Her gasp had a note of distress behind it, a mewl of shock. But more important, the current caught her off guard, and she stumbled, almost going under as the water knocked her from her feet.
Josh snaked his arm around her waist just in time to keep her from going under. But his injured arm had been the one closest to her, and he reacted, slipping it free of the sling, without thinking it through. The tug on his shoulder as he caught her weight and pulled her back to her feet shot a lightning bolt of pain from his shoulder to his fingernails. His grunt of pain brought her worried gaze up to his.
She gripped a handful of his shirt, still fighting the current and struggling to find purchase on the slippery rocks and stay upright. “Josh?”
“I’ll be all right,” he replied, wincing, but refusing to release his hold on her. “Are you okay?”
“Unharmed, but the water is too strong. I don’t think I can cross without it knocking me over.”
A legitimate concern since she was several inches shorter than he was, and the river reached midchest on her. What’s more, the water pulled at the loose plastic of the rain poncho like wind in a sail. Considering how wet they already were and how moot the cape had become, he moved his hat back to his head, pulled the poncho off over her head and jammed it in a side pocket of the backpack, praying it didn’t work loose and wash downstream.
“Okay, here’s the plan.” He shifted the small backpack to his bad shoulder and gritted his teeth against the ache. He could endure the discomfort for a few minutes, and he wanted his stronger arm free to help Kate. Getting her safely across was his priority. And the sooner the better. The water was dangerously cold. “You hold on to my belt, and I’ll hold on to you. Small steps and lean into the current. We’ll cross together.”
She nodded, and he noticed her bottom jaw trembling from the chill. Hell. He couldn’t build a fire in this rain. All their clothes were wet. And they were at least forty-five minutes from the rendezvous spot. Assuming Zane was even there. Considering he’d had no communication with his brother in the last twenty-four hours, they’d likely have to find a way to get back to the ranch on their own.
He made a mental note to add Keep a vehicle at end campsite to the list of changes and additions he intended to make to the business plan.
One tedious step at a time, they waded through the swift water. Even Josh, worn down by fatigue, pain and the numbing effects of the cold water, had trouble keeping his feet under him. But with Kate snuggled against him, his arm supporting her, encouraging and guiding her, they eased across the river and dragged themselves out on the opposite shore. He found a spot a few yards downstream where a small rock outcropping created a canopy of sorts to protect them from the worst of the downpour. He stopped there long enough to remove the sling, awkwardly strip off his wet shirt and wrap the thin rain poncho around them both. The plastic, thin as it was, would do the best job of trapping what body heat they had. He pulled her down, settling with his back against the rock wall and pulling her onto his lap. Holding her shivering body against his chest, he rubbed her arms and tried to chafe some heat into them.
“D-don’t we need to keep m-moving?” she asked, her chin quivering. “The water’s s-still rising.”
“In a minute. I want to warm you up a little first.” A chill raced through him, and his body shuddered. If he was this cold, she had to be freezing. She was already battling early stages of hypothermia. The need to get her out of this river valley and back to civilization grew more urgent every minute. He weighed the risk of staying put a few more minutes in order to infuse her with what little body heat he could versus the danger from the rising water and the delay in getting her real medical help.
If only they had...heat packs!
He reached around her to fumble open the backpack and rifle the contents. Obviously he was suffering the early effects of hypothermia, as well. He could tell his thought process was muddled. He’d completely forgotten about the heat packs that were part of the guests’ backpack supplies.
He found two of the rectangular plastic packets that, when crushed, mixed chemicals to create a small amount of heat. After activating the first one, he handed it to Kate. “Tuck this somewhere in your clothes.”
Heating her torso was the most important goal.
She took the packet but dropped it as she tried to work it under her shirt.
He smashed the second heat pack, and after savoring the heat on his own hands for a few seconds, he took over for her, raising her shirt and shoving the heat source into her bra.
Under the circumstances, he shouldn’t have found the soft swell of her breast against his fingers so arousing. But he noticed. And he stored the memory away to examine at a more appropriate time.
“Y-you’ve just been waiting for a chance to c-cop a feel. Haven’t you?” She twitched a lopsided grin at him, and he chuckled, relieved to know she still had the presence of mind to crack a joke.
“You got it, sweetheart. All part of my master plan to seduce you.” He took the second pack from her and tucked it next to the first one, hoping the packs would help warm her blood as it flowed to and from her heart, carrying the heat to her vital organs.
She turned to face him and raised one icy hand to his face. “You don’t need an elaborate plan. All you have to do is ask.”
With that, she placed a soft kiss on his lips, then snuggled back in against him, her bottom nestled intimately against his crotch.
Two things occurred to Josh. One, she hadn’t stuttered this time. He hoped that meant she was starting to warm up. Two, just ask? In any other circumstance, that would be all the invitation he needed. His mouth dried, and he struggled not to think about how good her fanny felt rubbing against his manhood.
Last night by the fire, she’d told him she didn’t want a vacation fling. So had her opinion changed? Or did she believe he could give her more than a fling? Or was it the hypothermia talking?
