Page 92 of In Too Deep
“I’m going to haul you up.”
He wrapped her unresponsive fingers—cold and limp—around the rope.
“You don’t have to climb.Just hold on.”
Her hands were still covered in Noah’s blood—dark against her pale skin, dried in the creases of her palms.Still shaking.
But he got them positioned on the ascender—thumbs wrapped around, fingers curled over—and hoped muscle memory would kick in once she was moving.
“Hold on, Meg.Just hold on.”
Teague signaled up the shaft.The rope went taut with a sharp jerk, and Meg rose off the ground, her body lifting like a rag doll.He guided her toward the opening and made sure she didn’t catch on the rough stone—one hand on her shoulder, one steadying her boots—then watched her disappear into the vertical darkness above and get swallowed by the shaft.
Thirty seconds.
She should clear the shaft in thirty seconds.Maybe less if Liam was hauling fast.
“She’s up!”Liam’s voice echoed down from above.“Teague, you’re clear!”
Teague clipped into the rope, his ascender catching with a familiar click.Solid.Reliable.He started climbing, his movements automatic after years of vertical rescue work.Thousands of ascents.His muscles knew what to do without conscious thought.
Hand over hand.
Legs pushed against the rough stone.
The ascender slid up the rope with each movement.Metal teeth bit and held.
The shaft walls slid past in the beam of his headlamp.Limestone striations.Old pick marks from the miners.The geology of eons compressed into vertical feet.
Twenty feet.
Forty.
The rough stone scraped his pack and his shoulders, gouging his skin.That’d sting tomorrow.There was a reason climbers didn’t do this without a shirt, but his was wrapped around the knife at Noah’s side.
He winced as another rock dug into his shoulder, but he didn’t let it slow him.His breathing was steady and controlled.
Sixty feet.
Almost there.Almost to fresh air and open sky and safety.
His hand reached up and found Liam’s.Liam gripped hard as he hauled him over the lip of the shaft.Teague rolled onto solid ground, small rocks digging into his flesh, and breathed hard—sucking in clean air that didn’t taste of minerals and blood—and immediately the sound hit him.
The thunderous roar of helicopter rotors cutting through the air.Two distinct beats.Two birds.
Two medical helicopters sat on the plateau with their rotors spinning at full rpm.Paramedics were loading Alex into the first bird—strapping him down and hooking up monitors—their movements quick and efficient.Teague could see Noah already secured in the same aircraft.Still.Too still.
The second helicopter’s crew was already helping Liam guide Meg toward their aircraft and half carrying her.Her legs barely worked.
Teague pushed to his feet, his legs trembling slightly from the climb, from adrenaline.
They were out.
All of them.
Alive.
He slid off his pack and grabbed the spray paint from the side pocket—bright orange, the kind used for marking landing zones.The bomb squad needed to know exactly where the charges were if they didn’t go off.Without precise coordinates, they’d have to evacuate a mile radius.
