Stranded with a Stranger

by Frances Housden

  Kurt stayed put, and with another few noisy paces across rock and ice she came level with him. “Actually, it’s not as cold as I thought it would be.”

  “Yeah, we’ve got us a clear sky and no wind.” He ran an eye over her outfit—matching Gore-Tex shell trousers and pants in a shade of pumpkin that would make her look like a huge chunk of squash from a distance. But hey, beggars couldn’t be choosers—it was all they’d had in her size.

  “Toward the middle of the day as we climb higher and the sun reflects off the ice, you’ll be tying that jacket around your waist and stripping off a few other layers, as well.” His gaze focused on her chest.

  It lingered there for several seconds.

  You wish. She kept the thought to herself as her mind took a leap backward to their first meeting—his hand on her breast and the heat of his body burning against her hip.

  This wasn’t good; sex had no business rearing its ugly head when she had to concentrate on learning everything she could from this guy. Darn you, Kurt Jellic. Why d’you have to be so gorgeous? she thought.

  But Kurt had moved on. “How are those glacier glasses going? Not too loose, I hope. Did you remember to put the spare pair in your pack?”

  Great! Any notions of sex went straight out the window when he treated her as if she was still in kindergarten. “The glasses are fantastic—nice and firm but not rubbing—and yes, I have the spare pair in my pack. I’m not a child, Kurt. You don’t have to keep checking on me all the time.”

  “If you were a child things would be easier all around.”

  “What is that supposed to mean—things would be easier all around?” She mimicked his serious tone.

  “Come off it, Chelsea. Keep beating around the bush if you must, but the attraction between us is no secret. The kind everybody knows, but no one wants to be the first to mention out loud. Okay, I’m attracted to you.”

  Secrets? If only Kurt knew. Chelsea’s career depended on it. She’d sworn never to reveal the contents of any document she translated or anything she heard in the IBIS ops room. That meant she couldn’t afford to be as open as Kurt about her life.

  And she couldn’t afford a hormonal distraction that would shorten the odds of her making it through this week. Because of her inexperience, the odds were already on Kurt’s side. Animal attraction would have to wait.

  His steely expression didn’t look promising. It showed he had a streak of hardness at his core that he didn’t want anyone to breach. “Well, I guess the secret’s out now. But—”

  “Well, keep that secret in your pants for now, Jellic. I’ve no intention of freezing my butt off for any man,” she said, taking attack as being her best form of defense.

  Kurt laughed. “So the lady knows how to get down and dirty. I’m amazed, and fascinated. I only wanted to reassure you that I wouldn’t be trying to jump your bones.”

  Typical male. I’m attracted to you, but not enough to do anything about it.

  It was another twenty minutes before he spoke again. “Time to show me what you can do.”

  They were on solid ice now. They were the only two people in the empty white space, but the noise of shifting ice was constant.

  “What? No demonstration?”

  “Would I do that to you? Come closer.”

  Chelsea moved up next to him as he brought up the ice axe looped around his wrist. They had used the long handle like a walking stick crossing the rocky valley at the foot of the glacier, and even with her crampons digging into the frozen snow, it had helped to keep her balance.

  “Okay, as you can see, the slope is becoming steeper. Crampons aren’t going to be enough on their own. Normally, as leader, I would cut steps and you would follow in them. But what happens if you’re on your own?”

  A rush of coldness whooshed up from her toes and settled near her heart. Panic? “But you’re not going to leave me up Mount Everest on my own?”

  “Never say never. I didn’t think I’d be coming down on my own and leaving Bill and Atlanta up there. I’m just covering all the bases.”

  Self-confidence had a way of slipping that could leave people—namely Chelsea Tedman—flat on their back. It didn’t matter that an accident had brought her there. That it could happen to her or Kurt hadn’t entered her tunnel-vision mind.

  He swung the ice axe and carved out of the ice a step big enough to fit one large foot. Then he stepped into it. “See how I’m not just relying on the crampons on the sole of my boot. I’m digging the spikes on the front of them hard up against the back wall of the step.”

