Stranded with a Stranger

by Frances Housden

  “I didn’t make the connection either until Chelsea showed up. She wasn’t married, you see, and the moment I met her it clicked. Tedman Foods. Basie was head of security at their Port Elizabeth plant,” he explained, sounding pretty pleased with himself.

  Kurt was furious. To think they had broken bread with Nichols, and all this time he had kept that news under his hat. “You might have warned us. Chelsea would have been eager to help. When news of this gets out you’d better start watching your back. She has friends in places you and I never knew existed, and her safety means a lot to them. This is probably the last warning you’ll get.”

  Though he wasn’t dead certain of his facts, it was gratifying to turn the tables and make Nichols look uncomfortable. To rub it in, he said, “You may act the part of a stone-cold killer, but I’d say these guys are the real McCoy.”

  “Look, I couldn’t tell you, man. It might have given me away.”

  “Well, I hope you can still look Chelsea in the eye when we get down to where she’s waiting. Serve you right if she pushes you off the edge herself once she hears you might have been able to save her sister.” He picked up Basie’s pack. “If I find anything in here that proves what you said is true, I’ll save it for the local magistrate.”

  He gave Rei his instructions first. “I want you waiting with Chelsea at the spot where we climbed into the couloir. Nichols, you can take the quick route down after Rei. I’ll follow.”

  A replay of the emotions that had pummeled him as he’d clawed on to the face of the couloir filled Kurt’s heart and mind while he waited on top for the others to descend. If he’d lost Chelsea, would life be worth living?

  He didn’t think so.

  It had taken a near tragedy to make clear what he should have known all along. He loved her with every particle of his being. Not that he would confess his feelings to her—better to leave them unsaid, make it easier on both of them when he let her go.

  As he would.

  His decision couldn’t put the brakes on his pounding heart, though. Following the others down, he tried to pretend that loving her from a distance would be enough, but neither his head nor his heart believed him.

  If she lived to be a hundred, Chelsea would never forget the moment when she hung in midair, nothing but air between her and death, as her anxious gaze searched for Kurt against the continuous dazzle of white ice.

  When she’d heard him call her name, she had been sure it was him who had fallen. Immediately she had been stung by pain and guilt. If Kurt died it would be her fault. Wasn’t she the one who had hounded him to bring her back to the scene of the previous tragedy?

  Her heart had rolled over, a useless lump of lead in her chest that refused to beat without knowing Kurt was safe. The moment her eyes latched on to his red anorak against the gray-blue shadows near the top, her heart had gone into overdrive, pumping blood to her spinning head. Shock.

  Only, Rei had kept her from falling. His voice had come from above her, issuing urgent instructions until he had pulled her, flushed and exhausted, back up to the starting point.

  That moment had taken its toll. No matter what Kurt said, or how he much he protested that he was no good for her, she knew she’d never love anyone else with the overwhelming emotions that Kurt evoked. The difficult task would be convincing him of that.

  When she was young, if she found that an arduous undertaking came easily to her, then her father would say, “You must have taken shortcuts. Next time do it right.” She would let Kurt off the hook until she had fulfilled all her obligations. After that he was hers.

  But before then, someone, namely Paul Nichols, had a lot of explaining to do. Now that the incident was over, she was bothered about how her usually excellent skill of reading people had let her down. She hadn’t realized Paul could be so calculating, and all in the name of truth and reconciliation.

  Well, it would be a cold day in hell before she became reconciled to the thought that Atlanta and Bill might still be alive if Paul had given them fair warning of his suspicions. And it was no thanks to him that she was able to stand here listening to his excuses as he repeated what he’d told Kurt.

  A light-headed sensation rocked her the moment Kurt joined them. She sent her thanks up to the mother goddess that Kurt didn’t have her death to add to the guilt he was carrying over Atlanta’s and Bill’s tragic demise. More tragic than they’d realized—their deaths maybe could have been prevented.

  Kurt was being strong and silent. He left the excuses to Paul as he looped in the line and issued orders regarding the next descent. “Right, Rei, you go first again, then you, Nichols. Chelsea and I will stay back till we see you’ve both reached the lower icefall.”

