Her Mountain Man Page 4

  “Some people probably can,” he said. “Guess I’m not one of them.”

  Near the top of Red Mountain Pass, he turned the Jeep off the highway onto a narrow gravel road that wound uphill through stands of aspen already beginning to turn gold. Even in August the air up here hinted at fall, the breeze cool on Paul’s bare skin. He breathed deeply the aroma of purple asters that bloomed in profusion along the road.

  “This road once led to the old Tomboy Mine,” he explained. “It was used to transport ore into Telluride.”

  “So mountains aren’t the only things that interest you,” she said. “You know the history of the area, too.”

  “History is interesting,” he said. “It’s everywhere you look around here. So many reminders of the past are out in the open—old buildings, mine trams, ore carts. People walked away from some of the old settlements and mines over a hundred years ago and left everything behind. Stuff survives a long time in the thin mountain air.”

  They passed the remains of mining buildings, the wood weathered to silver-gray, orange-yellow mine tailings spilling down the hillsides. “Whenever I drive this road, I try to imagine what it must have been like for those miners, with their wagonloads of ore, negotiating these same curves,” he said. “They didn’t have the benefits of four-wheel drive and power brakes.”

  “They must have been pretty desperate to make a living, to work such a dangerous job in such remote and wild surroundings.”

  “I prefer to think of them as brave adventurers who relished the freedom of life on their own terms.”

  They stopped at a stream crossing and a bull elk raised his head to watch them. The gurgling of the water sounded over the low rumble of the Jeep’s engine. Other than an occasional burst of birdsong and Indy’s enthusiastic panting from the backseat, there was no other sound. “We haven’t seen any other cars in a while now,” Sierra said.

  “Traffic’s pretty light today. Come back Saturday and you’ll see bumper-to-bumper Jeeps sometimes. Four-wheel-drive clubs from all over the world come here to run these trails.”

  “I guess a lot of people like to get back to nature in a powerful, gas-guzzling machine.”

  He laughed. “I knew there was a sense of humor somewhere under that veneer of cool sophistication.”

  “Are you saying I’m a snob?”

  “You have snob potential, but I don’t think you really are.” A woman who’d trade her fancy high heels for a waitress’s hiking boots could never be called a snob.

  “I can’t decide if that’s an insult or a compliment.”

  “Not an insult, I promise.” He pulled the Jeep into a turnout on the side of the road. “There’s a trail here that leads back to some neat old mine buildings and a waterfall. Let’s check it out.” He collected his pack from the back of the Jeep, whistled to Indy and led the way up a narrow trail through the trees.

  “How long have you lived in Ouray?” she asked, walking close behind him while the dog bounded ahead.

  “About five years. I’d been coming here for a few years to climb the ice in the winters. I decided I wanted to live at altitude, near good climbing to help me stay in condition.”

  “So Ouray was a practical choice.”

  “That, and I really like it here.” He held a low branch up out of her way until she’d passed. “It’s beautiful. Not too big. The weather’s nice—what’s not to like?”

  “Maybe the fact that it’s three hundred miles from a major city? Almost a hundred miles to a mall?”

  He laughed. “If I want to buy anything, I order it off the Internet.”

  “Spoken like someone who doesn’t understand the allure of shopping.”

  “Guilty as charged.”

  The trail began to climb and they fell silent as they scrambled up the incline. Indy took off in halfhearted pursuit of a squirrel, then circled back to Paul’s side. Sierra fell farther and farther behind, until Paul stopped to wait for her. “Want me to get behind and push?” he called.

  She glared at him. “Some of us…are used to…breathing air…that contains…oxygen.”

  “More like smog for you. Stick around a few weeks and you’ll get used to the thin air up here.”

  She caught up with him and stopped to catch her breath. “I’ve got it figured out now,” she said after a moment.

  “Got what figured out?”

  “Why you’re crazy enough to climb mountains. Lack of oxygen has obviously left you brain damaged.”