Regardless of which one was true, he couldn’t take her up on the offer. Certainly not now, when they needed to get moving, get out of this river valley before it flooded, get warmed up before more damaging cold settled in their cores. And not when he knew she was vulnerable, worn down by the trip, the stress, the cold. Which sucked, because he really wanted Kate. In a powerful, marrow-deep way. Right now, just holding her close, her delicate scent in his nose and her soft breath on his neck were about as erotic as anything he’d ever experienced. But it was more than just lustful, mutually satisfying one-night-stand sexiness. He’d connected with Kate over the past few days, bonded with her. He liked her. Her gumption and wit, her gentleness and insight, her intelligence and compassion.
He drew her closer, pressing a kiss to the top of her head. She was the kind of woman he wished he could find in Boyd Valley. Someone he could build a relationship with.
He blinked as that thought filtered through his head. Whoa. A relationship? Kate had worked some potent magic on him, if he was considering a relationship with anyone. He felt a bit like he’d been kicked in the gut by a bull—winded, a little dizzy, mentally reeling.
He tried to picture himself settling down with one of the women from town whom he’d dated. Nice gals, all of them. But the image didn’t crystalize or feel right until he put Kate’s face on the woman. A restlessness fluttered in his chest and spurred a rush of adrenaline to his blood.
Why was Kate the only woman he could see in his future? And why was he even considering such nebulous issues when he had more pressing concerns like getting them back to the ranch in one piece?
A rumble of thunder roused him from the distracting thoughts of having Kate in his bed, not just for a night but for a lifetime. He cleared his throat and nudged her. “Feeling better? Think you can walk?”
She raised her head and gave him a nod. When she reached into her bra for the heat pack, he stopped her.
“Leave them there. They stay warm for
a few hours.” He helped her climb to her feet. Then, stretching his stiff, cold muscles as he stood, he hitched his head, signaling the need to get moving. The water level had risen a good foot just in the few minutes they’d been hunkered down under the outcropping. As if to punctuate their situation, a louder growl of thunder rolled through the valley, echoing off the rocky bluffs.
Josh returned his hat to her head, took her hand and sent her a grim look. “Bigger storms are moving in, Kate. We need to haul ass.”
* * *
For the next several minutes, they all but jogged downstream, stumbling over loose rocks and slipping in the increasingly slick mud and wet rocks of the riverbank. As Josh predicted, the water rose quickly, lapping at their feet and forcing them to move to higher ground every few minutes. But each move took them to steeper terrain with larger boulders to maneuver over or around. Josh helped her navigate, picking the best foothold and easiest paths across the rough landscape. Even with his help, his hand holding hers to steady her, her feet slid on one of the mossy and rain-drenched rocks, and she landed hard on her butt.
“Kate!” Josh was at her side in an instant. “Are you okay?”
The taste of blood filled her mouth, telling her she’d bitten her tongue. She dabbed at her mouth, and, realizing how dirty her fingers were, she immediately regretted it. She spit out the grit and blood on her tongue and gave him a shaky nod.
“I think so.” The spike of adrenaline in her blood left her trembling from more than just cold as she pushed back to her feet. Other than a sore bottom and wounded pride, she was uninjured.
The fall did make her more careful as she picked her way along the muddy bank. But careful also meant slow, and Josh gave her a frown after a few minutes.
“I know the fall shook you up, but we need to move faster.” He cast a meaningful glance to the river, where the water level had crept up another foot in the last half hour, and the current seemed swifter by the minute. She readjusted Josh’s hat, which had been knocked askew when she fell, and gave the narrowing strip of navigable terrain a glance. Not only was the water rising, but the forested hillside on the opposite bank had changed to a similar landscape of boulders and sheer rock wall, narrowing the gulch that the river traveled through.
“How much farther?” she asked, not wanting to complain but eager for some gauge of their progress.
“Not far. A few more minutes. Thirty at best.” He swiped at the rain dripping from her eyebrows and gave her a smile that warmed her inside, better than the heat packs stuffed in her bra. “Would it sound patronizing if I said I was proud of you?”
She blinked and tipped her head in surprise. Of all the questions he could have asked, that was way down the list somewhere close to, Have you ever met a purple penguin?
“You’re proud of me?”
His face brightened. “Hell, yeah. This trip has been a clusterf—” He stopped and cleared his throat. “A challenge from the start.”
She gave him a wry grin for his alternate word choice.
“It’s been far more difficult and more arduous than we ever intended,” he continued, “and you’ve soldiered on admirably. You’ve risen to the occasion every time I needed you to and sometimes when I’d never have expected you to. You’ve been a—”
“Halt.” She flung her hand up and shot him a teasing scowl. “If you call me a trouper, I’ll puke.”
“I wasn’t.” He cocked his head. “But your aversion to the word is intriguing.” He adjusted the backpack on his good arm and turned to keep walking downstream. “I’d love to hear the story why that word bothers you when we’re not trying to get out of a gulch before it floods.”
“No story,” she called to him, “just a term that makes my teeth hurt.”
