“You’ve…been sitting with me. They tell me you were very…faithful.”

“I had the time,” Katrien said, not knowing how to deal with this. She looked away, clasped and unclasped her hands, and finally said, “I wanted to help.”

“I’m…grateful.” Zachary paused, took a couple of labored breaths. “Only a bit…confused.”

“Yes, I—” Where did she start explaining?

“Must be the…hypothermia.” He drew a struggling breath. “Along with…everything else…seem to be suffering…a bit of amnesia. I love you, Katrien…but…when did we get engaged?”

DAPHNE CLAIR lives in subtropical New Zealand, with her Dutch-born husband. They have five children. At eight years old she embarked on her first novel, about taming a tiger. This epic never reached a publisher, but metamorphosed male tigers still prowl the pages of her romances. She has won literary prizes for short stories and nonfiction, and has also published poetry. As Laurey Bright she writes for Silhouette.

Reckless Engagement
Daphne Clair

www.millsandboon.co.uk

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER ONE

THE man of her dreams.

She knew him. Knew him in the abrupt tightness of her breath, and in the hot quicksilver that had suddenly replaced her bones, so that her body seemed held together by nothing but the startling tension that suffused it.

Across the big high-ceilinged room, filled with people holding glasses of wine and restlessly chattering, the man’s head lifted as though he’d felt the concentration of her stare, and his eyes met hers.

A dark brow lifted in amused enquiry, and a hint of masculine speculation entered fathomless sea-green eyes. The hard lines of his mouth took on a subtle curve.

‘Katie?’ Callum touched Katrien’s arm, and she flinched. ‘Katie?’

Her eyes ached. She blinked, moistening them. ‘Sorry. I was thinking.’ Her fiancé’s familiar features and perfectly groomed sandy hair, and the kind blue eyes peering worriedly into her clear silver-grey ones, seemed faraway, in another dimension.

The stranger’s hair, almost as black as his decisive brows, was carelessly cut, showing a tendency to curl onto the collar of his dinner suit. He stood with a hand thrust into a trouser pocket, his stance one of casual ease, and yet he didn’t seem to belong in this elegant gathering. Perhaps it was because he was so big—broad in the shoulders and tall.

‘I’ll get you a drink,’ Callum offered, steering Katrien further into the crowd. He beckoned a passing waiter and took two glasses from the silver tray the man proffered. ‘Here, you look as though you need it.’ As her hand closed about the glass, Callum worried, ‘You haven’t really got over that flu, have you? You’ve lost weight.’ He touched a strand of the thick, russet-lit hair that lay on her bared shoulders, and smoothed it back from her cheek.

Katrien made her lips move into a smile. ‘I’m fine, really.’ She took a sip of the wine, cool and dry to her tongue. And smiled again. ‘Models are supposed to be thin.’

Callum smiled back, making an intimacy of it. ‘I don’t want you too thin.’ He raised his glass at her before drinking from it. ‘To us…our future.’

An inexplicable panic fluttered about her heart. Then a couple they knew swooped on them, and while the man clapped Callum on the shoulder the woman demanded to see her ring.

Katrien obligingly held out her left hand, regarding the large diamond flanked by two smaller ones with disturbing detachment, almost as though she hadn’t been there when Callum had plucked it from the jeweller’s tray and smoothed it onto her finger, declaring with satisfaction that it fitted so perfectly it might have been made for her.

She tried to recapture the glow of warmth that she’d felt then, scarcely two weeks ago. Tried to fix her mind on the conversation of her companions. But all the time she was fighting an urge to look for the man who had evoked that powerful sense of recognition when she’d first entered.

Some inward antenna seemed to tell her when he moved, coming closer. A shiver passed over her skin, and she couldn’t stop herself from turning her head, hunting him down. He wasn’t looking in her direction, but at the touch of her gaze she saw his shoulders tauten, his head begin to swivel, and she forced herself to look away, fixing Callum with such an attentive look that he faltered in what he was saying and looked at her enquiringly.

Katrien gave him an encouraging smile, and drank some more of her wine. She hadn’t the faintest idea what the topic of conversation was.

The man moved away, and now the crowd was drifting towards the tables in an adjoining room.

Callum took her emptied glass and deposited it with another waiter. She felt as though she was walking on a layer of fog between the high heels of her shoes and the floor. Maybe she had downed the wine too quickly on an empty stomach. Just as well they were to have dinner.

It was a charity affair in aid of the widow and children of a mountaineer who had died on a New Zealand expedition to the Himalayas some months ago, the after-dinner speech to be given by a friend who had survived the journey—Zachary Ballantine. There had been photographs of him in all the national papers at the time of the tragedy—grainy snapshots of a gaunt and bearded man with haunted dark eyes shadowed by snow-frosted brows under the fur-edged hood of his parka.

Every TV station and newspaper in New Zealand must have wanted his story, but he had shunned the news media, refusing to give interviews. Yet someone had persuaded him to speak tonight.

The man she found so unsettling was seated at a table near the shallow dais on which a microphone stood ready. Katrien looked at him once and then dragged her gaze away. She hardly tasted the food that was put before her, mechanically emptying the plates until she found herself staring at a mound of chocolate cake and cream, and her stomach revolted. She pushed away the dish and grabbed her wine glass. It was empty—again. She’d already drunk far more than usual, but when Callum refilled the glass she gave him a distracted smile and raised the glass to her lips.

His arm came around her, a hand squeezing her shoulder. ‘Are you okay?’ he whispered, glancing at her untouched dessert.

‘Of course. You know I don’t usually eat sweets, and anyway I’m full.’

He smiled and nuzzled her temple with his cheek. ‘It’ll do you good.’ He drew back slightly and his gaze lingered on her bare shoulders and the low neckline of her dress. ‘You can do with a bit more weight. Not that you aren’t gorgeous.’ His fingers tightened. ‘I can’t wait to get you alone.’ Turning aside briefly, he took a spoon and scooped up some of the untouched dessert, presenting it to her with a teasing grin. ‘Open up.’

Katrien laughed and shook her head, but he insisted, and she parted her lips and let him slide the spoonful between them. It tasted sickly, and when he repeated the gesture she put a staying hand on his wrist, smiling so that he wouldn’t think she was angry. ‘No, really. I can’t eat any more.’

Callum was smiling too. ‘You have a bit of cream…’ He ducked his head and licked it from the corner of her mouth.

Someone across the table laughed, and Katrien drew back, turning away.

Her gaze collided with a stormy, deep green one across the room.

She felt heat along her cheekbones as the man’s brooding expression changed to amusement tinged with satire. A faint anger stirred inside her, along with an odd recurrence of fear.

Callum said, ‘I was only teasing—’

‘I know.’ She turned back to him. ‘It’s okay.’ Callum was sensitive to her moods. It was one reason why she loved him.

Coffee was served and the chairwoman of the committee got up to introduce the guest speaker with a long spiel about his adventurous career climbing mountains, working in the Antarctic, helping to build a hospital in Nepal, and exploring the world’s highest, wildest regions. She stepped down and led a round of introductory applause for Zachary Ballantine.

The lights dimmed except for the spotlight illuminating the dais. And with a curious lack of surprise Katrien watched the man who got up to walk forward with an unhurried, confident stride to take his place behind the microphone. Without the beard she hadn’t recognised him earlier.

He looked around the room, and she thought his seacoloured eyes flickered as they met hers; then he glanced at a card in his hand and began to speak.

