The clouds had fallen to earth during the night, blanketing the ground with another half-foot of snow and leaving the sky a clear, rinsed blue. Laura winced as the sub-zero temperatures hit her sleep-coddled body, still rosy from sleep. Rob helped the driver attach their skis to the car roof.
Everyone else was still sleeping, of course. The party the previous night had gone on till four, with Orlando hosting dance-offs all night. Cat, it transpired, moved like Beyoncé with silky hips and shimmying shoulders. Kitty appeared to specialize in ska; Isabella had a Shakira hip action that had practically hypnotized the boys; Sam seemed to be more influenced by Jessie J – all foot stomps and fierce faces. Alex had showed off his breakdancing skills, including a terrifying-looking head-spin that made a mess of his beautiful hair. Laura had laughed like a drain when he’d gone into the ‘worm’. What looked cool in an underground car park with a pack of teenagers looked somewhat ridiculous among a bunch of thirty-somethings in black tie. She’d stopped laughing pretty abruptly, though, when Alex had caught her eye and thrown her a look of such simmering intensity she had thought he was going to chase her up the stairs there and then.
Laura climbed into the car and turned on the heated seats, blowing on her hands. She watched Rob packing the rest of the kit – a rucksack with emergency supplies, poles, boots . . . She could see from the way he moved how excited he was – his body was taut and moving rapidly, already on high alert. The adrenalin was pumping through him – that and last night’s vodka.
‘Let’s go,’ he said with bright eyes, sliding into the seat beside her.
Strange, she thought, how they’d gone from being stiff and formal with each other in their business relationship to provocatively daring in a social one.
The car purred up the drive (well, as much as a car can purr with snow chains on) and they left their exhausted, toxic housemates behind them as they fed into the virgin snows. Only the snow-packers were about, orange lights flashing, as they bashed and compacted the fresh falls. They were pulling up at the heliport within eight minutes.
Laura looked at the helicopter sitting in its circle, the pilot inside running through his tests. She felt a stab of fear as she realized the enormity of what they were about to do: attack one of the most notorious mountain faces in the region on two and a half hours’ sleep and a hangover. Usually she couldn’t even do the laundry on a hangover. She looked over at Rob as he shook hands with the pilot. He’d been as half cut as everyone else last night, although that had only been apparent by how he hadn’t behaved. Unlike the others, who stumbled over their own feet (David) or slurred their words (Orlando, disintegrating into an appalling Italian-English hybrid language that was as undecipherable to Isabella as to the others), Rob had been given away only by the brightness in his eyes and an unrestrained vigour that wasn’t characteristic of his usual reserved manner. Out of his suit, out here, he was an entirely different man: an adrenalin junkie, an athlete pushing himself to his limits.
She fastened her helmet as Rob waved to her from the helicopter to climb in. The blades were starting up and she had to crouch low to run past. He buckled her into her seat with a speedy ease – betraying just how much this wasn’t his first time in one of these – before sitting opposite her, staring at her intently. He was as finely tuned this morning as a Ferrari.
She tensed as the helicopter lifted up, pushing her head back against the seat for a moment before daring to turn and look out. Verbier shrank before her, iced and pristine like a Christmas cake.
‘So, how do you want to do this?’ Rob shouted across at her.
‘Do what?’
‘Get out of this thing.’ He gestured to the helicopter they were sitting in.
‘Through the doors, please. Not the ejector seat,’ she shouted back.
He laughed, so thoroughly amused that she started giggling too.
He leaned in towards her and she met him halfway. There was a gleam in his eyes and it thrilled her to think she had put it there. ‘I mean, do you want us to land first? Or do you want to hit the ground skiing?’ he asked.
Laura looked into those copper eyes. She could see what he wanted her to say. He thought he’d found a kindred spirit in her – someone whose skill could match his appetite. ‘I don’t think I can jump, Rob.’
‘I think you can. I think you just don’t want to.’ His voice was velvety, coaxing her on.
‘Okay, I don’t want to, then. I’m worried enough about my survival as it is.’
