Chapter 1
One
Present Day
River looked up and up and…oh fuck…up at the face of the cliff. Steep, sheer, shit-a-brick terrifying. His mind flashed back to a time indelibly printed in his head and his knees started to shake. Double fuck.
“We’re all getting cold, River,” shouted Alex, the assistant director. He’d already shouted the light is failing along with you’ll be fine once you’ve started to climb.
If Alex pressed him any harder, River would snap.
But Alex was being pushed by the director who was clearly getting annoyed at the delay.
The crew were fidgeting, keen to go home because most of them already had, the cameramen were in position and River’s stunt double, Barney, was safely doubled up in the trailer with stomach cramps.
Bastard. River wished he’d thought of that.
Too late now. He’d look like a wimp if he said no.
Still tempting. Every cell in his body was telling him not to climb.
He shouldn’t have been asked to do this.
But it was the last day they could use this location. He’d been asked if he’d do it and he’d stupidly said yes. But that was before he stood at the bottom of the cliff looking up at hell. That was a novelty. He was going to wreck everything if he didn’t pull himself together.
“Just climb as far as that darker section of rock,” said Justin, the director. “That’s the only shot we need. You spreadeagled on the rockface, looking right, spotting the drone, knowing it’s all over. And we have to have it now, River, before the light changes.”
As if River would even think of going any higher…
Even that looked too high. He was not into free climbing.
He wasn’t into climbing at all, even if he’d had safety equipment in place.
A lot of it. Didn’t matter that River had an abject fear of heights, for good reason.
Not that anyone here knew. Didn’t matter that this was a piss easy climb according to fuckhead Barney and a straightforward ascent according to Malik, the expert climber who didn’t look right so couldn’t do this for him.
The director of Cloud Fall needed River to do him a huge favour, so he had to do it, and grin and bear it.
Well, not grin. He was the bad guy. Grinning wasn’t allowed, which was fortunate, so looking surly and pissed off worked perfectly to mask his fear.
River took a step forward and his knees didn’t give way. It was a miracle!
“The holds are marked,” Justin said. “Quiet on set.”
“Camera ready? Sound ready?” Alex called.
Muffled responses but clearly yeses. Fuck it!
“Action,” Justin called.
I’m not fucking ready. But River started to haul himself up. The sooner this was over the better. The last shot, and the filming of his part in the movie was done. If Barney hadn’t fucked it up, they wouldn’t be having to do it again, but apparently, he had so they were.
Thinking about Barney was a good idea because it was a distraction.
There was something about the guy that irritated River.
Maybe it was the sly sneers he’d caught that implied Barney didn’t like him.
River had done nothing to earn that dislike.
He’d gone out of his way to try and change Barney’s opinion; bought him drinks, talked about how much he appreciated Barney doing the stunts, but there was something off about him.
Which made River wonder if the guy was actually ill or just out to make life difficult.
Though Barney had no idea that even the thought of doing this had made River feel ill.
River had been walking away, almost at the car that would take him to the airport, congratulating himself on a job well done, when he’d had a call telling him there was a problem.
Now he was climbing a rockface, looking for chalk marks and wondering if he’d still make his rescheduled flight.
Maybe he should have changed it to tomorrow. His foot slipped and he yelped.
Concentrate!
“You’re fine,” Malik yelled.
No, I’m fucking not!
Malik was an experienced climber, but the wrong height, colour and build to replace River.
He stood below, occasionally calling out instructions about where River should put his feet and how many inches he was away from the next hold.
Somehow that made it more fucking stressful.
When River’s foot slipped again and only his hands kept him safe, he thought he was going to have a heart attack.
But a few moments of scrambling let him find places to put his feet and he kept going because he wanted this done, kept going because once upon a time his life had depended on not losing his footing.
“That was great,” Justin called.
Fuck you!
“Looking good,” Malik said.
Fuck you too!
Then River’s left foot started to shake, followed by his whole leg. Shit!
“The shaking is fine!” Justin said. “He’s desperate to escape. This is his only chance.”
