The Captain's Frozen Dream

by Georgie Lee

  ‘Where is it?’ Conrad asked the foreman.

  ‘Just down there.’ He pointed to another ladder perched along the mine wall, not too far from the main ladder. ‘The ramp for the mules is on the other side. We can go down that way.’

  Across the wide pit the ramp sloped into the grey earth. It wasn’t far as the crow flies, but reaching it meant walking the wide circumference of the mine.

  ‘We’re already losing the light and walking will take time. The ladder will do just as well as the ramp,’ Katie insisted, making for the wood.

  The man looked to Conrad, waiting to see if there would be a disagreement but Conrad merely shrugged, then moved to step between her and the ladder.

  ‘Let me go first.’ Before she could protest, he gripped the top pole and swung himself around to catch the rung, sliding more than climbing to the bottom. He hopped off, looking up past the layers of jagged rocks to usher Katie to follow.

  While Mr Turner held the top, Conrad stayed beneath Katie as she descended, ready to catch her should she fall. She managed the ladder with the agility of an experienced rigging monkey, except no man on his crew moved with such tempting grace. Her hips shifted from side to side as she took each rung and her cotton dress swung in time to her steps. As the fabric swayed, it revealed a teasing length of black stocking and a shock of white thigh just above it.

  Conrad admired the hint of flesh and the memories it conjured of another evening like this one, a week before he’d left for the Arctic, when the two of them had come here after dark, lanterns in hand, to search through the rocks. He flexed his fingers, remembering the curve of her calf beneath his palm as he’d reached up to slide his hand beneath her skirts and caress the derrière hidden beneath her dress. She’d stopped in her descent and he’d waited for her to kick him away. Instead, she’d met his bold gesture with an inviting smile, dropping down from the ladder into his arms with a kiss as searing as her flesh against his.

  The length of him burned with the memory of her pressed beneath him against the wall of the mine as he’d caressed her exposed thigh resting against his hips. They’d teased each other to near desperation, eager in their desire to cling to one another and forget his coming departure. He’d been careful with her, tender but restrained, satisfying her as he denied himself, not wanting to leave her with child when the dangers of his mission lingered so close. Though he’d been cavalier back then about dying, he’d known the risks, but with her breath heavy in his ear, her body trembling against his, he’d believed there’d be many more nights to indulge in the full pleasure of her when he returned.

  Conrad stepped back, attempting to shield himself from the tempting hint of her legs and the heat it sent ripping through him as she manoeuvred the last few rungs. She wouldn’t greet his touch with such enthusiasm today, no matter how much he needed the comfort of her embrace.

  Humiliation as much as desire burned through him. He shouldn’t need or want her, especially if she didn’t want him, but it wasn’t simply lust driving his pursuit, but the craving for peace. The night before last, when she’d clasped his hand on the back of the horse, it had stilled the trembles which had plagued him since his rescue. In the study today, with her breasts pressed against his chest, all the glories of his past exploits and all the hurtful words of that night had faded away. There’d only been her and the glimmer of love which had carried him through so many dark, Arctic nights.

  Katie hopped off the last rung with a wide, exhilarated smile Conrad could feel in his core. The brisk breeze caught a strand of her hair and whipped it across her face. Conrad reached out and tucked it behind the curve of her small ear, though he wanted to wrap the gold curl around his finger, bury his face in the softness of it and make them both forget the past and the present.

  Katie’s dark lashes fluttered as she watched him draw his hand away. She bit her bottom lip, the anticipation in her expression urging Conrad forward, but he held back. He didn’t want to push her too far and break the fragile bond they were slowly repairing.

  ‘Hurry, I want to see the fossil before it gets too dark.’ Katie quickly moved off over the loose piles of slate and around the large outcroppings of rock dotting the mine floor.

  Conrad followed, stopping to join her at the base of the second ladder. Katie peered up at the length of dark bone so distinct against the grey slate and the metal stake driven in next to it to mark its place. A nearby overhang increased the shadows in this portion of the quarry, shading the mine wall and the bone.