‘I wouldn’t have suggested it if I thought it would put you in danger.’ He smiled and took her hand in his. ‘I’ll look after you, Laura. I promise.’
Laura stared at him. Rightly or wrongly, she trusted him. She nodded.
Rob gave a thumbs-up sign to the pilot and slid her skis over to her. She fastened her boots with shaking hands.
‘Can you carry one of these?’ he asked, holding up a small black rucksack.
Laura nodded, slid her arms through the straps and checked the chinstrap on her helmet.
‘Okay, do you want to go first, or shall I?’ he asked, placing a hand on her arm. Laura hoped he couldn’t feel her quaking with fear through her jacket. It was official. She was clinically insane. She had thought it was bad enough to be off-pisting one of the most extreme faces in the Alps on two and a half hours’ sleep; now she had gone and made the scenario so much worse by agreeing to jump out of a helicopter first! What was wrong with her? What would Jack say? Actually, she didn’t want to think about it. Not right now. What she was about to do was so far removed from the Laura he knew and loved, he simply wouldn’t believe it.
‘You first. I’ll follow.’
‘Okay,’ he nodded as the helicopter began to drop height, circling over a shallow plain just below the rocky outcrop of the summit.
Rob slid open the door and straightened himself up. Getting ready to go.
‘Wait!’ Laura clamped a hand on his arm suddenly, struggling against the icy winds, which broke over her like waves. ‘Don’t we . . . don’t we need a guide or something? I mean, how will we find our way down from here?’ she gabbled, panicking.
He slid back into the helicopter. ‘I’ve been coming here since I was three. I know these mountains better than most of the guides. I pay a discretionary premium not to have one come with us. Don’t worry, I know what I’m doing.’
‘But . . . but what if there’s an avalanche?’
‘There’s an avalanche probe in your backpack.’ He shrugged. ‘Or just ski faster.’
‘Ski f—?’
He put both his hands on her arms, squeezing her and looking straight into her eyes. ‘Trust me.’
She nodded dumbly.
‘Count to three after I go, then jump. Okay?’
He winked at her, turned away and in the next instant was gone. Just like that. Laura gasped as she watched him land a second later, perfectly balanced, easing straight into wide, meandering S-bends, keeping his speed down as he waited for her and looking back to check that she actually was going to follow him out.
Three. She thought of Jack.
Two. She thought of Fee.
One. She thought of . . .
Nothing at all. For she was airborne, her body tucked and tight, as she felt the wind above, below and all around her. It was so cold she could almost feel the friction of the minute crystals in the air as she sliced through them, and then she was down and off, travelling at thirty, forty miles an hour within seconds, the pristine snow immaculate beneath her skis.
Rob held his poles up in jubilation as he saw her weaving down towards him, her ski tracks and his the only signs of life on this cold, hard mountain. He whooped at her and she screamed back with delight. She let instinct take over – her body knew this made sense. Her body knew what her mind did not: that there’s a tangential difference between existing and living – and this was living.
She followed him easily, letting him lead, feeling no compunction to catch up or overtake as she had with Alex. Today she wanted to enjoy the ride. She laughed as they zipped down wide motorways, disappearing into the shadows thrown down by the rocky walls, slicing cleanly through the blue light of icy cols before emerging into the wide, sun-drenched vista of a glacier.
They jumped three times – becoming almost blasé about the military procedure – before Rob showed some mercy and stopped for breakfast. Laura slowed down her approach behind him, buying herself a little more time for the tears to drop from her lashes and sink into the cushioning of her goggles. After years of silence, her soul was singing again and its sweetness was almost more than she could bear. She felt closer here – to herself, to them.
‘Nice place to stop for breakfast, don’t you think?’ Rob asked with deadly understatement, his eyes lingering on her a moment when he saw the wet tracks on her pink cheeks as she removed her goggles.
‘It’ll do,’ she quipped, looking back up at their tracks, overlapping, intertwined, mirrored.