Katrien stared at the cup of coffee before her, watched the steam rising from it, and picked up a spoon, then quietly replaced it in the saucer. She took her coffee black, no sugar.

He had a resonant voice like dark, slightly gritty honey. At the first syllable Katrien felt a profound sense of recognition, a reverberating bell note deep in her soul.

For a long time she just listened to the sound, not the words, fixing her gaze on the white tablecloth before her. But in the end her eyes lifted and found him where he stood on the raised dais, commanding the room. And as if he knew, his head tilted and he paused, his gaze momentarily homing in on her. He looked away and consulted the card in his hand again before shoving it into his pocket and continuing his speech.

She tried to curb the hurried rhythm of her heart, telling herself he could scarcely see anyone in the partially lit room.

Beside her Callum stirred, his fingers still resting lightly on her bare shoulder, and she fought an extraordinary urge to shrug away from his touch.

‘There’s no feeling quite like being literally on top of the world,’ Zachary Ballantine was saying. ‘Standing on the summit of Everest, looking down across those mountains, a view that goes on for ever—it puts all the pain, the effort, the danger into perspective. You know then that whatever you went through to get there, it was all worth it. Every climber wants to do Everest. Ben and I did it for the first time together—five years ago. It was something neither of us would ever forget.’

He paused again, staring at the floor as if searching it for inspiration. Someone clinked a coffee cup into its saucer. Someone else shuffled a chair.

Zachary Ballantine looked up slowly. ‘After that, all you can do is search for harder climbs, untried routes, more challenges, mountains that are still unconquered.’

‘Why?’ Callum muttered humorously in Katrien’s ear.

Katrien shook her head slightly. She didn’t understand either, but suddenly, passionately, she wanted to. She was concentrating now, intently, afraid to miss a word.

‘There’s always another mountain.’ The man in the circle of light placed a hand on the gleaming chrome of the microphone stand and gripped it. ‘Always another challenge, another risk, another Circe luring men to lay down their lives for her…’

His voice had lowered and he was staring at his hand clasped about the cold metal rod before him. This time when he stopped speaking no whisper of sound touched the silence.

Katrien was sure that for a second or two he had forgotten his audience and departed from his prepared script. He released his hold and thrust his hand into his pocket.

‘Men,’ he said slowly, his gaze seemingly fixed on some distant point outside the room, ‘and women, make mistakes. And the mountains are unforgiving. Last year they took the closest friend I’ve ever had—or ever will have. Ben Storey was the best.’ His head turned slightly and his eyes shifted and refocused to meet Katrien’s. She felt her own head lift infinitesimally, her gaze caught by the naked pain in his. ‘The best friend, the best mountain man, the greatest person I’ve ever known. I miss him.’

He stepped back then one pace, out of the brightness of the light. His pain crashed around her, and she closed her eyes against it, her body trembling, her throat aching with the effort not to cry.

When she opened her eyes he was gone, taking his seat again amidst a wave of applause. Callum had removed his clasp from her shoulder to join in the clapping, and she wrenched apart the hands locked damply in her lap and did the same.

A woman across the table picked up her napkin and wiped away a tear.

I’m not the only one, Katrien told herself. He probably had the same effect on every woman in the room.

The purpose of the evening was to raise funds for the dead mountaineer’s family. Zachary Ballantine’s speech had been calculated to arouse sympathy. And no doubt he had been genuinely fond of his friend. It was very sad but she knew neither of them, and when the news had first broken of the disastrous expedition her chief emotions had been pity for the woman who had lost her husband and the father of her two children, and a sort of distant anger with the man who had deliberately put his life in danger despite their dependence on him.

She had never understood what drove anyone to take insane risks in order to experience some adrenalin high that apparently came with the knowledge that death was breathing down one’s neck. It seemed to her a bizarre, aberrant way of living.

Watching Zachary Ballantine rise to shake hands with a pretty young woman who had rushed to his table and now gazed at him with something approaching adoration, Katrien was unexpectedly angry all over again. How could they—men like him, with grace and attraction and the glamour that clung to them as known adventurers—make women love them, and then carelessly throw away their lives in pursuit of some Boys’ Own dream? It was unfair, and downright cruel.

The young woman smiled and touched his arm, her white, ringless hand resting on the sleeve of his jacket, her lovely face earnest as she spoke to him, no doubt artlessly telling of her admiration, leaving herself open to being hurt by him.

‘You fool.’ Katrien’s lips shaped the words.

‘What?’ Callum leaned closer.

She shook her head. ‘Nothing. Can we go now?’ She didn’t think she could bear watching this any longer. Her emotions seemed to have turned into some ill-tempered steed, bucking and swerving all over the place. Maybe Callum was right; she hadn’t fully recovered from the bout of flu that had recently attacked her.

‘You don’t want to speak to the guest of honour first?’ Callum enquired.

There was a bevy of people around him now. The girl was standing on the outskirts, looking slightly crestfallen. ‘No,’ Katrien said. ‘He has plenty of admirers. And I’m…tired.’

Callum gave a surprised grin at the unintended waspishness in her tone. He stood up to pull out her chair. ‘Come on, then. I’ll get us a cab.’ He never drove his car if he was going to be drinking. Callum’s strict sense of responsibility was another of the things she liked about him. He would never worry her by going off on some wild, hazardous adventure.

He left her standing in the carpeted foyer, a light woollen wrap draped about her shoulders, while he ventured into the street to find a taxi.

She shouldn’t have drunk so much. Her head felt weightless and a bit swimmy. Shifting from foot to foot, she looked around for a chair. The only two—gilt affairs flanking a tiny marble-topped table—were occupied by a couple having a low-voiced but apparently passionate conversation.

Closing her eyes, she leaned back against the embossed paper on the wall.

‘Are you all right?’

Recognising the deep voice, Katrien straightened with a jerk, her eyes flying wide. Black spots danced before her vision and her forehead went cold and damp.

Hard hands clamped on her arms, steadying her. She ducked her head and closed her eyes again, willing away the brief dizziness before slowly and carefully looking up.

So near, Zachary Ballantine’s sea-green eyes were uncomfortably penetrating. She could see the lift of his cheekbones beneath faintly tanned skin, and a tiny white scar at the corner of his upper lip; smell soap, and wool suiting and a hint of something that brought to mind pine trees and wooded, snowy slopes. Aftershave?

She said, ‘Yes, I’m all right. Thank you.’

He still held her arms. ‘You’re very pale.’

‘I’ve had the flu.’ His grasp was less tight now, his thumbs making absent stroking movements against her skin. Katrien’s breath clutched at her throat, and she swallowed. ‘You’re not leaving?’ she asked him. There must still be dozens of people wanting to speak to him.

‘I was on my way to the men’s room,’ he said, ‘when I saw you alone and palely loitering…’ He smiled. ‘I thought you were about to faint.’

No man should have a smile like that. It was positively lethal, glinting in his eyes and tilting the masculine planes of his mouth into a seductive curve framing a glimpse of white, even teeth.

She felt the involuntary tightening of her facial muscles, the widening of her eyes. And knew he’d read the startling, inappropriate quickening of sexual awareness when his own eyes darkened and the smile died from his mouth. She saw the slight flare of his nostrils as he took a deeper breath, and long dark lashes momentarily veiled his eyes as he dropped his gaze a few inches to her parted lips.

Katrien felt dizzy again, and perhaps he noticed, because his hold on her arms became more urgent, almost painful.

Her body curved towards him, her spine arching subtly, her head tipping back—movements that were small but unmistakable. Her eyelids fluttered, and she watched his mouth part as he leaned towards her.