  ‘What do you think it is?’ he asked. It was difficult from where they were standing to tell.

  ‘I don’t believe it’s an ichthyosaur. It looks too long and thick. I must get a closer look.’

  ‘I’ll have the men dig it out for you tomorrow,’ Mr Turner offered as he came to stand with them.

  ‘No, we make for London tomorrow. I must see it tonight,’ Katie insisted.

  ‘Then I’ll fetch a lamp.’ Mr Turner hurried off to secure the light.

  Katie crept closer to the ladder, tilting her head back and forth to try to get a better look at the bone. The curls at the back of her neck caressed her shoulders before one of them caught in the small lace of her neckline. Conrad reached up to free it and Katie jerked around to face him, then took one small step away.

  ‘Dr Mantell found a large bone he thinks is the leg of some unknown creature,’ Katie explained. ‘Mr Cuvier says it’s a kind of hippopotamus from before the deluge, but Dr Mantell isn’t convinced. He and I discussed the matter. He’s afraid to publish his paper on it for fear the societies will laugh and reject him. It’s difficult to be taken seriously if one doesn’t come from a titled or wealthy family.’

  Katie toed a small piece of slate with her boot.

  ‘Then all the more reason to align yourself with a man who possesses both.’ It wasn’t a subtle reminder of his standing and small wealth, but a powerful one. Though he’d always cherished Katie’s eagerness to love him despite his money and family connections, he wasn’t above using both to try and persuade her to be with him now.

  Katie peered around Conrad with a frown, obviously not as enamoured with his argument. ‘What’s taking Mr Tucker so long?’

  The sun was falling fast and the shadows deepening by the minute.

  ‘He’ll be back soon.’

  ‘I can’t wait any longer.’ She marched to the ladder, sliding a little on a piece of lose slate before she regained her balance.

  Conrad hurried up behind her. ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘If I managed the ladder into the mine, surly I can manage this one. Steady it for me.’

  Before he could take hold of it, Katie began to climb.

  Conrad grabbed the poles tight and the higher Katie climbed, the more the wood wobbled under her weight. As she ascended, the top of the poles nestled against the walls rattled, breaking off shards of slate. Conrad turned his head as the pebbles she’d knocked loose pelted his shoulders and scattered over the mine floor. By the time he looked back up, Katie was at the top, hands on the last rung as she strained to see the bone.

  ‘Don’t go any higher,’ Conrad warned as she stretched up to try and touch the fossil.

  ‘I can almost reach it.’

  Holding on to the side of the mine for balance, she stepped up on to the second-to-the-last rung. She gripped the spike to steady herself and with her other hand, picked at the soft slate entombing the fossil, trying to free more of the bone. ‘It looks like a femur, but bigger than any I’ve ever seen before.’

  ‘Come down, we’ll examine it further in the morning, before we leave,’ Conrad insisted, struggling to keep the shaking ladder steady, willing his fingers not to go weak when he needed them to stay strong, but his grip was already beginning to tire.

  ‘No, I can almost reach it.’ She rose up a little higher to trace the top of
the fossil and the slate beneath the ladder shifted, jerking the wood to the left. Katie’s half-boots slipped and her body dropped, stopped only by her hold on the spike.

  She let out a scream as a hail of rocks and dirt rained down on Conrad.

  He fought to clear his stinging eyes of debris as he positioned himself beneath her. She hung ten feet above the mine floor, her feet flailing in an effort to regain her footing on the ladder.

  ‘It’s right below you,’ Conrad yelled.

  ‘I can’t find it.’

  Her grip on the spike gave out and in a flurry of skirts and screams she dropped towards the ground.

