She hauled Wren up. “Where did you hit?”
“My shoulder. And my body, and my arm hurts...” Wren wiped her lip, saw the blood, and started to hiccup breaths.
“Calm down. Okay, let me see.” She met Wren’s big brown eyes, searched them. Pupils looked normal, so maybe she hadn’t hit her head, but Keely wasn’t a doctor.
Hadn’t even played one on TV. And where that thought came from she didn’t know. Most likely panic, because staying out here probably meant hypothermia, given the frigid temperatures.
“You said your arm hurt?”
Wren held it up, and Keely cradled the girl’s wrist in her grip. “Can you move your fingers?”
She moved her hand, and her mitten flexed.
“Anything else hurt?”
“My tummy.”
“Yeah, you probably got the wind knocked out of you. Okay, let’s get you home.”
Wren blinked, tears clinging, frozen to her eyelashes. “Where’s my sled?”
“It’s not in good shape, but I’ll bet your daddy can fix it.” She stood up. The bank came to her shoulders. Still, if she pushed Wren out, she could probably use the tree to leverage herself out.
“Wren, can you step into my hands?” Keely bent and made a basket with her hands. Wren tried to raise her foot, then cried out and fell back.
“What’s wrong?”
“My tummy hurts!”
Keely stood over her. “Okay. Listen. I have to get you out of here. Otherwise, we’ll freeze to death.”
“I’m scared.” Wren hunkered down in the well. “Daddy is going to be so mad.”
Yeah, well. And she got that. Probably better than Wren could imagine. She crouched in front of her. “Listen. Dads get worried about their little girls. They want to protect them, but sometimes they can’t. They can’t always protect them from all the hurt and pain that they’re afraid of. Like your dad. He’s sad because of your mom, right?”
Wren nodded. “He cries sometimes, at night.”
She got that too. “So, we’re going to forgive your dad for being scared. And raising his voice, and no, he shouldn’t, but you going sledding without his permission probably wasn’t a great idea, right?”
Wren’s eyes welled up.
“But he’d be even sadder if something happened to you, right?”
Wren nodded.
“So, let’s not make him even sadder. Let’s get you out of this hole. And home. And even if he gets mad at you, try to remember it’s because he loves you, and he’s just really bad at showing it.” Keely bit back arguments to her own explanation and reached for Wren.
The little girl put her arms around Keely’s neck. Then Keely lifted her, turned her, and pushed her up, her mittens on her boots.
Wren launched out of the tree well and landed somewhere above.
Keely put her hands on the snowbank and tried to pull up, but the snow crumbled under her mittens. Right.Think,Keely.
Only this time, it wasn’t her father in her head but stupid Chase Sterling.“You made this decision,not me! So you’ll have to deal with it.”
The memory boiled inside her. Yeah, well, she was trying, okay?
She turned, studied the tree. Branches, maybe six feet up, but if she used the tree trunk, and made footholds for herself...