  Stepping back down and out of her way, he instructed, “Now you try it.”

  Chelsea looked down at her foot as she bent her knee. She had big feet—size nine and a half—but she knew it was one of the costs of being a tall woman and until now had let it bother her only when shopping for shoes. Now her long, narrow feet were encased in double plastic climbing boots with fully insulated overboots on top. Kurt had insisted she get used to the full deal, and her toes did feel warm and toasty—hot even—but he’d assured her that when they climbed higher, sometimes three layers of liner socks over the ones she was wearing now wouldn’t be enough. All she could see when she put her foot on the step was that it looked huge.

  She dug her toes firmly into the back of the step.

  “Good.” Kurt’s hand was touching her calf urging her weight forward onto her toes. He seemed so indifferent, her leg might be a part of the masses of climbing equipment he carried. “Now you cut the next step. Don’t make it too far up so it’s difficult to reach. That’s the way to overbalance.”

  She dug the other crampons into the slope as she swung the ice axe and cut a step the way Kurt had done. Except that it took her longer to get the shape she wanted.

  Sweat gathered in the small of her back, and the coil of rope lying against her hip bumped her leg with each swing, as if marking time, but at last she was done. “There.” She sighed. “Finished.” Pulling her toe spikes out of the icy slope, she took a step onto the fresh hollow she had hacked out.

  One annoying thing about men like Kurt was that most of the time they were correct. She had made the next step too high. Oh, she reached it, all right, but she hadn’t taken the weight of her backpack and ropes into account. Her foot stayed on the step for about two seconds, then with her equilibrium out of kilter she slowly toppled backward.

  Chelsea felt Kurt’s arms gather her in, but she was no lightweight. He went down, as well. They slid a few feet farther, her feet waving in the air, until Kurt dug in his ice axe and arrested their slide. Gurgles of laughter she was unable to control bubbled up inside her. She hadn’t laughed since before she’d heard the news about Atlanta. A sobering thought.

  Released from his arms, she twisted and, grasping for purchase, took hold of his jacket. Looking into his face, she risked her equilibrium for the second time in the space of a minute. His harsh breath grazed her cheek. His features could have been carved out of the icy slope. She panicked and fought to get to her feet. Kurt grasped her arms and held her. She couldn’t move.

  “Hell’s teeth, woman! Be careful with those crampons. If you spike my leg we might as well book our flights home now, for we won’t be doing any climbing.”

  She went still in his grasp. Embarrassed, not knowing where to look, she shut her eyes. Next thing she knew, he was pressing her face into his shoulder. His voice sounded as rough as the whiskey they’d shared a lifetime ago. “Don’t take on more than you can handle. If it means cutting extra steps to be safe, be safe.”

  The thud of his heart echoed in her ear while he paused for breath. She had no excuses. Kurt had warned her and proved that climbing wasn’t a game.

  As if to reinforce the gravity of her mistake, he said, “Say we’d been two, maybe three hundred meters up even without a vertical slope—you would have slid right down. The momentum would have carried you away and me with you. Later I’ll teach you to self-arrest.”

  Chelsea had gone through lif
e expecting the unexpected. That was how she’d ended up studying languages at Harvard and had fallen into her job at the embassy, ending up with IBIS. But Kurt’s gloved hands cupping her face as his mouth descended toward hers was more than just a surprise, and his “Damn you, Chelsea,” shocked her.

  At the same time, his freezing lips were both soft and firm and his mouth hot enough to melt a glacier. The kiss went from gentle, exploratory, to hard and urgent in ten seconds flat. Then as if her time was up he lifted his head.

  “C’mon,” he said. “Let’s get you back on your feet. Turn around, dig in your crampons and I’ll push from behind.” Which he did with deceptive strength. Chelsea knew she was no lightweight, yet one second she was on the ice, and the next she was holding out a hand offering to help Kurt to his feet.