  “I never said I wasn’t crazy.” Their eyes met and he felt the heat of attraction. She had the most amazing eyes, so full of emotions he couldn’t read. He’d like to know her well enough to interpret those emotions.

  She looked away. “We’d better get going,” she said, and moved past him up the trail.

  He shrugged. Not that he minded the view from this angle, but he couldn’t help but feel she’d moved ahead to get away from him—or from something in herself he made her feel.

  CHAPTER THREE

  MORE THAN A LACK OF OXYGEN had stolen Sierra’s breath back there on the trail—for a moment, when she’d looked into Paul’s eyes, she’d wanted him to kiss her. The impulse had surprised her. Yes, he was good-looking and entertaining. His evasiveness of her questions frustrated her and his fascination with her father puzzled her, but he had a zest for life and a goofy wit that disarmed her. When he did answer her questions, she sensed that his replies were honest, and he had none of the arrogance she’d expected from a star in a sport that demanded supreme self-confidence.

  She’d awakened this morning prepared to endure the day’s activities for the sake of the story, but she was actually having a good time, thanks to Paul. Maybe it was their surroundings that influenced her feelings toward him. Odd, how such vast open spaces could seem so intimate. She and Paul were truly alone, without another soul around.

  The important thing was to not let her attraction to Paul get in the way of writing a good story. Her job was to find out everything she could about him and his motivation for climbing, and share that with her readers. If she also gained some insight into her father, that would be a bonus.

  If she could only understand why her father had been so determined to conquer mountains while he avoided any obstacle at home, maybe she could find a way to reconcile her feelings for him—to mingle love and hate into acceptance.

  “The mine ruins I was telling you about are just ahead.” Paul touched her elbow, pulling her from her reverie. “On the left.”

  She stopped and studied a square black hole in the side of a hill, framed by leaning timbers and blocked by a rusty metal grate. “What was the name of the mine?” she asked.

  “I don’t know. There are dozens of them scattered around these mountains. Maybe hundreds.”

  “I wonder how many of them ever made any money?”

  “Apparently a lot of them—for a while, anyway. There are still people with mining claims up here, still looking to strike it rich, I guess.”

  They continued on the trail, which began to slope down, making the hike easier. “I’d forgotten there are still places this remote in the United States,” she said.

  “I guess there’s not much hiking in New York City,” he said.

  “There are trails in Central Park, though I haven’t explored them. When I was a girl, I used to go hiking with my dad.” She hadn’t thought about those trips in years. Climbing this trail—the smell of pine, the crunch of gravel beneath her feet—had brought the memories rushing back.

  Those trails had seemed long and steep to her, but her father must have chosen the easiest routes, and modified his long strides to accommodate her short ones. When she tired, he’d carry her on his shoulders; the whole world had looked bigger and brighter from that lofty perch.

  “Where did you go?” Paul asked.

  “Everywhere. Weekends when he was home, we’d get in the car and drive. We’d pack a lunch and hike for hours. We were living in northern California then, so we had a lot of trails
to choose from. We’d stay out all day, just him and me.”

  “In the Sierra Nevadas, right? You must have been named after them.”

  She frowned. “Yes. I still can’t believe my mother let my father name me after a mountain range.”

  “At least he didn’t saddle you with Shasta or Bernina or Lhotse. Sierra’s a really pretty name. Maybe that was his way of bringing together two things he loved most.”

  She swallowed past a sudden knot in her throat. As a girl, she had looked forward to those hiking trips with her father with all the anticipation of Christmas. The opportunity to have him all to herself for an entire day had been better than any gift she could have received.

  “How old were you when you went hiking with him?” Paul asked. His expression was gentle, full of warm interest. The caring in his eyes emboldened her to reveal more than she ordinarily would have to someone she’d known such a short time.

  “This was probably between the time I was six or seven and ten. Before my parents split up and Mom and I moved back east to live with her parents.”

