Murphy's Law

by Yolanda Wallace

  She paused before moving to the unpleasant part of her speech.

  “Annapurna is Sanskrit for ‘full of food.’ Don’t take that literally. This mountain is never full; it’s always hungry. Avalanches are how she eats. In case we’re unlucky enough to be swept up in one, we’ll each be supplied with an inflatable air bag that we’ll keep in our backpacks and an avalanche beacon that we’ll keep on us at all times.” She held up the beacon, a small battery-powered radio transceiver that fit in the palm of her hand. “The beacon sends a signal alerting rescuers to your position if you’re buried under the snow. The signal broadcasts for hours. After fifteen minutes, though, the mission could change from search and rescue to retrieval.”

  She watched the import of her words sink in.

  “But there are techniques you can employ to be proactive. First of all, get the fuck out of the way. Move to the side, try to jump upslope past the fracture line, swim to stay near the surface, dance a jig if you want. Just don’t stand there mesmerized. If you do, you’ll be carried downhill. Second, if you can’t escape, grab on to something solid like a boulder or a tree. Third, if you know you’re going to be buried, create an air pocket. When the avalanche slows down but before the snow settles, cup your hands in front of your mouth. The resulting air pocket should provide enough air to last for half an hour, plenty of time for someone to find you and dig you out. Just before the snow settles, take a deep breath and hold it for a few seconds. This will give you the breathing room you’ll need once the snow hardens around you. Finally, conserve your air and your energy. Try to free yourself after the snow settles, but don’t jeopardize your air pocket in order to do it. If you’re close to the surface, dig yourself out. But if not, don’t waste your breath. Remain calm and wait for help to arrive. Any questions so far?”

  “I have one.” The reporter raised his hand. With his spiky blond hair and wispy facial hair, he bore more than a passing resemblance to Big Bird. Sam doubted he would appreciate the comparison so she kept the observation to herself. “I admit this is a rather morbid question, but I have to ask. Nearly sixty people have died trying to climb this mountain. During your years as a guide, how many climbers have you lost?”

  Sam could feel the tension ratchet up another notch. She had to put everyone at ease while making sure they didn’t completely let down their guard.

  “Have you heard of Murphy’s Law?”

  Peter tapped his pen on the table like a star student who wasn’t being sufficiently challenged in class. “Anything that can go wrong will go wrong.”

  “My version is a little different. For the next six weeks, Murphy’s Law says this: no one dies on my watch.”

  Chapter Two

  Olivia tossed the thin sheet and scratchy wool blanket off her restless body, swung her legs over the side of the cot, and pushed herself to her feet. She couldn’t sleep, and she refused to be serenaded by the snores of five people who didn’t share her affliction.

  She pulled a bright orange Denver Broncos sweatshirt over her long-sleeved silk undershirt and reached under her cot for her battery-powered LED headlamp. She secured the elastic strap and turned on the light so she could find her way to the bookcase. She picked out a book, not bothering to check the title or subject matter. She tucked the book under her arm, picked up her hiking boots, and tiptoed out of the room. Near the exit, she stepped into her shoes but didn’t lace them up. She didn’t plan on venturing far. She simply needed a change of scenery to keep the proverbial walls from closing in.

  She opened the tent flap and stepped out into the inky blackness. The weather felt as mild as a Colorado fall—until the gusting wind reminded her she was a long, long way from home.

  She shoved her hands in the pockets of her gray sweatpants. She tried to locate Annapurna I’s distant peak, but clouds covered the moon, limiting her field of visibility to a few feet. An animal howled in the darkness. A wolf?

  “No way. Not at this elevation.” She laughed nervously. “Maybe the mythical Abominable Snowman isn’t so mythical after all.”

  She sat on an upturned sal tree stump. The surface, rubbed smooth by frequent use, was so shiny it seemed shellacked. She directed the light beam at the book she had randomly selected. Maurice Herzog’s classic tale of his expedition’s harrowing experiences on Annapurna I.

  She started in surprise at the distinctive sound of a bottle being opened. The click of the cap being twisted followed by the hiss of escaping carbonated air.

