The wait for someone to reply over the radio seemed to take forever. I ducked inside my blanket, holding it close around my shoulders, and found myself leaning against Aiden’s warm, strong body for support. He didn’t let go of the radio – just slipped one of his arms around me.
That small gesture was enough to leave me feeling like I wanted to cry.
Why did he make me feel so safe and cared for with a tiny gesture – something that Brody had never made me feel at all?
“Hi there,” a voice crackled over the radio – the same one we’d heard yesterday – and I sagged in relief. There was still someone else out there. There hadn’t been some kind of terrible accident that would leave us stranded here with no one knowing where we were. “Try not to worry. We’ve had another small amount of snowfall.”
“Another avalanche?” Aiden clarified. His arm was still tight around me, holding me close.
“I’m afraid so. It wasn’t as big as the first one, and no one was trapped or injured. There’s, ah… there’s just a little more snow on your location than before.”
Aiden glanced up at our fire, and I did the same, sudden fear seizing me. “Is our oxygen tunnel still clear?”
“Yes, don’t worry. We reinforced it with plastic tubing as soon as we first saw the smoke. Thankfully, we’d set up a taller length of tube which sat above the snow for safety, and it hasn’t been covered over.”
Aiden sighed in relief. I felt his chest heave up and down where I was leaning on him. “What about the others? Everyone’s alright?”
“Yes, please don’t worry about your friends. We’ve already managed to rescue six of them. Everything is proceeding as planned. It’s just that the efforts we were making to reach the next chalet dislodged a snow shelf higher up the peak.”
“Who’s rescued?” Aiden asked, looking at me. I knew he was asking on my behalf – because I would want to know about Caleb.
“We’ve got the top two cabins out – that’s Harvey and Dunbar and Black and Mendoza. We just got Caleb Coleman and Aubrey Smith out from the second row. We’re going ahead as planned to rescue the inhabitants of chalet four now.”
I clamped a hand over my mouth as a cry of relief broke out of it. Caleb was free. He was safe. He wasn’t trapped anymore. I met Aiden’s eyes and saw they were shining too like mine had to be. Caleb was okay.
The weight off my shoulders was so intense I could barely breathe.
“What about us?” Aiden asked, getting serious again. “Will this affect our rescue?”
“We’re still coming for you.” There was a pause. A pause I didn’t really like. “Look, I’ll be honest with you. With the added depth of snow across the second half of the site, we’re going to see a little difficulty. It might take us a few more days to get to you than we had anticipated.”
Was I a bad person? Because my heart leaped inside my chest at the thought of being down here a few more days. Not in fear or anger. In excitement.
A few more days with Aiden.
A few more days of pretending.
I shouldn’t have wanted it, given the circumstances… but I wanted it.
“Okay,” Aiden said. “That’s okay. We still have our supplies and plenty of wood. I think we’ll be okay.”
“Alright,” the voice responded. “Hang in there. We’ll keep you updated if anything else happens, but our experts are telling us that’s the last of the risky snow. We should be clear from here on out.”
“Thanks,” Aiden told him, and we both stared at the radio for a moment as it crackled into silence. He was gone.
My brother was safe, but we were buried under even more snow and the rescue was going to be even more difficult. We were still in danger.
I wanted to cry.
I wanted Aiden inside me.
“We’re going to be okay,” Aiden said. I had the feeling he was saying it for himself as well as for me.
I felt so much relief that Caleb was safe – and that they could still get to us even though more snow had fallen. Maybe it was the strange kind of security of knowing that we were going to be alone here for at least a couple more days that made me brave.
I reached out and put my hand on Aiden’s bare chest, looking up and meeting his eyes so he could see what I was thinking.
A sly grin came over his face and a moment later he leaned down to kiss me.
