Stranded with a Stranger Page 9

  She ripped the picture of him out of her head.

  Her feet touched the shelf. It was narrower than it looked from above, barely five feet wide. The way up, walking the top of the ridge had been longer, but an easier ascent.

  She waved to Kurt. “Your turn.” She watched him start down. He made it look so simple. His big body didn’t bend to the will of the glacier; he used his skills and technique to overpower it. But then, he had made climbing his life. That was another of the differences between them. Sure, she gained pleasure from each new achievement, but aches and pains dulled the edge of the splendor laid out in front of them with each ridge or icefall they conquered.

  Conquered, hah! Her mother’s family had followed in the footsteps of the conquistadors. In this age there were few places on earth men hadn’t been. Goodbye the moon, hello Mars.

  Her mother’s bloodline must have been well watered down by the Tedman half, for at one stage her mother had dominated the riding circuit. Agueda Filipa y de la Chavez, star, became Agueda Tedman, second wife, mother and star. Chelsea had a collection of videos of her mother eventing at places like Badminton, but she’d destroyed the one where her mother had broken her neck at the water jump. The way her father had destroyed the horse.

  Taking riding lessons at boarding school had been just one more way of defying him.

  He had been wise enough to let it go, knowing depriving her of funds would have no effect—not when half of her mother’s fortune had come to Chelsea without strings or restrictions.

  Yes, if she’d inherited anything from her mother’s bloodline it had been willfulness.

  She wasn’t going to climb halfway up Mount Everest for a prize or trophy. No, the moment she had started her quest, she had begun to suspect that Sydney Carton from Dickens’s A Tale of Two Cities must be one of her ancestors.

  It is a far, far better thing I do…

  Obviously she had more of her father in her than she had so far acknowledged. She was making this sacrifice for his business. To make sure it didn’t go under in a huge scandal that would take thousands of little, ordinary people with it.

  And the funny side was, there was a funny side to all her meanderings. She looked down at the huge vista in front of her and began to laugh, holding her ribs and chortling out loud, “Good grief, will you listen to yourself?” The thin air had to be responsible for all these delusions of grandeur.

  She was still laughing when Kurt landed beside her.

  “What’s up?”

  “Nothing that will translate. Let’s just say I suddenly realized I was taking myself far too seriously. If there is one thing climbing mountains does, it is show you how small a part you actually play in the continuum.”

  Her hand swung in an arc that took in the whole view. “Look out there. Is it any wonder we came past so many monasteries on the way to Syalkyo? This place makes you believe in God.”

  “You mean you didn’t before?”

  Kurt’s smile didn’t patronize. It held understanding and a certain something that made her insides tremble, but most of all, it was if he was telling her, “Been there, done that.”

  He was already reeling in the lines to use on the next step of their descent. Kurt had an effortless way of doing things that made them look simple. But she recognized now that spoke of self-confidence and a vast experience in everything he did to keep them both safe.

  “I did believe, but more in a general way. Up in these mountains it’s as if you can see the hand of God. That’s what makes the difference.”

  “Welcome to the club. But I should tell you that the Sherpas believe he is female, a goddess.”

  Chelsea didn’t have to reply; her smile said it all as the feminist in her won the day. So the Sherpas took comfort that the mother of all gods was with them on their perilous climbs into her lap.

  Once Kurt had fixed the lines for the next section of their descent, he grinned at her and said, “Ready, Teddy?”

  His teeth were a blinding white against the darkness of a beard he’d never gotten around to shaving. She was sure that behind his ski goggles his eyes were alight with enjoyment…and something else, something more elusive. They might not be having sex, but the attraction Kurt had spoken of the first morning on this glacier hadn’t gone away. It had as much of a physical presence as the safety line that more often than not was strung from Kurt to her, keeping them together.

  How long had she been staring at him? Quickly she caught hold of the line and took up the little joke that for some reason she had started letting him get away with. “Ready, teddy, go!”