He chuckled as he took off his backpack. ‘You’ve got the cheese. Stinking Bishop.’
‘Eww! And there I was thinking you’d put a pair of your socks in here to force me down this mountain quicker,’ she joked, swinging the bag over to him.
They settled on a small exposed slab of rock, sitting side by side and smearing the incredibly Stinking Bishop on their baguettes as they watched a snowboarder far, far below on the south face of the Grand Combin opposite.
Rob poured them each a hot chocolate from a thermos made by Porsche. ‘So, glad you came?’
Laura nodded. ‘I can’t believe how beautiful it is up here.’
‘Feels like sitting on top of the world, doesn’t it?’
‘Mmm . . .’ she agreed, lacing her fingers around the enamel cup and letting the steam warm her cheeks. ‘Oh look! A balloon!’
Rob followed her pointed finger to see a red hot-air balloon drifting towards them from Evolène.
‘I’ve never been in one. I bet Cat would love it. I ought to book a trip for next time we’re out.’ He looked over at her. ‘Have you ever ridden in one?’
Laura nodded. ‘Once.’
‘Was it good?’
She nodded again. ‘Terrific.’
‘Where did you do it?’ he asked, intrigued.
‘Tanzania. An air safari. It was amazing – we saw a lion kill right beneath us,’ she murmured, smiling wistfully as she watched the balloon drift higher above the crags and over towards France.
‘What?’ she asked after a minute or so when she realized that his eyes were still trained on her.
‘I don’t know,’ he shrugged. ‘I’m just trying to work you out.’
‘I’m not a sudoku.’
‘I tend to think I’m a pretty good judge of character, but you’re not at all who I thought you were.’
‘Huh,’ she breathed, content not to pursue the line of conversation.
But Rob was persistent. ‘When we first met, you were really uptight and defensive and . . . kind of sad.’
‘Gee, thanks. As I recall, you weren’t exactly showing your best side either.’
‘I meant sad as in unhappy, but you’re different out here. You’re funnier, friendlier, prettier . . .’ His eyes slid over her hair.
‘The altitude’s getting to you,’ she muttered.
‘No,’ he grinned. ‘I’m perfectly sane. You’re being defensive, and you’re only being defensive because you know I’m right. You were desperate last night that no one should know how accomplished you really are. I was watching you. I thought you were going to bolt for your room again. I don’t get why you’d want to keep something like that a secret.’
Laura hiked up her eyebrows. ‘You’ve got to get over the skiing thing. It was just an invitation to try out.’
But he shook his head, making her groan. Why couldn’t he just give it up?
‘I ask whether you can ski and, eventually, no thanks to you, discover you were one of the top young skiers in the country. I ask whether you’ve been in a hot-air balloon and learn that yes, an air safari over Africa, Rob, thanks for asking . . . Are there any other epic life experiences you want to share? Do you go potholing in Staffa? Do you go deep-sea diving and wrestle great whites?’
‘Not quite,’ she snorted.
‘Not quite?’
She looked at him sideways. ‘I am a qualified diver.’
Rob rolled his eyes. ‘I don’t believe this. I was joking.’
‘It wasn’t anywhere near as exotic as you’re making it out to be.’
‘Tell me the gritty truth, then,’ he said, turning himself slightly on the rock so that he was facing her.
Laura sighed. ‘I volunteered on a marine conservation project in the South Pacific. Twenty weeks on an island called Gau during my gap year. We had to explore the mangrove forests and inter-tidal areas, as well as do visual censuses of the reefs, assessing algal and coral cover.’
He stared at her, fascinated and baffled all at once. ‘Christ, scratch the surface with you . . . Why are you so determined to hide yourself?’
‘Hide myself?’ she scoffed. ‘I am out here this weekend to work, not to pursue my own personal happiness agenda. My life is just the way I want it. You’re not the only one living the dream, you know.’
‘You think I’m living the dream?’
‘Hello? Deluxe chalet, helicopter on standby, the most beautiful woman in England as your wife . . . Do I need to go on?’