Then Callum’s voice said, ‘Okay, Katie—got one.’ And, more sharply, ‘What’s going on?’

Katrien jumped, automatically raising her hands to push ineffectually at Zachary Ballantine’s chest as her body stiffened.

His hands slid from her arms without haste and he turned. ‘Who are you?’ he demanded of the man who had been at Katrien’s side all evening and was now striding towards them.

Callum blinked, looking both outraged and uncertain.

Katrien laid a hand on his arm as she stepped to his side. ‘This is Callum Steward,’ she said. ‘My fiancé. Mr Ballantine thought I was going to faint, Callum,’ she explained. ‘He was kind enough to stop and…offer his help.’

Her cheeks burned. She knew that her fiancé’s searching glance would see no sign of paleness now.

Callum’s arm slipped about her waist. ‘You felt faint?’

‘Just a bit. I’m all right now.’ She risked a fleeting glance at Zachary Ballantine, and saw that he appeared cynically amused.

Addressing Callum, he said, ‘I wouldn’t leave her alone if I were you.’ As she looked up again his eyes shifted, giving her a cool, assessing stare. ‘She seems likely to fall into the arms of any passing stranger.’

Katrien sucked in a choking breath. ‘Not at all. It was a momentary dizziness. I’m sure it would have passed.’

‘Apparently,’ Zachary Ballantine observed, ‘it has.’

‘Still,’ Callum said with a shade too much heartiness, ‘I’m grateful you were there to catch her, Mr Ballantine. We enjoyed your talk, by the way.’ He held out his hand, and after a moment the big man took it in his.

‘Thank you.’

‘Thank you for looking after my fiancée. Now if you’ll excuse us, I’ve got a cab outside. Come on, darling…’

As they walked away and Callum pushed open the door, ushering her into the wintry air outside, Katrien knew that the other man was watching them. She resisted turning to look back at him.

Zachary Ballantine was the stuff dreams were made of. Every woman’s fantasy. His friend who had died on the mountain had been another one. She recalled a picture of Ben Storey published in the aftermath of his death—a young god smiling against the backdrop of a snow-covered mountain, the sun glinting on his golden hair, the hood of his parka pushed back and a pair of goggles slung about his neck.

On the same page had been a picture of his widow, looking with tearless bravery straight into the camera as she cradled the youngest of her children in her arms while the other leaned against her knee.

Katrien even remembered the caption: ‘Mountaineer “died doing what he wanted”.’ The quote had been from Wendy Storey, the woman who had supported his insane aspirations and borne his children. Like everyone else she had praised his courage. Katrien had admired hers more.

‘Thank heaven,’ she said to Callum as he got into the cab beside her and took her hand in his, ‘you have no desire to conquer mountains.’

‘How do you know?’ he asked her lightly.

Katrien directed him a look of undiluted horror.

Callum laughed, pulling her into his arms. ‘I have other desires,’ he growled in her ear.

She let him kiss her, and kissed him back, trying to banish from behind her closed lids the vivid memory of aroused male curiosity in a pair of deep green eyes.

When the taxi driver let them out at the door of her flat in the inner suburb of Herne Bay, her hair had lost its sleek styling and Callum was breathing less than evenly. He fumbled as he dug in his wallet for money to pay the driver before following Katrien inside.

She made coffee and they sat side by side on the comfortable softness of the two-seater sofa in her sitting room while they drank it, but when he took her in his arms again she laid her head on his shoulder and said, ‘I’m really tired, Callum.’

He stroked her hair. ‘I’m a selfish brute.’

‘No, you’re not. You’re the nicest man I’ve ever known. But I guess you’re right…I haven’t quite got over the flu bug. I’m sorry.’

‘Don’t worry about it.’ He kissed her forehead. ‘I’ll wait until you’re properly well again.’

He was the nicest man she knew. So why was she suddenly finding it impossible to look at him? Why did she feel that if he didn’t leave soon she’d scream?

She kissed him on the lips, not giving him a chance to reciprocate before she pulled away and turned to rise from the sofa and pick up their cups. ‘Maybe next time…’ she muttered vaguely.

Almost any other man would have swept her into bed the minute he’d got a ring on her finger, if not before. Callum had too much finesse for that. He’d been prepared to wait for the right moment. And when the right moment was delayed by her inconveniently succumbing to the nasty ailment that seemed to have afflicted half the population this winter, he’d sent her flowers and phoned every day, even called in person with offers of nursing and food.

She’d wanted only to be left alone to subsist on packet soups and orange juice, and not to have him see her looking and feeling like a sodden and aching dishrag.

His offers spurned, Callum had phoned her sister, and Miranda had come round regularly with chicken soup and aspirin and bracing sympathy, sometimes bringing the youngest of her three children, with strict instructions to stay out of the sickroom and not disturb Aunty Kat.

Callum phoned for another cab while Katrien took the cups into the kitchen. She fussed around washing and drying them and putting away the sugar bowl she’d taken out for Callum’s coffee, making sure that no grains had spilled on the bench to attract Auckland’s voracious ants. Of course there were none. If there had been Callum would have wiped them up himself.

She was hanging up the tea towel when he came to the kitchen doorway. ‘I’ll be off, then,’ he said. ‘The cab will be here in a few minutes.’

She walked with him to the door, and he kissed her gently and lingeringly, his thumbs stroking her cheeks as he lifted his head and smiled down at her.

She recalled Zachary Ballantine caressing her arms. His skin had been less smooth than Callum’s, the pads of his thumbs faintly rasping.

She closed the door behind Callum and leaned against it, her forehead on the painted wood. What was wrong with her tonight?

She had a warm shower, then climbed into bed wearing a fleecy-lined cotton nightshirt. After switching off the light she lay staring into the darkness for a long time.

When at last her eyes drifted shut and the night enfolded her, he came.

It was the same as always. The man held her in his strong, imprisoning arms, and spoke words she couldn’t hear. And she struggled, frightened and unable to breathe, trapped in silent, murky depths, until the dark voice commanded her stillness, her compliance. And the words came clearly to her—Trust me.

The voice changed to reassurance, soothing her panic away. She felt his mouth on her lips, his breath filling her, the warmth of his body against the utter coldness of hers. And then the warmth flooded her as she clung to him while he lifted her and carried her out of the blackness and into the dazzle of light. And she opened her closed eyes and looked up at him.

She had dreamed of him so often that she knew now how the bright sun behind him shadowed his features, so that she could never see what he looked like.

Only this time it was different. His eyes were the deep green of the sea, and his hair was sleeked back but stubbornly waved; the chest she rested against and his shoulders under her encircling arms were bare and muscled.

He looked at her and smiled, and she felt her lips part under the lambent fire in his gaze.

Then he lowered his head and at the touch of his mouth on hers, her eyes flew open on darkness.

Her heart pounded as if she’d been running, and the bedclothes were disarrayed about her heated body. She pulled at them, then sat up and switched the bedside lamp back on, pushed back tumbled hair from her damp temples and squinted down at the time on her watch.

She’d been asleep for less than an hour.

Slumping back on the pillows, she left the light on and fiercely gazed at the cream-painted wall opposite her bed.

She had never been able to see the man. Sometimes she’d woken crying with frustration because he wouldn’t reveal himself to her, wouldn’t let her find out what he looked like.

Now, for the first time, the man of her dreams—and nightmares—had a face.

CHAPTER TWO

‘YOU know I don’t do swimsuit work.’ Katrien handed back the folder her agent had passed to her.