She stared at his back as he headed out, mulling his praise. He was proud of her? Maybe she should consider that condescending, but he hadn’t said it in an ironic or snide way. His sincerity touched her. Her heart swelled, and his kind words buoyed her spirits and energized her to continue walking, despite the chill in her bones and her aching muscles.
Josh continued to surprise her. She’d originally assessed him as an adrenaline junkie playboy whose flirtatious charms were not to be taken seriously, but he’d shown himself to be a man of convictions, courage and a generous soul. Her heart thumped realizing that her first impressions of him, her snap judgments about him before she knew his heart and mind, were exactly the kind of labels he’d been pegged with his whole life. People misread his joviality and love of adventure as proof he had no substance, no commitment, nothing to contribute to the family business beyond his workaday ranching skills. And after hearing it repeated enough times—or implied through actions and attitudes—Josh had bought into it himself.
But his love and loyalty to his family were abundantly clear in his desperation to save them from financial ruin. She could see that he was attempting to prove his worth to the family through his contributions to the adventure business. The passion behind his attempts spoke of his internal pain for the years he’d believed he didn’t live up to some false measuring stick of success and value in his family. Before she left Colorado, Kate vowed to tell Josh exactly how she viewed him, how his dedication impressed her and how his protection and encouragement when she needed it had meant everything to her.
Set in her resolve, she squared her shoulders and ducked her head, watching her footing carefully and allowing his wide-brimmed hat to shield her eyes from the worst of the stinging rain as she trudged on behind him. The rain had let up some, but one look over her shoulder told her another band of heavy rain was headed their way. And if it was raining hard upstream, they could expect the river to continue its rapid rise. They were already wading through floodwaters in low spots along the bank, and the swift water carried increasingly larger debris from washouts upstream.
Her gaze was focused on next steps ahead of her when she ran into his back. He caught her elbow to steady her balance, then dropped the backpack on the tiny strip of rocky shoreline that wasn’t part of the swirling floodwaters.
“Okay. This is it,” he said.
Kate raised her head, tipping the hat back from her face so she could get a better look around. She gave the surrounding area a sweeping gaze. “Here?”
She’d expected to reach a widening in the river valley, a flat spot where Zane or the ranch staff could drive a vehicle in to pick them up. The terrain here was no different than anywhere they’d been the last two hours. “But where are—”
Her words lodged in her throat when she saw what hung from the sheer rock cliff beside them.
Chapter 12
Josh knew the exact moment she spotted the ropes anchored to the rock face of the bluff, because her sentence cut off and her cheeks paled. She turned an accusing look on him.
“You didn’t say anything about rappelling to get to the pickup place!”
“Technically this isn’t rappelling. Rappelling means you’re going down the cliff. This is climbing, because we’ll be going up.”
Her expression said his explanation of the difference only irritated her further.
“Look at it this way. Our transport back to warm, dry clothes and a hot meal are at the top of that cliff.”
Her face modulated some, but clearly she wouldn’t let him off the hook easily. “I asked you to be completely honest with me.”
“I never lied.” He shot her a guilty look. “I just didn’t—”
“It falls under the full disclosure part of the promise. Remember that?” She looked pointedly at his injured shoulder. “And how do you propose to climb with your bad shoulder?”
“Well...” He rubbed the joint in question, which ached even at the thought of the task ahead of him. “It will be tricky. No denying. But I have no choice.”
“No choice,” she mumbled, giving the bluff and ropes a wary scrutiny. “Are you even sure Za
ne’s up there?”
“I—No.” Josh angled his face to look up toward the top of the rock face, then cupped his hands around his mouth. “Hey! Zane? Brady? Anybody up there?”
They waited, holding their collective breath, and he strained his ears to listen for a response over the drumming of the rain and roar of the rapids behind them. The river water had overflowed its natural banks, and wind-driven waves lapped at their feet. Another line of hard rain was just behind them, and an urgency to get up the ropes and out of the path of the floodwaters gnawed at his gut.
When he got no response from above, he shouted again, and Kate added her voice. He hated the note of anxiety that he heard in her tone. The despondent, discouraged underpinnings bore into his soul. He’d wanted what he thought was best for her, tried so hard to take care of her. But look at them—limping home, chilled to the bone. Defeated.
And his family still had to find the culprit behind the vandalism, before anyone got hurt.
“No one’s there,” she said quietly. “Now what?”
“Maybe they left a vehicle for us. I don’t know.” He swiped rain out of his eyes and gritted his teeth. “First things first. We go up, then we deal with what is or isn’t waiting up top.”
She held his gaze for a moment, her nerves evident from her pinched lips and lowered eyebrows. But she gave a resolute nod and turned to face the cliff. “Show me what to do.”
“Before anything else, I’m going to check that the anchors are still solid and secure, that no one has messed with them.”
Kate’s already pale face blanched a shade whiter.
He stepped closer to her and squeezed her upper arm. “It’s okay, Kate. I will make doubly sure it is one hundred percent safe before you hook on. I will get you to the top unharmed. I promise.”
Rancher's High-Stakes Rescue Page 16