Page 89 of Rescuing Dr. Marian
That area was above the tree line and would be exposed to lightning, not to mention another rockfall risk. “Chickie!” I called again, racing after her.
I slipped up the trail as fast as I could, grateful when the muddy trail ended and I caught the rocky grass under my boots instead. Cold rain pelted me from all sides, whipped up by the howling wind. The bright orange of Chick’s coat made her easier to see through the thick fog around us, but it wouldn’t take much longer for her to outrun the visibility.
“Chickie!” I continued to call before realizing there might be a very good reason for her failure to listen. The only other times she’d been this disobedient had come when she’d ignored me in favor of Tommy.
Hope threaded through me like a thin, shimmering wire. Please,please.
When I began carefully picking my way over the slick boulders and scree toward the top of the saddle, I saw a thin plume of smoke that seemed a little darker than the fog around it. Ihoped it was coming from the hunter’s shack Trace had mentioned.
I quickly thumbed the radio. “Blake to base.”
“Base here.”
“Smoke coming from hunter’s lodge. Approaching now.”
“Thank fuck. Let us know when you have confirmation.”
In my excitement to get to the shack and hopefully find Tommy in it, I didn’t pay attention to where I stepped. When my boot hit the next rock at a funny angle, the giant rock shifted, sending me sideways toward the sharp edge of another boulder. I cried out in surprise as I scrambled to catch myself. The ground underneath me continued to slip as the rocks began tumbling one over the other down the side of the mountain.
“Rock! Rock! Rock!” I shouted out of habit from my years of SAR and rock climbing. “Rockslide!Fuck.”
The entire ground below me was moving back down in the direction I’d come from, and if I didn’t act fast, I was going with them. The sound of Chickie’s barking came through the thick fog, along with a muffled shout.
“Foster?”
Tommy’s voice barely made it to my ears as I scrambled forward toward the thin plume of smoke and away from the sliding rocks below me.
“Stay there!” I shouted. “Stay back!”
The sound of his voice brought with it a new urgency to get to him, to make sure he was okay. To… to, I wasn’t sure. Keep him safe. Tell him how I felt. That the past four hours had been some of the worst of my life, thinking he was alone and hurt in a storm.
I moved as quickly as possible from one boulder to the next in search of stable ground, but I was being carried down the slope, almost in slow motion.
Thankfully, the side of the saddle with Tommy on it, with safety and a warm fire, was out of the path of the rockslide, but the side I was on seemed hell-bent on creating the same path of devastation and broken trees that I’d seen west of here. I felt like a lumberjack trying to stay on a spinning log in the river without being flung into the icy depths.
“Foster!”
The ground continued to shift under me as I tried to determine the safest way forward. I clawed at the rocks higher on the mountain and tried climbing up them. Smaller rocks hit others and bounced into my legs and feet. My hands slipped on the slick granite as I scrabbled to keep hold.
“Tommy!” I cried, hoping to god Chickie didn’t try and come to me. “Find Chickie and hold her! Stay back!”
His safety was the last thought I had before the ground disappeared beneath my feet.
24
TOMMY
It waslike a scene out of a horror movie. One minute, Foster was there, fighting for his life as the rocks tried their best to fling themselves down the mountain, and the next, he was gone.
“Foster!” My panicked shriek seemed to fill the entire canyon as I raced as close as I could without losing my own footing. Chickie’s collar dug into my palm as I struggled to hold her. All the hair on her back stood on end, and she barked in Foster’s direction. “Wait, baby,” I pleaded, unsure whether I was asking it of the dog or the man. “Wait.”
My eyes watered as I refused to blink, scanning the spot where I’d last seen him. Suddenly, I saw movement and raced forward just in time to see the dark green tip of his rain jacket hood appear.
“Please,” I whispered. “Foster? What can I do? Should I find some rope?”
I didn’t have any rope, but I would cut off the straps from my pack and yank out the water tube from my hydration system if I needed to.
His hands appeared, reaching for another handhold on a large, wet boulder. I edged closer until I could reach him safely, clasping his wrist in one hand while trying to control Chickie with the other.
