but he kept focused, kept moving. Surfacing, he blew out, sucked in

another breath, and started pulling for the girl.

“Ellie,” he panted. He was trying not to hyperventilate, reminding

himself that he would use up less energy if he stayed calm, took slow

breaths. But, oh my God, the burn . . . His bare chest was already numb.

Lightning shocks of pain lanced from his feet to his hips. “Ellie, I’m

right here,” he said. Those fifty feet never seemed so long, and he suddenly wondered just how much rope they had. God, we never checked.

Too late to think about that now. He watched water slop around her

chin and then her nose; saw how she didn’t flinch. Losing it. “Listen to me, Ellie,” he called. “Are you listening? Put your head

all the way back. Look at the sky, Ellie, look at the sky.”

il sa j . bick Her staring eyes rolled. They were glazed, and he wasn’t sure she knew who he was. Then her head lolled back, but in slow motion, as if she were truly at the end of her strength.

Almost there. “Good, good.” Turning to face the way he’d come, he paid out rope, praying that he didn’t run out. Jayden, he saw, had guided his horse a little closer. Can’t drop the rope either. The rope would sink, and once it was gone, it was gone. He could probably swim with her, but the cold was starting to get to him, too. To his left, the dog was paddling toward him now. Get the rope around Ellie, grab the dog, and then we all—

Then, suddenly, he was out of rope, and still short.

Shit. “Ellie.” Grabbing the loop with one hand, he swam until the rope was taut and actually out of the water, then stretched his dripping, freezing free hand. Six lousy inches . . . “Ellie, you have to come toward me. E-Ellie, honey, take my hand. C-come on, you can do it!”

He watched her arms move but only feebly. One limp hand broke the surface, flopping like a fish. “E-Ellie, t-try again,” he said, his teeth stuttering, his breath starting to come up short, the cold like iron cinching down around his ribs. So close. Thinking he really was going to have to let go of the rope, grab her, then swim for it. Do something and do it now.

Her hand came up in that same dreamy slow motion. This time, he lunged, hoping the sudden lurch wouldn’t send the packhorse into a panic. He felt the slap of her hand, icy and wooden. His own fingers, numbing fast, cramped around her wrist and reeled her in.

“Okay, good, you’re doing great,” he said. She was shivering so hard the water danced. He worked the rope over her head and under her shoulders. The dog was there now, too, nudging at his shoulder with its snout. “I see you, girl, hang on, hang on,” he said, unsure which girl he was talking to now. “Ellie,” he said, getting his face in hers, grabbing her hands and trying to bend her fingers to curve around the rope. “You have to hang on. I’ll help you, but I’ve got to help Mina, too. . . .”

That did something. He saw a tremor shiver over Ellie’s face, her head slowly turn, her shock-trauma eyes crawling past him. “Muhmuh-muh,” she stuttered.

“Right, it’s Mina. You have to help Mina.” Puffing now, treading more from memory, his feet numb and legs leaden. How long had he been in the water? Five minutes? He could only imagine how well her brain probably wasn’t working right now. But she recognizes the dog. Still holding her hands around the rope, he got his free arm under the dog’s chest. Please, Mina, don’t panic, don’t bite me. Chuffing, the dog let out a piteous whine and then stretched for Ellie, its tongue flicking out to try and lick her face.

“Muh-huh-huh,” Ellie gasped. He could see the white crescents as her eyes began to roll back into her skull. Her fingers were chalk. “Cuh-Cuh-Chrisss . . .”

“I’m h-here,” he stammered. Won’t let you go. He sucked in a breath and pushed it out in a shout: “Juh-Jayden, pull! Pull!”

87

“It should be me,” Ellie said, cradling Bella’s head in her lap. Despite the dance of orange light from a fire Jayden and Connor had started two hours ago, her face was drawn and ashen. Her eyes crawled from Jayden, who looked uncertain, to a tight-lipped Hannah, who only looked more furious by the second. “She’s my horse.”

“But there’s no need. Jayden can do this, or Connor,” Hannah said, and Chris thought she really was trying to keep a lid on it. Jayden had refused to go anywhere without warming Ellie first. Chilled to his marrow, Chris hadn’t argued. Stripping the girl out of her sodden clothes, they wrapped her in a saddle blanket and Jayden’s parka. Chris had accepted Jayden’s sweater and then waited, next to the fire, with Ellie cradled in his arms and the dog practically in his lap, too, while Jayden rode for help. He’d returned with clothing, thermoses of hot soup and tea—and a fuming Hannah.