  Conrad rushed forward, catching her in his arms. The weight of her knocked him backwards. As they fell, he clasped her to him, determined to protect her from the sharp rocks jabbing his ribs, back and sides as he thudded against the hard ground. His shoulders screamed from the exertion, but he didn’t let go, clutching her to him until they rocked to a halt against the hard floor.

  She trembled in his arms, curled in a tight ball, her head tucked beneath his chin, her eyes screwed shut.

  From somewhere behind Conrad came the grinding of boots over rock as Mr Turner and his men hurried to reach them.

  ‘Katie, are you all right?’ Conrad whispered, easing his hold on her enough to smooth her hair off her forehead. She didn’t look up, but pressed closer into the arch of his body, her hands clasped together in front of her chest. ‘Katie, look at me. Are you all right?’

  He stroked her cheek with the back of his finger until her eyes fluttered open.

  ‘Yes.’ She opened her trembling hand to reveal a bright red mark across her palm from where she’d gripped the spike. ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘Sir, we’ll help you up.’ Mr Turner and his men reached out to take Conrad’s arms, but he shook them off. Despite his hips and shoulders protesting with pain, he hauled himself to his feet with Katie still cradled in his arms. As he carried her to the ramp at the far end of the mine, the memory of slogging through an ice field, every muscle aching as it did now from his exertion, near strangled him. His hands began to lose their grip and he forced them to keep a tight hold on her as he pushed through the ache in his arms and back. He carried her to the gig, ignoring the men who stood along the mine ridge watching as he put her down on the bench. When she was settled, he joined her, his hands protesting as he took up the reins and snapped the horse into motion.

  With each turn of the gig’s wheels, Conrad’s relief at Katie having survived slowly gave way to anger. His gut tightened with the memory of her dropping through the air with nothing beneath her but cutting stone, Conrad and luck. If he hadn’t been there, if he’d left for London and Mr Turner had taken her to see the bone, who knew what might have happened. If she was this careless in his presence, he could well imagine the risks she took when he wasn’t around.

  He shifted the reins in his hand and a sharp pain shot through his shoulder. He wanted to yell at her as he used to his sailors when they’d failed to dry out their socks and put themselves in danger of frostbite. He bit back his rebuke, keenly aware of her beside him, shoulders hunched, hair falling forward to cover her face as she rubbed her sore hand. If he yelled at her it would do nothing but make her retreat from him. Instead, he stared straight ahead, guiding the horse with less enthusiasm than he’d employed when driving them to the mine.

  * * *

  When Heims Hall at last came into view, he experienced a small measure of the relief which had marked his homecoming last night. When everything around him was changing, Heims Hall remained the same and the desire to hole up inside its walls proved almost as tempting as the call of exploration. The urge disgusted him as much as Katie’s carelessness. He wasn’t a man to hide from the world or to allow those around him to needlessly risk their lives. He hadn’t allowed his men to do it in the Arctic and he wouldn’t allow Katie to do it here.

  * * *

  Katie winced when Conrad closed the study door behind him with such methodical care; he could have slammed it for all it did to conceal his fury. He marched to the table with the liquor, seized the decanter still shiny with spirit and splashed some into a glass.

  ‘What were you thinking, climbing to the top?’ Conrad pushed the glass in her still sore hand, making the liquid slide up the side and nearly tumble over to stain her dress. ‘You almost got yourself killed.’

  ‘Don’t chastise me as though I was your wife.’ She gripped the glass and took a hearty drink, coughing as the alcohol burned down her throat. The warmth of it began to still the shaking which had gripped her since the fall, though not even the bright fire in the grate could drive back the chill completely.

  ‘If I can’t speak to you as your affianced, then let me speak as someone who cares for you.’ His voice softened like the wind after a storm. ‘What you did tonight was foolish, reckless and unnecessary.’

  ‘I know.’ The truth in his words stung nearly as much as her aching palm from where she’d clutched the spike. She stared past him to the tiger. She’d always said she didn’t want to be like either of her parents, yet tonight she’d come perilously close to dying like her father.

