded.
“You need it more.”
“No!”
I grabbed her face and forced our eyes to collide. “Look at me.”
She went still and listened. My eyes bored into hers, searching. Her pupils were dilated. I cursed.
“What?” She whimpered.
“I think you have a concussion.”
“Me?”
I was pretty sure we both did. She definitely was in shock, but her level of delayed understanding and movement… She’d hit her head at some point. Maybe whenever she injured her shoulder.
I picked her up, careful of her shoulder and making sure the right one was facing out and not against me as I cradled her against my chest. “We’re going.”
“Your knee!” She gasped.
“I don’t give a damn about my knee!” I roared.
She fell silent, slinking against my chest. The curse I spat floated behind us as I walked. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. I just… Just let me get us somewhere safe.”
“But where?” she asked, laying her head against my chest.
I glanced ahead, hoping like hell it was still there. “I know a place.”