Sarah tried a step and found the same thing. Earlier snowfalls must have melted, then frozen again to make a compact icy layer under the latest couple of inches. Her foot slid before she stabilized her stance.
“Don’t you dare fall off those beams and break your necks,” Regan called out. Their audience had caught up to them.
“You could give up now,” Dan said conversationally. “Regan’s right; you don’t want to break your neck.”
“You could give up now.”
He took another step. Wavered.
Sarah made a decision. If either of them fell off the beam, they’d have to go back to the inclined log, climb up and start all over again—that meant time lost, if not an injury. She didn’t have time for injuries, and she didn’t want to get halfway across the log, fall off, and then have to start again. She’d take the safe route.
She crouched down, braced her hands on the log ahead of her, and sat down, straddling it. She began to inch her way across, using her hands to lift her forward in a rocking motion that moved her down it more quickly than she might have expected.
“What the hell are you doing?” Dan taunted her as he took two more tentative steps. “It’s not a rocking horse, Metlin. Stand up, for crying out loud.”
Sarah ignored him. Her safe, rocking motion had already taken her a quarter of the way down the log. But now Dan was moving again, his short, nimble steps quickly passing her.
Fall, damn it. He moved halfway across with no sign of stopping. Had she played it too safe? Sarah moved faster.
Dan reached the three-quarter mark. Hell, he was leaving her far behind. The log must not be as slippery as she thought. She was blowing it!
“Eat my dust, Metlin!” Ten feet from the end of the log, Dan slipped and tumbled to the ground, landing with a heavy whump.
“Dan!” Regan raced toward him, Mason quickly passing her.
“Dan, you okay?”
Sarah kept going. She’d stop when and if she knew his injuries would take him out of the race. She had reached the three-quarter’s mark when Dan managed to lurch to his feet with Mason’s help. “I’m fine. I’m fine.” But he was limping a little as he turned in a circle. “Go ahead and gloat while you can, soldier. I’ll be ahead of you again in a minute.”
“Big words from a clumsy man.” She picked up the pace again now that she was sure he was okay. She knew he wouldn’t hold back; SEALs were trained to push through any pain.
By the time she reached the end of the log and slid down the incline on the other side, Dan had climbed up on top of his balance beam again. He began to cross it as he had the first time—walking in short, tentative steps—but when she glanced back a moment later, just as the trees closed around her again, she noticed he had dropped down into a sitting position.
She bit back a smile.
Chapter Three
?
If he’d set out to take Sarah down a peg, his plan had certainly backfired, and he couldn’t even cry foul on her for his latest setback. It was all his own damn fault. Humping it over this log wasn’t manly, or fast, or comfortable, for that matter, but it was the quickest, safest way to reach his goal and catch up with Sarah.
Still, Dan wasn’t unhappy to get the balance beam behind him and a minute later, after several more obstacles, he’d caught sight of Sarah slowing to a halt before a set of salmon ladders. He laughed, even as he put on a burst of speed. No way she could do a salmon ladder; no woman could.
Except… shit, she was doing it.
Dan slid to a stop next to his salmon ladder—a double set of notched uprights screwed to two trees standing close together. A metal bar rested in the bottom most set of notches. The trick was to jump up, grab the bar and use a kind of chin up motion to pop it up the ladder from the lowest to highest position. It took incredible core strength and coordination.
And Sarah was popping up her ladder like a pro.
Whoops and whistles from their audience filled the air as Sarah popped right up to the top. When she dropped down and came face to face with Dan, she looked startled, but recovered quickly. “Better get to it, SEALman. Or are you afraid you can’t?”
Dan wasn’t distracted by her banter, though. He was man enough to admit when someone had surprised him. “I’ve never seen a woman do the ladder.”
“Lots of practice. That’s all.” She moved to brush past him, but he caught her arm.
“Learn to take a compliment, Metlin.”
She hesitated. Nodded grudgingly. “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome. Now step back and see how a man does it.” He hoped she understood what he meant to say—that he respected her ability. That he would treat her like one of the guys now.
“If I see any men, I’ll be sure to watch them do the ladder.” She shrugged out of his grip and loped away. Dan watched her go.
“Quit ogling the competition and get a move on, Hemmins! Don’t let the team down!” Mason called out.
Dan jumped for the bar on his salmon ladder, but he had a smile on his face as he completed the obstacle.