Chapter 9
Rhian had stayed in a hotel in El Calafate rather than go back to El Chaltén with Carlos. She needed to speak to this Jayden Harris, and she figured she wouldn’t be leaving the hospital anytime soon. Rachel had e-mailed her everything she could find on Jayden, and she was right. The woman certainly was impressive, probably the best female climber in the world and one of a handful of women to complete all fourteen of the 8000ers—the highest mountains on the planet: Everest, K2, Broad Peak, Nanga Parbat, Shishapangma, Cho Oyo, Manaslu, Kangchenjunga, Lhotse, Makalu, Dhaulagiri I, Annapurna I, Gasherbrum I, and Gasherbrum II. There were only fifty women in the world who had ever climbed the Seven Summits—the highest mountain on each of the world’s seven continents—and Jayden Harris was one of them.
Then, eighteen months ago, she just dropped off the radar.
Why would someone do that? What would make a person give up a passion like that? Because it had to be a passion, a commitment, a love affair, to keep someone striving to reach those feats, to keep pushing yourself further and higher than you ever thought possible. She’s been to fricking Antarctica, for God’s sake! She made a mental note to research next time she was free what had happened.
She wiped her hands on her pants and tucked them into her coat. It was cold. Spring had arrived in Argentina, but clearly someone had forgotten to pass on the message to the sun. Her breath fogged as she walked from her hotel to the hospital.
As well as Jayden Harris’s professional history, Rachel had e-mailed her the contract Fen had signed on behalf of the company, and it clearly was on behalf of the company, Adventure Trekkers, and not just Fen McCash. So, legally, Jayden was now responsible to uphold the deal on their behalf. She’d spent the night studying pictures and interview footage of Jayden Harris, and she could see why the sponsors were so happy with her. Long, dirty-blond curls with sun-streaked highlights gave her a slightly wild look. She had blue eyes that shimmered with the same humour and intelligence Rhian had seen in Fen, and a reputation and climbing history that would make even the most hardened climber stand up and take notice of her.
Rhian opened the door to the hospital and followed the signs to the cafeteria. She typed out a quick message to Mark, bought a coffee and a few pastries, and sat down to enjoy her breakfast. And wait.
She didn’t have to wait long.
She’d barely finished the medialunas when Mark slunk into the room. She pushed her untouched coffee towards him. “You look like you need this more than I do.”
“Thanks,” he said and quickly guzzled it. “What can I do for you?”
“First tell me how she’s doing.”
He shook his head and rested one elbow heavily on the table. “She had a bad night. The pain in her arm and ribs kept her up or woke her up throughout the night.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. What about you? Have you gotten any sleep yet?”
“No. I can’t find a comfy place here, and I can’t leave her. It’s too far to go home just to get a few hours’ sleep and then come back.”
Rhian didn’t think, she just fished her key from her pocket. “I’m a five-minute walk away from here. Go and get a few hours at my hotel room. Shower, get something to eat, and then you can come back.”
He started to shake his head. “No, I can’t—”
“You’ll be no use to her if you make yourself sick. She’s going to need you to be strong. To help her, you need to look after yourself too.” She pushed the key into his hand. “Go on. Tell me where she is, and I’ll go keep her company for a while.”
He frowned. “I’m too tired to even argue with you.” He quickly gave her directions to Fen’s room and held up the key. “Thank you for this. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate your help.”
“No need. Just go and get some sleep. You look like death.”
“You forgot the warmed-up bit.”
“No, I didn’t.”
He snorted. “Funny.”
“I aim to please, Mr McCash. See you later.” She watched him stumble through the cafeteria and out the door before getting herself a fresh coffee and a spare and following his directions to Fen’s room.
Monitors bleeped, and a drip hung above the bed. She could barely see Fen over the footboard. She was laid flat on her back with one side of the blanket raised for the cast on her arm and leg and the other hand clasped around that of a woman sleeping in the chair beside the bed. Jayden Harris—her long, lean form stretched out in the high-backed chair, a coat tucked about her shoulders, and one hand on the edge of the bed—was instantly recognisable.
“If you wake her up to give her another goddamn sleeping pill, I swear to God I’ll shove it up your arse.” Her voice was a low, menacing whisper.
Rhian chuckled softly. “I come bearing gifts, not weapons,” she said just as quietly, but without the menace. One blue eye popped open warily, glanced at her, then fixed on the coffee cup she was holding out. “It’s black, but I’ve got some whitener and sugar packets in my pocket.”
