“That’s not what she told me.” It made Nat nervous that Igor still held the knife, turning it over and over in his hands, as if he were considering his options.
“Maybe she didn’t want to hurt your feelings.”
“You know what? I think we should calm down, have some dinner, talk about less heated topics,” Andrew said. “Otherwise, someone is going to end up dead, and it won’t be because of any yeti.”
“I’m sorry, but I can’t drop this with you guys thinking I’m some sort of wannabe rapist. That’s not fair. I really liked Lana, and would never have hurt her. Please believe me.” Steven looked into her eyes, and even though Nat knew predators often dressed in sheep’s clothing, she did believe him. Heaven help her.
“Unfortunately, Lana isn’t here to give her side of the story, so we’ll probably never know exactly what happened in her tent. But I believe Steven isn’t a rapist,” Nat said.
He nodded at her. “That’s something, at least. Thank you.”
“And I wish she, or someone, had told me what was going on. This was supposed to be my expedition, and I feel like there was a whole world going on behind the scenes that I didn’t know about.”
Andrew put his hand on her shoulder. “Isn’t that always the way? The boss is the last to know.”
“I suppose. But I’d hoped I wouldn’t have to be a boss. I wanted us to get along, to be friends. To work as a team.” Nat looked at what was left of her group, which Andrew had assembled with such pride. The Russian stood, knife in hand, like he expected to be attacked at any moment. Red welts had already appeared on Steven’s throat. And Vasily, poor Vasily, looked as if he’d like nothing better than to melt into the ground and disappear.
“Well, that was never going to happen,” Steven said, and everyone laughed. Even Vasily cracked a smile.
“Like it or not, we’re stuck with each other. So we might as well make the best of it and try to survive. Igor, buddy, can you please put that knife away? You’re making me nervous.” Andrew slung his arm around Steven’s shoulders, and Nat wasn’t sure if it was out of affection or to protect him from the Russian. “What’s for dinner?”
“I’m no Joe, obviously, but I’d suggest we crack open the cans of pork and beans. That way, we’ll be without their weight tomorrow. Sound good?”
“You’re asking for our opinion?” Nat feigned shock.
“Sure, there’s a first time for everything,” Steven said with a grin, thankfully taking her shot in the way it was meant.
Perhaps Igor’s outburst, as terrifying as it was, had done some good.
“I think that sounds fantastic,” Andrew said with more enthusiasm than canned beans deserved. “Igor, my friend, does that suit you?”
“Yah, I could eat.” The Russian returned to his place by the fire, stabbing the knife into the ground by his feet. With the weapon taken out of play, Nat found she could breathe again, though her mind was spinning. How had she missed the drama between Lana, Igor, and Steven? She’d seen some flirting, but she’d thought that was the extent of it. Poor Lana. Had she pitted the two men against each other and died because of it? Or had she told Igor the truth? Even if Steven weren’t a predator, he wouldn’t have been the first man to have read a woman’s signals wrong.
Nat’s eyes filled at the thought of the vivacious Olympian. She missed the woman’s sense of humor, her bright and easy chatter. From the start, Lana had provided much-needed comic relief. Nat doubted things would have gotten this dark if she’d been with them.
With supper sorted and Steven once again agreeing to cook for them, Andrew moved to sit beside her, bringing her close in a one-armed hug. She rested her head on his shoulder, using it as an excuse to hide her tears.
“I know,” he said. “I miss her too.”
~ Chapter Fifteen ~
The howling began in earnest that night. The ominous cries echoed over the campsite, chilling Nat in spite of her heavy parka, as the group’s five remaining members clustered around the fire. She shivered in tandem with Andrew, who crouched beside her on the overturned log.
“Those aren’t wolves,” Igor said.
The color drained from Vasily’s face. “No,” he agreed. “Not wolves. It is the snowmen.”
Nat braced herself for another outburst from the Russian about how the yetis were a fairy story, but the man kept his peace. Then again, it would have been difficult to argue with that horrible baying going on around them.
Removing her phone from her pocket, she hit the power button, only to be rewarded with a blank screen. “Fuck.”
“Are you planning to record this?” Andrew asked. “Good idea.”
“Well, I wanted to, but the battery’s dead. I’ll have to use the power packs to charge it.” She left the rest of the sentence unsaid. No way she felt comfortable going back to the tent by herself.
“I think I should stay with you and Andrew tonight,” Igor said, as if reading her mind. “It’s not safe for us to be separated.”
“What about me?” Steven asked.
“You can stay with Vasily. Perhaps your combined knowledge of yetis will protect you.” The Russian stuck out his tongue.
“Very funny, but that’s not fair. You have the only weapon,” the mountaineer said. There was a frantic expression on his face that made Nat nervous.
“Vasily has his rifle. Besides, what happened to Lana wasn’t fair.” Igor shrugged.
“I told you, I had nothing to do with that. I loved her, okay? You happy now? I fucking loved her. I was going to ask her to move to California with me.”
Nat’s mouth dropped open, but before she could speak, there was another chorus of howls. Now she could hear snarling as well. Whatever was making that dreadful sound was getting closer.
“Please, please be quiet.” Vasily raised his hands in the air. “You are going to get us all killed with your fighting.”
“Maybe we shouldn’t even go to bed tonight. Seems like that would make it easier for them, offering ourselves like pigs in a blanket,” Andrew said.
Seeing Steven and Igor were on the verge of tearing each other apart, it was up to Nat to respond. “We aren’t much safer out here.”
“Aren’t we? We could build the fire higher, make some torches. The torches could be our weapons, or maybe Vasily would let us take turns with his gun. At least out here we’d see what was coming. I don’t know about you guys, but there’s no way I’d get a wink of sleep, lying in that tent, wondering about who or what was creeping up on me.”
Andrew’s idea had some merit. She hadn’t relished going inside for the night either. The image of Dyatlov’s tent with its ruined side kept coming back to her. If their group hadn’t gone to sleep that night, would they still be alive? “Sounds good to me. What do you guys think?”
“If they want to hurt us, they will hurt us,” Vasily said. “It matters not whether we are inside the tent or outside.”
“We can at least present a united front. Maybe if they see we’re ready to fight, they’ll leave us alone.” Andrew selected a long stick from the firewood pile and stuck the tip of it into the fire. Nat guessed he was seeing how it would fare as a torch. “Maybe they’ve sensed weakness, and that’s why they’ve been attacking us. Divide and conquer, and all that.”
“They would snap that silly thing in half.” Vasily curled his lip at the sight of Andrew’s stick. “You do not understand what we are dealing with. These creatures have brute strength, and they are not dumb animals. You can’t scare them off by waving a torch around.”