Hattie Fisher sighed. ‘You’re limiting your options. And this assignment—’

‘Yes, the money’s good.’

‘The advertising agency asked for you specially, you know.’

‘I’m flattered that they want me, but I’ll pass on this one, thanks.’

‘I don’t have anything else for you at the moment, until that shampoo commercial you’re booked for.’

‘That’s okay. I could do with a break.’ Katrien quashed a tremor of anxiety. She’d had to pull out of her last assignment when she got the flu and now here she was with only one confirmed booking in view. Modelling work within New Zealand was limited, and although in the past she’d flown to Australia at the drop of a hat, and sometimes further afield, she’d promised Callum to limit her overseas assignments. But she had her savings, and maybe it was time she took a holiday.

‘Skiing?’ Callum looked doubtful, stirring sugar into his coffee. Katrien had phoned his office and suggested meeting for lunch at their favourite downtown café. ‘Do you think that’s wise when you’re just getting over the flu?’

‘Mountain air’s healthy, they say. And there’s a special deal going at Whakapapa, with accommodation at the Chateau.’

‘Well, at least you’d be comfortable, in a decent hotel.’

More than decent, Katrien thought. The wonderful old hotel offered luxury on the ski fields. ‘With all the rumbling Mount Ruapehu’s been doing in the last couple of seasons, I guess they have to get as many people down there as they can.’ The volcano had created havoc by spreading ash on the snow and many tourists had been frightened away by the danger of eruptions, although others had enjoyed the thrill of watching the mountain throw fire and rocks into the sky. The ski fields had not opened on schedule and the operators had lost a lot of money.

‘You’ll get cold and wet,’ Callum fussed. ‘Suppose you have a relapse?’

‘I’ll be careful, and with the proper gear I won’t get cold—or wet.’

‘I wish I could come with you, but the bank wouldn’t look kindly on a request for leave right now.’ He was a senior bank executive and his job was much too important for him to go on holiday at a moment’s notice.

‘I wish you could come too,’ Katrien assured him, disturbed to find that it was a lie. ‘But you don’t ski, and it’s only for a week. You’ll hardly know I’m gone.’

‘Not true. I’ll miss you every day.’

Katrien gave him an absent smile. ‘That’s sweet. I’ll miss you too.’ Surely it was the aftermath of her illness that had caused this odd lethargy of her emotions. When she was really over it the warm, loving feelings would come back. She reached out for his hand and his fingers closed around hers. ‘I love you,’ she murmured.

His clasp tightened and a flush came into his cheeks. He raised her hand to his face and pressed his lips into her palm. His voice muffled, he said, ‘And I love you!’

Her heart contracted, shrinking. Gooseflesh chilled her arms. She looked away, and was relieved when Callum lowered their joined hands to the table. Feeling guilty and bothered, she let her fingers lie slackly in his grasp. ‘I’ve already made a booking,’ she told him. ‘I leave tomorrow morning.’

‘That…’ He cleared his throat. ‘That was quick.’

‘Once I’d made up my mind—’ Katrien shrugged.

‘Yes, well… You’ll be packing tonight, then?’

Katrien forced herself to look at him regretfully, apologetically. ‘I’ve got a lot to do.’

‘When you get back…’ Callum smiled hopefully.

‘I’ll be fully recovered then,’ she promised. ‘As soon as I’m home I’ll let you know.’

The ski slopes were magnificent, the snow glinting like spun sugar in the wintry sun. Tiny figures zigzagged down the mountain, far below the adzed peaks veiled in snow and a drift of lazy cloud.

Looking forward to joining them, Katrien idled up the slope in the chairlift, the cold air numbing her nose even as the sun warmed her cheeks. She raised her eyes to the mountain top, and found herself speculating on what drove men like Zachary Ballantine. Going up with the object of skiing down again with the wind in her face and the snow sliding away beneath her skis was one thing. Climbing laboriously over sheer rock faces and across treacherous ice fields and skirting hidden crevasses with the sole aim of reaching the top was another, totally alien concept.

Her first skiing lesson had been during a photo shoot for a travel magazine. She’d been playing the part of a beginner—and played it convincingly because she was. Later she’d paid for more lessons, partly because she’d found it enjoyable and a challenge, and partly because she figured it might be a useful skill to add to her portfolio, just as it was handy to be able to sit on a horse without falling off. It had paid off. She’d gained a couple of assignments modelling winter sportswear on the strength of her ability to provide genuine action shots on skis.

The chairlift deposited her at the intermediate slope, a level at which she was quite confident now.

The snow was already crisscrossed with the marks of those who had gone before her. As she adjusted her goggles and took off, someone far below in a red jacket wavered, fell and landed in a flurry of snow, then picked themselves up again. The snow swished under her skis as she gathered momentum, her knees bent, her body perfectly balanced, the stretchy fabric of her bright pink body-hugging ski pants allowing her freedom of movement.

By the time she’d made the run a few times she was exhilarated. She’d taken a tumble once but had landed unhurt and untangled herself to complete the course with ease. The rest of the time she’d skied smoothly and well.

On her last run of the day down the milky incline, she saw a blur of dark blue and bright yellow to one side as another skier swooped past.

A man, slim-hipped, broad-shouldered, and skiing with such speed and grace that she couldn’t help but admire his style. Surely he belonged on the uppermost slopes where the real experts hung out.

When she reached the end of the run she found herself looking around for him, but there was no blue and yellow ski suit in sight. She caught a bus back to the hotel and had an early meal and a leisurely hot soak, gave her skin a thorough moisturising treatment to combat the effects of sun and wind, and retired to her bed with a book, later slipping into a dreamless sleep.

The next day she decided to go to the third level and think about testing herself out on it. If the run looked too difficult on close inspection she could ride down again to the familiar, less difficult slopes.

The summit appeared much nearer from where the chairlift left her this time. Today no cloud obscured the peak, and there was no sign of its recent volcanic activity. It looked remote and beautiful and unattainable. She remembered that in Maori legend the mountain was a woman, squabbled over by her jealous lovers, the other mountains nearby. One, Taranaki, had retired in dudgeon to the coast and now reigned there in splendid isolation. His rival Tongariro remained nearby, occasionally huffing and puffing his displeasure in clouds of volcanic steam.

Katrien watched a couple of skiers take off and gather speed while she stood by, still a little uncertain.

Deciding to have a cup of coffee first, she turned away from the ski field to the nearby café, leaving her skis with all the others leaning against the building before going in.

She was sipping coffee and contemplating the ski run when she heard the voice. ‘Thanks a lot.’

That was all, but it brought her head whipping round, in time to see the back of a blue-and-yellow-clad figure disappear through the doorway. Tall, dark-haired.

No, she told herself. You’re imagining things.

But she had hastily clattered her half-finished cup of coffee back into its saucer and was on her way to the door before she even realised what she was doing.

She’d look silly retracing her steps, so she kept walking out onto the deck.

He was bent over, doing up the buckles on his boots. She watched fatalistically until he’d straightened. And then he looked up and saw her.

‘Mr Ballantine,’ she said.

His surprise showed only in a faint lifting of his brows, an even fainter glint of light in his eyes. ‘Hello,’ he said, ‘…Katie.’

‘It’s Katrien,’ she told him. ‘Katrien Cromwell.’

He nodded. ‘Katrien.’ The name left his tongue like a caress, giving the ‘r’ a slight burr so that it sounded exotic and foreign.

