Tears welled in her eyes. There. She found the carabiner. “I can do this.”

His arms had really started to shake.

She couldn’t move the knot in without removing the other.

Which meant that, for a moment, he’d be unbelayed, and . . .

“I can’t! It’s too dangerous.”

“I know.” And then in a move that nearly made her scream again, he let go with one hand, grabbed the axe, and swung it up into the ice.

The axe bit into glacier wall, held.

“I’m getting my weight off the line. You’ll be fine. You’re hooked in.”

Her entire body froze as he let go and swung himself onto the axe, hanging there like Spider-Man.

Except, not quite because he needed two axes to climb. Still, the heaviness on the line eased.

And then Colt unhooked his rope from his harness.

“Are you crazy?”

“What’s going on?” Dodge shouted, an edge of fear to his voice.

“Nothing! We’re fine!” Colt shouted back, clearly ignoring her.

“We’re not fine! You’re not tied in.”

“If I fall, you don’t go with me.” He raised his voice. “Pull her up!”

“I’m not leaving you here!”

He grabbed the end of his rope. “When you’re up and anchored, I’ll hook back in.”

She stared at him even as her line began to move. “Seriously. You’re calling me nuts? What is wrong with you?”

And then, well, she could just kill him because he smiled, a little gleam in those brown eyes, and she saw something in them that she’d seen weeks ago, at his bedside.

Fight. Determination. And the reason, probably, that he just kept surviving. The man didn’t have quit or helpless or even fear in him.

His voice turned quiet. Solid. “Listen, tune out everything else—me, the drop, your fear. Just focus on the next step. Climb, Tae.”

Focus on the next step.

Fine. Yes.

“Don’t fall,” she snapped, before tears could cripple her.

“I’m not going anywhere.”

Stupid, arrogant man—but she started to move, walking her feet up the ice. His rope spooled out, but as promised, he kept hold of it with one hand.

She came over the lip, dug her toes in and scrambled for her ice axe, still lying in the ice. Dodge lay on top of his axe and Echo on hers, both of them dug in with their crampons, fighting the pull of the axe from the ice.

“Come here,” Dodge said, and she scrabbled to him. “Lay on this axe.”

He got up, and since Colt still hadn’t clipped in, no weight hung on the anchor. But she took Dodge’s position while he dug in her axe next to them, then transferred some of the weight with a sling through the figure eight knots to the new anchor. He dug himself back in.

“Colt! Climb up!” Dodge shouted.