Not far.
One tiny handhold in the stone, two fingers in, pull up.
For what felt like ages but was likely just a millisecond, she teetered on the edge, her body undecided—could her muscles power her up or would gravity take over?
Her muscles failed; she lost purchase, slithering down those few last hard-won feet. As her body grappled, she stretched, reaching so hard she could have sworn her bones cracked, fingers, toes, elbows, every part of her was in the fight, trying their damnedest to hold on to something—anything.
And then she stopped, with a bone-jarring abruptness, one wrist caught in a viselike grip. The rest of her dangled above nothing but air.
***
Elias was on the ground, bent over the side of the mountain, holding Leo up with one hand. His feet, which had found a crack in the rock, were his anchor.
Their anchor.
“Other hand, Leo.” Frigid water flowed around him, over him, pummeling her, trying its best to end them like everything else in this place.
She threw her head back, took a face full of the stuff, and swung it down again. “Can’t.”
“Find a foothold. Push up.”
He felt more than saw her breathe, as if their joined hands were plugged into each other, bringing their vitals together—pulses and air, shared from contact.
In that place that would decide if she lived or died.
“Find one?”
She didn’t have to shake her head for him to feel the answer.
“On the right, put your foot out. Bend your leg.”
She did it, her toes reaching for that elusive place, while the deluge tried to drown them.
There was a moment when he thought she’d slip again—was worried she wouldn’t make it—and he decided right then he’d rather go with her than be left here alone.
Muttering obscenities, he pulled one foot from its slot to get that extra inch, giving himself to the mountain in a way he’d never dared before. If he could swing her, maybe. Or get her under the arms…
Without both legs mooring him to the top, his body shifted, his efforts more about balance now than security. Stretching his reach with his left hand, he felt the bandages at his side give, the wound open up, the pain providing extra propulsion in a way he couldn’t begin to understand.
He dipped lower, slid his hand under her arm, and, with a roar that tore open the night, swung up and back.
There was nothing for a few seconds. No sound, no pummeling waterfall, no death or fear or plummeting to the ground.
And then, with awhoosh, he was back in his body, Leo tight in his arms, trembling on the edge of a cliff.
He ripped off his glove and slid a hand around her neck, covering her pulse.
Alive. Cold and hot and whole.
She lifted her head, and though he couldn’t make out her features, her breath pelted his throat, the rhythmic press of her breasts to his chest, the wet coil of her arms winding around his neck. He dipped when she tugged, wrapped himself around her sopping body, and held as tight as he could.
They sagged into each other, shiny and wet and shuddering. Vibrating with the thrill of breathing for another short while. He planted one hand on her ass, tight, demanding. The other held her still by the nape.
“I do like you, Elias. I like you a hell of a lot,” she whispered, the sound harsher than anything she’d ever let out, like she’d lost her voice on that cliff. “Please kiss me.”
He strained up—to hell with the wound and the weather and the world trying to kill them—and drank from her lips. Gulped, consumed. Her mouth was cool against his, her lips demanding, and her tongue when it touched him was a brand.
A tiny, barely cognizant part of his brain knew this wasn’t real—this was danger pushing them together. Nature trying to make them mate or some shit like that. Bear attacks as aphrodisiac. Adrenaline like a drug, screaming,Hell, why not? You’re not gonna make it anyway.
