Page 28 of No Hope of Rescue

Kelly’s head snaps up. “Fossils?”

We both nod.

Kelly turns around and marches to the table, reaching for her laptop.

΅

I convince Brock to shower first, claiming I have to eat something before I pass out. In the hallway, we fiercely argue the point under our breath, until I remind him he may need me to help him, so he really should go first. I whisper all this as I grab the first aid kit in the bathroom and throw it into the back bedroom. For whatever reason, he’s chosen not to tell his family he was shot, and I’m now complicit with this edited version of the story.

The shower runs while Kelly sits, drinking coffee and staring out the window at the remnants of the storm. The sky is beginning to lighten. Already, our snowmobile tracks have disappeared under another four inches of snow.

Kelly has stoked the woodstove full and put the damper down right at peak, leaving the inside of the cabin so warm that I’ve shucked off my jacket and both sweaters and am sitting in thermal underwear.

“You know when my husband proposed, we knew right away we wanted children.” Kelly fingers her engagement ring as she speaks. “I don’t think I fully realized what we were getting into.” She smiles a wan smile. “There’s so much worry. All. The. Time.”

I give her a hug. I can’t imagine.

Ryan, who is kind enough to fry two eggs, grate about three pounds of potatoes, and fry up a pile of hash browns, is somewhat crushed when I poke at the second egg and leave some of the hash browns on my plate. Just then, the shower shuts off, and in a couple of minutes, the door opens with a waft of steam billowing from behind.

I glance up, trying to make it all casual. Brock emerges with a dark brown towel a little higher than his waist. His chest and abs are absolute perfection—wide pecs flank either side, and smooth muscles layer symmetrically down his stomach. His voice is gruff.

“Hey, Riley. I think I might need you after all,” he says and disappears down the hall. He says this as if we always casually hang out together in a bedroom, and I feel all eyes on me as I rise from the table.

“What the hell?” is Ryan’s response, but he’s just giving voice to what I know they’re all thinking.

After washing my hands thoroughly in the bathroom, I tap lightly on the door, enter, and find him lying on his back, pillows jammed under his head. His color is good, but his breathing gives away the truth. He’s hurting. I sit down next to him on the bed and pull the towel away to see an angry red tear above that hip. I try very hard not to stare at his groin and that hard V that runs to somewhere under the towel.

Swallowing, I glance at his face, but his eyes remain closed.

“Are you just never going to tell them or see a doctor?”

His eyes open, and those blue eyes are burning. “Not now. Codie’s out there. We have to find her.”

“Rick Hammond is going to be so pissed at you—”

“I’ll tell him—we’ll tell him at the right time. This isn’t the right time.”

“He’s a good doctor.”

“I know.” Though he doesn’t flinch, his eyes close again as I slather antibiotic cream everywhere. There’s no puffiness and no heat, which means no infection, at least for now. The edges of the wound are clean, and there’s no more bleeding. It’s deeper than a graze. The jagged tear will heal, but he still needs to be seen—by a doctor, not me, his paramedic friend who’s guessing.

I rip open a sterile gauze patch and smooth it over the wound.

I lean over to pick up the paper slip it came in when Brock closes his grip around my upper arm.

“Riley,” he says, and it takes a beat for me to realize his voice is cracking. “I just want to thank you for everything you’ve done for me. I know you must have been terrified.”

I shake my head. “I don’t think I’ve had time to process,” I say. I stand and flip off the light. The room is bathed in stormy twilight, turning everything a silvery blue.

“We need to head out as soon as the snow stops,” he says.

He cuts me off before I can argue. “Those two from last night said they’d gone four or five miles. It should be easy enough to scout what cabins are on that side of the gorge in a radius that short.”

“But Brock—”

“As it starts to lighten up,” he says.

“What’s your plan?”