  “Who’s there?”

  “Relax. It’s only me.” Sam, the handsome tour guide, appeared so suddenly she seemed to have materialized out of thin air. She shielded her eyes from the glare of the beam from the headlamp. Olivia switched off the light. Sam offered her a bottle of beer. Olivia didn’t recognize the label. “Gorkha. It’s not Bud Light, but it’ll do in a pinch.”

  “Under normal circumstances, I’d take you up on your offer but I’m abstaining from alcohol until the climb’s over. I haven’t had anything stronger than protein shakes since March.”

  “You’re a better woman than I am.” Sam wrapped her lips around the bottle’s opening and took a long pull.

  Olivia felt her mouth water. And not for the beer. She mended broken bodies for a living. She didn’t have time to treat broken hearts as well. One-night stands and friends with benefits were more her style. So was Sam Murphy.

  The clouds overhead had parted, allowing the moon’s bright light to shine through. Sam tilted the book in Olivia’s hands, pointing it toward the moon so she could see the title. “Not the subject matter I would have chosen the night before attempting to climb the same mountain, but to each her own.”

  Olivia shivered as Sam’s fingers brushed against hers, the calloused tips sliding across the back of her hand. The rush of adrenaline felt like a chill. She crossed her arms as the wind picked up again. “I saw you this afternoon.”

  “Was I doing something I shouldn’t?”

  “You were doing your homework.”

  After that afternoon’s readiness meeting/training session, while everyone else was resting or taking pictures for posterity, Sam had spent hours studying charts and maps in the ready room.

  “I was tempted to join you, but I didn’t want to intrude.”

  Sam shrugged. “You wouldn’t have been intruding.”

  “That’s not what it felt like to me.”

  “What did it feel like to you?”

  Olivia narrowed her eyes. Damn, this woman was hard to read. Did she want her to move closer or go away? “You strike me as a woman who enjoys her privacy.”

  “I enjoy being private. There’s a difference.”

  Olivia wished she hadn’t turned down that beer. Serious thought required alcohol. “And the difference is?”

  “One means I prefer being left alone; the other means my business is my own.”

  “So I shouldn’t ask you how it feels to be one of the handful of women who have climbed the seven summits?”

  The highest mountains on each of the seven continents were Kilimanjaro, Vinson Massif, Everest, Kosciusko, Elbrus, McKinley, and Acongua in Africa, Antarctica, Asia, Australia, Europe, North America, and South America respectively. Few climbers could claim to have reached the summit of all seven. Sam Murphy was one of the few.

  “I see you’ve done your homework as well. I don’t know how to answer your question without seeming like a pompous ass, so I’ll simply say it feels pretty good. Not as good as it would feel to have climbed all fourteen eight thousanders, but give me a call after I conquer Shishapangma and I’ll let you know for sure.”

  Olivia closed her book. The subject at hand was much more interesting than the one on the printed page. “How did you get into climbing?”

  “I bristle at authority. Climbing lets me be the one giving orders instead of the one taking them.” Sam shifted her weight from one foot to the other as if she wished she hadn’t made such a personal admission. She quickly turned the spotlight away from herself a
nd toward Olivia. “How did you become a doctor?”

  “Lots of practice. No pun intended.”

  “None taken.”

  Sam took another pull of her beer. She reminded Olivia of a cowboy in a vintage Western sizing up the opposition over a drink in the town bar. Where were the stoic sheriff, the comical drunk, and the hooker with a heart of gold?

  “Tell me how a girl from the Land of a Thousand Lakes ended up in Nepal.”

  Sam seemed surprised. “How did you know I was from Minnesota? The seven summits stuff is on our website for all the world to see, but I made sure the webmaster didn’t include any personal information.”

  Olivia pointed to Sam’s Twins cap. “Educated guess. I took you for a hometown girl, not an idle fan.”

  Sam adjusted her hat as her panicked expression gradually faded. “I wear this thing so often I sometimes forget it’s there.”

