Page 175 of Hell and High Water

I feel Gavin clench in a similar fashion and I know he’s getting beaten just as badly.

The flood careens us along at a horrific speed, cartwheeling us under every so often, tossing us out into open space for a moment, then sucking us back in. In midair, we haul into one another, hugging as we plunge under again, holding on as tight as we can and blocking each other from impacts and flying debris.

Squeezing my eyes shut against the freezing, muddy wash as we drop over another steep fall, I feel us suddenly jerk to a halt. My legs dangle out over nothing before dropping back into the steep flow of the cascade. Above me I hear a deep, painful grunt.

“Hold on!” Gavin shouts, trying and failing to lift me up toward the massive tree he’s hanging onto with one arm, blood seeping around the crook of his elbow as he keeps us stationary.

“Gavin!”

“I got you…”

“No, you don’t!” I can see it. The agony in his eyes.

I don’t need to look far to see why. He’s gushing blood down his side. His wrist is misshapen, the bone jutting oddly in the middle of his forearm just above my hand gripping his wrist. How he’s managing to hang onto me is beyond me.

And I know he won’t be able to for much longer.

Not before his other arm gives out.

“Let me go!”

“Fuck you! No way!” I feel his fingers tighten, and he roars with unrestrained torment.

“It’s okay, Gav! You have to make it out. You have to make it back to her!”

“You do too, you idiot!”

My fingers slip an inch. Another. I can’t feel most of my extremities in the cold. At least one of my fingers is broken.

“Please, Gavin!”

“No, I'm not fucking letting you go. I'm not losing you! She needs you!”

“She needs you more! You can take better care of her than I ever could. And you can protect her from Marco! You have to kill that son of a bitch!”

“No!” he sobs, realizing the inevitable. If he lets go now, we’ll both die in the fall. There’s no way he can possibly keep his grip on me, either.

“Tell her I'm sorry. Tell her I’ll miss her. Tell her I love her.”

“You tell her that yourself!” He screams, his grip giving out.

I hang on for a second more, clinging to his wrist. Then I’m falling, dropping into the darkness. Over the roar of the current, I make out his scream in the night.

The water catches me, knocking me senseless.

Cold. Only ice, bitter cold.

Then nothing.

33

HELLENA

“Hang on!”

The seat belt snaps tight, pinning me to the seat as we crash through the bushes and trees along the sloping hillside. Thankfully, Tell turned into the fall, keeping us from flipping.

That’s as far as the advantages go.

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