Winter in Paradise Read Free

laughed in relief.
    She discarded the second hypo. “Did you activate the disruptor?”
    He nodded more vigorously this time.
    “Good. Let’s go.”
    Kelly pulled him to his feet. He stood, using her for support. She was down to one gel-pack, as was he. She jettisoned the spent two and left the backpack and med-kit. She was down to only her suit, sidearm, wrist-nav, and furs. Better to travel light. If they didn’t make it to base, the supplies wouldn’t do them any good.
    Head tilted against the wind, Kelly hugged her polar furs with her free hand as she slid Grayson’s arm around her shoulder and pulled him closer. He wrapped his other arm around her; even half frozen, his powerful body enveloped her in warmth.
    An hour later, Kelly was amazed Grayson could still walk. Hypothermia had to be winding its way through his body. His gel-pack had failed a half-mile ago. Fear twisted her stomach. If she hadn’t found him when she did, he would be dead. They might still end up dead.
    She tightened her grip on his sleeve and pulled him through the blinding wall of snow that whipped past in a horizontal whiteout. Cold stung the small line of exposed skin on her forehead. The power in her goggles had died minutes after they’d started for base, but without them, her lids would be frozen shut.
    Flashes of white-hot weapon-fire slashed through the whiteout like silent lightning. They paused and lifted their heads heavenward, then looked at each other. His expression mirrored what she was thinking: the Kirsovals had arrived. Would their months of hard work pay off? Would their friends, their families survive?
    Grayson slipped an arm around her shoulder and squeezed. He had thought to draw fire away from her, even if that meant giving his life. But his efforts were moot. Instead of their last moments being spent with her legs wrapped tight around his waist as he thrust into her, they would likely die in this frozen wilderness. Even if they made it back to base, it would probably be to find the mountain blown apart. When she’d lowered the force field to go in search of him, she’d left an open door.
    But he had closed the shield after he left. How had he planned on getting back in? There was no communication from outside the cave. Did he think he could link with her mind? Gooseflesh rose on her arms. Was it coincidence that she’d woken from a dream about freezing to death when the man she loved was wandering across twenty-foot-thick ice? But it wasn’t him linking with her, she realized, for he wouldn’t want her risking her life by coming for him. Had she really linked with his mind?
    Kelly wanted to laugh. Grayson was always one step ahead of her. Not this time. This time, she was one step ahead of him. The dream had seemed a natural reaction to the unnatural weather and the fear that they would lose to the Kirsovals. But what if it was something more, what if it had been prophetic? Visibility was arm’s length and the heads-up-display in her goggles had gone dead half an hour ago. Did the dream mean they weren’t going to reach home? Her jaw tightened reflexively. Onyx had been a subtropical planet. Only those who could have predicted the Kirsoval sub-thermal probe that had put the planet into deep freeze could have seen the need for a HUD to survive on Onyx.
    A white beam stabbed down in her periphery. A Kirsoval weapon. Kelly whirled, dragging Grayson with her. A white rod of energy stretched from ground to sky, moving in a ragged path toward them. A sizzle shrieked above the wind. She yanked Grayson back. Brilliance threatened to singe her eyes. Her goggles didn’t darken. No power. Lines burned in her vision everywhere she looked. Fear twisted her stomach. The Kirsovals had detected their heat signatures. Grayson stumbled, nearly pulling her down with him. Her shoulder wrenched, but she yanked him upright.
    “Move it,” she yelled, but her words were devoured by the wind’s howl and the beam’s roar.
    The weapon