  “Which part of Minnesota are you from? If that’s too personal, you don’t—”

  “I’m from St. Paul,” Sam said the words in a rush as if she were afraid she might decide not to respond if she didn’t answer the question quickly—or if she were spitting out the name of the first city that came to mind.

  “Relocating must have been quite an adjustment.”

  “Not really. Minnesota winters are legendarily bad. A friend of mine once poured herself a cup of coffee to drink while she drove to work. The coffee froze solid by the time she walked the twenty feet from her house to her car. Didn’t stop her, though. She stuck a tongue depressor in it and licked it like a Popsicle.”

  Olivia laughed but quickly quieted to avoid disturbing the others. “I have the distinct impression my leg is being pulled.”

  “Gently, I hope.”

  I hope that’s the first and last time you’re gentle with me. She tried to shake the pleasant thought out of her head.

  “I understand why you stay, but how did you get here in the first place?”

  Sam shrugged. “Rae made me an offer I couldn’t refuse.”

  She waited in vain for Sam to expand on her answer. “How did you two meet?”

  “At a rock climbing competition in Italy. When I won, she came along with the prize.”

  Olivia felt a pang of disappointment. “How long have you been together?”

  “Ten years. But we’re not together together. We’re business partners not lovers.”

  “Oh.” She tried to temper her excitement. “I mean, that’s cool you can do something you love with someone you…care about.”

  Sam’s lips quirked into a smile. “Some days I’m not so sure. Rae and I are as close as sisters, which means we fight like them, too. But at the end of the day, there’s no one I’d rather be in a partnership with.”

  “I feel the same way about Gigi. Considering we spend more time with each other than we do our families, that’s a definite plus.”

  Sam pawed at the grass with the toe of one boot. “I could tell how close you are by watching you interact during orientation this afternoon. Were the two of you ever an item?”

  “Unfortunately, no. She has always had eyes for Chance and he has always had eyes for her. They started dating during freshman year in Boulder and they’ve been married since the day Chance declared for the draft as a junior. I’ve never been anything more than a fifth wheel.”

  “Gigi may be out of the picture, but there’s no one at home anxiously awaiting your return? There’s no one here waiting for you to come back down the mountain?”

  Olivia smiled. Some sack time with Sam could be the perfect remedy for her insomnia. Perhaps her interest was mutual. “If you’re asking me if I’m single, yes, I am.”

  “I wasn’t asking.”

  “Then maybe I’m volunteering the information.”

  Sam stiffened. “Thanks for the offer, but I don’t sleep with clients.”

  “Understandable. Disappointing, but understandable.” Her eyes roamed Sam’s body. Sam’s black pullover was loose fitting, but her jeans were tight, clinging to thickly muscled legs. Olivia wondered how it would feel to have those strong limbs wrapped around her, squeezing her as she came. “I have a similar rule about sleeping with patients. But you look perfectly healthy to me.”

  “I should go.”

  “Don’t.” She put her hand on Sam’s leg but immediately withdrew when Sam backed away as if she had an infectious disease. “I think that’s my cue to leave.” She stood and turned to make what she hoped would be a graceful exit.

  “Dr. Bradshaw—”

  “Look. No harm, no foul. I’m a big girl. I know how to take no for an answer. If I came on too strong, I apologize. I assure you it won’t happen again. And by the way, it’s Olivia. Not even my patients call me Dr. Bradshaw. See you in the morning.”

  She climbed back in bed with her tail between her legs. She would have preferred to have something else there.

  *

  Sam sighed in frustration as she watched Olivia walk away.

  “I couldn’t have handled that better if I tried.”

  She sat on the sal stump Olivia had vacated during her abrupt departure and rolled the bottle of Gorkha between her palms.

  She wasn’t used to answering questions about her personal life. Her professional one, either. Olivia challenged her edicts against both. She had felt so comfortable talking to her—until the conversation turned sexual. She wasn’t a prude. Far from it. Why, then, had she reacted so badly when Olivia made it clear she wanted to sleep with her? In fact, the idea of having sex with the gorgeous doctor was pretty damn appealing. But her usual wham, bam, thank-you-ma’am wouldn’t do. Not this time. She wanted to get to know Olivia. She wanted Olivia to get to know her. But the thought of sharing her deepest, darkest secrets scared her to death.

