Breakaway

by Nancy Warren

  But because of a badly written business agreement, Lydie Quinn had been left with virtually nothing. All the business assets went to Innis, and though Max was supposed to have had a life insurance policy through the company, Innis had stopped paying the premiums a few months before the Everest expedition. So Lydie had been forced to sell their little house in Rotorua and move the family back to Auckland, where they’d lived with Mal’s grandparents.

  Though they’d moved away from their childhood home, Max Quinn’s sons couldn’t forget his legacy. So they’d started their own adventure guiding business, the name a nod to their father—Maximum Adrenaline. In deference to their mother, they refused to return to Everest, but with only two eight-thousand-foot expeditions on their trip list, it had been hard to compete with Innis’s company.

  The family’s relationship with Roger Innis became almost hostile when they became competitors, with Outbound Adventure doing all it could to win the battle for clients and reputation.

  But Innis took chances, sometimes putting his clients at risk in order to get them to the top of a mountain. The Quinns were known to err on the side of caution, and for climbers who paid dearly to get to the summit, this was not always a popular choice. Nor was it flashy enough to get them the media coverage they needed to expand their business.

  But they were getting it now, weren’t they?

  Mal sat down on the front steps and ran his fingers through his hair. “I’m not sure what to say.”

  “Well, you’d better come up with something. We’re going to have to make a statement to the media at some point. I didn’t think it was my place, and Mum just refuses to talk about it.”

  “All right. The next person who calls, have them ring my mobile and I’ll make a statement.”

  “There’s something else,” she murmured.

  “Please tell me the business is bankrupt or my house has burned to the ground. I’d be much more equipped to cope.”

  “Innis announced that he’s going to mount an expedition to recover Dad’s effects.”

  Mal felt as if he’d been punched in the stomach, his breath leaving him. “What the hell? Where does he get off? It’s his fault Dad is dead. Does he think he can make up for that by rescuing him now? He should have done his job twenty years ago.”

  There had been whispers all those years ago, comments from other climbers about Innis’s reckless disregard for his partner’s safety. They’d said he’d made decisions that had directly contributed to Max Quinn’s death. But those had only been rumors; no one knew the real story except for Roger Innis and Mal’s father—and neither one of them was talking.

  Dana wrapped her arm around Mal’s and leaned against him. “It’s just talk,” she said. “Publicity. You know how he is—he’ll use anything to get his business in the news. Just last month he had the cover story in High Adventure magazine for his Antarctica expedition.”

  “The cover?” Mal cursed. “How the hell does he manage that?” Mal had been trying to get a feature in High Adventure for years. Mal was convinced the glossy American magazine was key to capturing more American clientele. “I suppose he’s hoping for another cover with this harebrained scheme of his. The bludger.”

  “He can’t mount a trip to Everest until at least next spring, and even then, he’d have to get permits and shuffle his clients around. By then all the interest will have died down and—”

  “He wants Dad’s journal,” Mal muttered. “He’s well aware Dad kept it in his climbing suit and he’s afraid of what might be written there. Innis has worked all these years to rebuild his reputation. He’s not going to let it all fall apart now.”

  The sound of a phone ringing echoed from the office and Dana stood up. “Probably another reporter.”

  “Do you want me to handle it?” Mal asked.

  “No. You’re just home. You deserve a chance to relax a bit. I’ll tell them what I’ve been saying for three weeks. No comment. Although that seems to make them even more determined to get a quote.” She paused. “You know, maybe we should give an interview. All of us, Mum, too. The publicity couldn’t hurt. We could beat Innis at his own game.”

  “Maybe,” he murmured.

  “And High Adventure magazine has rung three times in the past few days. I told the girl you’d be back tomorrow. Maybe you should talk to her.”

  A feature article about their father and the Quinn family business might finally bring them out of the shadow of Roger Innis. Especially if they mounted their own expedition. Maybe it was time they learned the truth about that week on Everest.