Rob stared at her. ‘Nobody’s life is perfect.’
‘You have to admit yours is pretty damn close.’
He was quiet for a moment. ‘It’s all just stuff. It doesn’t mean anything.’ He looked out over the valley, his eyes on a distant helicopter that was ferrying another set of privileged skiers to the mountain’s VIP area. ‘Money’s great not because of what it allows you to buy, but because of what it allows you to do. Stuff like this. It’s not about being flash in a chopper. It’s about having breakfast on the glacier,’ he shrugged. ‘What can beat that?’
‘I hear you,’ she sighed, watching the snow being blown off the eastern escarpment like icing sugar.
‘And anyway, there’s plenty money can’t buy you.’
‘Love?’ she asked ironically, prompting him to reach down and throw a well-aimed snowball at her shoulder.
She shrieked, trying – and failing – to get out of the way and falling off the slab they’d made their seat.
‘I was going to say time, you cheeky mare,’ he remarked, watching her sit up, giggling, in the snow in front of him.
‘Oh, so Orlando’s got company in his midlife crisis, then, has he?’ She blew a lock of hair out of her face and looked back at him, relieved the focus was off her at last. ‘You’re not even forty yet, are you?’
‘Thirty-six. And not getting any younger.’
‘Well, I think everyone would probably agree that you’ve proved yourself,’ she said, wrinkling her nose unsympathetically, angling her face up to the sun.
He watched her basking and shook his head. ‘You’re missing the point. I’m the youngest of five,’ he murmured.
Laura opened her eyes. ‘Five?’
He nodded.
‘Don’t tell me. The youngest of five brothers. That’s why you’re so alpha.’
‘Four sisters.’
‘Ah, so that’s why you’re so in touch with your feminine side.’ Her highly sceptical tone prompted another snowball, which hit her on the other shoulder. ‘Hey! What am I? Target practice?’
‘Yes, if you’re going to carry on with the sarcasm. Something of a speciality for you, I notice.’
Laura let the observation pass and sat forward, resting her chin in her hands, her elbows on her knees. ‘Four sisters, huh? I bet you’ve seen it all.’
‘More than any man should ever have to see,’ he agreed, a smile on his lips. ‘It was great, actually. Never a dull moment – or a quiet one!’ He looked over to the crenellated horizon. ‘I always assumed that I’d have a big family too. I thought it would have happened by now.’
Laura fell silent, all teasing gone as she remembered the baby names book she’d seen on his bedside table yesterday morning.
‘Well, I’m sure it will. You’re both young and healthy,’ she faltered. It was an assumption based on Darwinian theory – the human race didn’t get any fitter than the Blakes.
He shrugged. ‘Cat isn’t as bought into it as I am. She didn’t have a particularly happy childhood so she’s not in the same rush to do it all herself . . . But she’s getting there.’
Laura nodded. It was no wonder he hadn’t wanted to have this conversation surrounded by other commuters in the café. At least three and a half thousand metres up this mountain splendid isolation was their only witness.
‘How about you?’ he asked, looking across at her.
‘You know I don’t have children. I told you when we first met.’
‘I mean, what about your family? Growing up?’
Laura swallowed. ‘It’s just me.’ She saw the pity clamour in his expression. ‘What? Don’t look at me like that. I don’t need your sympathy. I’ve got a great boyfriend, a dog I love, a best friend . . .’
Rob pulled a face. ‘Shouldn’t that have been the other way round?’
‘What?’
‘Shouldn’t it be that the dog’s great and you love your boyfriend?’
‘That’s what I meant.’
‘It’s not what you said.’
Laura stared at him. ‘An error, then.’
‘Or a Freudian slip. Maybe you’re not really living the dream after all, Laura Cunningham.’
He didn’t stand a chance. Within a fraction of a second, the snowball she lobbed hit Rob square in the face, and she fell back in the snow, laughing with her hands across her stomach, her eyes closed in the sun. The valley was still in shadow and she’d only been awake a few hours, but this was fast shaping up to be one of the best days of her life.