‘I saw you yesterday,’ she told him, ‘on the intermediate slope, but you seemed too good to be on that level.’

‘I did a cross-country run yesterday, then made my way down the mountain.’

‘I guess you have a lot of experience.’

Something changed in his eyes. He looked at her, standing there in her pink ski suit, her hair loose about her shoulders since she’d pulled off her hat when she entered the café. ‘Some. How about you?’ he asked.

Katrien wrenched her eyes from his and looked down the slope. ‘I came up here today thinking I might try this run but…I’m not sure I’m quite brave enough.’

‘Is your fiancé with you?’

She had to look back at him then. ‘He wasn’t able to get away. And anyway, he doesn’t ski.’

His mouth tilted up at one corner and he gave a brief nod. ‘I see.’ There was a small silence. ‘If you like, I’ll go down with you.’

‘I wouldn’t like to hold you up. I don’t suppose you want to spend your time nursing along a bunny skier.’

‘You’re no bunny,’ he argued. ‘You looked pretty competent yesterday.’ At her surprised look, he added, ‘I recognise the…outfit.’ He cast a glance over the figure-hugging stretch pants and the fleecy-lined shirt under her open jacket. ‘So…shall we go?’

It was a challenge, pure and simple. He waited for her to make up her mind whether to accept it, or to walk away and return to the less exciting lower slopes.

She stepped onto the snow and retrieved her skis.

The sound of their skis gliding on the slick white surface was like tearing silk. Katrien’s hair streamed behind her, the momentum of her downhill flight dragging it back from her face. She had left the café in such a hurry she’d forgotten to retrieve her woollen hat.

Zachary was a blur of blue and yellow at her peripheral vision, a couple of times swooping away in a half loop, then coming back to stay at her side, moderating his speed to hers.

‘Okay?’ he shouted at her once, and she risked a look at his face, saw his white smile, and smiled back.

‘Okay!’

When they reached the end of the run she fluffed the stop and ended up in a jumbled heap, laughing.

Zachary offered a gloved hand and helped her up. ‘How was it?’

‘Wonderful!’ She brushed snow from her arms and body, and he reached out to flick away flakes of white from her hair.

His hand touched her cheek, and even though he still wore gloves, she felt a tingling awareness that stopped her smile and made her veil her eyes with her lashes. A flash of unease assailed her, and she tried to step away, forgetting she was wearing skis.

She would have toppled again if he hadn’t caught at her arms. ‘Steady.’

‘Thanks.’ She was breathless, not only from the run. ‘And thanks for bringing me down. I might have chickened out otherwise.’

‘I don’t think so.’

She glanced up and into his eyes, uncertain what it was she read there.

Then he looked away up the slope and said, ‘Want to try again?’

Why not? After the thrill of that descent, the thought of returning to the easier slopes seemed very tame. She nodded. ‘Yes. But this time you don’t need to wait for me.’

They shared a T-bar back to the top, holding on and standing side by side while little puffs of their steamy breath mingled in the frosty air.

Zachary waited for her to go first. She was halfway to the bottom when she heard a shout from behind and then two young men, whooping in feigned panic, went flying past, much too close for comfort. A quick look sideways showed her a third, about to cannon into her. She took evasive action and he careered on down the slope, but Katrien lost control and went sliding and skidding to the edge of the run, hitting her head painfully on a hidden rock under the snow and landing in a tangle of skis and poles, one of which went flying from her hand.

‘Katrien!’ Zachary slid to a stop beside her, clicked his boots from his skis with his poles and knelt to grip her shoulder. ‘Are you hurt?’

The white world gradually steadied. ‘Banged my head,’ she said. ‘But nothing’s broken.’

He swore. ‘Bloody fools, they were all over the place. Keep still. Where did you hurt your head?’

She put a hand to a tender, sore lump, and winced.

Zachary swore again. ‘Let me see.’ He bent over her, stripped off his gloves, and gently parted her hair. ‘Mmm. That’s a nasty bump. Are you feeling dizzy at all?’

‘No, not really.’

‘Not really?’ He frowned and shifted his hands to either side of her face, lifting it so he could study her.

‘I mean, it’s gone now. I’m all right.’ Except for the way her heart was hammering away.

Another skier slid to a stop nearby. ‘You okay?’

‘Yes,’ she said.

‘Hang on,’ Zachary requested of the man. Turning to her, he said, ‘We can get medicos up here if you might be concussed.’

‘I’m sure I’m not, honestly.’

He studied her again, then nodded to the would-be Samaritan. ‘We’re okay, thanks.’ The man gave them a wave and carried on downhill.

Katrien scooped up a handful of snow and pressed it to the bruise.

‘You should wear a hat,’ he said.

‘I took it off in the café and forgot it.’

‘Why didn’t you say so?’ He looked irritated. ‘If I’d known you had one with you I’d have made sure you put it on.’

She’d been afraid he might change his mind about accompanying her if she held him up. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I’ve spoiled your run again.’

‘Don’t worry about it. I have another five days.’

Had he opted for the same cut-rate package that she had taken? ‘I haven’t seen you at the hotel.’

‘I’m staying at a friend’s private lodge.’ He paused. ‘Were you looking for me at the hotel?’

Katrien blinked at him. ‘What do you mean?’

Zachary studied her face consideringly. ‘Never mind. Do you think you can stand, with my help?’

‘Yes.’ She could probably manage without it, but she didn’t fancy floundering round trying to get her balance if she was wrong. She manoeuvred herself into position, then stood up slowly while he steadied her. His hand remained on her waist and he was looking down at her with a slightly amused, knowing expression.

‘Thank you,’ she said tightly. ‘I can manage now.’

He didn’t move and she cast him a fierce glare. ‘I know I seem to have made a habit of looking to be in need of rescuing when you’re around, but it wasn’t deliberate. And I certainly didn’t come up the mountain with the intention of waylaying you.’ She was appalled that he might have thought so. ‘I don’t find climbers that fascinating, and anyway, in case you’d forgotten, I’m engaged to be married.’

‘I hadn’t forgotten,’ he said. ‘Had you?’

Katrien drew a deep, furious breath. ‘No!’ She’d done nothing that could be construed that way, she assured herself.

She stiffened against his light hold and put a hand behind her to tug at his wrist, but that was a mistake, making her body curve towards his just as he bent his head and increased the pressure of his hand on her waist against her ineffectual resistance. And said softly, ‘Could I make you…forget?’

His voice, his face were those of the man in her dreams, and for a second she imagined that this was another night fantasy. Tongue-tied, she was possessed of a great curiosity. The air around them seemed stilled, waiting.

But when his mouth was a hairsbreadth from hers, she jerked away, assailed by a sudden shaft of familiar fear. ‘No!’

‘Okay,’ Zachary said easily, releasing her. He picked up the pole she’d lost and handed it courteously to her. ‘Only that isn’t the message I’ve been getting from you.’

She looked up from pushing her gloved hand through the loop on the ski pole to see him regarding her with quizzical enquiry. Flushing, she realised he was right. Somehow in her mind he’d got mixed up with the larger-than-life figure who had dominated her dream life since adolescence. It wasn’t his fault that she’d been giving out confusing signals. She was confused herself.

‘The thing is,’ she said, ‘you remind me of someone I…met a long time ago.’

‘Not your fiancé?’

Katrien shook her head.

‘Does he know about this…someone?’

‘There’s nothing to know.’

‘Nothing?’ He gave a short, breathy laugh.

Katrien looked at him angrily, and he said, ‘I’d say your fiancé has a problem on his hands.’

