Not If I Save You First by Ally Carter (16)

Maddie

Logan stared at where Maddie stood, in the center of a bridge that looked like it should have already fallen based on the weight of the snow and the ice alone. Much less with Maddie’s weight. Much less with his.

“Logan, it’s okay!” she called to him. “Just do what I said.”

He heard her words again: From this moment on, step exactly where I step.

There were things the Secret Service agents had to teach him, back when he was a kid and his dad was just a candidate—back when no one assumed they knew him. Back when Maddie really did.

The first lesson they teach a protectee is that, if an agent says duck, you duck. If an agent says run, you run. You don’t stop for questions. You never, ever say What? Because in the time it takes you to stop and say that single word, a sniper can strike from a thousand yards away. It’s the protectee’s job to follow directions and then get out of the way and let the professionals do their jobs.

Maybe it was that training coming back to him. Or maybe it was the look in Maddie’s eyes when she asked Logan to trust her. Logan swore right then that he never wanted to disappoint Maddie ever again. He owed her that much at least. He was going to mirror her movements exactly, even if he was at least fifty pounds heavier than she was. In the part of his brain that was always thinking, analyzing, calculating, Logan knew that just because a board was strong enough to hold her there was no guarantee that it would be strong enough to hold him. But it was as good a place as any to start.

He inched toward the bridge and paused to look down at the icy ground in front of him. It had been blowing and swirling all day and something like a drift covered the mouth of the bridge. But it wasn’t so deep he had to wade.

“Remember! Be careful,” she shouted. And something in Logan knew—just knew—that it was the remember that mattered.

Be ready, she’d said.

But ready for what?

There was only one way to find out.

Logan’s footprints dwarfed Maddie’s as he stepped into her tracks and moved slowly toward the bridge.

He could still feel Stefan behind him, on Logan’s right, where he had an angle on both of his captives. He kept the gun trained on Logan as he matched Maddie’s big step onto the mouth of the bridge, mirroring her in every way. But his hands were still cuffed in front of him, and he could only hang on to one side.

When he slipped on a slick board it was harder than it should have been to catch himself. His body kept twisting at the waist to grip the rope handles and he couldn’t get centered.

When Logan slipped again, he risked a glance at Stefan, a smirk. “Bet you’re wishing you hadn’t thrown away that handcuff key about now, aren’t you?” he asked.

“Walk!” Stefan ordered, and Logan forced himself to turn around.

Maddie was still inching closer to the other side, but she turned to him and nodded slowly, the universal signal for it’s time.

So, slowly, Logan reached into his pocket for the key Stefan had thrown away that morning. In the darkness, Stefan couldn’t see well enough to know what Logan was doing when he unhooked the left wrist cuff but kept his hands together.

With a glance back, he could see that Stefan had put away his gun and was approaching the bridge himself.

Maybe it was because he was coming from a slightly different angle. Maybe it was because he didn’t think he had to listen to a teenage girl. Or maybe it was common sense for him to step right up to the edge, to the place where bridge met land. To the place where the snow was a little bit thicker.

To the place that Maddie—and then Logan—had jumped right over.

Stefan stepped into the deep snow and immediately his foot disappeared.

For a moment nothing happened.

And then Logan heard the snap.

The yell.

A moment later Stefan was falling over and digging at the snow and ice, pulling at his leg. But it wasn’t just his leg.

Something clung to Stefan’s dark jeans, like an animal that had locked its jaws around his calf and was hanging on for dear life. But it wasn’t an animal, Logan realized.

No. In that moment Stefan was the animal, as he pried the metal jaws apart and pulled his leg free of the trap.

“Logan, run!” Maddie yelled, and Logan realized that she’d already made it to the far side of the bridge.

This was her plan.

This was their chance.

But Stefan had already pried the trap off his leg and tossed it into the abyss below. Hate and rage radiated from him.

They didn’t have a moment to lose.

Stefan must have been so angry that he ignored Maddie’s footsteps and started to run. As soon as his big foot landed on the first rung of the bridge, the board snapped. The bridge jerked beneath Logan’s feet as Stefan grabbed at the ropes and lunged forward. The next board snapped, too, and Logan knew it was no accident.

He thought about the small knife that Stefan had taken from Maddie, and just like that he knew. Maddie had come here. Maddie had done this.

He had to get to Maddie.

Now.

Stefan’s strong arm was wrapped around the icy ropes of the bridge. His good leg dangled down between the broken slats. There was too much pressure on the leg that had been in the trap. When he screamed, it sounded like a bear had been caught in Maddie’s trap instead of a man.

And Logan didn’t dare stick around to see if his bite was as bad as his growl.

“Logan, exactly!” Maddie yelled again, and Logan tried to match his steps to hers.

He tried to be fast.

He tried to be careful.

He needed so badly to be with Maddie again, both of them finally on the same side of the river after what felt like a lifetime apart.

