Chapter One
Kyle Dolan was convinced that his wife was trying to kill him. Forty degrees with a chill wind, but he was sweating like a prizefighter.
Fifty feet ahead of him, Bethany poked her stick along the trail, bracing against slick rocks. Headphones on, she conducted an unseen orchestra that long ago had laid down its instruments.
"Bethany!" If Kyle's lungs didn't explode, his heart would. He was an avid racquetball player, but his wife set a killer pace. Was this what she had been doing for the last month-racing up and over mountain trails as if they were highways? He never should have let her go to the New Hampshire farmhouse without him.
"I need the time away. Time to be alone," she had said. Too much consolation from friends and colleagues was choking her in Boston.
She had gone north at the end of March. In the last week of April, spring was in full force in the Mount Washington Valley. The grass was lush and green, the Saco River swollen from snow and running hard. Strawberry plants were already full with foliage, their fruit blossoms just short weeks away.
Beautiful, yes, but Kyle knew that spring in the White Mountains was the most dangerous time of the year. Ice still choked the upper slopes. Snowstorms could spin out of the clouds without warning, stranding hikers who had left the valley in shorts and T-shirts. Even vigorous, experienced climbers weren't immune to the avalanches in the ravines.
And his wife had been climbing there for weeks, all by herself. Anything could have happened. "Bethany!" Kyle bellowed.
She slid the headphones down and scrambled to him. "You look like you're having a heart attack, Southie."
"You won't be laughing when you have to drag my body off this mountain."
She grabbed his side. "Especially with this extra twenty pounds you brought with you." She half-pinched, half-tickled his ribs.
"Looking for love handles?"
Bethany put her lips to his ear. "Looking for love."
He pulled her close, sliding his hands under her backpack. She was hot under her pack but cool against his chest.
"Some heart rate you got going there," she said. "This little stroll too much for you?"
"You. You're too much woman for this Southie kid to handle."
"That's blarney, Dolan. I know you. Deli lunches, stack the ham high. Chinese takeout, extra noodles and double chicken wings. And cookies for dessert. Though I maintain that no one needs dessert after breakfast."
"You sent them to me!" he protested.
"To share with your staff! Not to eat in front of the television every night."
"I was just being a good husband. Doing my duty by eating every single one."
She kissed the tip of his nose. "You are the best husband. I missed you, Kyle."
"I missed you. Oh, how I missed you." He could feel it now, that slight tremble in the small of her back-the crushing fear that this pain would last forever. What he would give to lift that from her, or for her to at least let him help carry it.
He laced his fingers into her hair. Her father had gone gray early, but Bethany didn't even have a hint of silver. Just that rich brown, so dark it was almost black, and glossy, like an elegant cat. And like a cat, she loved having her head rubbed, his fingertips deep in her scalp.
"Beenie, I shouldn't have left you up here so long by yourself."
"I needed the time. But I'm glad you're here now." Her smile was convincing. "So what do you say, old man? We have to summit by noon so we can get down before dark."
"Get down?" He faked a dying gasp. "You mean, there's not a car service up there, waiting for us?"
"There ain't even portapotties up there, sweetie!"
"I've been holding it all morning! And now you're telling me-"
"There's a nice tree, right over there. And there, and there, and there-" Laughing, she started up the trail.
"Hey! You never answered my question," he called after her.
"What question?"
"Pick one."
"Why is the sky blue?" The standard question that always began the why game. The who game began with Who's on first? The what's up game began with What's up, Doc?
"Why do men sweat and women glow?" Lame choice-Kyle was never as sharp at this as she was. Bethany insisted that he could never win because he wasn't a question kind of guy; he had all the answers. He only wished he did.
"Why do people water their lawns in the rain?" she parried.
"Why do people climb mountains for fun?"
"Oh. So we're getting personal, are we?" Bethany scrambled up a boulder and assumed a prophet's stance. "Answer me this, son of the mountain."
He bowed at the waist, his face grave and attentive. "Speak, daughter of the skies."
She bit her lip, trying to wipe the grin off her face. "Why-WHY-do the Red Sox blow it every year?"
He grabbed his heart, staggering backwards. "Why do I root for them anyway?"
"Why are you such a sweet fool?" Bethany looked sixteen in that moment, her skin clear and unlined, her eyes dancing with mischief. He ran up the trail. Too fast-he slipped, scraping his hand. When he reached her, she took his hand and kissed the scrape.
"Why do I love you so much?" he asked, knowing the answers were endless.
She was silent.
"Beenie. It's your turn," he prompted.
"Why-" She buried herself in his chest.
"Why what?"
"Just why," she whispered to his heart.
The breeze swelled, now cold and raw, sweeping down from the north side of the ridge, the shadowed side where the sun never shone. Kyle held his wife as tightly as he could.
It was not much of an answer, but it was all he had.
###
Bethany savored this time, the smooth rock under her back, the sun on her face. Her husband beside her, snoring lightly as he slept. She stretched from toes to fingertips, enjoying the warmth in her body, the new strength. Kyle had called her chiseled last night, exploring her with love but also care, wanting to make sure she wasn't too thin. He was the athlete, she the artist, but the constant hiking, from dawn to sunset, had made her body hard.
Her heart was proving more difficult to conquer.
"Beenie?" Kyle's eyes were blurry with sleep, his hair flat on one side. Those lines around his eyes were new. But they were inevitable, weren't they? He was forty-one; she was thirty-nine. Still young by many measures, they had lived a lifetime in the past few years.
She kissed his cheek. "It's almost two. We need to get going."
"Not yet," he said, pulling her to him.
"You do realize the whole world can see us up here."
"Let them look." He kissed her, sweet and deep. And then, despite all they had been through, despite how she had failed him, she knew he loved her still.
He sat up and leaned against the boulder, drew her into him, her back against his chest. There was no sign of civilization, only miles of sky, trees, and mountains. "Bethany. There are things we could be doing now."
Bethany pushed away from him. "Like starting down this mountain before the sun goes down and the night wind turns us into giant Popsicles."
"Every day we don't talk, we're a day older. A day further away from what we want."
"There is nothing to discuss." Without thinking, Bethany moved her hand to her abdomen.
"We still have one embryo. It would still be our baby if we used a surrogate."
"It's not that simple, Kyle."
"Maybe not simple-but it has become very routine. Remember that thing on the news last night, about a sixty-year-old woman carrying a baby for her daughter? Easy."
She nodded, watching a redtail hawk cruise in the wind. It was always so easy for Kyle. Something either worked your way or it didn't. Their marriage was a tremendous success. The acclaimed pianist, Bethany Testamarta, and the dashing entrepreneur, Kyle Dolan, were an attractive, exciting couple. Even in private they were a good match. His temperament soothed her; her passion inspired him. Their faith rooted them.
"Won't you at least consider it?"
"I can't." She shouldered her pack, then pulled her cap down on her forehead to hide her face.
He turned her around and pulled her into him. "Hey, it's okay," he whispered. "We'll talk about this later. You'll come around when you have time to think it through."
Bethany hugged him, then turned for the trail. She would never come around. It had taken all her courage to survive the death of her baby and the hysterectomy. She had nothing left to hope with. God had lifted His hand and let nature take its course.
It had been a cruel one.