  Oxygen deprivation on the mountain kept conversation to a minimum during the latter stages of a climb. Aside from the presentation she gave the day before each ascent began, she let Rae do most of the talking. The arrangement worked for all involved. Rae loved to talk and clients loved trying to guess if her accent was English, South African, or Australian. Then Olivia Bradshaw came along and threw a monkey wrench in the well-oiled machine that powered her defensive shields.

  They’d just met and Sam already wanted to tell her everything. The story behind the secrets, half-truths, and non-answers. She wanted to talk to her until her voice gave out. Kiss her until her lips went numb. When was the last time she felt that way about someone? Hell, when was the last time she felt anything at all?

  Easy. Before Mont Blanc. Before it had taken ten seconds to lose what she had waited twenty-two years to find.

  She drained the rest of the beer and reached for another. She needed something stronger. Bourbon, tequila, or a jar of her grandfather’s homemade moonshine. She needed to dull her senses. If time healed all wounds, why weren’t twelve years long enough to ease the pain?

  She finished her beer, placed both bottles in the recycling bin, and returned to the room she and Rae shared when they had clients onsite.

  “Is it time?” Rae asked drowsily.

  “Almost.”

  “Where were you?”

  “Talking with Dr. Bradshaw.”

  Rae stifled a yawn. “Lucky you. She’s a hell of a lot sexier in person than she is in print. That Marie-Eve is a looker, too. Almost makes me wish I was leading the climb instead of you.”

  “It’s not too late, you know.”

  “Nah, I’ll let you do all the dirty work. Take them to the summit and get their juices flowing. I’ll help them celebrate their amazing feat when you return them to BC safe and sound. It’s been years since I had a good ménage à trois. Hell, times are tough. I’ll even take a bad one at this point.”

  Sam flinched from a pang of what felt like jealousy. She envied Rae’s ability to live life carefree, unburdened by guilt or regret. Why couldn’t she do that? She turned and faced the wall. “Sweet dreams, Rae.”

  Rae yawned again. “Trust me. If my dreams are about
Olivia Bradshaw, they’ll be as sweet as sugar.”

  Sam’s dreams weren’t the kind she cared to remember. They were nightmares best forgotten as soon as the sun rose. She closed her eyes and tried to grab a few hours of sleep before the alarm went off. Tomorrow she could put everything behind her and do what she did best: climb.

  Chapter Three

  Olivia could feel Sam’s eyes on her when she approached the breakfast table. For the next six to eight weeks, they would need to rely on each other. Trust each other implicitly. If they didn’t get past the awkward ending to their last encounter, trusting each other would be virtually impossible. She pulled out a cold metal chair and took a seat. “Good morning, everyone,” she said, trying to infuse her voice with as much good cheer as she could muster.

  Sam didn’t respond, but her body language changed from guarded to semi-relaxed. Mission accomplished.

  “Namaste,” Rae said chirpily. “Did you sleep well?”

  “Like a baby.” Olivia poured herself a cup of coffee. In truth, she hadn’t slept a wink after she returned to bed a few hours ago. She hoped the bags under her eyes wouldn’t give her away. She couldn’t stop thinking about the climb. A journey of a thousand miles began with a single step and she was about to take the first one. She piled her plate high with scrambled eggs, roasted potatoes, and fresh fruit. Then she poured ketchup on the potatoes and took a bite of the rubbery eggs. “How’s the weather? Are we good to go or are we on hold?”

  Rae spread butter on a thick slice of bread. “We can push off as soon as Jimmy finishes fueling the portable generator.”

  “That’s great news.” She needed to get going. She needed to get her body in motion. She needed to forget. Forget how it felt to have Sam’s eyes gazing into hers. Forget how much she wanted to feel Sam’s climb-roughened hands sliding over her bare skin. Forget her budding attraction to Sam Murphy even as she followed her twenty-six thousand feet into the sky.