  ‘Then why did you do it?’

  She snatched up the decanter and splashed more liquid into the glass. She raised it to her lips and tossed back the entire measure. Her eyes watered as the drink singed her tongue, dulling the ache in her palm, but not her heart. ‘Why do you keep leaving for expeditions when you know you might die?’

  Conrad straightened the silver label on the decanter. ‘It’s different for me.’

  She slammed the empty glass down on the table. ‘Why, because you’re a man? You think you can disappear and leave behind everyone else to deal with all the problems of life while you’re gone? I don’t accept that.’

  ‘I don’t expect you to.’

  ‘Of course you do. Just like my father did, just like my mother did when she walked away.’ She stormed across the room to the wide leather bench and dropped down on one end. ‘No one ever thinks of me before they go, not my father, my mother or you. I’ve never mattered to anyone.’

  She pressed the heel of her hand against her forehead, struggling to stifle the sob choking her. She had nothing, was nothing, just as she’d always been. There was no reason to stay here, or in England. At least in America there was someone who wanted her, if only for what she could render with her pen.

  At the sound of Conrad’s muffled bootsteps she braced herself, expecting another rebuke or more arguments against her opinion. She was stunned when he knelt on one knee before her and withdrew her hand from her forehead, smoothing open her tight fingers to reveal the red mark marring her palm. He ran his thumb across it, heightening the heat already flowing through her from the strong drink.

  ‘Do you know why I’m here and not in London?’

  Katie shook her head, not understanding what difference it made.

  ‘Because the only thing I could think about the moment the ship docked was seeing you and holding you in my arms. Nothing else mattered, not Mr Barrow, the Admiralty, nothing, only you.’

  He raised her hand to his mouth and she could barely breathe as he pressed his warm lips to the exposed flesh.

  She tried to tug her hand away, but he held it firm. Even with Conrad studying her as though she was his entire world, she couldn’t believe him. No one ever put her first. ‘But you left.’

  ‘Every time I thought I might die in the north, every time I wanted to give up and let the cold overwhelm me, I thought of you.’ He laid his hand along the side of her face, his voice like velvet across her bare cheeks. ‘You were my reason for continuing on, for not giving up, for making sure I came home.’

  The loneliness she’d suffered for the past year and a half began to pale under this revelation. For the first time ever someone was putting her above anything else.
It wasn’t possible.

  ‘I fought so hard to reach you.’ He rose up on his knees and slid one arm around her waist, drawing her firmly against him. The strength of his embrace sent a thrill racing through her like a spark along a dry length of hay. She pressed her palm against his chest, trying to create some distance between them, but his heart beating under her hand almost soothed her into surrender. ‘Don’t pull away from me now.’

  Her arm went weak as a passion illuminated his rich brown eyes, a passion far greater than that she’d seen in them when he’d told her he’d find the Northwest Passage. She curled her fingers around his lapel as all desire to run from him, from England—everything began to fade. The happiness she’d known with him hadn’t ended the day he’d sailed away. Instead, it had died slowly over weeks, and months, as every day made it more unlikely she’d ever see him again. Yet here he was alive, his eyes silently pleading for her to cross the distance between them. She couldn’t deny him, or herself. ‘I won’t.’

  She wrapped her hands around his neck, the need for solace driving her deeper into his arms. A warning like the one the miners sent up whenever a hill was about to collapse sounded from somewhere in the back of her mind, but she ignored it. His grip was too solid, the press of his lips too tender, but strong enough to ease the pain and loneliness which had burdened her for years.

  He crushed her to him, his mouth meeting hers with the demanding fervour of a man too long denied. Katie surrendered to the want in his kiss, arching against his body, giving herself up to the heady pleasure swirling between them. She parted her lips to accept his seeking tongue, returning each silken caress with one of her own. She wasn’t sure she could ever love anyone, even Conrad, again but his sincerity captured her as strongly now as it had the first time they’d kissed in this room.