Freefall by Kristen Heitzmann Page A

water.
    The only other possibility was that he’d been the reason Jade went over the falls. Cameron looked up the unforgiving column of water to the edge of land. “Jade, think. Did you see anyone in here with you?”
    She searched the basin, falls, and pool with pain in her eyes. “I wasn’t looking. I must have hit my head when I fell. I did. I know it now.”
    “Stop.”
    “What?”
    “Making your case. I believe you.”
    Her lips parted. “You do?”
    He’d said it without thinking, some instinct speaking for him. “Yes. But you have to face the facts.” He swallowed. “If he’s here, he hasn’t made it.”
    Her chest rose and fell with abbreviated breaths. Tears filled her eyes. What had he expected? Another lesson on the universe of possibilities? He didn’t want to be the one to tear her illusions apart, but now was the time for reality. “I want you to sit here while I go back to my pack.”
    “Why?”
    “To get my flashlight. It’s waterproof.”
    Her gaze jerked to the pool. “You think he’s in there.”
    “I don’t know.”
    She started to cry.
    “Stay here and let me do this.”
    She dropped her face into her hands. It was the best he’d get, so he left her there and made his way back to his pack. He took out the light they’d used the night before, checked that it worked. The thought of a corpse in the pool made diving in unpleasant, but how else would they know?
    With a glance to make sure she’d stayed put, he got a good breath and went under. The light illuminated the foggy surface that cleared and darkened as the water stilled deeper down. He shined it over branches and rocks and even a cow skull that must have been carried over the falls. But no body. Yet. He surged to the surface for air, treaded, and went back down, moving around the perimeter, then the deeper center, using what he knew from years of skin diving to clear his ears and gauge his breath.
    She stood in the water up to her knees when he surfaced next. “Anything?”
    He held out a handful of netting that he’d grabbed because it looked like the pockets on her hydration pack. If the guy’s pack had been torn apart …
    With a cry she splashed over and took it. She pressed the scrap to her chest, obviously realizing what he had. Fighting tears, she fingered it, then gasped, working it around in her hands. “Wait. It’s tied together. Like a net.” Hope sprang fresh in her face. “He’s here.”
    “Jade …”
    “Look. The pieces are tied.”
    Cameron looked from the net to the steep walls of the enclosure, the pool and the falls. Lava basins frequently had caves and air pockets. He’d been looking for a body, but now … He rubbed the water from his beard. “I’ll try again. I haven’t searched the falls.”
    “Is that possible?” She clutched the net to her chest.
    “I’ll have to go deep, get under if I can. Will it do any good to tell you to wait?”
    She swallowed hard and nodded. “They’re too strong for me.” As he started to dive, she caught his arm. “Be careful. And hurry.”
    “I can hold my breath a long time, so don’t panic.”
    She nodded.
    Gripping the light, he dove down near enough to feel the push of the falls. The rocks beneath were bad. No one driven down would surface unscathed. Was that where she’d hit her head hard enough to cause amnesia, yet still walked away? Her light weight might have been a factor. That or what portion of the falls carried her over; anything. But he pictured her throwing off the centipede and wondered again what kind of protection she had.
    Pressure built in his ears. The percussion of the falls pounded his chest. He ran the light over the floor, the walls, the—
    Cave. No way to tell if it extended above water. Not without going in. Could he make it through the falls without getting crushed? He went deeper, his lungs urging him up for air. With his chest almost brushing the rocky bottom, he caught sight of a lava tube under one side of the cave