But the man with the gun was still standing at the lake edge, waiting for her to make one wrong move.If she ran out onto the ice, he could pick her off easily, but if she stayed where she was and continued to defend her position, Jiro could die.She was between a rock and a hard place.And there was only one decision to make.
CHAPTER TWELVE
THE FREEZING WATER was excruciating, the cold cutting into him like a thousand knives.He gasped for breath, the frigid water squeezing the muscles around his lungs so that it was almost impossible to drag in air.Grappling for the edge of the broken ice, he managed to grasp on and keep his head above water.Fully clothed, with the snowshoes dragging his feet down, he knew he would never be able to swim if he let go of that ice.But the gloves were making it difficult to grip, and while he wanted to rip them off, he dared not let go now he had a hold.
One minute he’d been running for his life; the next minute the ice had disappeared beneath him.Fuck, he was so stupid.He hadn’t listened to Aurora, instead running away against her command.But he’d never been shot at before; never had someone try to kill him.He was going purely on instinct.When she hadn’t followed, part of him thought he was doing her a favor by running—he could draw the sniper’s focus away from her and onto him, as he zigzagged across the ice to avoid being hit, so she could shoot back.But the other part of him had just been running like a frightened rabbit.Those thoughts were all fleeting, however, as the need to survive pushed everything else out of his head.He tried to remember what you were supposed to do if you fell through the ice.Things such asstay calm, andtry to float parallel to the surface to make it easier to get onto the ice, drifted through his head.But both of these things seemed impossible to do right now.
Somewhere in the corner of his mind, he could hear gunshots echoing across the frozen landscape.That must be Aurora firing back.Did she know he had fallen in?Because without her help, he wasn’t sure he was going to get out.The freezing water was sapping his energy quickly, as well as his ability to think.
He had to do something now.Even though the snowshoes were weighing him down, he kicked hard with his legs in an attempt to bring his body to the surface, while also scrambling at the edge of the ice.He managed to get one elbow up onto the slippery surface, but was gasping for air like a stranded fish and he slipped back in.Thank God he hadn’t been wearing a backpack, because he was pretty sure he would’ve sunk like a stone if he had been.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.How long could someone survive in zero-degree water?Not long, he suspected.So he tried again to heave himself up onto the ice.This time he succeeded in getting both elbows out of the water, but then he had to stop so that he could suck in enough air to keep going.But he could feel himself sliding backwards, the cold dragging him down and under again.
No, no, no.This wasn’t how it was supposed to end.He was supposed to be helping Taro, not drowning in a frozen lake.
There was a sudden flurry of movement, and something crashed into the snow nearby.“Jiro, I’m here,” Aurora called.“Hang on, I’m going to crawl on my belly across the ice to get to you.”
Within seconds, her face appeared as she shoveled her way through the thick blanket of snow, using her elbows and knees to commando crawl across the ice.“Grab my hand,” she ordered.“Quickly,” she said when he was slow to obey.Didn’t she know he was doing the best he could?His body was numb and lethargic, and he knew he was moving slowly, but every tiny movement was a momentous effort now.Using the last of his energy, with a mighty heave, he lunged up and out, fumbling at her hand and almost missing.If she hadn’t snagged his wrist at the last moment, he might have fallen back into the water, and kept going down, down, down.
She pulled with all her might as he kicked feebly until he finally rolled out of the water like a beached walrus and lay on his back, dragging in great gulps of air.
“Keep moving,” she prompted.“We need to get further away from the hole.The ice is still thin here.”
He wasn’t sure he could move, but he rolled over with a groan, his wet clothing hampering his progress.“Follow me.Do it like this.”She was commando crawling back the way she had come.He wasn’t sure how he did it, but he followed her.His teeth were chattering now.Clashing together so hard, he thought he might break a tooth.He’d never been so cold in his entire life.He needed to get warm really soon or hypothermia was going to set in.They only crawled a couple of meters, but it felt like a couple of miles when she stopped, and whispered fiercely, “Keep your head down.”They were in a little hollow, where the snow had been pushed aside to make a sort of trench.Glancing at her for the first time, he could see she was wet, too.Not soaked through like he was, but the water had welled up over the ice as she pulled him out, and the front half of her torso was wet.It wasn’t until much later that he realized how much danger Aurora had put herself in rescuing him.She could have easily fallen in as well.