  “I didn’t know your father and mother were divorced.”

  “Technically they weren’t. I think my mom hoped her leaving would convince him to stay home more and give up risking his life climbing mountains. She told him he had to choose between his family and the mountains.” She watched Paul’s face, waiting for his reaction to this statement.

  “And he chose mountains,” he said matter-of-factly, as if of course this was the only choice. Sierra turned away, disappointment a bitter taste in her mouth.

  She’d begun to imagine that because Paul was more laid-back than her father, that because he had room in his life for friends and other interests and even a dog, he might be different from her dad. She’d have to be on her guard not to make such misjudgments again.

  This reminded her of the real purpose for this trip. Why not use this glimpse into Paul’s real nature to develop her article?

  “So you don’t have any regrets about the choices you’ve made?” she asked Paul.

  “Regrets? Why should I have regrets?”

  “You chose to become a mountaineer instead of going to college and starting a more conventional career. You travel much of the time instead of having a more stable home. You work mostly alone…”

  “No regrets,” he said firmly. “I’d go nuts if I was imprisoned in a cubicle in an office. And I do have a home—right here. I’m here about half the time. Being away makes me appreciate it that much more.”

  “And working alone so much of the time doesn’t bother you?”

  “You don’t write with a partner, do you?”

  “No, but I still work with other people at the office.”

  “And I have climbing partners and participate in large expeditions from time to time,” he said. “I’m no hermit who hates people. But I like the challenge of facing a mountain alone. Climbing solo requires you to live very much in the moment.”

  “How very Zen.”

  “It is. People spend too much time worrying about the future.”

  Or fretting about the past, she thought. This trip to Ouray was turning into more of an excavation of her history than she’d been prepared for, dredging up memories of her father—both good and bad. She’d anticipated some of that, of course. Her father, or at least his body, was the link between her and Paul. But trying to understand her father’s motives by examining Paul’s wasn’t working out that well. Paul was so much warmer, much less interested in the spotlight than her dad. Yet he clearly felt a strong connection to her father.

  That mystery both drew her and frustrated her. The simple story she’d expected to write about two generations of mountain climbers grew more complex by the hour. And Paul grew more intriguing.

  The idea unsettled her, the way that moment on the trail when she’d craved his kiss had unsettled her. She didn’t want to be attracted to a man who climbed mountains for a living. It didn’t matter that he wasn’t like her father—he still had that one very big strike against him.

  Fine. She wasn’t at the mercy of unpredictable emotion. Whatever brief chemistry had passed between she and Paul, it wasn’t permanent or fatal. She’d step back into her reporter’s shoes and get this story done. And Paul would be just another interview subject—more memorable than most, but not the kind of man who would change her life.

  PAUL SENSED THE CHANGE in Sierra’s attitude. The easy warmth of her manner vanished, and was replaced by the cool, all-business demeanor she’d greeted him with yesterday. “We should get back to the car now,” she said. Not waiting for an answer, she turned and started back the way they’d come.

  “Wait,” he called. “You haven’t seen the waterfall.”

  “I don’t need to see the waterfall.”

  He hurried after her, Indy at his heels. “Be careful,” he called. “If you take a wrong turn you might end up at the bottom of a mine shaft.”

  She said nothing, but slowed down.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked when he caught up with her.

  “Nothing,” she said. “I just think we should get back to the Jeep and get on with our interview.”

  “Wait a minute.” He stepped in front of her, forcing her to stop. “Something happened just now and I want to know what it was.”

  “You’re imagining things.” She tried to move around him, but he refused to give way.

  “We were getting along great, like friends. Now it’s almost like you’re angry with me.”

  “I’m not angry with you. I don’t even know you.”

  “The whole point of this outing was for the two of us to get to know each other better. And I thought we were making pretty good progress. Until we started talking about your dad.” As soon as he said the words, he felt sick to his stomach with guilt. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’ve been an idiot.”

