Stranded With A Stranger

“I could fix your money problems.”

“Whoa, back up there. That wasn’t why I mentioned them. If I was into borrowing money I would have asked Bill—I’d known him a lot longer than I’ve known you.” This woman’s mind worked faster than a black cat disappearing at night.

She was hard to keep up with and knew exactly which buttons to push. He’d have to learn to keep his mouth shut and not give her another opening. He polished off the rest of his wine in one gulp.

Chelsea signaled the sommelier to refill Kurt’s glass, but kept her smile tucked inside her mind as she did it. She’d learned negotiating on her daddy’s knee and knew not to blow the deal by letting the other side recognize you could see the winning post streaking toward you. “I’m not talking about a loan. You have something I want and I have something you need. Fair exchange is no robbery. Let’s parler.”

Her mind clicked to possibilities that hadn’t entered her plans when she sat outside on the veranda. Now it took shape, a plan she hadn’t considered before. “I think the least you can do is give me a trial. I deserve at least that. I believe I can cope. You don’t. Take me up there and give me a chance to prove what I can do.”

She saw Kurt’s lips quirk, pulling his mouth up at one side. The action emphasized the depth of the dimple in his chin and distracted her attention from his words for a moment, but only a moment.

“You really think you can take the leap from a climbing wall to the highest mountain in the world in one go?” He gave the question a facetious quality with the lift of one eyebrow.

Chelsea wasn’t used to being talked down to, even by men who were six inches taller. But she now knew she had an edge. Seduction and feminine wiles didn’t have to come into her proposition. This was business. Her territory. “I’ll never know unless I’m given the chance to try. Look at it this way—you’re here, you’re available and you need the money. I have money, I want to find my sister’s body and you have the opportunity to make sure I’ll be safe before you take me on. Or rather take me up the mountain.”

“Why don’t you just pay me to go up and recover the bodies and bring them down to Namche Bazaar?”

“No… Definitely not. That isn’t the way it’s going to go down. I have to be there.” She couldn’t take the chance on someone else finding the key before her.

His dark eyes glinted as if he sensed she wasn’t telling him the whole truth. She was right. “What’s so important about you being there?”

She rolled her eyes at him and thought fast. “If this is the moment when you expect me to spill all my guilty little secrets about my relationship with Atlanta, forget about it. I don’t remember what I told you last night, but that was whiskey-on-an-empty-stomach talking. All I’ve had today is a few sips of wine and a big breakfast.”

The mention of food appeared to trigger the arrival of their first course—corn and feta fritters, layered with bacon strips and vegetables. It had sounded good on the menu, but at the moment it had lost its appeal by slowing the momentum of their conversation. Kurt had already made it clear that he didn’t care to have a discussion in front of any of the dining-room staff.

It didn’t matter to her who knew she wanted to go up Mount Everest after her sister’s body. There was only one secret she needed to keep, apart from her connection to IBIS, and that was the whereabouts of the key. This was the first time in her twenty-eight years that she had felt the lives of thousands of employees lay in the palm of her hand.

She didn’t look on it as a burden. All she knew was there was no way she wanted to let them down. She hadn’t even stopped long enough to check out wills or anything. Maybe someone from Bill’s family owned part of Tedman Foods. She didn’t give a hoot. As a Tedman, Chelsea was the last of that name, Arlon Rowles being her father’s first cousin only because their mothers had been sisters.

The server left and Chelsea picked up her knife and fork, but didn’t use them. She wasn’t able to start eating. Getting her own way was more important than food, even if she had been starving.

She watched Kurt cut into a fritter and layer it with bacon and tomato on his fork. Once his mouth was full and he had no choice but to listen, she made her move.

“If you’re worried about my safety, don’t be. It won’t make any difference. I will go up there, either with you or someone else, even if I have to fly an experienced guide in from the States. They can’t all be in Namche Bazaar right now.

“What you have is a chance to make sure I can make it. I’m fit. I have some experience with ropes, knots, carabiners and ascenders. Teach me enough to get me up to where Atlanta and Bill are lying. I know you trust yourself. Well, forget about the accident. I trust you enough to get me up there and back again in one piece. So what do you say? Have we got a deal?”

She gripped her eating utensils hard.

Not that that would stop her hands shaking, or dissipate the sense of urgency coursing through her veins as if her life was at stake. She thought of Maddie and knew that it could be, if knowledge of the key Atlanta had been carrying got out.

The sooner they did this the better.

Chelsea meant what she’d said. She trusted Kurt Jellic with her life, only she couldn’t tell him that her life was more likely to be in danger from an external force, not the mountain that had taken her sister.

Kurt’s face was grim. Did he consider that what she asked amounted to blackmail? But like it or not, fate had linked them in this endeavor. And like it or not, there was no going against fate. The monks in the temples of this high mountain stronghold would be the first to agree with the supposition that it was already written in the sands of time.

“Since you put it like that, you leave me no choice.”

He took a sip of wine while Chelsea held her breath.

“I know someone who owns a place we can use. It’s not on Everest, but it’s within four days’ walk from here, maybe three depending on your stamina. The mountain it’s close to isn’t anything like as high as Everest, so we won’t have to worry about oxygen. We won’t need tanks where you want to go, in any case. We don’t have to climb to the top.

“What Ama Dablam does have is a glacier, an icefall that’s easier to reach than any of the others. And if you can’t make it on this one, you’ll never be able to reach the couloir where their bodies fell.”

She wanted to punch the air and shout Yes! Her next reaction was to tell him I’m glad you see things my way, but they were still in Namche Bazaar and neither reaction was what she would call politic. Also, Kurt’s face looked carved out of the ice he’d told her about.

But she couldn’t hide the excitement fizzing through her veins. She could make this happen. Hard work, danger—hah, she laughed in their faces. She would do this. “When do we start?”

“As soon as we’ve got you kitted out and I’ve instructed Sherpa Rei to rehire one of his cousins and some more Sherpa porters to carry our gear.”

“Good. I can’t wait.”

The sooner the better.

She flashed him a smile that had nothing to do with getting her own way and everything to do with knowing she was going to spend some quality time with this guy. “Eat up, then let’s get out of here. I don’t know about you, but suddenly I’m filled with energy.”

Chapter 4

They spent three nights on the trail to Ama Dablam, sleeping in tourist lodges on the way, their first stop at Tengboche within sight of the great Buddhist monastery.

The distance wasn’t great, but the path rose and fell steeply, winding between tall, leafy, scented trees, some of them seemingly growing straight out of the rocks. But once their path branched away from Mount Everest and Base Camp, their height above sea level rose and the green shade was left behind.

At Ama Dablam, one look was enough to tell Chelsea that when Kurt said, I know someone who owns a place we can use he wasn’t talking about the type of mountain lodge you might find at Aspen, or near the standard of the lodges dotting Sagarmatha National Park.

The almost squalid little shack was like nothing she’d ever experienced. Its owner, whom Kurt knew well enough to ask a favor from, was a Sherpa, another relative of Kora’s brother.