  But did he really want to know? It wouldn’t change anything. His father would still be dead and he’d force his mother to relive the tragedy all over again. And he’d promised her that he and his brothers would never climb Everest. There were so many reasons not to go.

  Yet Mal couldn’t help but wonder if learning the truth—his father’s truth—might not put to rest some of the pain he and his family had suffered. Could the answers be found in his father’s journal? Had he written his farewells there before he died on the mountain? There were so many unanswered questions.

  “I’m going to go see Mum,” Mal said, pushing to his feet. “And then I’m going home to grab a shower and a drink, and maybe I’ll get myself a haircut.”

  “What about the woman?” Dana asked with a wry smile.

  “That might have to wait,” he murmured.

  Mal gave Duff a rough pet and the dog trotted beside him to the Range Rover. “You want me to take him?”

  “No, I’ll keep him.”

  He waved at his sister, Duffy at her side, as he drove out to the main road. Life had always been pretty uncomplicated for Mal and he liked it that way. But the reality of their business problems was beginning to weigh on him. There was never extra money; he could barely afford to make rent from month to month. When finances were tight, he bought new equipment instead of food and ate expired rations from their expedition stockpile.

  He reached into his pocket and grabbed the wad of cash that he had left over from the client tips he and the other guides had divided amongst themselves. He’d take enough for a single night out. The rest would have to go to pay the bills.

  “I’d better make it a bloody good night,” he muttered. “I’ve had enough of living like a damn monk.”

  * * *

  “HEY, BILLY FINSTER! Set me up with a pint and make it quick. I’ve got myself a powerful thirst!”

  The shout echoed through the empty pub and Amy Engalls looked up from her laptop at the tall, lanky man who strode up to the bar. His hair was shaggy and he wore a well-worn T-shirt and faded jeans. The cap on his head was turned backward and his eyes were hidden by a pair of bright blue sunglasses.

  He glanced around and his eyes lingered on her for a long moment. Amy grabbed a quick breath and held it. Was this Malcolm Quinn? He wasn’t due back until tomorrow, but she’d studied the photos and it could be him. Word around town was that he and his brothers hung out at Brawley’s Pub near his place on the beach. So she’d decided to stake it out. When he turned away, she quickly pulled a file folder from her bag and searched for a reference.

  Her breath slowly escaped as she stared down at the handsome face in the photo, then compared it to the profile of the man at the bar.

  An instant later, the barkeeper burst through the swinging kitchen door and confirmed her suspicions. “Mal Quinn, you old dog. I was wonderin’ when you’d roll back in. Where was it you were?”

  “Greenland,” Mal said as he slid onto a stool.

  The barkeeper drew him a glass of beer and set the pint in front of him. “Bloody hell, what’s in Greenland?”

  Mal took off his sunglasses and tossed them on the bar. “Lots of ice. And snow and cold.”

  “Any pretty girls?”

  Mal laughed. “Not that I saw. The whole expedition was blokes. Not a woman for miles.”

  Billy nodded, then slapped his hands on the worn wood surface of the bar. “At tha
t is exactly the reason why you’ll never find me out there, trudging up some mountainside or walking across some bloody glacier. I can’t do without female companionship. And they can’t do without me.”

  “You can’t do without your smokes and Foster’s for more than a day,” Mal teased. “It’s hard yakka out there. Not for a piker like you.”

  The barkeeper frowned, then patted his stomach. “I could get in shape for it. Give up the ale and the cigs. You could put me with a group of ladies and I’d keep them all entertained.”

  Amy listened as they exchanged jibes, silently taking in Mal’s appearance. How would she describe him in her story? Tall, graceful, fit. He was thin but muscular, broad shouldered and narrow hipped. His dark hair was long and shaggy and streaked by the sun, and his tanned face was shadowed by the stubble of a beard.

  He was, by all accounts, one of the most gorgeous men she’d ever seen. The pictures she had didn’t come close to conveying the energy that surrounded him. He was powerful and focused, even in casual conversation. Here was a man who lived life to the fullest, a man who wasn’t afraid of danger. A man she wanted.