‘It’s not a problem,’ she said emphatically. ‘You don’t understand.’ Not that there was any need for him to do so.

‘Does What’s-his-name understand?’

‘Callum,’ she said. ‘He has nothing to worry about, and excuse me, but it’s none of your business.’

‘Maybe it isn’t. But I tell you what—if I were engaged to you and saw you looking at another man the way you look at me, I’d be worried all right. I’d be doing something about it.’

‘Like what?’ she shot at him without thinking.

He looked thoughtful. ‘You probably don’t want to know.’

Violence? Her lip curled with scorn. ‘Of course, you rugged mountain men are so physical!’

‘Yeah,’ he said, his eyes glinting. ‘We are.’ His hand reached over, so casually, and cupped her chin, turning her face towards him. And then he leaned down and kissed her thoroughly, his lips exploring hers, parting them, mastering her with a flair and panache that he hadn’t learned on any mountain slopes.

Anchored by her skis, hampered by the ski poles looped to her hands, she could hardly move. Pure panic fought with the hot sweep of passion that sent the blood racing in her veins and made her lips pliant and shamefully eager under his.

Someone swished by with a whoop of laughter and someone else whistled shrilly across the snow. Katrien made a protesting sound and tried to tear herself from Zachary’s hold.

He lifted his head and looked down at her. ‘If I were your Callum,’ he said, ‘I’d be very worried.’

She pulled herself away, keeping her balance with some difficulty, and trying to breathe normally. ‘That was…’

‘Wonderful?’ he suggested as she hunted for words.

‘Unfair!’ she snapped. ‘Contemptible.’

His lips pursed. ‘I didn’t think my technique was that bad.’

He was laughing at her. ‘You had no right to kiss me!’

‘I didn’t notice you complaining.’

‘I’m complaining now!’

Zachary laughed. ‘After the fact.’

‘I could hardly do it before—I didn’t know what you intended.’

He gave her a level look. ‘You had a fair idea,’ he drawled. And added, ‘You wanted to know, too.’

About to deny it, she hesitated, and then clamped her teeth together. She had wanted to know—to know what he would do in Callum’s place, what it would be like to be kissed by him. She’d almost invited him to do it.

Mortified, she turned away from him. ‘Thank you for stopping. I’ll be fine on my own now.’

But he paced her all the way, then followed without comment as she made for the chairlift going down. ‘Is your head aching?’ he asked her.

‘No. It’s just a bump.’

‘If you feel unwell—’

‘I’m not unwell. But I think I’ll stick to the easy run after this.’

A chair arrived and she stepped forward. ‘If that satisfies you,’ he taunted quietly, standing aside as she took her seat and the safety bar came down in front of her.

Katrien stared straight ahead, refusing to look at him, and the chair lifted her into the air and carried her away from him.

She was in the hotel lounge bar, having a brandy after dinner and chatting with two American girls, when she saw Zachary come in, dressed in cords and a chunky natural wool sweater. He looked around the room, found her and gave her a nod, then approached the bar.

Katrien forced her attention back to her companions, but was aware of Zachary getting his drink and then crossing the room to them.

When he stopped before their table she had to look up and acknowledge his presence.

‘Hello, Katrien.’ He pulled her woollen hat from a back pocket and dropped it on the table. ‘I thought you might be missing this.’

‘Thank you,’ she said, staring at it.

‘May I?’ he asked politely, including the two Americans in his enquiring glance.

‘Oh, sure!’ One of them moved her chair over to make room for him to take the empty fourth at the table.

Katrien introduced him, and watched him charm the girls with his smile and stories of the mountains. But when she had finished her brandy and made to go he put down his glass and stood up. ‘Nice meeting you,’ he told the American girls, and followed Katrien from the room.

In the foyer he said, ‘I hoped to talk to you.’

‘What for?’

Taking her arm, he drew her over to where a couple of armchairs were placed at either side of a low table.

Reluctantly she sat down, and he took the other chair, leaning forward with his hands clasped between his knees. ‘To apologise,’ he said, ‘for imagining you were deliberately putting yourself in my way. And for the kiss…though it’s hard to say I’m sorry about that. I enjoyed it too much.’

He wasn’t the only one, she thought guiltily. ‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘Apology accepted. I guess…you couldn’t be blamed for wondering if I was pursuing you. I suppose women do.’

His mouth twitched in a half smile. ‘Not often enough. I was going to buy you a drink, but—’

They couldn’t return to the bar now. ‘I’ll take a rain-check on that,’ she offered.

‘Right. I’ll hold you to it.’ He leaned back, smiling at her in a relaxed fashion. ‘You’re a model, aren’t you? That’ll be why I thought I recognised you at the dinner when…we met.’

Was that why he’d stared at her, as she’d stared at him? She was used to people knowing who she was, or not knowing but being aware they’d seen her face somewhere. And yet she’d thought there was something different, some special awareness about the way he’d kept looking at her. Maybe she had simply imagined it because of her own sense of recognition, her conviction that he was the man who haunted her sleep.

‘You’ve probably seen some of my magazine work,’ she suggested. ‘Or maybe a TV ad.’

‘I think I’d remember if I’d seen you on TV. I don’t watch much, and the last few years I’ve been out of the country most of the time.’

‘Climbing.’

‘Yes. In India, South America…wherever there are mountains.’ Perhaps he saw something in her face. ‘You don’t approve?’

Katrien shrugged. ‘I don’t understand the compulsion. When you talked about it that night I could see you were in love with the mountains. But it seems so…’

‘Pointless?’ Zachary laughed. ‘Only those who do it truly understand. It’s a matter of pitting yourself against the elements, experiencing the worst that nature can throw at you, and coming out on top. Of proving yourself to yourself.’

‘Over and over? Until you die? Like your friend Ben?’

His face went smooth and expressionless, and she said swiftly, ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to remind you.’

Zachary shook his head. ‘It’s okay.’ He was silent for a moment, gazing down at his brown leather boots. ‘I’m used to losing my friends to the mountains. Not many of us live to a ripe old age.’

Inexplicably angry, she said, ‘So it’s acceptable? You can just shrug your shoulders and say, “Poor old Ben”—or poor old Dick or Tom or Harry?’

‘It’s not like that. But on the mountains you realise how little one human life really matters in the scale of things. And Ben died doing—’

‘What he wanted to do. I know.’ Her voice was decidedly tart. ‘And he left a wife and family behind while he went off to do it.’

‘Wendy knew what she was taking on when she married him. They used to climb together before the children came along.’

‘And then she gave it up, but he didn’t?’

Zachary spread his hands. ‘Climbing was his life.’

‘And yours?’

There was a moment’s silence. ‘I’m not married.’

He would be about thirty, Katrien guessed, a few years older than herself. ‘Have you ever been married?’ she asked.

He was looking at her, his eyes dark. ‘A couple of near-misses. They wanted me to give up climbing.’ He gave her a crooked smile.

‘I rest my case.’ She stood up and he followed. ‘I’ll see you around, Mr Ballantine.’

She made to pass him on the way to the stairs, but he reached out and caught at her arm. ‘Tomorrow?’ he urged. ‘On the top ski field? I wouldn’t like to think you were staying away from the upper level because of me.’

There was no need for her to stay away. He’d apologised, they both understood the situation, and nothing more was likely to happen. What could happen on a popular ski slope with dozens of people about?

Temptation warred with common sense. She temporised, knowing it was weak and stupid. ‘Maybe.’