  Back at the rim of the ice shelf, Chelsea took the same kind of nervous leap her heart had been taking during this week she’d shared with Kurt—off the edge of the world.

  Kurt looked back over his shoulder. Thin, see-through clouds that resembled huge wedding veils were building up over the glacier. The wind had been steadily picking up, strengthening its tug. Even now as he turned to look back, it lashed his face with the ties of his hood, and dragged the air he was trying to suck in away from his mouth.

  He switched his ice axe to his other hand and tucked the strings under his chin, slackening his speed until Chelsea caught up. The rope from one belt to the other lay in slack loops on the ground. “We need to step it up. Can you manage?”

  “I’m feeling no pain. You set the pace, and I’ll follow.”

  They were roughly a mile from the shack and had left the icefall behind. The surface underfoot was mainly ice and rocks brought down by the glacier over millions of years. A lot of damage could be done in the time it took to walk the distance to the shack, while the wind was doing forty-five, maybe fifty knots, growing stronger every minute.

  “Take a look back there.” He turned her, looping an arm around her shoulder, pointing up where they’d come from. Chelsea turned, the side of her pack pressed tight against his chest and her head almost touching his shoulder as she followed the straight line of his arm with her eyes.

  “See those clouds swirling near the top? Most of that white stuff is windborne snow scraped off the glacier. We don’t want to be out in the open when that hits. Be glad we kept our warmer parkas on this morning instead of changing.”

  Twisting her head to face him so her words couldn’t be torn away by a wayward gust, she cupped her mouth to be heard. “You mean be glad it felt too cold on the ice to change out of what we’d slept in.”

  “That, too,” he said, grabbing her arm as a huge gust rocked them together. It was the closest he’d voluntarily come to her since their kiss. Maybe he should kiss her again, just to take the significance out of it only happening once.

  She pushed against his arm, cupping her mouth again. “What are we waiting for? Let’s get out of here.”

  When they eventually reached the deserted shack, the ground around it was bare, wiped clear of the tents and paraphernalia the Sherpas and porters had used. Not a scrap of paper or can littered the ground. He ought to be pleased the men he’d employed this time knew how he felt about conservation. But another thought overshadowed it. How was he going to get through the night without touching her, or repeating that kiss?

  Chelsea drew up beside him. “I never thought I’d be so glad to see this shack.”

  “I see that being in the mountains has downgraded your expectations somewhat.”

  “The Ritz by any other name, you mean?”

  Kurt nodded. Last night he and Chelsea had slept side by side in a tent on the ice at the top of the glacier. Another new experience for her, one she would have to become accustomed to.

  When they’d finished their descent of Ama Dablam, he’d unwillingly conceded he was going to have to make good on his promise to take her up Everest. Damn, at least another month of keeping his hands off her. In a fit of exuberance when he’d told her, Chelsea had flung her arms around him, but he’d dragged her arms away and told her, “Don’t thank me yet. This isn’t over—it’s just the beginning.”

  He’d a notion tha
t his deliberate withdrawal of anything physical was the reason that a mere meeting of lips continued to loom large in his memory.

  He’d begun to look at her in a new light since she’d pointed her finger at his chest and pretended to shoot him. Whether she was an actress or comedienne, he’d gotten the impression that there was more to Chelsea than met the eye. That she wasn’t simply a rich woman enjoying the prestige and perks that came through working in the American embassy. That the supreme confidence he’d taken for bossiness came not through being rich, but also from making her life count.

  Kurt pressed his shoulder against the door. “Looks like we’re definitely on our own. How are your cooking skills?”

  “Nonexistent.”

  “Then it’s just as well I can throw something together if need be.”

  If he discounted the sometimes virulent whistle of the wind, the area around the shack seemed oddly quiet. No chatter or pots rattling. He looked at his watch. “I wonder how far our team got before this struck.”