  She shifted uneasily, surprised by the depth of her attraction to him. It wasn’t just his looks. It was something deeper, more perplexing. Maybe she admired his courage because she had never had much of her own. She’d spent her entire life accepting what was tossed her way and had never really stood up for herself.

  Until now, she hoped. She was here to change the course of her life. And she wasn’t about to let opportunity slip by, even if it meant approaching an impossibly sexy man and convincing him to do something he wouldn’t want to do.

  A phone rang and Billy moved to the end of the bar to answer it. Amy continued to observe Mal Quinn from her spot at her table, wondering how she ought to introduce herself. Should she take the initiative now, or wait until tomorrow? What if she didn’t get another chance?

  She’d worked as a copy editor for High Adventure magazine for the past six years, hoping for her big break into feature writing. But most of the feature writers were adventurers themselves, out in the world, doing daring deeds and living to tell their tales. She was just an ordinary girl who could write a really good story. An ordinary girl who just happened to be the publisher’s daughter.

  Amy had never wanted to write for an adventure magazine. In truth, she would have been happy working at any one of the numerous women’s publications that her father owned. But with her father’s twisted sense of purpose, he’d put an impossible goal in front of her and challenged her to meet it, all the while assuming she’d fail. That was the way it had always been with Richard Engalls. He wanted his children to prove they were worthy of his valuable attention. Her brother had been a model student and was an adventurer himself. But Amy didn’t seem to possess the Engalls backbone. She was her mother’s daughter, still scarred by her parents’ divorce when she was thirteen, still hoping that her father might notice her and approve.

  Which was why she was here. Amy knew a good story when she read one. And just because she’d never been on a big adventure didn’t mean she couldn’t write an adventure story, did it? For the first time in her life, she’d show her father that she had what it took to succeed in publishing. She’d cashed in her savings and wagered it on one bet—that she could land a feature with the Quinn brothers. She’d follow their journey, documenting the story of the three Quinn brothers in regular articles. It had everything her editor looked for in a feature—conflict, emotion, a high-profile location and adventurers with personality.

  Her editor had scoffed at the notion that Amy could get an exclusive and convince her father to fund the expedition. But beneath his bluster, she could tell the editor had found her idea intriguing, and she didn’t doubt that he’d go to her father at the first available opportunity and ask for the story himself. But Amy was one step ahead of both of them. She took her two weeks of vacation and, after checking Mal Quinn’s online itinerary, bought a plane ticket from New York to Auckland.

  Gathering her courage, she pushed her chair back and walked to the bar. She’d order something to eat and maybe strike up a conversation with Mal. She’d almost reached a spot beside him when his mobile rang. He fished it out of his pocket and then slid off the stool and walked to the front door, stepping out into the afternoon sunshine.

  Amy groaned inwardly. She was no good at this. Give her a manuscript and she could make it pulse with excitement. She was better with words than people, and she’d never been comfortable talking to strangers. And now, because of her dithering, she’d lost her chance. Mal Quinn had walked out the door. What if he didn’t come back? Even worse, what if he did?

  Talking to a handsome, sexy man wasn’t exactly her forte. Her palms sweated and her heart pounded in her chest and every rational thought just slipped out of her head. It was a wonder she’d managed to have relationships at all. She had, though they were never anything she wanted to make permanent.

  When Billy the barkeeper returned from his phone call, Amy slid onto a stool.

  “What can I get you, darlin’?” he asked. “Another diet cola?”

  “I—I thought I’d have something to eat. Do you have any specials today?”

  “Bangers and mash, mussels in cream sauce and a crispy salmon patty. The soup is a crab chowder. The kitchen opens for supper in another half hour. I can probably scratch up a sammie for you or some potato fries if you can’t wait.”

  “I’ll just have a bag of crisps,” Amy said. “And a beer. Whatever you have on tap.”

