Gia trudged forward another step, leaning heavily on the branch Elijah had trimmed into a staff for her.

Elijah was going slower than yesterday. While part of her wanted to believe it was because they were both tired, she knew he’d measured his pace for her.

Her ankle burned with every step. The worst of it was, even with the slower pace she was barely managing to keep up. She was desperate to stop, to give herself a break, but the threat of Ray closing in kept her putting one foot in front of the other.

Regret still weighed her down. She never should have stolen Ray’s money. Never should have relied on Elijah and gotten him involved in this mess. Her first instinct had been to run, and she should have done so, even with a bad ankle.

She’d believed she was safe, but she should have known Ray would find her. He’d be motivated, determined to get his money back. Determined to hurt and punish her.

And now Elijah had lost everything he cared about because of her. Because he was a good man who had helped her, who had rescued her and taken her in when she was desperate, and shared everything he had with her. And how had she repaid him? By getting his entire life burned to dust.

Guilt gnawed at her.

Elijah had been kind to her earlier when she’d apologized, but she knew he must be angrier than he said. Because she knew he cared for her, a lot, and he’d still chosen that cabin over her.

He was probably cursing the ground she walked on, hating her with every step. He’d be too nice to say it here and now, when they were in such a dangerous situation.

Gia shivered in the cold, her limbs stiff like ice, but still she trudged forward, slowly and carefully.

They’d had more steep descents, more thin ledges down a cliff face, and Gia’s ankle hurt more with every step where she had to twist or maneuver. Even Elijah’s splint hadn’t helped through the worst parts.

Even if she let him carry her—which she wouldn’t—it still wouldn’t help in those more difficult bits, with deadly drops beneath them.

Gia sighed.

It occurred to her that despite her pain and cold and misery, she’d still prefer to be right where she was rather than back in Ray’s comfortable and decadent mansion. The company was better, for one; even Elijah’s silent back was better than Ray’s anger. And, even better, she was free. Not constantly afraid of what Ray might do or say, not worried about being judged or reprimanded. Out here she could make her own choice, could place her trust in her companion, and know they’d get through anything.

A smile bloomed across her face at the knowledge. Who would have thought she of all people would trade in her glamorous life of silk dresses and ten thousand dollar handbags for handmade leather boots and a mountain man?

But she had.

If Elijah could forgive her.

Which was a big if. Was his silence over the last few hours because he was concentrating on their path, or because he didn’t want to speak to her? She couldn’t help thinking it was the latter.

Ray had a lot to answer for.

If he hadn’t found her at the cabin…how had he found her at the cabin?

She could understand finding the plane. She’d assumed there were rescuers searching for the wreckage, and they might have spotted it from the air. But even if they’d somehow found that, how had Ray known she’d been on it? And how had he gone from the plane to Elijah’s cabin?

“How do you think Ray found us?” she asked on a gasp, sucking air into lungs burning with cold.

Elijah stopped and turned. “What do you mean?”

She pulled up beside him. “I mean…how did he know I was on the plane? How did he find the plane? How did he find your cabin? You don’t have a phone, so you didn’t tell anyone I was with you.”

He frowned down at her, thinking. “Right,” he said, then stared over her shoulder at the direction they’d come from. The direction Ray would be following them.

 “Maybe he put some kind of tracking device on me,” she muttered bitterly. “I wouldn’t put it past him.”

Elijah smiled indulgently at her. “It’s not that. I’ve touched every inch of you. I know.” His gaze heated as if remembering doing exactly that, warming her from the inside out. If they weren’t halfway up a mountain in the snow, Gia would have thrown him down and had her way with him.

One last time.

Tears pricked her eyes and she turned away from him, following his gaze up the path. She hoped she was pregnant. That she’d have something to remember him by.

Of course, she’d tell him if she was. But he hadn’t seemed interested in making their relationship work back at the cabin. Perhaps she could rent a house near town, and he could visit once a month on his supply runs. But could she bear to see him when she wasn’t with him? If he wanted a relationship with his child she supposed she’d have to lock away her heartbreak and accept it.

He’d be a good father.

She blinked away tears.