Jayden’s eyes opened fully, and she glanced at Fen before slowly pulling her hand from her sister’s grip. “I don’t care right now.” She stretched her arms over her head, and Rhian heard the vertebrae pop softly back into place. She stepped further into the room and held the cup out. “You don’t sound Greek to me.” Jayden took the paper cup from her hand and took a sip.
Rhian frowned. “I’m not. Why…oh, the gift thing. Trojan Horse and all that. Right. Sorry.”
Jayden shrugged and sat back in her chair. “So who are you, then, if not a Greek?”
“I’m Rhian Phillips. I’ve been working with Fen and M—”
“I know what you’ve been doing with them. Why are you here? Surely you can see she can’t help you anymore.”
Rhian nodded. “She can’t be the guide, no. I wanted to see her, talk to her. But I’m also here to talk to you.”
“Me? Why? I’ve got nothing to do with it, and I don’t want anything to do with a stupid, bloody TV show.”
“Wow, okay.” She held her hands up in surrender. “I’m not sure how I’ve pissed on your chips, but I just want to talk to you.”
“The only thing you could possibly want to talk to me about is picking up where Fen left off. Right?”
“Well, that’s a bit of an assumption—”
“We don’t know each other and we’ve never met. The only reason you could have to talk to me would be about this ridiculous scheme of yours. So tell me I’m wrong?”
“You’re not.”
“Then get the fuck out.”
“Can you at least let me explain?”
“I’m not interested. I don’t want anything to do with it. I don’t want anything to do with climbing.” She pointed to Fen in the bed. “It gets people hurt. Sometimes it gets people killed. And I don’t want any part of it.”
The way Jayden phrased it set alarm bells ringing in her head. Sometimes it gets people killed. But Fen’s okay. She’s alive, she’ll recover. So who…? Rhian shook her head. She didn’t have time to be distracted by questions about words that could just as easily be throwaway lines. Everyone knew climbing was a dangerous sport. Of course it killed some people. She needed to focus. She needed to get this project back on track, and she needed to protect the company—protect Rachel.
“I understand you’re emotional right now. And I really am sorry I had to come here and speak to you at this time. I wish it could wait. But it really can’t.” She pulled the contract out of her bag. “This is the contract Fen signed on behalf of your company.” She flipped the pages and pointed to the bit she’d highlighted. “Your company. Not just her personally. So that means as half-owner of the company, you’re now responsible for fulfilling this contract.”
Jayden rose out of the chair like a wave folding in on itself before it crashed against the shore. Rhian wasn’t sure if she was the grain of sand about to be washed away by the tide, or the wall that would halt its progress.
“So sue me.”
“Jayden, stop.” Fen’s voice cut through the crackling air and grounded the electricity that seemed to spark about them. “We can’t afford for them to sue us, so don’t try and dare them into it. Rhian doesn’t want to do that, do you?”
Rhian shook her head. “No. God, no. I truly wish I could have come here today just to see you and make sure you’re okay. I swear, Fen.”
Fen was quiet a moment as she studied Rhian carefully. “I believe you. We’ve gotten to be friends over the past few months. So sit down, the pair of you, and talk like civilised human beings.” Fen tapped one hand on the bed. “Rhian, come and sit here. Let the ogre stew over there.” She smirked and grimaced as it turned into a yawn.
“How are you feeling?” Rhian asked as she perched next to Fen on the bed. “You look better than Mark did when I saw him earlier.”
“I think I got about twenty minutes more sleep than he did.” She lifted her head from the pillow. “Where is the big lump, anyway?”
“I sent him to get some sleep.”
“Good.”
“And a shower.”
“Even better.”
“In my hotel room.”
Fen chuckled. “Well, since you’re here, I can’t see the harm. Thank you. He needs a kick up the arse sometimes.” She clasped Rhian’s hand. “Now, tell me what the problem is?”
Rhian let out a deep breath and quickly filled her in on the issue as Rachel had laid it out to her.
“You’re telling me that if Jayden doesn’t take on my project, the one I agreed to—”
“On behalf of the company,” Rhian interjected.
Fen stared silently. Rhian let her mouth close with a click.
“As I was saying, if she doesn’t take on my project, this Rachel is going to go bankrupt because the big companies will sue her, and she’s the kind who likes to take the whole ship down with her. If she goes, we go. Is that right?”