“What you need is to stop fighting me, Ellie,” Hannah pressed. “You need to come home.” “I’m not fighting. I’m just saying.” Ellie’s lower lip quivered. Bundled in a watch cap, two sweaters, snow pants, two pairs of socks, and a parka, she reminded Chris of the shrunken old women, swathed beneath reams of blankets, to whom he’d used to read back at Rule’s hospice. At Ellie’s tone, Bella let out another moan through a froth of scarlet foam. Gulping back a sob, Ellie stroked the horse’s poll. “I should be the one to do it. I had to leave Eli and Roc. Don’t make me leave Bella, too.”

“It’s not the same. Eli and Roc were not your fault.” Hannah said it to Ellie but aimed daggers at him.

Chris knew she was right. This whole mess—the barn; Bella; Eli and Roc, trapped under the ice or at the bottom of the lake—was all on him. No one wanted to say it, but Chris thought they might not find the boy and his dog until spring, if then.

“Yes, it is. Cutting the ice was my idea, and now E-Eli . . .” Ellie looked up at Jayden. “Is my gun big enough? For Bella?”

Jayden shook his head. “You’d need to use one of our rifles.”

“Which would be much too heavy,” Hannah put in. “It’s not your job, Ellie. You’re not old enough. If you love Bella, you’ll let us end her suffering.”

“Hannah’s right.” Jayden bent, reached a tentative hand. “We have to go, Ellie. It’s getting late. Hannah has to check Isaac, and the animals need us. Wouldn’t you like to help?”

“Yes, but . . .” Ellie’s brimming eyes overflowed. Bella groaned again. “Shh, girl.” Ellie impatiently backhanded tears from her cheeks. “It’s okay.” To Jayden: “Of course, I’ll help. But I want to help my horse, too.”

“Then you’ll let us—,” Hannah began.

“I’ll help you, Ellie,” Chris said.

Hannah turned him a frosty glare. “Thanks, Chris.” She said it like he was a bug. “But this has nothing to do with you.”

No, it’s got everything to do with me. Ignoring Hannah, he squatted until he and Ellie were eye to eye. “We can use my gun.”

“Chris,” Hannah said.

The distress on Ellie’s face eased for a second before clenching again. “But it’s too heavy for me.”

“Chris,” Hannah said again.

“Leave him alone, Hannah,” Jayden said.

“What?” Hannah goggled up at the other boy, who only returned her look with a resolute expression. “What did you say?”

“You heard me,” he said. “I have a say in this, too, remember?”

“Jayden, this isn’t the time to—”

“Here’s what we’ll do,” Chris said to Ellie. “We’ll hold the rifle together. I’ll keep it steady and you pull the trigger. You’ll have to use both trigger fingers, but you can do it.”

“Really?” Ellie’s chin quivered. “You’d do that?”

“Chris,” Hannah rasped, clearly having abandoned her argument with Jayden. To his ears, she sounded as if she were clamping back an impulse either to scream or blow his head off. Possibly both. “Ellie is too young to—”

“It’s her choice, Hannah.” Chris thought there was no irony in his tone. “Isn’t choice what you’re all about?”

“What?” Hannah blinked as if he’d slapped her, and then all her frustration—and her grief, Chris thought—poured out in a poisonous rush. “Don’t twist this around. This is your fault, your responsibility. You brought this on us. You think helping her with something like this makes up for what you’ve done? For what you didn’t do today?”

“Hannah,” Jayden said. “That’s not fair. We killed three. You weren’t there.”

Her eyes blazed in the firelight. “I didn’t need to be. Chris had Lena. You said so. But he didn’t take the shot. I don’t know if I care to understand why—”

“For the same reason I’m not sure I could shoot you,” Chris said, roughly. He kept reliving the moment: Lena in his sights, her face huge in the scope and so . . . Changed; that terrible sweep of mingled pity and dismay that stole his breath and robbed him of the chance to end this. Well, end her. He’d shot, finally, but pulled it at the last second. Then, it was all about Ellie. “I’d feel the same about Jayden, or anyone I know or care about.”

Hannah gave a brittle laugh. “This is caring? You led them to us. You should’ve recognized what was happening to Lena, but you were blind, Chris; you were willfully blind. If you’d been honest from the beginning, we could’ve taken precautions. We could’ve left.”

“We’ll still have to leave,” Jayden said. His face had paled.

“Yes, but on our terms, not after losing animals, a child. After Lena killed her own brother.”

“Hannah.” Ellie’s face knotted. “Don’t. Don’t yell at Chris.”

“You think you can wash away that kind of blood, Chris? There’s no way you can make this right!” She actually balled her fist and shook it in his face. “Isaac’s old. That fire did him no favors. If he lives, he might forgive you. You and Jayden may be best friends all of a sudden—”