Betrayal in the Arctic

I gritted through the stabbing pain and made it as far as the door before Carl Tillman called out, stopping me in my tracks.

"Wait."

My heart leapt. For one hopeful second, I thought he'd changed his mind about sending me home. Instead, without even looking up, he said, "Cover Susan's shift tonight. She wants to see the northern lights, so I'm taking her out to watch them."

The smile froze on my face. I turned back, certain I'd misheard him. "Carl, the injuries have already numbed half my body. I need to rest."

He paused, brow furrowing in irritation. "Still putting on that act? You dragged me through three days and nights during the avalanche. Don't tell me I don't know what kind of shape you're really in. Susan's naturally delicate. Don't go faking it just to copy her."

He took off his glasses and pressed his fingers to his temples like I'd given him a headache. "Naomi, you weren't always like this. When did you get so petty and jealous? Susan's the youngest one on the team, and a girl besides. Is it really so wrong that I look out for her a little more?"

Copying her? Jealous?

It hadn't occurred to me that risking my life to save him ten years ago would one day become proof that I was too healthy to need saving myself. I laughed bitterly.

Looking out for her. Right. He'd handed over his own glucose packet to Susan when my blood sugar crashed, and fobbed me off with a diet soda instead. He'd handed Susan his protective goggles during my snow blindness and told me to just tough it out.

Every single time, it came down to the same story: Susan Farrow was too delicate, and I was too healthy—healthy enough, apparently, that even my one chance to go home and save my life had to be handed over to her instead.

The pain was grinding through my nerves, and I didn't have it in me to argue anymore. Carl seemed to take my silence as defiance.

"Enough," he said, voice gone cold. "Quit walking around half-dead all the time. Who exactly are you putting on that face for?"

He crossed the room, grabbed my frostbitten arm, and scrubbed hard at the blue-black bruising.

"Susan showed us the other day how different shades of makeup can fake a bruise that looks completely real. I didn't think you'd stoop to copying her just to make a scene over me."

I hissed at the pain and yanked my arm back, and just like that, the urge to argue drained out of me.

"Carl, Institute regulations require every researcher to rotate home after three years. It's because the human body can't survive extended exposure to this kind of cold indefinitely. Did you not know that?"

His back stiffened for a second before he answered, voice mocking and impatient. "Other people are other people. You're you. How could their bodies possibly compare to yours? Susan especially—she's frail, she needs more time to recover at home, or she'll end up with permanent damage."

I swallowed hard, nails digging into my palms. "She's only been back three months!"

He froze. "So what if it's three months? She's weak and you're strong. Can't you just let her have this one?"

Let her have it. Let her have my rotation so she could go watch the northern lights while I covered her night shift. Let her have the newly issued cold-weather gear because she complained hers was too thin. Let her have my husband's concern too, apparently, since even that was too delicate for her to go without.

"Carl, I'm telling you the truth. I'm going to die out here."

He scoffed. "Susan called it exactly right—the second you found out I gave her the placement, you'd start threatening to die on me."

Something in me that had been holding on for years finally snapped. "Carl, are you my husband, or are you Susan's husband?"

He grabbed my arm in a bruising grip and dragged me out the door, and before I could even process what was happening, he shoved me down into the snow.

"You've completely lost it, going on and on like this. Sit out here and cool off."