  Rei and Ang Nuwa, his cousin, were to have packed up, then joined the others on the trek to Base Camp, where everything would be set back up before he and Chelsea reached it.

  Now he wished he could call them back.

  Come off it, Jellic—be a man. It’s only one night.

  And it was going to be a long one.

  He swiped at the powdering of snow coating their shoulders. No point in taking it inside. When he released the hand-made wooden catch, the wind flung the door open. They tumbled inside full of breathless laughter as they jostled each other to be first, bumping against the sides of the door frame in their rush to escape the wind.

  Shrugging off his backpack, Kurt dropped it where he stood, then braced his back against the door to force it closed. The gusts were growing fierce and he was glad of the roughly cut lengths of wood that held the door shut. Even then the wind buffeted the door hard enough to make it shake.

  Daylight was minimal. For a change, at this time of day, the sky was dark. Larger windows might have made a little difference, but not much.

  The odd giggle disrupted the huffing and puffing caused by Chelsea’s exertions. He heard her pack hit the floor, then the zipper on her anorak slide down. Kurt tried to ignore the sexual ingredient of her stripping in the dark. Instead he concentrated on the damage that would be done if one of them tripped over their carelessly discarded packs.

  On Everest the effects of any injury increased tenfold. Lack of oxygen stressed the body to its limits without adding the pressure to heal itself onto its struggle to survive.

  One more danger to add to a long list. One more set of odds to beat, as he pitted his luck against the mountain.

  “God, I think it’s still too cold to take my jacket off,” Chelsea said.

  “Yeah, the temperature is plummeting, but shelter will soon take the edge off it. Offhand, do you remember where your headlamp is stashed? I feel a sudden urge to be able to see what I’m doing.”

  “No problem. I rolled it in a T-shirt on the top of my pack.”

  “Get it out, will you?” Kurt asked. “And check what they left behind in the way of food. I noticed a pile of stuff between the cots as I was blowing through the door.” Kurt stripped off his gloves, then raked around in the pockets of his pack for the matches and lamp they’d used in their tent, a task made a whole lot easier once Chelsea retrieved and switched on a headlamp.

  She totaled their resources. “They’ve left us the small kerosene stove, some bottled fuel, but not a huge lot—though I guess that’s not really important, since most of the food they’ve left is freeze-dried. There are protein bars and some snacks, plus the bottled water. Also a few plates and a pan for using on top of the stove.” The beam of light turned in his direction. “I’ve got my mug and some extra tea bags in my pack.”

  “Anything else? Any more protein bars or candy you haven’t eaten? I’m asking because I’m not certain that this wind is going to die down overnight. I’ll try to get a report on the satellite phone, but the link could be closed out by the storm. I’m worried that if there’s a lot of weather coming our way, we’ll need to conserve what supplies we have.”

  He took the gas mantle out of its protective case, fixed it to the gas cartridge and set it on the floor to set it alight. The match flared and in an instant they could actually see. For all they’d just gone through, Chelsea still looked damned sexy. Not an idea to reflect on while being shut up in small space with her for God knew how long.

  Kurt made his thoughts do an about-face. “I’ve got a couple of gas cartridges. Are you carrying any?”

  “I know I’ve got a partly used one, and I’ve the makings for a cooking top that it fits, still in the box I bought it in.”

  Kurt crossed the room. Their last mile back to the shack hadn’t been a pleasure stroll. Twice he’d had to stop to refasten Chelsea’s hood. He’d pulled her woolen ski cap down level with her goggles, but knitted balaclavas that covered everything but the eyes and nose would have done better, if they hadn’t been somewhere near the bottom of their packs.

  Damn, he should have known better. He was in charge of seeing no harm came to her, from him or anyone else.

  “Let me see your face. Does it sting?”

  Pink half circles painted the creamy cheeks where her snow goggles had finished. Kurt rubbed at them with the backs of his knuckles. “Just checking for windburn.”