“Effectively…yes.”
“Bitch,” Jayden said.
Fen silenced her with another glance. “And what about you?”
“What about me?”
“What would you be doing if Jayden wasn’t involved?”
“I was going to see if the rude one would take over.”
“The rude one?”
“Oh, sorry. Sarah. The guide I spoke to first. She was so rude, I never even told her exactly what it was I was after. But at least I think she’d be decisive enough to make the calls that were needed, rather than Miss I-Need-To-Think-About-It.”
Fen squeezed Rhian’s hand. “So why are you doing what she wants? Is your job that important to you?”
Was it? Yes, her job was important to her, or at least this project was. But was it important enough that she would do this simply to keep it going? No. What was important to her was Rachel. And if Rachel lost this project, she lost her company. And the company meant everything to Rachel. Almost as much as winning Rachel’s approval meant to Rhian. Those three parting words still echoed in her head: “make me proud”. She had to deliver.
Rhian shook her head. “Rachel’s my mum.”
Fen’s eyebrows rose. “Glad I didn’t put voice to what I was thinking about her, then.”
“It’s okay. She can be a bitch. And I know that this is a really bad time, the worst possible time, and that I’m asking an awful lot—”
“More than you’ll probably ever know.”
Rhian frowned and followed Fen’s gaze to Jayden. Her hands were shaking as she sat in the chair, elbows on her knees, and her head bent forward. Her hair cascaded around her shoulders, hiding her face.
“Can you give us few minutes, please, Rhian?” It was a question, but not one that needed an answer and not a request she could refuse. She stood and closed the door behind her. Jayden didn’t move, yet she seemed to crumple in on herself as Rhian watched through the small window. Just for a moment. Then it felt too intimate, too private, and she turned away.
“Please don’t ask me to do it.” Jayden’s voice was a whisper.
“Listen to me,” Fen said softly. “The routes are all scouted, and the challenges written up. Mark and I have been working closely with Miguel and Santiago. They can do the climbing to set lines for the cameramen, and the rest of the crew can do the heavy lifting. All you need to be is the face for this. You lead them out on the hikes in the early days, you speak in front of the camera, and you send the weakest players home. You stop anything dodgy from happening. It’s that simple. Honestly, the hard stuff’s done.”
“That’s bullshit and you know it.” She ran a shaky hand through her hair, then clenched her fist, trying to work out the tingling pins and needles as her fingers turned cold and the blood drained away. “Anything can happen out there. Anything. Look at you!”
Fen nodded. She held her uninjured hand out for Jayden to take. All Jayden could do was stare at it. Fen wiggled her fingers, and Jayden saw her hand grip them without even realising she’d moved.
“I know. And I know this is only adding to your fears, honey. What happened to you, to Rebecca, is more than I can imagine. It’s every climber’s worst fear and the ultimate reminder of who’s in charge out there—a reminder that we’re not all-knowing or all-powerful, and that no matter how skilled we are, we also need a bit of luck on our side every time we step foot out there.”
“She died, Fen. So many of them died.” Jayden laid her head on the sheets, next to Fen’s arm, and tried to hold back the tears as Fen stroked her head.
“As callous as it sounds, hon, people die every day. People die in their beds, while crossing the street, while sitting in restaurants eating salad. It happens.”
“I can’t risk it. I can’t let them risk it. I shouldn’t have let her risk it. I should have gone out with Pete, not her. It was my expedition; I was the leader. It should have been me. Not her.”
“Rebecca knew what she was doing out there, Jay. She was doing what she loved.”
“She went out there, and she died.”
“Yes. She died doing what she loved. What about you?”
“What are you talking about?”
“Rebecca died doing what she loved. I got hurt doing what I love.”
“Exactly my point. It’s too dangerous.”
“Pft. Personally, I’d rather die young doing what I love, having lived every single day of my life, than die in bed, a hundred-year-old, toothless hag never having seen or done anything.”
“I’m not you.”
“No, you’re not. But if you don’t get back out there, you’re going to die a little more every day anyway. You feel the call of it even more than I do. It pulls you, doesn’t it? Even as much as it scares the living shit out of you right now, it’s still drawing you in.”
Jayden frowned and sat back in her chair, staring down at the floor. She didn’t want to admit that she’d been ready to give in to that temptation just to feel something beyond the ache, beyond the void that sat in her chest.