“Fuck, where’s he gone?”Aurora popped her head above the snow three or four times, like a meerkat bobbing up and down.What was she doing?Then it hit him.For the few blissful seconds as he’d lain on the ice panting, Jiro had forgotten the reason he had fallen through the ice in the first place.Forgotten that a sniper had been trying to kill them.
Now he remembered, Aurora had been shooting at him, so she must’ve made the decision to take her eyes off him to come and rescue Jiro instead.The guy had been a good couple of hundred meters away, and Jiro was sure he couldn’t have run that distance in the short time it took Aurora to pull him to safety.
“Could he still be hiding in the trees?”he asked through teeth chattering so hard now he wasn’t sure she would understand his words.
“Probably,” she replied tightly.“Either that, or he’s run out onto the ice and now he’s hiding in a snowdrift just like we are.Waiting for us to pop up so he can pick us off.”She’d turned to look at him as she spoke, and her face fell as she took him in.“Shit, your lips are blue.You need to get your wet clothes off.”
“What?”That seemed counterintuitive.The air around them was below zero, surely if he removed his clothes, he would still freeze to death.But he slipped off his wet gloves, rubbing his hands together to get some circulation going.
“I’ll give you my jacket, and I’ve got a Mylar blanket in my pack,” she replied, tearing her gaze away from him so she could continue her surveillance of the surroundings.“But you need to get your wet clothing away from your skin, otherwise they will continue to draw heat away from your body.”
“Okay.”He wasn’t going to make the mistake of not trusting her this time.Although with a gunman stalking them across the ice, it seemed like the last thing he should be doing was getting naked.What if they needed to run?
Without taking her eyes away from scanning the edge of the lake, she began to remove her jacket.
“No, you’ll freeze,” he argued.“Not as quickly as you will,” she snapped.“Put the fucking thing on.”Her glare was like a thousand hot knives slicing into him.
“Okay,” he replied meekly.
“I think I saw him over there.”Aurora pointed toward a spot further around the lake from where Jiro had first seen the shooter.He must be creeping around the perimeter, using the trees as cover, trying to get closer to where he and Aurora were hunkered down.And the shooter wasn’t wrong, because as Jiro raised his head above the snow, he could see a finger of land jutting out into the lake, and if the gunman made it round there, the distance as the crow flies he would have to cover to get to them would be almost halved.
“I’m going after him.You stay here.”Aurora crouched on the ice, gathering herself to leap forward.
Jiro wanted to argue, but the way his teeth were chattering, and his numb fingers were fumbling just to undo the zipper on his jacket, he knew he would be of no help to her; probably more of a hindrance.
He watched the profile of her face as it became resolute.More wisps of hair had now floated free of her beanie and were whipping about her face as she stared across the snow.She was so beautiful.Fierce and strong and beautiful.She wasn’t afraid to walk toward danger.Wasn’t afraid to confront this crazy killer head on.He suddenly knew he couldn’t bear to lose her.Couldn’t bear it if she were injured, or worse.
“Aurora, wait.”His voice came out feeble, like an old man.How could he put what he was feeling into words?She’d come to mean a lot to him over the past forty-eight hours.He liked her.Really liked her.Cared for her deeply, even.
She turned just her head to look at him, dark eyes deep and bewitching, most of her focus still on the criminal who was trying to hunt them down.Then her face softened, almost as if she understood what his words couldn’t say.“I know,” she said.“I’ll be careful, I promise.I won’t leave you out here alone.”Then, she was gone.
After she disappeared through the snow, Jiro spent many moments contemplating his fate.She was going out to save his life yet again, and all he could do was lie here and shiver.The least he could do was try to survive long enough to thank her.So he slowly and painfully got to his knees, pulled his beanie off and his wet fleece and then the thermal shirt over his head.The icy breeze sliced into his bare skin, and he could barely move his arms to pull on Aurora's jacket.It was too tight, but even though the front section was damp inside, her body warmth remained in the fabric, and it was the most euphoric feeling he’d ever had.He hugged her jacket tightly around him, sucking in every bit of heat he could, and drawing in the smell of Aurora, her essence.She’d told him to take off all his clothes, but his numb fingers were incapable of undoing his pants or bootlaces.So he left both of them on for now.Remembering what Aurora had told him, he lay back down on the ice, and rolled himself into the Mylar blanket, like a caterpillar in a cocoon.It didn’t stop his teeth chattering, however.And he knew his thought processes had slowed right down; it was like he was thinking in slow motion.If Aurora came and told him he had to run for his life right now, he wasn’t sure he would be able.But he left his legs free of his cocoon just in case.