  No more than three seconds after Paul’s head disappeared from view, Kurt called to her, “Come here, and stand by me.” He was using one hand to guide the line, while the other encouraged her to step inside the circle of his arm. “How are you holding up, Teddy bear?”

  His silly little pet name for her warmed her heart more than any of the flattery Jacques had used on her.

  “I’m better now you’re here.” She lifted her face to his. “I would be better still if you gave me a kiss.”

  “Much as I would love to kiss you, and let Nichols fall, I’ll have to give it a miss. He may be a cold rat fink of a guy, but I’ve done enough killing for one day.”

  “I’ll settle for the cuddle,” Chelsea responded. She snuggled against him. “You saved my life, Kurt. If I get through the next few days and manage to turn around the damage cousin Arlon has done, it will be thanks to you.”

  “Teddy, you give me too much credit. Keep some of that for yourself. I killed a man today. Easy for Nichols to reckon Basie deserved it, but it was a first for me. Now that all the shouting is over, and I know you’re safe, I’m back to doing what I do best with a real bad taste in my mouth.”

  She reached up, the tips of her gloved fingers grazing the stubble on his cheek. “You look like a real badass with that unshaven face, but the difference between you and those two, Paul and Basie, is obvious to anyone who really knows you. Because you’re a lover, not a killer, Kurt Jellic.”

  “Thanks for the vote of confidence.”

  The line tugged in his hands, telling them their few minutes of respite from the others was over. “Right, Teddy bear, your turn to clip on. Take it easy. Take it safe. I’ll be back beside you before you know it.”

  Kurt left one line in case the helicopter didn’t pan out and they needed it for the return journey. He wasn’t taking anything for granted this trip.

  Every time he looked at Chelsea now he experienced a deep-seated sensation of relief. It had been bad enough going through the redundant motions of checking Bill and Atlanta for their pulses the day they’d fallen. If he’d had to do the same today for Chelsea…

  He felt sick to his stomach. It wasn’t a scenario he could bear thinking of. Not now. He needed some time on his own and the distance to put everything into perspective, a situation that wasn’t likely to happen anytime soon.

  Chelsea hung back while the others were checking out Basie. Kurt put his arm around her shoulder, propelling her along with him. “C’mon, let’s get it over with.”

  “Do I have to look?”

  Hell, Chelsea probably hadn’t seen anyone dead until after the mortician had done a paint job on the corpse. Basie would have to forgo the dressing up. It wasn’t likely anyone would be putting himself out to see he got back home off the mountain.

  “If it’s too much, then don’t look, but the magistrate might want to ask you about it when we report the death in Namche Bazaar. Don’t worry, I’ll be right here with you.”

  He chuckled, a deep husky tumble of vocal cords he hadn’t realized he was capable of in the circumstances. “I’ll even let you hold my hand.”

  “Since Paul has more to fear from the media than us at the moment, I accept.”

  Basie was more banged up than Bill and Atlanta had been, so Kurt didn�
�t keep Chelsea hanging around. Instead he handed Nichols a camera.

  Five minutes on, he asked, “Did you take enough photos? Chelsea and I are climbing down to the Chaplins’ resting place. I’ll need to take some shots of them this time around.”

  Nichols took the hint. “If you don’t mind Rei and I looking for the gun, we’ll stay here a little longer.” He passed over the camera and said quietly, “I’m going to search the body, and I’d rather Chelsea wasn’t around.”

  For once Kurt was happy to oblige Nichols.

  “Right. Chelsea, crevasses on the horizon, so we’ll put on a safety line. We’re looking for a marker. It’s an ice axe with a scarf tied to it. And if I remember correctly it’s at least a good hundred yards that away.”

  Chelsea knew Kurt let her find the pointer. He was being very careful, almost tender in his handling of both her person and her emotions. Too bad it was simply a precursor to what he knew they would find when the marker popped into sight.