  Her lips were very close to his. He held back, though that most natural of caresses had set off an explosion of heat inside his groin.

  Oh, yeah. Circumspection had added to instead of subtracting from the attraction she wrought in him.

  Testosterone, long denied, was having a field day.

  Time to step back.

  “How are you fingers and toes? No numbness?”

  “I’m fine—honest. I’d tell you if I had any problems.”

  But would she? She was bright and gutsy, never seeming to let anything get her down for long—not anything she’d show him, at least.

  Chelsea had secrets and they weren’t all connected to her job. At times she’d begin saying something, mainly about Atlanta or her father, then she’d stop abruptly, pretending she’d lost her train of thought.

  He’d come to realize there was some mystery, something so private that only Chelsea and Atlanta had known, and she wasn’t about to confide in him.

  But with the news rife with stories of child abuse these days, he’d begun to wonder. He’d refused to jump to any conclusions, though. It wasn’t misery he saw smudging her gray eyes as she shut him out—more like fiery determination.

  The same kind of spark had appeared this week with each new step he’d used to test her endurance. To all intents and purposes they might still be strangers, but if he’d been less cautious they might have been lovers.

  Time was what he needed to earn her trust. The clock was ticking and there wasn’t a lot of that commodity left between now and the end of the season. Standing here while they both froze wouldn’t advance that goal. “Okay, before the wind gets any stronger, I’d better go out and hunt and gather.”

  Chelsea smirked. She always teased him about acting like the chief of his clan as he organized the Sherpas.

  “There’s a pile of juniper stored in the lean-to at the back of the shack,” he said. “I didn’t want to touch it, but what we have going now qualifies as an emergency.”

  He eased the hood of his dark green parka over his head and pulled the drawstring tight. “Close the door after me. I’ll thump on it with my boot to be let back in, but it could take three trips, maybe more.”

  He eased his gloves back over his fingers, and before he reopened the door he teased, “While I’m out hunting and gathering, why don’t you do the wifely thing and prepare something to eat?”

  She tilted her chin at the challenge. Next second, Kurt was outside and the wind whipped away any smart-ass reply she might have made as she shut the door.

  How many translators
did it take to light a kerosene stove? One. There were no more available. Chelsea reasoned that if the porters could get it to light outside in the wind, she could do it inside. She put a lot of effort into pumping the fuel the way she had seen it done, then lit the match. It took, the fumes caught light and she sighed as if it was some great achievement. She could translate four other languages besides French, do the sort of task that required skill and speed, but so far the bureau hadn’t asked anything more from her. She shrugged off the discontent niggling at her. So she would never set the spy network on fire the way some of her companions at the bureau did. Had she ever expected to? God help her if she had leaped into this adventure to retrieve Atlanta not without a second thought, but as a way of proving her worth.

  How utterly naive would that be? Jason Hart, chief of IBIS, had told her up front she would never be called on to work on a clandestine op. Her money, if not her face, made her too memorable.

  How calculating if she was the sort of person motivated by nothing but personal glory. If any hint of selfishness lingered in her subconscious, she dismissed it now. Simply being here, seeing that money didn’t matter that much when you were up against the immense challenge of the mountains, had changed her already.

  By now, her compassionate leave had segued into AWOL. She had to get in touch soon or IBIS would send someone out looking for her.

  When Kurt kicked at the door after his fourth trip outside, she had water heating on top of the stove and the two freeze-dried food packs warming in it for dinner.

  Chelsea rushed to open the door once more, stepping back quickly as he was blown through the opening.

  The scratchy juniper branches were soon added to the pile, and looking at the size of it, she wondered if Kurt knew something about the conditions he wasn’t telling her.

  “I reckon that will about do it. I lost as much as I managed to carry this time. The wind snatched off the top of the bundle and whisked it away. I think we can thank our lucky stars we’re not perched on top of Ama Dablam in a tent.”