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“Yes. They’re completely freaked out. I called them after I called you guys.”
Raina could understand freaked out. If this was her child—
She cleared her throat. While she talked and gathered information, Raina triaged the unconscious girl, speaking into the headset to those on the other end. Blood pressure, pulse, breathing status. “...And uneven pupils indicative of a concussion. The gash on the side of her head is going to need stitches.” She moved down, her gaze landing on the bone protruding from the leg. “Broken right tibia.” Raina ran her hands over the girl’s body as gently as she could, searching for more injuries. A low moan escaped Sadie when Raina’s hands grazed her ribs. She unzipped the light windbreaker and lifted the girl’s shirt. The bluish area under the skin alarmed her. “We’ve got some internal bleeding, maybe some broken ribs.” She listened to the girl’s lungs once more. “Breath sounds are still good, so no lung punctured.” Yet. She got the cervical collar on, then moved down to stabilize the broken leg.
More chopper blades beat the air. Farther away, but close enough to capture her attention. She took a moment to shoot a glance in the direction of the noise. “Great,” she muttered under her breath. A news chopper.Ignore it and focus.It was all she could do.
That, and keep her head down.
“Hey!”
Raina’s head jerked up at the shout that came from above. So much for keeping her head down, but at least her back was to the news chopper.
A man leaned over the side of the cliff. “I’m Larry Owens with the fire department. If I throw this line down, can you send up the uninjured girl?”
“Sure can! And I need someone to come down here and help me get Sadie in the chopper basket.” Holly could do it—would do it if necessary— but she absolutely hated to rappel down.
“As soon as she’s up, I’ll come down.”
“Perfect.”
“No.” Carly clutched Raina’s arm. “I want to go with Sadie.”
“You’re both going to the hospital. They’ll let you see her when you get there, but we need to focus on Sadie right now, all right?”
Carly bit her lip, then nodded. “Yeah. Okay.”
In less than two minutes, she had Carly in the harness and Larry was pulling her toward the top.
“Send down the basket,” Raina told Penny.
“On the way.”
And so was the firefighter named Larry. Working together, they got Sadie into the basket. “She’s ready,” Raina said, “take her up.” Raina watched her lift gently off the ground and head for the belly of the chopper. She turned to Larry. “Thank you.”
“Anytime. See you around.” He signaled his readiness to return to the top, and his team moved into action.
“Ready,” Raina said into her mic. She noted the location of the news crew still hovering in the sky and positioned herself accordingly, never more thankful for the helmet and other gear covering most of her face. The line pulled her up off the ledge and she started her ascent.
The line lurched and Raina gasped, fingers clutching the rope. “Penny? What was that?”
“No idea.”
The line jerked again and Raina dropped twenty feet before it stopped. “Penny! Holly!”
“Something’s wrong with the winch,” Penny said, her voice low and controlled. “Hang tight.” A pause. “No pun intended.”
Raina almost laughed but couldn’t quite get the sound through her tight throat. “Don’t let me fall.”
“You’re not falling. Just hold on a sec.”
After what felt like a lifetime later, Penny’s voice came through the headset. “Bringing you up.”
Raina held tight as she started moving upward once more. She decided not to look down while steeling herself for another abrupt stop. Thankfully, that didn’t happen, and soon, Raina was back in the chopper, kneeling next to Sadie.
Holly looked up from the still unconscious girl. “You good?”
“I will be when my heart rate gets back to normal. Then again, I’m here, so we’ll count that as a win.”