If only he hadn’t been the one to find her. He’d still be living his contented, simple life in his cabin. If she could make the choice, she’d go back in time and fix it all for him, so he hadn’t lost everything. At least then he’d be happy, which is all she ever needed for him.

Even if she wished he was happiest by her side.

She sighed and stared into the trees. No movement, no Ray. Maybe he wasn’t even following them. For all she knew he’d helicoptered off the mountain and waited to ambush them in town.

“Aaron,” Elijah breathed.

“What?” Gia said, spinning around. She winced at the movement on her ankle, digging her staff into the snow to relieve the weight on it.

“It must have been Aaron. He’s the only tracker good enough in the area to have found my cabin.”

Gia frowned. “But he’s your friend. He wouldn’t lead a lunatic to your door, surely.”

He stared at her. “Would he have known he was a lunatic?”

Gia thought back to the way strangers reacted to Ray. No one had seen the dark depths she’d known were there. No one had been as scared of him as they should have been. He was a man good at presenting a charming surface to disguise the depravity beneath. “Maybe not,” she admitted.

“Or, from what you said, Ray used violence to get what he wanted. Maybe he threatened Aaron.”

She nodded. Also a possibility. “I didn’t see anyone else up at the cabin,” she mused.

Elijah stared off in the direction the cabin was in. “No,” he agreed. “And he never would have stood by while Ray set it on fire.” His jaw was tight.

“What are you saying?” Gia asked, but a chill ran down her spine, and not from cold.

“If Aaron is the one who helped Ray find my cabin, then he’s probably dead.” His fists clenched at his sides.

Gia stepped forward and wrapped her arms around his waist. When he didn’t pull away, she sank deeper into the hug until he raised his hands and pressed her closer, burying his face into her beanie.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. This was her fault, all her fault.

And she didn’t think Elijah could ever forgive her for it.

 

 

Three hours later, Gia’s exhaustion made her stumble. Again. Walking with a limp was more tiring than walking on two strong ankles. Her feet dragged and tripped against the uneven ground beneath the snow. The snow itself didn’t help, the resistance pulling at her ankle, causing even more pain.

She attempted to lift her feet out of the snow with every step, but it tired her faster.

She didn’t want to call a halt, or tell Elijah how badly she was doing. They needed to keep moving, or Ray would catch up to them. He was probably already gaining on them, considering how slow they’d been going.

They broke through the trees onto a plateau of crisp snow. A cliff dropped off twenty feet away, and beyond that was one of the most beautiful sights Gia had ever seen.

Mountains spread in every direction. They soared above and dropped off below into a snowy, tree-filled canyon. The sun sat low on the horizon, ready to dip beneath the peaks. Its orange glow strengthened with every second.

She stopped for a second to take in the view. It settled deep into her bones, and she knew now why Elijah loved this place more than anything.

All her fears and worries fell away in the face of such grandeur. Elijah must have noticed she’d stopped walking, because he turned back to her. She smiled at him and returned her gaze beyond his shoulder. He came up beside her and followed her gaze.

“It’s so beautiful,” she told him. “I can see why you love it.”

“It’s home,” he said simply, then wrapped an arm around her shoulder.

They allowed themselves to enjoy the view for a few minutes more, then reluctantly started forward again.

Elijah led her to a thin ledge cut into the cliff face. It was barely wider than she was, and the drop to her left was at least one hundred feet. She took half a second to prepare herself. It was all the time she’d allow herself. If she thought too much about what was about to happen next, she’d chicken out.

She took a deep breath, then stepped down.

Her head spun at the drop to her left. She planted a hand onto the wall of rocks next to her and paused. She didn’t like heights. It’s one of the reasons she’d never like airplanes.

But she couldn’t think of that now.

She took another step, and another, gritting her teeth against the pain in her ankle. It was worsening, she knew. By walking on the sprain, she risked damaging herself permanently. But this was life or death, and she didn’t exactly have much choice.

And then, at the worst possible moment, her ankle gave out with a sickening stab of pain. She fell forward on the narrow ledge, stumbling into the wall at her right and then overcorrecting and tipping backward.

