“You know there’s no mobile reception, and no one passes by? These climbers are the only others up there.” Her lips tightened. “The only ones presumed alive.”
“You didn’t think of talking me out of it before I paid you?”
“Hell, no. I need the money. But we’ve already lost four tourists on the river this spring and it’ll be bad for business to lose a fifth. So just...don’t die.” Her tone caught somewhere between dry humor and genuine concern.
“Wait, four tourists? I heard about two, a month or so back.”
“Another couple went missing a fortnight ago. The tapu had only just been lifted after the last pair.”
“Tapu?”
“If a place is tapu, it’s sacred or forbidden. When someone dies up there, it becomes tapu until it’s blessed.”
“When someone dies. This happens often?”
“There’s a reason the river’s called Awatapu. But I’m hoping like hell both couples are waiting for us up at the hut, living off eels and huhu grubs.”
He noted her pronunciation—Ah-wah-tah-pu. Long vowels, a soft T, even stresses on the syllables. Not far off Spanish. “What’s it mean?”
“The forbidden river, the sacred river. Want to lift your kayak and paddle up here, and I’ll strap them?”
“And... Wairoimata?” he said, hoisting the craft, following her lead on the pronunciation, rolling the R. “That’s the name of the town I’m getting out at, right?”
“Yeah. Wai means water, roimata is tears.”
“Water of tears. Uplifting names. Did you fly them in—the missing tourists?”
She frowned as she strapped the kayak. “The ones from two weeks ago, yes. Danish couple. Experienced kayakers.”
“But not the others—the first couple?”
“I didn’t think they could handle the paddle. Both couples are officially still missing, but yeah, it’s a safe bet they won’t be walking out. We’ve had some late-season snowfalls so it’s not a good time to be lost in the bush. Not that there’s ever a good time.”
He pictured the terrain he’d flown over—the Alps, subalpine scrublands, rainforest... “Guess it can be tough to find people out there.”
She tugged at the kayak—it didn’t budge—then straightened and dusted her hands on her jeans. “Yep. I was up there long days, searching. I’ll be paying off the fuel for months.”
“You cover your own fuel on a search and rescue?”
She picked up the remaining straps and walked to the other side. “I’m funded to a point,” she said as they got to work. “But what am I supposed to do when the budget maxes out, leave them out there? And I took the second couple in, so... They’re probably snagged in tree roots, caught in a sieve. They’ll be flushed out soon, with the snow melting in the tops. The river always gives up its dead. The bush, not so much.”
“I’m getting the idea these aren’t the first people to disappear up there.”
She gave him a sideways look. “How much research did you do on this river?”
“Enough to know it’s one of the wildest kayaking runs anywhere.”
“See, I’d have thought that would warn people away, but it just seems to attract them. I’ve never understood that urge to put yourself in danger.”
“And yet you fly a helicopter.”
“I fly it very safely.” Her voice strained as she pulled a strap. “The lucky ones get airlifted out with broken limbs. Of course, by then they’ve usually been waiting awhile—hungry, dehydrated, hypothermic...”
“You trying to talk me out of it?”
She yanked. “Would you listen?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Would you heed the warning?”
“No, ma’am. You’re just saying that for the record, right? Covering your liability.”
“Yep. That and the fact I’m not your mother. I take it you’ve been in a helicopter before.”
“Many times.”
A dimple in her cheek twitched. “Okay, we’re good to go.”
“I’m a soldier.” Now, why did he feel the need to make that clear?
“You’re a soldier.” Not a question, more a sarcastic echo. She tipped her head and studied him like he’d blown her assumptions and she had to start over.
He laughed.
“What?”
“I can hear you thinking.”
“You’re a psychic, too? Wow.” Deadpan again, like it was the end of a long day and she didn’t want to encourage conversation. Neither did he, normally. Mindless chatter shriveled his soul. But she was fun. There was passion hiding in those eyes, a smile simmering under those lips.
“Yep,” he said. “You’re thinking, ‘What kind of soldier charters a helicopter rather than hiking in?’”
That dimple again. “Yes. Yes, I am.”
“‘And what kind of soldier buys a new kit instead of stealing military supplies?’”
“Maybe you are psychic.” She folded her arms. “Or maybe you’re a rich-boy fantasist who thinks that because he’s in some hick backwoods at the end of the Earth he can reinvent himself into anything he wants—like, say, a soldier—so the gullible local girl will trip over herself to fall in bed with him.”
“Whoa.”
“And maybe you’re also a risk taker with a death wish,” she continued, a twitch away from a smile. “You’ve done so many reckless things—out of rich-boy boredom, let’s assume—that you’ve overridden your survival instinct and now it’s only a matter of time before you make headlines and everyone says all that bullshit like ‘He lived life to the fullest’ and ‘He died doing what he loved’ and ‘He’ll always stay beautiful.’ But you’ll just be unnecessarily dead like all the other unnecessarily dead people.”
Shee-it. She was ten kinds of cool. “You calling me beautiful?”
The smile broke through, curving her lips at an intriguing angle. An exasperated smile, but he’d take it. “Still, it’s not a bad thing that fate weeds out the risk takers. Makes the herd stronger. Just try not to die in my country, on my river.”
“Your river.”
“My people’s river. Ko Awatapu te awa, ko Maungapouri te maunga. Awatapu is my river. Maungapouri is my mountain.” She jerked her head at the highest of the snow-crowned peaks jutting up behind the deep green nearer range. “I haven’t always lived here but my whānau—my family—are anchored by these mountains and that river, guardians of them. So yeah, don’t die on my watch because you’ve screwed up your wiring and death is the only challenge left.”
Oh, he was getting a reminder that a very different challenge could still amp him up. He had zero time for women who were impressed by his uniform or his family’s money. A pity legionnaires with death wishes didn’t do relationships.
She walked past him, toward the cockpit. “See, to me, you look like a rich guy with too much time to spend at the gym.”
Okay, so that stung—his fitness had come from hard work, self-control and self-loathing. Those he could take credit for. But it also meant she’d been checking out his body.
Guessing he wouldn’t get an invitation,