Page 10 of Crucible
Too close.
If there are other survivors, it means they’d cheated death a second time. The pilots hadn’t been so lucky. I’m too cold to cry for them—or maybe it’s my heart that’s too frigid.
Rushing for the back of the plane where the empennage tore off, I stop when I see footprints leading out of them—one large set.
“Hello?”
Nothing but sparking wires and wind rattling loose metal answers me. Teeth chattering, I climb inside the fuselage. It’s dark and haunted, but it’s shelter. It’s better than being out there.
I don’t make it more than a few steps inside before I see them—the frozen corpses of my security team.
Clapping a hand over my mouth, I turn away when I realize they’re still strapped into their seats. The neck of the praying bodyguard is twisted at an odd angle, his mouth forever frozen in a soundless scream. I think it was Harold or Harrison, but I can’t be sure. The other two are pinned to their seats by the fragments of the plane that impaled them.
This isn’t a wreck site. It’s a graveyard.
God, they never had a chance.
Are you happy now?
Dropping my hand, I inhale deeply through my nose and let it out slowly. This isn’t my fault. I wasn’t flying the plane. I didn’t cause the storm.
Not this one.
Stop it!
My bodyguards aregone. Cassie and Tyler probably are too. I can only help myself.
Walking deeper inside the plane, my teary eyes reluctantly travel to the seat where Tyler had been sitting, and my knees buckle when I see it’s empty.
Cassie’s, too.
Remembering the footprints I saw outside the fuselage, my heart beats a little faster.
They’realive.
But it’s not all good because it means they’re out there. In the storm. Probably looking for me.
I turn to rush back out of the plane when the cold hits me like a freight train, and I stop at the edge of the opening. I beg my feet to move, but they won’t.
Because who am I kidding? I won’t survive out there.
Rescue will come soon. I should stay here where it will be easy for them to find me. I’m sure Cassie and Tyler will be back soon. Feeling something suspiciously like guilt, I turn to go back inside and wait for them where it’s safe.
“Help! Oh, God! Someone help me!”
Gasping, I turn around. My gaze frantically searches the area for the scream’s source, but the storm makes it hard to see anything. Maybe it was my imagination.
The scream comes again, followed by more pleas, and I can’t deny the voice’s similarity to Cassie’s. Wind can’t replicate the sheer terror in it.
She could have been hurt looking for me, or she could be in trouble. Either way, if she stays out there much longer, she’ll die.
Making a decision, I turn back into the warm confines of the fuselage.
KHALIL
“This is bullshit! There’s no one here!” I shout over the wind, snow, and hail. I’m two hundred and thirty pounds of pure muscle, yet the storm raging around us has my solid frame trembling like a twig in a hurricane. Snow clings to Thorin’s blond lashes and thick brows when he sends me a look to shut the fuck up, and I send him an aggravated one right back. “Seriously, I can’t feel my nuts anymore, Thor! We need to make camp!”
Reality paid us a visit this morning, and we’ve been on a knife’s edge ever since.