The shaking wasn’t fucking fine. How was he supposed to keep climbing?
“Move your hips left. Shift your weight,” Malik called. “It’ll stop.”
River did that and Malik was right, the shaking stopped.
He kept going, cursing Barney for whatever he’d eaten last night, half-wishing he’d eaten it too.
Though he thought they’d all had pizza. Maybe it was a topping.
Stop it! He tried to blank his mind to everything other than making sure he always had three points of contact with the rock.
And scowl. Look menacing, determined, aggressive.
Maybe slightly scared but not scared out of my skull.
Which was the way he was currently feeling.
“Another six feet and you’re there!”
Six? Fucking hell. River looked for the chalk marks and reached up. He felt as if he was creeping up the rock like a petrified snake, his belly as flat to the cliff as he could get it. Nothing like the mountain goats who sprang around as if they didn’t even think about falling off.
Don’t think about falling off!
He wasn’t as high as he’d been that night his world had imploded, but he was at more risk of falling because he had to keep moving.
“Drone incoming,” Alex shouted.
He was almost at the darker section, spread-eagled as instructed, looking horrified—that wasn’t difficult, then resigned as the drone hovered too fucking close—more difficult.
Just one more handhold to reach for, and it was quite a reach.
He’d have to push up on his toes. The smudge of chalk was clear and he wrapped his fingers around the lip of rock only to feel it crumble under his hand.
What the… One gasp to take in what was happening, a split second to think oh fuck, before he fell.
Was that him screaming? He hit the ground, then everything blinked out.
River came round in a world of noise. His eyes wouldn’t open but that blade-slap sound was familiar.
A helicopter? Then again, maybe the noise was in his head.
Even thinking the word head brought on the worst pain he’d ever felt in his entire life.
He tried to move and couldn’t. Where…? What…
? My head… Oh God…the agony! River had never felt so helpless and scared.
Not since that night when, aged seventeen, his world had imploded, his childhood gone.
Someone was talking but he couldn’t make out what they were saying. The world faded away.
He had no idea how much time had passed before he came round again.
Minutes, hours, hopefully not days. No loud noise this time, just gentle, regular beeps.
His eyes fluttered part-open. His head… It felt as though someone was digging into his brain with a spoon.
Jesus Christ Almighty! There was a tube in his mouth, pressure in his throat and he wanted it gone but his eyes were closing again and there was nothing he could do to stop that happening.
He tried to lift his arm—couldn’t, tried to move his legs—couldn’t. Shit. What the hell is wrong with me?
Was he in hospital? Maybe his arms and legs didn’t work because they were broken. Or because he’d broken his back, severed something in his spine. No, no, no. His breathing turned ragged. What if he could never walk again?
When awareness faded, he felt nothing but relief.
The next time he woke, the tube was taken out of his mouth and after a moment of discomfort, he wanted to cry. Instead, he went back to sleep.
When he opened his eyes, he saw a man and woman looking down at him.
Doctor. Nurse. Hospital. The pain had gone.
That was good and also bad because it might not mean he was okay.
It might mean he’d lost feeling in his body.
At least he recognised where he was. Though not which hospital.
Nor why? What had happened? Why couldn’t he remember what had happened?
“Ohhl te fink?” said the doctor.
River blinked. What?
“Enny cat dout.”
He had no idea what the doctor was saying. A foreign language? Where was he? He’d been filming in Croatia but this didn’t sound like Croatian, though he only knew a few words.
“Wheen top.” The nurse patted his hand.
Oh, he still had a hand and he felt her touch. That was something but why couldn’t he understand what anyone was saying? Why didn’t they speak English? Was he still asleep and imagining this? Some weird dream?
They started to leave and River didn’t want them to go. The word stop wouldn’t come out of his mouth. He tried harder. “Nee!”
He gasped. What the hell did that mean? That wasn’t what he’d been trying to say. He made another attempt. “Nt.” It sounded wrong. Why? But they were still looking down at him.
“Pel tront vicent,” the doctor said. “Trem og hunp fot?”