“The freedom. The quiet.” She reached out for her hand. “The peace that fills your soul when you sit on top of a mountain and look down. How have you managed to stay sane without it?”
“Who says I have?” she whispered.
“Fair point.”
Jayden still couldn’t lift her head. The tiled floor had a crack along one edge of a white tile, curving around one corner in a perfect arc. “I can’t.”
“I know how much Nepal took from you. I know how much losing Rebecca tore you apart. But it’s time to stop hiding from the world.”
She snorted a bitter laugh. “I haven’t been hiding. I’ve been a part of more of the real world these last eighteen months than at any other time in my adult life—”
“But you don’t live in the real world. You just exist in it. You live in our world. The world of ice and rock. That’s what you’ve been hiding from. What you’re still hiding from.”
“You weren’t there, Fen. You didn’t see… You don’t know what it was like.”
She was quiet a long time. So much so that Jayden looked up, half expecting her to be asleep.
“No, I wasn’t. And I hope I never have to see what you did. But I’d like to think that if I did, it wouldn’t change me. That it wouldn’t keep me from the people I love or the places that feed my soul. That it wouldn’t kill me slowly, one day at a time.” Fen held her gaze as she carried on. “I could tell you that if you don’t do this, we’ll go under, and Mum will end up in an NHS care home. We both know what they’re like. If you don’t do this, I’ll never be able to pay for my medical expenses, never mind what I’ll do after the company we spent fifteen years building is gone and I have no income to support myself. If you don’t do this, Mark will likewise be fucked too. And he’s worked just as hard as we have.”
“I don’t need to listen to this guilt-trip shit.” Jayden started to stand up.
“Sit down!” Fen shouted. “I am not done.”
The tone of her voice was as demanding as Jayden had ever heard, and the effect on her wobbly legs was immediate. She dropped heavily back into her seat.
“I could tell you all that, and every word of it’s true—we both know it.” The look in her eye gentled, and her voice softened. “But that isn’t why you need to do this. That’s why we need you to do it. Do you want to know why I want you to do it?”
Jayden shook her head.
“Because I miss my sister.”
Jayden’s eyes stung with the tears that welled and slipped down her cheeks.
“I want my best friend back.”
Jayden hung her head again and tried to push back the emotion she’d held inside since the ice had cascaded down the mountain and frozen her soul.
“She was so strong and capable and talented. She was my hero. She might’ve been my little sister, but she was the person I looked up to most.” Fen’s voice cracked, her own emotions slipping through the crevices. “She was my rock, the one person in this whole world I knew had my back no matter what.”
Jayden turned her head, trying to get the words to miss her ears. But each one landed and gripped hard, like an alpine heather clinging to the granite the avalanche had forced her to become. Each word dug into the cracks and took root.
“I really need her now. To be my strength. My heart. To be my hero again.”
“You don’t know what you’re asking of me.”
Fen nodded. “Yes, I do. I’m asking you to be everything for me that I would be for you. That I am for you.”
Jayden couldn’t hold it back anymore. She let the grief and the tears flow.
Fen tugged her until her head was resting beside her on the bed again and stroked her fingers through Jayden’s hair. It was softly soothing as her grief began to release.
“You’re really gonna make me work with that stuck-up little bitch out there?”
Fen chuckled. “Rhian’s nothing of the sort.”
“She came barging in here, threatening to sue us, Fen.” Jayden spoke with a lacklustre voice. The passion and fire had drained from her with her tears. “She knows what’s happened to you, and she still—”
“You’re generalising and taking things out of context. Rhian’s become a friend over the past six months that we’ve been working together. She truly has. Telling us everything today was as much a warning as anything else.” Fen carried on, stroking her fingers through her hair. “She doesn’t want anything bad to happen to anyone. She’s a good person.” She tugged on a lock of Jayden’s hair. “Give her a chance. I think she’ll surprise you.”
“Pft,” she said and turned her head to look at Fen. “I’m sorry I’ve been so shit.”
“You don’t need to apologise. You had shit to deal with. But it’s time to stop wallowing in it and come back home.”
“I know you’re right. I do.” Jayden closed her eyes and tried not to feel the fear and panic that had gripped her from the instant she’d seen Rebecca’s eyes staring up at her. Dead, unseeing eyes. “I just don’t know how to do it.”
“The same way you got up your first wall, Mogo.”
Jayden looked up at her.
“One grip at a time.”