“What?” he yells, over the howlingwind.
“I think I sawsomeone!”
“Where? I can’t seeanything.”
“Wait for thelightning!”
Another bolt streaks across the sky a few seconds later. My heart leaps inside my chest when I locate the flash of yellow, maybe fifteen feet from us in the thrashing waves. A life vest. There’s definitely someone outthere.
This time, he sees it too. We call out, but there’s no response. If they’re still alive, they’re either unconscious or unable to reach us on theirown.
Which means… one of us has to go getthem.
I feel him tense at my side as the same realization jolts throughhim.
“I’llgo.”
I suck in a breath. “But—”
I cut off my own objections as my gaze creeps over to his. I see fear and hope warring in his eyes — the possibility of another survivor, weighed heavily against the prospect of leaving the raft to save them. I’m sure there’s a similar war waging inside my own eyes. As I watch, he clears his face of all emotion and loops one of the emergency lines around his midsection. He attempts a hurried knot with shakingfingers.
“No.”
He goes still when I speak, eyebrowslifting.
“Not like that. It won’thold.”
I lean forward and pull the rope from his hands. I hook the end through the closest belt loop on his black jeans, then string it through the others, one after another. I have to lean in and loop my arms around him to reach the ones at his back. We’re practically embracing as my hands work, my head pressed so close to his chest I can feel his heart hammering beneath my cheek. I barely breathe until his whole waist is circled and I’ve pulled back out of hisspace.
Able to breathe once more, I fashion a proper bowline. I’ve done it a million times — taught a million campers. Still, my fingers shake as I tug the knottight.
“There.” My eyes lock on his. “That’ll holdyou.”
He nodsstoically.
“You…” I swallow. “When you reach…” I can’t bring myself to saythe body. “Call out. I’ll pull you backin.”
Anothernod.
I bite the inside of my cheek, trying not to let the fear show on my face. Fear for him. Fear for myself. Fear that he won’t come out of that water again, once he goesin.
“If you’re not back in fiveminutes…”
“Start pulling,” he murmurs, eyes on mine. “But I’ll beback.”
I can’t help myself. I reach out, grab his hand, and squeeze. “Promiseme?”
He doesn’t promise. He doesn’t even nod. But his hand tightens on mine, a white-knuckled grip, and in that instant I feel something forge between us. A bond. Not of love or friendship or respect, not even of compassion or civility… but ofsurvival.
If politics make for strange bedfellows, plane crashes certainly create the most unlikelyallies.
His pulse is pounding in his jugular. Tick, tick, ticking like a bomb set to self-destruct. He’s afraid. I can feel it in his grip, see it in the depths of his stare. I want to tell him to stay with me, in this flimsy floating shelter. To be selfish. To let whoever is out there find their own way tosalvation.
Don’t leave me herealone!
I bite back thewords.
He swallows down hisfear.