  Kurt didn’t need her help. He was as agile as a mountain goat on the ice. One arm snaked around her shoulders. She could feel its weight on her backpack as he walked her back to where they had started the exercise. The kiss was never mentioned. She certainly didn’t intend bringing it up. It was one of those incidents that needed careful consideration—privacy, even. She’d save that task until she was back in her sleeping bag, where she could analyze each short second of his kiss.

  Though she didn’t need to seduce him now to get her own way, she wondered which one of them would have won.

  “Back to business. Let’s see you do that again. And no, I don’t mean the part where you tried to flatten me. It’s one thing you trusting me to take care of you, but have you ever considered taking better care of yourself?”

  Kurt’s gruff suggestion wasn’t something that occurred to her very often. She went her own way, did her own thing. Even at IBIS they knew whatever she put her mind to she did well.

  It had been a long time since there had been anyone she’d really mattered to, who cared even a little. She had always felt that Atlanta had abandoned her when she got married, but didn’t feel so bad about that anymore. Losing the sister who’d mothered her through childhood had hit her harder than she’d realized. But the letter she’d received from Atlanta had put a new slant on her memories of that earlier time.

  And now Kurt, too, cared for her, if reluctantly.

  Who’d have thought?

  Chapter 5

  Kurt closely observed Chelsea’s brightly clad figure. Her work had become sure and methodical. This wasn’t the worst slope they’d face, but he was pleased to note she made no more errors, didn’t try to take on more than she was capable of, or misjudge the length of her stride. “Not far to go.”

  He followed her up the ice face, reassured that was one mistake she would never make again. “You’re doing good work, but don’t try to rush it.”

  She didn’t reply, but he hadn’t expected her to. She was saving her breath.

  Overhead, the sky had formed a huge blue bowl frosted in white around the rim. They were treading through a dangerous, almost barren landscape where man’s voice was a pitiful thing compared to the groans of the icefall, which at times reminded him of a whale breaching.

  They were close to the top now and going easily. He issued an occasional instruction, but took care not to take Chelsea’s mind off her task. He knew from personal experience that cutting steps in the ice was hard, tiring work—just what Chelsea needed to build up her stamina.

  Now and again he pondered whether she was used to men suddenly kissing her without warning. She hadn’t lost her temper, dramatically told him to unhand her, or slapped his face.

  All of which she’d been entitled to do.

  No, he’d been the one who was angry. He could still feel pinpricks of memory, buzzing like gnats inside his skull, taking him back to the day he’d lost Bill and Atlanta. Lost them for all time.

  It wasn’t anything visual, unless you counted the stark sheet of white ice in front of his eyes as he’d heard those sounds.

  They’d reminded him of skimming flat pebbles across water as a boy, counting each bounce across the surface. The dreaded word avalanche had opened a crack of terror in his thoughts as he’d recalled hearing another climber telling about a close encounter with a rock shower. Chunks of ice had spit off the ice face as he’d rammed the spike of his axe in as hard as he could, waiting to be tossed around like a rag doll at any moment.

  Then he’d heard it fly past to his left.

  Bill and Atlanta—still roped together, spinning after each bounce like the weighted ends of a bola. Down and down…

  God! He had to stop thinking about that day before it drove him crazy. Had to stop second-guessing himself, looking for an answer that would have made a difference.

  Chelsea’s determination had infected him till he felt a new urgency to retrieve his friends’ remains—the last act of friendship he could make for the friends who had trusted him to get them to the summit.

  Kurt lifted his gaze and watched her reach the crest and disappear like a glowing orange sun setting behind the ridge. A pang of fear slammed into his gut with her out of sight. He increased speed until he caught sight of her as she stood panting, dragging in scads of thin air. Climbing at these altitudes deprived the human body of oxygen needed to fuel it. And it would only get worse.

  “How are you feeling, Chelsea?”

  “I’m tired but exhilarated. And I’ve discovered that the climber who said he wanted to climb a mountain because it was there was an idiot. He didn’t explain the half of it.” The palm of her hand skimmed the scene below as if it were a painted canvas she could touch.

  “I know we haven’t climbed anything like the heights waiting for us on Mount Everest, but this is wonderful. It’s not only reaching the top, it’s looking back where you’ve been and discovering just how beautiful planet Earth is.”