  The marker of the Chaplin’s last resting place was nothing fancy, nothing like what they deserved. No Star-Spangled Banner, just a scarf that had frozen to the shaft of the axe and had long since finished fluttering in its spot a few yards away from the rim of a crevasse.

  “Here we are, then,” she said, and then waited.

  Kurt didn’t disappoint her. “Okay. Atlanta is the one closest. The straps of her backpack gave way, and that’s the small snow-covered mound in the middle. Bill is lying facedown. I didn’t attempt to move them. All I did was check their pulses to make sure they were dead.”

  He turned away, and she saw him swipe the back of his glove across his face before he added, “It might seem a terrible thing to say, but all the way down, I prayed that they had died. There was no way I was going to get them back to camp on my own. And when I found them, I thanked God that their suffering was over.”

  But not even God could solve the Tedman Food problem, only her, and by proxy, Atlanta.

  She slipped out of her pack and knelt beside her sister’s grave. Kurt was behind her. “Do you want a hand to uncover her?”

  Chelsea glanced up. From that angle he looked very large, and very reassuring, but some things she had to fix alone. The guilt inside her ran deep. She should have taken more interest in the company. They both should have, but she was the one who had flitted off to France in search of excitement.

  “I’ll be okay. You see to Bill. Just one thing before you go.” She swallowed the hard lump in her throat. “Will I still recognize her? I mean, my sister’s poor face—was she…was she bruised?” She was too chicken to voice the words bloody or battered.

  “No, she died before any bruises had time to show, and I shouldn’t think that has changed. Don’t worry, she still looked like Atlanta.”

  “Thank you.”

  She started her work closer to one end than the other, brushing away the snow gently. Her gloved hands uncovered a shoulder first, shrouded in Atlanta’s green jacket. She recognized the color from the photos Kurt had shown her. Perversely, she began working the other way, gradually uncovering her sister’s body, staying away from her face.

  What held Chelsea back was the finality of seeing, of having to believe, that Atlanta actually was dead. There was no road back once she had looked upon her sister’s face.

  Little mom’s face. All these years and finally this was how she would see her again. They hadn’t had their shopping trip to the Paris fashion houses, or shared the laughter she remembered from the days before Bill appeared on the scene.

  And they never would.

  The crampons on Atlanta’s boots almost cut through Chelsea’s glove, and struck her as a warning that the time for procrastinating was long gone.

  She summoned up her courage and began to twist around. But with her weight on her heels the courage faded, and instead she checked on Kurt. Just as quickly, she turned back.

  He had rolled Bill over to take photos. Soon he would want to do the same for Atlanta. This was another proof of death.

  Chelsea’s time was up.

  “Hi, honey,” she whispered, taking special care as she brushed away the snow from the top of her sister’s head. “I’m going to look after you this time.”

  Startled, she jerked her hand away as a clump of stiff blond fringe fell into her palm. Atlanta had had beautiful hair with a natural wave. She would have hated to see it hard with ice. “Sorry, sweet thing.” Another of the pet names Atlanta had called her when she was little sprang naturally to Chelsea’s lips. “I wish I had a comb to make you look pretty.”

  She worked steadily, discovering her sister’s eyes were shut, as though she had fallen into a magic sleep like the princess in the fairy tale. Atlanta had been the purveyor of wonderful stories. She hadn’t needed a mom when she’d had her.

  Her sister’s nose was just as she remembered—a cute little button nose that went with her blond hair and heart-shaped face. Chelsea had envied that nose, convinced that her aquiline one dominated her face to the detriment of her other features.

  Without the smile Chelsea remembered, her sister’s mouth looked cold and tired and oh, so lonely. Atlanta was missing Bill.

  “Not to worry, precious. You’ll soon be together. Chelsea will see to it. I will fix everything.” Tears blurred her eyes as she brushed away the snow clogging her sister’s neck and shoulders and scooped Atlanta up into her arms.

  Her sister was so cold. Cold as ice. Not all the heat in the world could warm her, or bring her back to life. “Hush now.”