She fell onto her backpack, her head off the narrow ledge with the dizzying drop beneath her. She swallowed, breathing through the pain and terror to calm her racing heart.

But the nightmare wasn’t over.

The ledge beneath her crumbled under her weight, sending showers of rocks and dirt plummeting towards the earth. She tried to scramble forward and away but her backpack had raised her too far off the ground to get a solid grip. She had no purchase beneath her hands and nowhere to go with the rock face pressing in on her.

Panic seized her.

She was going to die.

Black terror swam over her vision, blocking out everything but the worst sensations. Her pounding heart, her hands scrabbling uselessly at dirt, the echo of stones tumbling down the cliff face.

And then she was yanked away from the edge and into a solid wall. No, not a wall. Elijah’s chest.

She clung to him as he leaned back against the rock face, holding her as close as he could. His heart fluttered in panic beneath her ear and his breath bellowed from his lungs.

“Shit,” he muttered. “Don’t ever scare me like that again.”

Gia shivered uncontrollably, both from the cold and the adrenaline rushing from her system. She laughed through chattering teeth. “I’ll try not to.”

But the terror hadn’t left her. There was every chance exactly that would happen again and her heart squeezed in panic. It was clear the landscape they were in was as deadly as Ray, if not more so. If they weren’t careful, this mountain would be their death before he even found them.

“Can you continue?” Elijah asked.

Gia hesitated for a long moment, pushing away the fear that clutched at her at his suggestion, obliterating all rational thought. She nodded, even though she wasn’t convinced it was true.

Elijah reluctantly released her, and Gia held onto the wall for balance. She’d lost her staff somewhere in the fall, but didn’t want to search for it in case she glanced over the edge and got dizzy again.

Carefully, she put her injured foot on the ground. The second she added the slightest bit of weight, pain ricocheted through her and the ankle collapsed beneath her. Elijah was there instantly, holding her upright.

Gia blinked back tears. “I don’t think I can walk on this leg,” she told him apologetically. A sob escaped her, and then another, from mingled pain and guilt and self-pity. They’d die out here because of her stupid ankle. Something so innocuous in the city could turn so deadly out here away from civilization.

Elijah set his jaw. “You should have told me it was that bad.”

“And what could you have done? Carried me down this slippery, uneven slope, so we’d overbalance and both of us would plummet to our deaths?”

Tears spilled out now, freezing on her cheeks. She wiped them angrily away and glared at Elijah. She knew this wasn’t his fault—he’d been wonderful and done everything he could—but he was the only target for her fear and anger and shame.

“I’ll find another way,” he said.

“There is no other way. You can’t carry me over every kind of terrain.”

He glared stubbornly. “There are other ways. They take longer, but if we work quickly we can be out of here before Ray catches up.”

Gia blinked away her tears, his words shocking her into logic. “What?”

“There’s a place near here where the drop is only forty feet or so. I can lower you down, then come down this way myself and meet up with you.” He hesitated, staring down into her eyes. “It’s not over. It won’t ever be over, okay? Trust me.”

She nodded immediately. “I do. I do trust you.”

“Good.” He nodded in satisfaction. Then, he bent to pick up her staff and handed it to her. “A few more steps and you’ll be safe at the top. I’ll hold you.”

He wrapped an arm around her from behind. She moved slowly, carefully, using the staff and Elijah’s solid body for balance. It was slow and painstaking and terrifying, but they made it back to the top and Gia collapsed in a heap on the snow, overcome with relief.

“I’m alive,” she said in amazement, staring out at the beautiful view beyond.

Elijah grinned down at her. “Thank God. I swear I nearly had a heart attack when you were half off that ledge.”

She nodded, grateful for his steadiness in the face of fear. She’d never been that close to death before, and would be more than satisfied never having to be ever again.

Then, Elijah sobered. “We don’t have much time, because this will take a while. I want to be long gone before Ray catches up.”

Gia sat up. “How can I help? Will you wrap the rope around me or…?” she trailed off at the awkward expression on his face. “What?”

“I don’t have enough rope. What I use is for snares.”

Gia’s jaw dropped. “So what are we going to do?”

“This is why I said it would take time. I have to make more rope.”

Oh, dear.