CHAPTER THREE

WHEN Katrien arrived next day at the upper field Zachary was coming out of the café. As she saw him pick up his skis she told herself it was coincidence, that he hadn’t been sitting and watching the chairlift, waiting for her.

He smiled at her lazily and, without speaking at all, tramped to her side at the top of the slope, let her push off before him, and followed, swooping past her in a series of sashaying curves, wide sweeps leaving parabolic lines in the snow.

She began to copy him, watching how he used his body, feeling her own muscles respond as she mimicked his movements.

She finished the run faultlessly and came to a swerving halt beside Zachary, flushed and proud of herself and meeting his eyes unafraid, responding to their laughing approval.

‘I never thought I was that good!’ she said involuntarily.

‘We none of us know what we can do until we try.’ He smiled at her, and suggested, ‘I’ll buy you a drink before we do it again.’

She let him, but the next time she bought the drinks and he just raised a dark eyebrow at her and allowed her to pay.

They skied together every day, and had coffee or drinks afterwards. One afternoon he asked her if it had always been her ambition to become a model, and she laughed and told him the only career she’d seriously considered was librarianship, which made him laugh in turn. ‘I was in my last year at school,’ she said, ‘and a friend asked me to model a dress she’d designed for a sewing contest. We came third, and one of the judges approached me and asked if I was interested in modelling professionally. My friend was terribly excited and talked me into going to see the agency the woman suggested. And…well, things just sort of developed from there. What about you? How does one become a mountaineer?’

‘I’ve been skiing since I was ten, more interested in cross-country than downhill. When I was fifteen I started climbing. At university I met Ben and we climbed together during the holidays.’

‘What did you take at university?’

‘A science degree.’

‘Is that how you got a job in Antarctica?’

‘Uh-huh. I studied ice movement, and did a fair bit of climbing there. Later Ben and I did Everest together, and then turned professional.’

‘You make a living climbing mountains?’

‘As mountain guides, nursemaiding recreational climbers to the best climbs around the world. In between, we tackled the real stuff, the places and routes no one had successfully climbed before.’

‘Surely it’s very expensive fitting out an expedition.’

‘I’ve had grants from various institutions to carry out scientific studies on the mountains—the qualities of ice and snow, geological information, environmental studies. And several clothing and equipment firms helped finance our climbs. Ben was good at rustling up sponsors, and he was very photogenic.’ Zachary grinned, half sadly. ‘He even did a bit of modelling work. I teased him about that. You never bumped into him?’

Katrien shook her head. ‘Your family must worry about you.’

‘My mother was killed in a car accident when I was fourteen, and my father died a few years ago of a brain tumour. I have a brother who lives in England with his wife and family. We keep in touch, but his life is too busy to spend it worrying about me.’

‘That was awfully young to lose your mother.’ She still felt grief for her father’s death over a year ago. How much worse it must have been for a fourteen-year-old.

‘Death is the inevitable consequence of life.’ He paused. ‘I learned that a bit earlier than most people, I guess.’

Too early, surely. ‘Is that why you took up climbing?’ she asked, wondering if having his mother taken from him at a vulnerable age was what drove him to risk his life over and over—a need to defy the cruel fate that had taken her from him, to shake his fist in the face of death.

‘It took my mind off things, certainly. When you’re climbing you need to concentrate on your next step all the time. If you don’t, it could be your last.’

‘That’s what I meant.’

He looked surprised, then searching. ‘What you meant?’

She shouldn’t have started this, but he was waiting for her to explain. ‘I just thought…maybe you wanted to show that you could…beat death at his own game, because of your mother.’

Perhaps she had offended him. He seemed disconcerted. ‘I suppose,’ he said slowly, ‘you could be right. I’ve never thought of it in those terms.’

She smiled apologetically. ‘I didn’t mean to psychoanalyse you.’

‘That’s okay.’ He was staring at her as if seeing her in an entirely new light. She looked down and fiddled with her coffee cup, until he pushed back his chair and said, ‘Right, shall we go back to the run?’

On her fifth day when she arrived at the café he wasn’t there. She unstrapped her skis and drank two cups of coffee she didn’t want before she saw a figure in the distinctive ski suit riding up on the chairlift.

When she came to the door he smiled at her and said, ‘I’m glad you waited.’

She didn’t deny it. Of course she’d waited. The thought intruded that she’d waited a long time for him. Years.

Nonsense. He was just a man, met casually and probably never to be seen again. A very attractive man, but not the first one she’d found sexually appealing. She was bound to meet attractive men even after her marriage to Callum, and she would have to deal with that.

Her dreams had been empty lately; no dark, mysterious figure held her close and murmured in her ear, carried her against his heart.

She was too tired to dream. But it was the kind of healthful tiredness that left her looking forward to the next day and the white, beckoning snow. And each day her skiing had improved, her skills growing as she exerted herself, pushing herself to the limit of her ability in an effort to match Zachary.

The run was clear for once of other skiers, except near the bottom.

They took off side by side, and then Zachary swooped off to the left.

Katrien swerved right, glancing at Zachary to see when he changed direction, and in the same instant she followed, gliding back to meet him.

She saw him laugh, and knew he’d read her mind. They passed in the middle of the run, missed each other narrowly and started new opposing curves.

With any other partner this would have been crazy—she wasn’t nearly good enough to successfully negotiate the hairsbreadth manoeuvres—but she knew he would compensate for her, that she could trust him to get them safely down.

When they made it, to a spattering of applause from a group of people waiting to be transported to the top, she laughed up at him and they slapped gloved hands together in triumph.

She looked back up the slope at the almost perfect series of figure eights in the snow, some cut across by following skiers, and gasped. ‘I don’t believe we did that.’

As an experience it was unrepeatable. Almost superstitiously she knew that trying again would be an anti-climax.

As if he knew it too, Zachary said, ‘Nothing beats the first time.’

Katrien supposed that was why he kept looking for more mountains to climb, peaks that hadn’t been scaled before. She said, ‘Tomorrow’s my last day.’

He looked up the mountain, past the skiers zooming down the slopes, to the high, untouched snow beyond them. Then he looked back at her and said almost urgently, ‘Come climbing with me.’

‘Climbing?’

‘You’ve never tried it, have you?’

Dumbly, Katrien shook her head.

‘Nothing difficult. An easy, beginners’ climb. Today I can teach you some of the basic techniques, and what to do in a fall so you don’t just go on sliding out of control. We’ll find a nice gentle slope to practise on. But we’ll need to get you kitted up before starting an actual climb.’

‘You’ll be bored.’

A strange expression flitted across his face. He looked back up again at the mountain, his profile grim and shuttered. ‘I promise you I won’t be bored.’

He had some gear in the back of his four-wheel-drive, and he found an easy slope not far from the ski run and showed her how to hold an ice axe when climbing, and use it as a brake, as an aid to help herself up a slope, and to probe the snow and discover if it was really firm or just a crust on top of loose powder. He taught her techniques for controlling a fall, and how to work with a partner on a rope.

He asked for her boot size, and next morning called for her at the hotel when it was barely dawn, bringing climbing gear, including boots and crampons and a helmet for her. ‘Borrowed them,’ he told her briefly.

He made her go over what she’d learned, and demonstrated how to remove snow from the spikes of her crampons with an ice axe. ‘You have to keep them free because if your crampons are balled up they can’t grip the slope.’

They had something to eat first, then signed a book for the park rangers stating their intended route and estimated return time, and set out to climb the mountain.

