“I know. But you’re not alone. Keep your phone tucked into your clothes to shield it from the wind, but leave it on loud. I’ll call you again when we’re close.” I force my voice to stay calm, steady, the way I do on every rescue. “You’re going to be alright. I promise you.”
There’s a soft sound from her, almost a sob she tries to swallow. It twists something deep in my chest.
I hover over the end-call button. I don’t want to hang up. The idea of leaving her alone with the wind roaring around her makes my stomach flip. My thumb hesitates.
Nick reaches over and presses the red icon himself. “She needs the battery,” he mutters. “We’ll talk to her again soon.”
I bite back a surge of gratitude mixed with panic. He’s right. And I hate that he’s right.
Tommy appears at the end of the corridor and tosses something underarm. I catch it by instinct. Car keys. “Take my BMW,” he says. “It’ll get you further up the service track than anything except the Rovers, and Unit Five will need those.”
He hands us each a radio next. “Channel three. Give me regular updates on how your stroll is going.”
Nick clips the radio to his backpack. “Aye aye, boss.”
I’m already moving, boots pounding the concrete floor as we head for the exit. The air outside is shifting, wind beginning to curl through the valley in those sharp, early gusts that warn of trouble coming.
Hold on, Emms. I’m coming.
The higher we climb, the worse the weather gets. The wind barrels down the ridge in violent bursts that shove at our bodies, and the rain feels sharp enough to sting through my jacket. Clouds have sunk so low they move like a living thing across the rock, thick and cold and blinding.
We reach the point on the GPS where she should be close. Too close to the Angel’s Wall for comfort.
I cup my hands around my mouth and shout her name. “Emma!”
The sound is swallowed instantly, ripped away by the wind like it never existed. Nick tries too, his voice deeper, louder, but the ridge snatches his call as well.
We walk on, careful, deliberate steps, boots searching for stable ground beneath the slick rock and grass. The path isn’t really a path anymore. It’s guesswork. Instinct. Familiarity with a ridge that doesn’t care how many times you’ve walked it.
When the slope begins to tilt beneath our feet, dropping away into something steeper and far more dangerous, Nick reaches for the coil of rope strapped to his pack.
“We’re roping up,” he shouts over the roar of the wind.
For once, I don’t argue with him. We clip in quickly, hands practised even in the vicious weather and check each other’s knots with grim efficiency. The rain is pouring hard enough now that it runs off my face in sheets. Visibility’s down to maybe ten metres on a good gust, five on a bad one.
We press forward again, moving as one. The ridge narrows. My stomach tightens. If she’s anywhere near the Angel’s Wall, she could be sitting a few metres from a fifty-metre drop she can’t even see.
Nick leans close so he doesn’t have to shout. “Call her,” he says. “Try again.”
I nod, pull out my phone, shield it under my jacket from the rain, and hit her name with a thumb that’s shaking despite every effort to keep it steady.
Come on, Emms. Pick up.
She answers on the second ring.
“Alex?” Her voice is thin, shaking, edged with cold. The sound goes straight through me.
“I’m here,” I say, trying to keep my own voice steady enough to hold her together. “You’re doing well. Listen… if you’ve still got enough battery, can you switch on your torch and wave it a little? Not too hard, just enough for us to catch it.”
“O-okay.” There’s rustling, a sharp breath, then, “It’s on.”
Nick jerks beside me, pointing through the sheet of rain. “There. Left. I saw something.”
I squint into the murk, heart hammering. For half a second, a tiny flare of light cuts through the grey. Then, just as quickly, there’s a piercing scream through the phone, high and terrified, and the call snaps dead. The light vanishes.
“Emma!” Her name tears out of me before I even know I’m shouting it. Panic slams into my chest like a punch. I lunge forward, fighting against the rope, instinct screaming to run, to cover the distance in seconds, to get to her before—
Nick grabs my jacket and yanks hard. “Alex! Slow down. You sprint and you’ll go over that edge too.”
