I looked up to meet his gaze.
“You’re panicking,” he said softly.
“No, I’m not,” I fired back. “I don’t panic. Landon doesn’t have time for me to freak out.” I shoved my gloved hand into my side pocket and retrieved the small handheld device.
“Right,” he said, calm and steady as always. “You got this?”
“I got this.” I could lose my shit later.
We spread out over the avalanche field. Alex arrived and took the far side. Then Pax, Little John, and I walked a silent, steady line up the snow path, our avalanche beacons all held in front of us like we were searching for buried treasure.
Landon was so much more precious than gold.
Every minute felt like an hour as we carefully picked our way over the snow.
Please, God. Please. I’ll go back to church. I’ll focus more on charity work. I’ll give up anything if you just give him back.
I’ll forgive him.
I bit back the panic that clawed at my insides, telling me what logic dictated—that any normal man couldn’t survive under the snow.
But Landon wasn’t a normal man. He’d grown up on a board and spent every spare second riding big mountains. He knew how to handle this—how to form an air pocket. I just had to find him.
The helicopter arrived as we were halfway through the field, bringing Leah, Bobby, and one of the cameramen. As more searchers fanned out, we hit a signal.
“I’ve got one!” I yelled.
Please be Landon.
My heart leaped, pulsing in time with the flashing light that pointed me in the direction of one of the beacons. I held the little device steady, keeping my eyes locked on that light as I made my way higher up the field. The ridgeline loomed above me, and though we’d traveled up a good distance, it was nothing compared to the thousands of feet of sheer spine that Landon had tumbled down.
“Got one!” Alex called out.
With both beacons found, the team split, and I found myself surrounded by Little John, Leah, and Bobby while Pax headed to help Alex with the cameraman.
The beeps grew closer together, and the distance shortened on the beacon until we hit the single digits.
“Hit the snow,” Little John ordered, and I hunched as we walked slowly, looking for the smallest number on the beacon.
“Seven,” Leah read.
“Six,” I said next. We were so close.
“Five. Four. Three,” Little John said, my throat too clogged to speak. We were going to find him. It was the only possibility.
“Four. Five…” Leah said.
“Back up, slowly,” I told them, and we inched our way back until we hit the three-feet mark. “Dig!”
Little John took out a long pole and gently pushed it through the snow until he found resistance. “Got something.”
Someone.
Pulling out small, collapsible shovels, we started to dig. My chest heaved, tight and burning, and my vision started to haze the harder we labored.
“Miss, can you give me that?” one of the Sherpas asked, reaching for the shovel. I handed it over and stumbled backward as another did the same with Leah. I told my inner feminist to shut the hell up. They were acclimatized, stronger, more capable, and there were men’s lives at stake.
When had the helicopter brought another load of searchers?
I looked over to see the bird parked on the snowfield, waiting to airlift the boarders.
“I’ve got him!” Little John said from inside the pit they’d dug.
Leah’s arms surrounded me. Please be alive.
“He’s breathing! It’s faint, but he’s alive!”
“Thank you, God,” I said, sagging in relief as my face pointed heavenward.
“Gabe is alive!” Little John called louder to Pax across the field.
Gabe. Not Landon. It was Gabe.
Which means… My head swung in Wilder’s direction, and I broke from Leah’s hug to run across the avalanche field where Wilder was digging in the same kind of pit.
My legs dragged like lead, unwilling to move as fast as my mind begged them to. It might have only been fifty yards, but it felt like fifty miles. The altitude was draining me of every last ounce of energy.
We hadn’t acclimatized nearly long enough.
“Wilder?” I asked in a desperate cry as I made it to the small huddle.
“Less than a foot,” he called up to me, now digging with his hands.
I heard a gut-wrenching sob, the sound so miserable that it ripped my soul, the pain excruciating.
“It’ll be okay,” Leah promised as she caught up, looping her arm around me.
I heard the sound again and realized I was the one making it.
“Here!” Wilder yelled, and I saw the tip of Landon’s Jones hat before he was surrounded by guys digging just as furiously.
“Wilder?” I begged, ready to crawl out of my skin. Had it been a half hour? Had he exhausted an air pocket if he’d managed to make one? Were we too late?
“Wilder?” I called again as they dug. It took everything I had not to shove my way through the sea of men and dig him out myself, not to get my hands down there and do something. Anything.
“Just a sec…” He grunted.
“Paxton!” I shouted, unable to take another second of not knowing. God, if he wasn’t breathing, if I’d lost my only chance—
“He’s alive,” Wilder said.
The Sherpas split, and as Landon’s face came into view, I hit my knees.