He roped her to him, even though the first part was an easy walk over a gentle incline where their boots left deep indents in the snow. ‘Don’t let the rope go slack,’ he reminded her.

When the going got steeper she was glad of the rope and of Zachary’s tutelage. He led on the upward slopes but made her go ahead on the downward side of a ridge so if she got into trouble he could help her. She was panting and her temples and upper lip were dampened with sweat when he hauled her onto a rugged bluff and declared, ‘Okay, we can rest here for a while.’

There was sweat on his forehead too, although he wasn’t flushed with exertion like her. The cold air seemed to have bleached the outdoor tan from his cheeks. He wiped his face with a gloved hand, staring out at the surrounding countryside—bleak and brown near the mountain, mistily green further away.

Katrien subsided on the snow. ‘And you do this for fun?’

He glanced down at her and laughed shortly. ‘You’re not enjoying it?’

She gazed about them and admitted, ‘The view is pretty spectacular.’

‘Worth it?’

But she wasn’t ready to concede that. ‘How far are we going?’ She squinted at the forbidding wall of rock—in some places too steep to hold the snow—that loomed above them.

He didn’t answer immediately, but stood up and she turned to look at him, shading her eyes because the sun lay behind him, making his features dark and indistinguishable. Her heart thumped once with a quick, irrational, complicated emotion, a stirring of familiarity.

‘How far,’ he asked her, ‘do you want to go?’

‘Not all the way,’ she answered. Then quickly added, ‘We couldn’t make it to the summit in the time we’ve got, could we?’

‘No,’ he agreed, after a tiny pause. ‘Not if you don’t feel ready for it.’

When she began to get cold she pushed herself to her feet. ‘All right, MacDuff,’ she sighed. ‘Let’s move on.’

‘You’re game?’ He glanced at the unwelcoming terrain above them.

‘If you are,’ she agreed lightly.

He gave her an oddly searching look, then a faint smile. ‘Remember what I told you. Let me know if you’re in trouble.’

It was all right at first, hard work but not difficult. Perhaps she became too cocky, but as she went ahead of him across a virgin slope the snow suddenly seemed to disappear under her boots and she shrieked Zachary’s name, desperately trying to remember and follow his earlier instructions.

She slid over a hidden overhang and found herself dangling in space, witless with terror. But Zachary had stopped the fall, and when her vision cleared she could see him leaning backwards further up the slope, his boots firmly dug into the snow.

She followed his calm, succinct directions, and with his help was able to crawl back onto the snow-covered slope. He held the rope firm, reefing it in as she panted towards him.

She collapsed into his arms, her breath coming in shuddering gasps. ‘An easy beginners’ climb, you said!’

‘You’re okay.’ His breath feathered her ear as his arms tightened round her. ‘It’s all right, I won’t let you go.’

She shivered, echoes of dreams reverberating in her mind, shards of memory kaleidoscoping and, rearranging themselves into a well-known pattern.

‘You…saved my life,’ she said, her voice sounding odd in her own ears.

His arms loosened and he gripped her shoulders. ‘Nothing so dramatic. But,’ he added, frowning, ‘I should have known better than to drag you up here with me.’

‘Drag me…?’ She hadn’t needed any coercion; she could scarcely claim he’d forced her. Then, looking down at the nylon line that still joined them, she made a little grimace. ‘Well, you could say that, I suppose…’

She raised her eyes to his, willing him to laugh, and after a moment he did, in a slightly strained way, releasing his hold on her. ‘You’re a brave woman.’

Brave? Katrien shook her head. ‘Hardly.’ But now wasn’t the time to detail her fears and phobias. And Zachary Ballantine, mountaineer, wasn’t a person who would understand them. ‘Did you ever,’ she asked him carefully, her heart thudding, ‘save someone’s life?’

His eyes went dark, his mouth straight. ‘I didn’t save Ben’s.’

She felt again the wave of pain that had emanated from him the night of the charity dinner when he’d spoken of his friend. Stretching out her gloved hand, she grasped one of his. None of the usual platitudes would suffice, she knew. He’d probably heard them all dozens of times.

He didn’t look up, but his hand closed hard about hers through the layers of insulating fabric. He lifted their clasped hands and brought them down once, on his knee.

They sat in silence for a few minutes, then by tacit consent got up and continued the traverse. At the next vantage point Zachary said, ‘Time to start going down.’

Katrien was surprised at her sense of disappointment, but there had never been any question that they would attempt to make the summit. She followed him obediently, and heeded his warning not to relax just because they were no longer climbing. ‘More lives are lost on the descent,’ he said, ‘when people get careless.’

A light snowfall had started before they signed in again at the foot of the mountain. When they emerged from the building dusk was falling and the snowflakes drifting across the car park had thickened, driving against the building.

They paused in the porch and Zachary said, ‘I’ll drop you off at the hotel.’

Katrien shivered, hugging herself. ‘That would be very welcome, thank you.’ She didn’t feel like waiting about for public transport.

‘Wait here.’ He strode off into the flurrying snow.

A few minutes later a four-wheel-drive vehicle drew up before the porch, and Zachary dropped to the ground and opened the other door for her. ‘Hop in.’

He had turned on the heater, and blessedly warm air curled about her feet when he restarted the motor. All the way to the hotel she formulated and discarded things to say. Zachary drove with his eyes on the road ahead, obscured by the whirling snow that platted continuously against the windscreen. The wind was increasing by the minute. She thought he’d been wise to get them down from the mountain not only before dark but before the snowstorm had begun. Surely it hadn’t been forecast.

He drew up close to the hotel’s main doorway.

‘Thank you,’ she said. How inadequate and thin it sounded. ‘And thank you for taking me on the mountain.’

‘I wanted you with me.’ With a curious air of hesitation, he looked away for a moment. ‘Have dinner with me.’

She glanced at the lighted doorway of the hotel. ‘Where?’

Zachary considered the question. ‘Would you come back to the lodge?’

‘Who else is there?’

He paused again before answering. ‘My friends are overseas. There’s just me.’ He was half turned to face her, his forearm resting on the steering wheel while he waited for Katrien’s decision.

‘With this snow,’ she said slowly, ‘we might be stranded there.’

‘Yes,’ Zachary agreed gravely. ‘We might.’ Another pause. ‘Would you object?’

She had difficulty getting the words to leave her lips. ‘Callum might.’ Reminding both of them.

Zachary nodded. ‘Uh-huh.’

She couldn’t do that to Callum. Or to herself. The strange pull this man exerted on her senses, her subconscious, didn’t justify her cheating on her fiancé, betraying her own principles and jeopardising her entire future. ‘I can’t.’

He nodded again, as though her answer was the one he’d expected. ‘I guess not.’ He shifted in his seat, his chest lifting on a breath. ‘How about here, then? In the dining room. Your fiancé couldn’t take exception to that, could he?’

Gratefully she seized on the reprieve. ‘I’m sure he wouldn’t. That would be…nice.’

It would be a lifeline. Callum would certainly have every reason to object if he knew that the stark necessity of saying goodbye to Zachary Ballantine was stifling her breath and freezing her blood. That the prospect of never seeing him again sent her into an irrational, mindless panic.

‘I’ll go back to the lodge and freshen up,’ Zachary was saying. ‘See you about seven?’

She nodded. Too late to back out now, she told herself with guilty relief. ‘Drive carefully. No, don’t get out, I can manage.’ She was scared to be touched by him again. She didn’t know how she was going to get through a meal with him without him guessing at what she felt. But at least she’d had the sense to insist on a public place.

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