Stefan grappled behind him, and the ropes swung. The bridge shifted, snow and ice crashing off the sides and disappearing into the vast darkness below.

But he was almost there. He could actually make out the look in her eyes—the little ring of blue that surrounded her irises. It was dark and he knew he couldn’t actually see it—not really. But he could see her in a way he hadn’t in years.

Somehow, it was a way he had never seen her.

So when the look of terror filled her eyes, he couldn’t help but turn back.

Stefan had dragged himself free of the broken boards and was on his feet again, running toward them.

“Logan, now!” Maddie shouted, and Logan leaped toward her, bypassing the last six steps of the bridge. He landed hard on the ground and rolled as Maddie reached for him.

He tried to get to his feet. They had to run. They had to—

But Maddie’s arms were around him then, pulling something from the small of his back.

She got free and rolled. Then, in one single, fluid motion she cocked the flare gun and aimed at the center of the old rope bridge.

There was still ice all over it, but Maddie had scraped away a lot as she walked, and when she took aim there was no indecision, no crisis of conscience or faith.

She was the image of her father as she fired.

Logan hadn’t realized how dark it had gotten—it had happened little by little, bit by bit. But as soon as the flare left the gun it was instantly daylight—if sunlight were the color of fire.

Red streaked across the sky and soared across the dark ravine.

It reminded Logan vaguely of the Fourth of July. The first year he’d celebrated at the White House, Maddie had come over and her dad had made arrangements for them to go up on the roof with the snipers. It was the best view in DC, everyone said, and they’d lain together on an itchy blanket watching fireworks over the Washington Monument. Logan remembered the big, booming sounds, the streaking lights in reds and blues. But most of all, he remembered thinking that he should hold Maddie’s hand but knowing that would be weird since she’d just started being his friend. His only friend. He couldn’t run the risk of grossing her out by touching her with the hand he’d been using to eat popcorn with too much butter.

And that’s what he thought about then.

Not Stefan.

Not Alaska.

Not even how cold and hungry and exhausted he was. How terrified.

Logan just wished he’d been brave enough to hold Maddie’s hand.

When the flare hit the center of the bridge, nothing happened for a moment. It seemed as if maybe the fire was going to die there, smothered by the snow and the ice.

But then the old ropes and wood exploded in a wave of color and fire and heat, and Logan didn’t doubt anymore. He swore to never put off anything ever again, and he reached for Maddie’s hand, pulled it into his own.

It was so small, and not nearly as smooth as it should have been. It was a hand that had known work and hardship and …

Maddie pulled away, and Logan fought the hurt that was growing in his chest. Maybe she didn’t want to touch him. Maybe she really did hate him, would hate him forever.

But Maddie walked to the side of the bridge, and then he saw a huge knife buried in the post, waiting.

“Stefan took your knife,” he blurted like an idiot.

Maddie looked like she’d never been more insulted in her life. “I never leave the house with just one knife. Seriously. Do I look like a one-knife kind of girl?” She pulled it from the post and Logan could see the fire glistening off of a long blade that could have easily sliced through those old ropes. But they hadn’t needed it. Yet.

She shoved the knife into a sheath in her boot. “Always have a backup,” she said, and Logan heard a crack. He looked back to see the bridge breaking apart.

Stefan had rushed back to the other side, but he’d lost his pack. It was lying there, in the center of the bridge that was burning all around him.

The pack with the satellite phone.

Logan didn’t think. He just started for the bridge. If he could get the pack, he could get the phone, and then this would all be over.

The pack was between Logan and the fire and he could get there. He could—

But he never made it to the bridge, because Maddie’s hand was back in his again, holding tight, yanking in the opposite direction.

“I can get it!” he yelled, but Maddie pulled back.

“Leave it!” she shouted.

Smoke filled the air as the fire spread. In the new light he could see her plainly, the worry in her eyes. The tension and the fear.

He tried to pull away again.

“We need it!” he shouted, but Maddie was stronger than she looked. So very strong as she pulled him back to her, wrapped her arms around his waist, and held him tight.

“I need you more.”

The fire crackled and the bridge burned, and Logan knew without a shadow of a doubt that they could never, ever go back. This moment was going to change their lives forever.

He turned and looked at what lay on this side of the ravine. More trees. Another steep hill and ice-covered rocks.

And then he heard it, something like a pop. He risked a glance back, expecting to see the bridge finally breaking apart and falling into the abyss, but the bridge still stood. Barely.

He heard the sound again, the echo of the shot off the steep stone walls of the mountains that surrounded them. And through the smoke and the haze and the falling snow he saw the assassin on the opposite bank, arm raised and steady. Stefan’s gun didn’t even quiver as he shot again. And again.

“Run!” Logan and Maddie both shouted, and they started for the cover of the trees.

They never stopped holding hands.