  She looked puzzled. “What do you mean?”

  “I’ve forgotten you’re in mourning,” he said. “Because of me, you have to relive the pain of your father’s death all over again, and here I am, asking you all these questions.”

  “You don’t have anything to feel guilty about,” she said calmly. “I mourned my father a long time ago. Long before he died.”

  She moved past him again, and this time he let her go. He wasn’t sure he believed her when she said she didn’t mourn Victor. When she’d told Paul about the hikes she and her father had taken when she was a child, he’d heard the sadness in her voice. Maybe she didn’t miss the father who’d been away climbing mountains, but some part of her grieved for the man who’d been with her on those childhood hikes.

  Paul wished he could have known that man. To him, Victor Winston was the larger-than-life figure who’d inspired him and encouraged him. The movies Victor made of his expeditions had introduced Paul to the mountains and shown him the possibilities of a world far different from the one in which he lived every day. That was the figure whose footsteps he’d set out to trace when he climbed McKinley.

  To come upon Victor’s body, so small and fragile, light enough to carry down on his back, had been a shock. It reduced Paul’s own accomplishments, made them less meaningful. Every time he climbed a mountain, he thought about staring down death, but finding Victor had been a different kind of confrontation with the end. He’d spent years comparing himself with his hero, inspired to live up to Victor’s achievements. Now, he had to wonder if he’d end up like the man he’d admired—dying slowly on a mountainside, all alone.

  The idea shook him still. Would Victor say it had all been worth it? It was a question Paul had wanted to ask Sierra.

  He remembered again the light in her eyes when she’d talked about hiking with her father, having him all to herself.

  Maybe it was guilt, or some latent desire to connect with his hero, but Paul felt protective of Sierra. She might be a tough city girl, but he’d glimpsed a vulnerability in her that touched him. These past few hours had changed his feelings about her visit and this int
erview.

  Now, instead of wanting to know Victor better, Paul wanted to know Victor’s daughter.

  THEY WALKED IN SILENCE back to the parking area. By the time they reached the Jeep, Sierra felt more in control of her emotions. Talking about her father with Paul had been a bad idea. He only saw the inspiring public figure—the man who had charmed millions in his videos and interviews. Paul didn’t see the reserved, uncommunicative man who had spent days shut away from his wife and daughter. The man who had made no protest when her mother took her away, and whose visits and calls became more sporadic as the years passed. The more of himself her father gave to the world, the less he had for Sierra.

  Paul wouldn’t understand any of that, and though his concern for her and her feelings seemed genuine enough, how could it possibly be real? He didn’t know her, and she was leaving in a few days anyway.

  Being here, surrounded by snowcapped peaks with a man who had literally walked in her father’s footsteps, had obviously shaken her up more than she wanted to admit. Maybe Paul was right and grief was responsible for part of her emotional turmoil. Better that than to imagine Paul himself had breached her usual reserve. She still couldn’t believe she’d told him about those hikes with her dad. She’d never told anyone about them—she hadn’t even thought of them in years. And yet she’d poured out the story to him with only a little prompting. What was it about him that inspired such confidence?

  Back at the Jeep, she settled into the passenger seat, once again determined to turn the conversation back to the interview. Indy took his place on the backseat and Paul started the engine, then turned to her. “Just to warn you, this next section of the road can be a little hairy in places, so hold on tight.”

  “We aren’t going back the way we came?”

  “This road goes into Telluride. There’s some terrific scenery you don’t want to miss. We’ll come back along the highway.”

  “Oh. Okay.”

  They set off with a lurch, and Sierra steeled herself for a harrowing drive. But after the first couple of miles proved to be not much different from the ground they’d covered so far, she began to relax. Maybe he’d been trying to frighten her—to shake up the city girl. She smiled. If he thought he could scare her off that easily, she’d show him he was sadly mistaken.