Up.
His booted foot swung free from the fanged jaws. Somehow his feet found purchase along the icy trunk.
He hooked an arm around a limb, hefted himself over and settled, straddling a swaying branch.
Chest pumping quick bursts of vapor, Josh inched closer to the trunk. Finally, he sagged back against the frosted bark. The howling dogs continued to snarl and jump at the trunk, but their growls didn't sound so loud to her ears now that Josh was safe.
He turned his head to look sideways up at her on a bough six or more inches above and over. White clouds from his mouth wafted around her. "Thank you."
"Thank you for the leg-up first." Relief coursed through her, cooling the adrenaline-induced sweat on her body. Minutes whispered by uncounted while she allowed herself to soak in the vitality of Joshua. Alive.
Nothing else mattered at the moment.
"Are you okay?" His gaze raked her.
"Me? I'm not the one who had a wolf hanging off my leg by his teeth. Are you all right?" "I'm fine. The snow pants kept him from actually biting me. Now, how are you, damn it?"
"Just winded." Scared, relieved, scared all over again. "Screw this saving ourselves crap. Arctic Survival School has concluded for us now. We need to report in about what we found in the cave. God, I can't believe anyone would be brash enough to mine uranium right in the backyard of a training area. Scares the hell out of me to think where they might be shipping it. Josh?" Why wasn't he talking? "Don't you agree?"
Cloudy breaths with no words continued to fill the night.
"Are you ready to call in a rescue?" "Look down."
Fishing her flashlight out of her pocket and scared all over again because she couldn't even remember putting it there, she arced the light down. Had she really climbed that high? How in the world had she reached to pull him up? The reality of how close they'd come to dying prickled over her, leaving her a little dizzy until the tundra below jiggled.
Alicia jerked her gaze up again. "I'd really rather not. It's a helluva long way down, and it's not like I have vertigo or anything, I mean, jeez, I'm a pilot, right? But I really prefer to have a parachute strapped to my back anytime I'm up high." Oh, God, already she was growing loopy from the cold and they still had at
least a couple of hours until dawn. "What was that about looking down, anyway?" Suck it up, Renshaw.
Rosen?
Ah, hell. Whatever her name was.
Securing her grip on the pine, she looked down again. A trio of wolves remained in sight, one nuzzling the limp carcass of the impaled beast. Blood stained the white perfection of fur and snow.
She swallowed hard, scanned the other animals busy prowling, circling the base of the tree. All but one.
A lone wolf stared up with the survival radio clamped firmly in its jaws, bits of torn snow pants hanging from his teeth.
No wonder Josh had wanted her to look down.
"Ah, hell." She sagged back against the sturdy trunk that still swayed under the force of the stormy winds.
Arctic Survival School was definitely over. Time to put their teaching to the test for real.
"De-e-eck the halls with boughs of holly..."
Alicia's warbly carol drifted around the tree, working better than a mega-jolt of caffeine to keep Josh awake.
His wife couldn't sing for crap. Her voice—a questionable contralto—carried on the tearing night wind.
He figured any safety benefits to shushing her were outweighed by the need to keep her awake.
Keep him awake as well.
Luckily the storm that had sent them into the cave in the first place was likely keeping the bad guys away for now. He and Alicia sat with backs against the trunk, legs stretched out on the limb to evenly distribute weight.
The branches seemed sturdy enough. But too easily he could envision the effortless snap of breaking off frozen wood for the fire earlier outside the cave.