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      To my daughter Rachel, with love.

      CHAPTER ONE

      GEORGIE MCARTHUR pulled herself up the almost vertical rock face, inch by painful inch. The day that had started with unseasonably warm sun was now, in true Scottish spring fashion, beginning to close in and the temperature was dropping rapidly. Despite the chill in the air, Georgie could feel perspiration beading her brow as she willed her stiff and unused muscles higher up the cliff. Taking a deep breath, she dug her fingertips into the rock and, finding the narrowest of footholds, dragged herself another couple of inches closer.

      The ledge she was heading for was now only two feet above her and slightly to the right. This last bit of the climb was critical and she prayed the injured boy would stay still until she reached him. If he panicked now and the shelf crumbled, it could send him tumbling over the edge—and her along with him.

      ‘Stay as still as you can,’ she called out. ‘I’ll be with you soon, but I have to climb above you first. Okay?’ There was no reply. The child was hidden from her view by the ledge and Georgie fervently hoped he was all right.

      Steadying herself, she continued climbing until she was above him. At last she could see him clearly. He was sitting huddled against the cliff wall, his legs in front of him, the left twisted at an unnatural angle. Without doubt it was broken, but how badly? The boy was pale and clearly distressed.

      ‘Almost there—just sit tight,’ Georgie said, inserting another bolt into the cliff. By climbing higher than the boy, she could suspend herself just above him until she made an assessment of the stability of the shelf of rock. The last thing she wanted was for her added weight to send them both plummeting to the ground.

      Finally she was in position. The boy had been watching her wide-eyed while she’d made her preparations. He looked about nine years old, and his anxious, pain-filled eyes tugged at her heart. He was so little to be going through this on his own. Which begged the question: where was the adult—or adults—who had been with him? As far as Georgie knew, the call had come from a climber who had just happened to be passing when he’d spotted the brightly coloured jacket the boy was wearing. He’d immediately called the rescue services.

      It had been Georgie’s bad luck to be visiting her brother Kirk at the mountain rescue clubhouse when the call had come through. The timing was all off. A few more minutes and she might have been out of the clubhouse and on her way home, absolved from feeling any responsibility for the young victim. But she had been there when the emergency had been phoned through.

      ‘There’s a problem up on Ben Nevis,’ Kirk had said grimly after answering his mobile phone. ‘A young lad is stuck on a cliff. No one knows how he got there, but it seems he’s hurt.’

      Kirk had looked at her with sympathy in his eyes. ‘There’s no one else, Georgie,’ he’d said quietly. He’d glanced at the clock on the wood-panelled wall. ‘Damn it, I don’t think the others are going to be back any time soon and I can’t do much with this cursed wrist in a cast.’

      Georgie had understood his frustration only too well. She’d known her action-mad brother had been angry with himself for not wearing protective gear when he’d gone go-karting four weeks ago. Now his arm was encased in a cast from wrist to elbow, confining him to the clubhouse, manning the phone.

      He held her gaze as he dialled the number of the mountain rescue team and asked for an update. His face fell as he listened to the reply. Snapping the phone shut, he turned to Georgie.

      ‘They’re at least another hour and a half away from getting back—and the weather’s closing in. Damn, damn, damn.’

      ‘I can climb to him, Kirk.’ The words were out before she was aware she had been even thinking them. A little boy. Hurt. Alone. How could she not do something?

      Kirk’s gaze swept her face. ‘Do you think that’s a good idea? You haven’t climbed for years.’

      Georgie was already

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