LITMIR.BIZ

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number of stares from hovering waiters focused in their direction. “I’ve felt more alone in Grand Central Station.”

      “They do pride themselves on exemplary service here. At least, that’s what it said on the hotel Web site. But it isn’t quite so overpowering at dinnertime when the restaurant is busier.”

      “I’ll have to take your word for that. This isn’t the style I look for when I’m thinking of climbing a mountain. Although a certain amount of comfort between climbs is attractive to people with money. At least, that’s what I had in mind when I started converting an old farmhouse near Aoraki National Park into a lodge.”

      He could see Chelsea was dying to question him about the place that had been a huge drain on his purse for the past year, but the sommelier beat her to the draw.

      He held out a bottle so Kurt could read the label. French. This far from New Zealand he’d known he couldn’t expect everything. Meaning a bottle marked Marlborough, one of New Zealand’s top wine districts. He nodded his acceptance and an opener materialized from the guy’s pocket.

      “Aoraki? Where is that?” Chelsea asked.

      He briefly lifted a hand to signal her to hold a moment.

      “Let me taste this, then I’ll tell all.” Kurt swirled the wine in his glass the way Drago had shown him, took a sniff and then tasted the wine. It had the pearlike aroma but not the rich, ripe fruitiness he’d expect if it had been a New Zealand wine. Still, it would pass muster. He glanced up at the patient sommelier. “Excellent. Thank you.”

      It was apparent that Chelsea agreed. Her gray eyes seemed to lift at the corners smiling at him over the rim of the glass as she took her first taste. “I’m pleased to know your taste in wine exceeds your choice in whiskey.”

      “I’m versatile. I use what’s on hand. Sometimes a compromise is necessary.” But there would be no compromising where Chelsea’s safety was concerned.

      “You wanted to know about Aoraki. It’s the Maori name for Mount Cook. It translates as cloud piercer.”

      “I like that. Much more romantic than Mount Cook.”

      Trust a woman to find the romance in a hunk of rock. After last month’s accident he was having trouble finding anything vaguely quixotic in his chosen field. It had become a means to an end—that end being his lodge. “I’d be telling a lie if I said there was any fairy-tale romance connected to my lodge. It used to be a sheep station, but it’s years since anyone lived there. Most of the land was ceded to the state in lieu of back taxes. The land itself is pretty barren, a flat valley scooped out at the foot of the Southern Alps by glaciers during the ice age. My interest in it is its accessibility to the Alps and Aoraki. It’s close enough to the township of Lake Tekapo not to be completely isolated. Lots of tourists pass by on the way to Queenstown.”

      “But it must be exciting making a project like that come to life.”

      “Exciting would be good, but when I think about the lodge, all I see ahead of me is hard work and lots of it.”

      “Why aren’t you there now working on your property instead of climbing Mount Everest?”

      “I need the money. Besides, it’s winter in New Zealand, lots of snow and rain—better for skiing than climbing, though there are plenty of fools who still want to risk it. My aim is to build up a training establishment attached to the lodge where I can teach guests to climb safely.”

      Kurt cleared his throat in an attempt to dislodge the lump that had settled in his craw. “You might not believe it, but I had one of the best safety records going until last month. Hell, they do say pride comes before a fall, but I’d rather have died myself than lose anyone on my watch, especially Bill and Atlanta.”

      “I know that feeling well. It’s called guilt. No wonder we’re together. They say misery loves company.”

      Kurt’s mind latched on to only one portion of her last sentence. “But we’re not together. After we’ve eaten I’ll go my way and you’ll go yours. Tell me something. When you were trying to hire a guide, did you give them all your name and your reasons for going up Everest?”

      Chelsea leaned back in her chair as if distancing herself from him. Hardly worth the effort, given they were already sitting at opposite ends of a table for two. “Yes. Why not?”

      “No reason.” He gave her the lie, knowing after today he wouldn’t see her again.

      He watched her lift her glass and pour some wine into her mouth as if she were drinking straight courage.

      He tried some of his own, just a sip, and waited. He wasn’t lacking in courage, but something told him if he didn’t keep his wits about him, Chelsea would try to tie him in knots.

      His stomach had already taken a few twists and turns since he’d arrived. Sexual attraction could steal a man’s soul. Look at Adam. Even he wasn’t immune to the allure of a good-looking woman. But then, he’d had only one to choose from. Why, out of all the women Kurt had met, was Chelsea the one to stir feelings that had lain dormant since he’d given his love to the mountains?

      He wasn’t the type to court danger and leave a family at home. No, there was nothing of his old man in him, except maybe going for the thrill. He couldn’t see why, as a cop, his late father had taken to dealing drugs. It couldn’t have been for the money. None of it ever appeared on their table. They’d been a big family, and after his mother died, Grandma Glamuzina had managed the way she had in the old country, working on a shoestring budget.

      After his father drove his car off a cliff, the fat hit the pan and the truth came out—or what had passed as the truth. He’d come to think that his need to climb stemmed from being able to get above everything else, up high where the stench of corruption couldn’t taint him.

      His sister and her husband, Rowan McQuaid Stanhope, were now in the process of trying to unravel the mystery of who’d done what. It was after he heard about their efforts that he’d decided to start work on the lodge. Even to himself he hadn’t admitted that maybe this had been the catalyst for thinking he could settle down at last, maybe find himself a wife.

      Yeah. That explained this sudden rush of testosterone to the brain; he’d given his instincts permission to find some woman attractive. But why Chelsea?

      She was the last person he could have a relationship with.

      “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.

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