  She needed the drink. Diet cola wasn’t going to give her any courage at all. It only made her jittery. She drew a deep breath, then heard the door open behind her. Afraid to look, Amy tried to appear nonchalant.

  Billy brought her the beer and crisps. “That’ll be six dollars.”

  “I’ll get it.”

  She froze as she heard his voice behind her. Slowly, Amy turned, and her gaze met his. Oh, hell, he was even more handsome close up. He had that rugged, outdoorsy thing going on. The kind of man that just oozed masculinity. He probably smelled like fresh air and soap and woodsmoke.

  Amy wanted to speak, but she couldn’t seem to catch her breath. She gulped some air and felt the blood rush to her head as he came closer. Oh, he did smell good. But like cologne, subtle and musky.

  Was she supposed to accept his gesture? Was that why he was regarding her so strangely? “I—I have money,” Amy finally managed to say.

  “So do I,” he said with a crooked smile. “I’m just back from a month away and I’ve got tips burning a hole in my pocket. I reckoned I’d buy the house a drink.”

  “There’s only two of us here,” she said.

  He leaned closer. “I know. The perfect plan, don’t you think?”

  “Thank you,” she murmured, grabbing her beer and crisps. “And—and welcome home.”

  She hurried back to her table, needing just a moment to regroup. All right, he was handsome and very charming. And that smile was enough to melt any woman’s resistance. But that didn’t mean she couldn’t act like a professional.

  Amy fixed her attention on her computer screen, afraid to risk another glance. The problem was, she really wasn’t a professional journalist. She knew exactly what made for a perfect story, she could even write a perfect story. She’d just never gone out and found a story. There were probably all sorts of tricks that journalists used to get their subject to confess all their deepest secrets. She just had no idea what those tricks were. She’d been more worried about beating her father and her editor to the story than to research journalistic practices.

  Should she introduce herself right off the bat or should she get friendly with him first and ease her way into an interview? Maybe she could just get him to talk about his work or his family and he wouldn’t even realize she was interviewing him. Was that ethical? Probably not, but it might be the only way she could get what she needed.

  “So what are you staring at? You seem awfully intent
on that screen. Let me guess. Porn?”

  Amy froze, then slowly looked up. “No, not porn. It’s my work computer. I can’t watch porn on my work computer. That would be against the rules.”

  “Do you always follow the rules, then?”

  “I—I try to,” Amy murmured. Mal pulled out the chair across from her, turned it around and straddled the seat. He rested his arm across the back and took a slow sip of his beer. “Go ahead. Carry on. I don’t want to interrupt your work.”

  Amy’s heart slammed in her chest as she refocused on the screen in front of her. Here he was, ready to talk. Now she just had to keep up her end of the conversation. “Thank you for the drink—and the crisps.” She glanced up to find him grinning at her. “What?”

  “Nothing,” Malcolm replied. “I’m just enjoying the view.”

  She scanned the room. “I—I don’t understand.” Then she realized he was talking about her. Amy’s face flushed with embarrassment.

  “I haven’t seen a beautiful woman in a month, so I’m just going to sit here and stare at you, if you don’t mind. I’ll try not to bother you.”

  Pretty? Did he really think she was pretty? She’d never really applied that term to herself. She wasn’t unattractive, just...ordinary.

  “You must have been gone longer than a month if you think I’m pretty,” she murmured, unable to keep herself from returning the smile.

  “Aw, now, don’t say that. You’re lovely.”

  She glanced around the pub. “I don’t have much competition,” she countered.

  “Well, I happen to be a very good judge of beauty. I’ve seen some of the most beautiful places in the world. So trust me on this.”

  “Thank you,” Amy said. “For the crisps and the compliment.”

  “I’m Mal Quinn, by the way,” he said, holding out his hand.

  “Nice to meet you,” Amy said.

  A long silence fell between them as she tried to decide what to do. In the end, she didn’t have a choice, the introduction just came out. “I’m Amy Engalls. I’m a reporter from High Adventure magazine and I’ve come here to interview you.”