  God help him, she was hooked already.

  “Tell me that when we get to the end of our week here. More important, how are your feet holding out in your new boots? Any blisters?”

  Her joyous expression took a dive. “None that I can feel.” She lifted a foot and glanced down at her yellow-and-red boot topped by black overboots, gaiter-style, that reached to her knee. “My boots feel pretty comfortable.”

  “So they should. They cost enough. It would have been wiser to break them in first, but since we didn’t have time…” He let the rest of the remark hang. No sense in reiterating the obvious. “The condition of your feet is vitally important. When we get back to the shack I’ll get out this stuff that will help harden them up for something more than walking around carpeted rooms wearing stilettos.”

  Her smile faded as his gibe hit the mark.

  Who was he kidding? He hadn’t been making a crack at her expense. He’d been protecting himself.

  That kiss had been a blunder.

  Letting loose the reins of the attraction they felt had been another. Two more to add to the mistake he’d made by agreeing to take her on this outrageous adventure. She was a rookie, for God’s sake. Her life was at risk, and heaven only knew what it would cost his soul if anything bad happened to her.

  Face it, Jellic—you agreed to be her guide only when she suggested flying someone in from the States if you turned her down. He couldn’t stand the thought of another man being alone on the mountain with her, touching her. It was sheer unadulterated jealousy that had driven him to agree to this crazy stunt.

  “Now all we have to do is get back down. This part should be a cinch for you, so let’s see how you belayed down that climbing wall in the Parisian gym.” He knew he was doing it again—emphasizing the difference between them, between the lives they led. By rights they should never have met.

  He stood aside, watching her deft handling of knots and carabiners. Finished, she pulled out the gadget to stop her gloves melting on the line. She didn’t make a wrong move. And he didn’t know whether to be happy or annoyed that, apart from her earlier mistake, she was passing his tests with flying colors.

  All he said when she was finished and he’d anchored the line was “You go fir
st. I’ll follow.”

  She stared at him. “Don’t you trust my knots?”

  This was one of those moments when the glacier glasses were too dark. He wished he could see her eyes and know if she was teasing. “Like everything else about you, the knots are perfect.”

  He should have known Chelsea wouldn’t let him get away with that remark. She hooked on to the line, took a good grip and just before she stepped back over the edge she asked, “Does that intimidate you?”

  Hell, yes, it disturbed him. He’d already discovered she could twist his insides into knots much less perfect than the ones she’d tied. Being with Chelsea was starting to feel like stepping off a high ridge without ropes. Flying without wings. Great until you came down to earth and crashed.

  Chelsea couldn’t remember the last time she had felt this tired. But it was a good sort of tired, bone deep with contentment now they were back at the shack. Knowing the Sherpas were camped outside and would do all the cooking sure helped.

  She pushed back into the wall at the corner of her bed, her down parka between it and her back, happy to have succeeded with only one small learning curve to blot her record.

  And one huge discovery—she enjoyed being kissed by Kurt. She relived the moment. His lips had tasted sharp and icy, worlds away from the heat his mouth and tongue had generated.

  And had he enjoyed kissing her? He was the one who had brought up the attraction between them. What had she done apart from falling into his arms that had startled that curse out of him? Damn you, Chelsea.

  He’d been blowing hot and cold from the first, telling her “No,” then changing his mind, but she had put that down to her persuasive talents. Not this time. Kurt was an enigma that she might be better to leave unsolved.

  The door opened and the man in her thoughts appeared holding a steaming basin. “Dinner?” she asked.

  “The meal will be ready soon, but before then, let’s deal with your feet.” He set the aluminum basin down on the crushed-rock floor. Water slopped back and forth and a few drops went over the side. Light wisps of steam wafted in front of his tanned face and tangled with his lashes as he hunkered down in front of her bed. His beard had grown thicker and darker. She called up the memory of the soft brush of stubble against her cheek, the feel of it tickling her lips. A swift heat spike impaled her down low.