  Chelsea’s love was all she had to offer. She hugged her against her breast and began to rock. Atlanta had done the same for her when she was little.

  Holding her in her arms, she began singing the lullaby that had been as comforting as could be to a child who lacked a mother’s arms. “Hush little baby, don’t you cry…” she sang. “Little momma’s gonna…”

  In the nights after her father had decided they were too old to share a room, Atlanta had sneaked into Chelsea’s bed with her once their father had retired to his study.

  Every night Atlanta had rocked her, singing her little sister to sleep. She had been the only one to realize how frightened she had been of being alone in the dark.

  But Chelsea had had to get over it when their father found out what was happening. Charles Tedman hadn’t been a great believer in mollycoddling his daughters.

  Where had all that love she and her sister had shared gone? Had Chelsea killed it by refusing to recognize that Atlanta could love someone other than her baby sister?

  Sadness too big for one person to bear ripped a hole in Chelsea’s heart. The tears blinding her began to form tiny icicles at the ends of her lashes. Just like Atlanta’s eyes. “I missed you, baby. I missed you so-o-o much,” she sobbed as Kurt’s hand clamped on her shoulder.

  “You’ve got to let her go, Teddy bear. Time to say goodbye.” He removed Atlanta from Chelsea’s arms and laid her back into the hollow where they had found her.

  Chelsea’s sobs cracked on the sorrow in her voice.

  She took Atlanta’s hand. “It’s too hard to say goodbye.”

  “No choice, Teddy bear. If we hold the helicopter up, we’ll never get them off the mountain tonight.”

  “I’ve been thinking about that. It was selfish of me, expecting other people to risk their lives so I could bury Atlanta back home. I think that maybe she and Bill should stay here together. Could we do that? Bury them here in the snow and ice? Or in the crevasse?”

  “Sure we can, honey. But you have to realize that the mountain is always on the move. Sooner or later they’ll end up at the bottom of the glacier.”

  “That’s okay.” Another tearful hiccup escaped, trashing her fight for composure. “We can come back and get them then.”

  Kurt didn’t mention the presumptuous word we. He pulled Chelsea to her feet, balancing her weight between his big hands. “Are you steady enough now to come look at this?”

  “Yes—oh, no. I didn’t get the
key. Imagine.” She laughed harshly. “I almost forgot all about it.”

  He gathered her close. Her laughter sounded a trifle hysterical, even to her ears. She was too strung up to feel anything but pain as her pulse beat hard against her temple.

  “Don’t worry about it. I’ll get the key for you.”

  “No. No, I will. I must. My sister died because of that key. The least I can do is look after it for her.”

  She took her gloves off to feel around Atlanta’s neck, dreading that the key had somehow been lost during her fall. But it was there, right where Atlanta had told her it would be.

  As if she had known that one day Chelsea would come looking.

  She stood up and slipped the chain holding it around her neck. Its dreadful coldness burned against her skin. She didn’t care. In her head she heard Atlanta sigh, and felt a lightness of spirit that had eluded her since the day she’d heard about her sister’s death. “It will be okay, little mom. This time I’ll make it all right.”

  Straightening again, she screwed up her courage and walked away to where Kurt was waiting.

  “Have a look at Bill. I’ve taken a lot of photos, but after the way I was castigated in some of those rumors, I’d prefer not to be the only one who knows the truth now that Basie’s dead.”

  She blinked in surprise. The hole on the middle of Bill’s chest was hard to miss. Shocked, she stepped back. That could have been her or Kurt with a hole in them.

  Misunderstanding, Kurt responded, “I know. I should have turned him over. Then the reason for their deaths would have been obvious. The bullet must have gone straight through into his pack. If Nichols finds the gun and can match it to the bullet, that will be all the proof you need of who killed them. I think it’s stating the obvious to say that Bill died first.”

  Chelsea nodded, looking down at the man she had blamed for stealing her sister away from her. She knew he hadn’t deserved this fate. He had been an innocent pawn in the game cousin Arlon was playing with all their lives, and now it was up to her to call checkmate.