Page 39 of An Italian Wedding Adventure

There was memory in the action, in the feel of the carabiner in her hand, the gentle clink of metal, the creak of the straps of her harness – even the way her skin prickled on the back of her neck, knowing there was nothing but air behind her, came with a deep-buried affinity.

She focused on the rock in front of her, on breathing in and out, footholds, ascent, clipping one carabiner back into the cable, then the other. She wasn’t climbing. She was just taking small steps, feeling the equipment in her hands –having a fun day out, she thought snidely.

‘I can’t imagine the wedding party doing this.’

‘Fair enough,’ came Andreas’s reply. ‘But you’re the one who has to tell them that.’

She chuckled as the clambered up another few feet. ‘Are you using emotional blackmail to get me up?’

‘I didn’t think it was emotional. Just the usual sort of blackmail. I’ll bribe you, too, if you like.’

‘Or a bet?’

He grumbled inarticulately and she wasn’t sure why his tone had suddenly grown belligerent.

‘A bribe,’ he repeated. ‘I’ll take you out for Knödel tonight to celebrate reaching the top. I know a place.’

Sophie had to stop climbing while she laughed.

‘Something funny?’

‘It was just something Tita said after we met you all in Weymouth. She thought it sounded like canoodle,’ she explained with a snort. ‘You know what canoodle means? It means?—’

‘No,’ Andreas said with a groan. ‘I mean, yes, I know what it means, but no – just no. That’s not funny.’

‘Ithought it was.’

‘Because you don’t speak German. We have a perfectly good word for “canoodle” and it’s “knuddeln”, not “Knödel”.’

She snorted another laugh.

‘What is it now?’

‘Because “knuddeln” and “Knödel” are sooooo different,’ she said with what sounded alarmingly like a hysterical giggle.

‘They’re entirely different!’

‘Okay, fine. I understand you’re very serious about your dumplings.’ She shot him a teasing look, but wrenched her gaze right back down, then unfortunately caught sight of the distant, deep blue of the lake, so far below her that the town of Riva was in miniature and a mountain range took shape behind.

She heard voices below and the clink of carabiners.

‘Should we let them overtake?’ she asked Andreas. She remembered him telling her that allowing faster climbers to overtake was one of the rules of the vie ferrate.

‘Not here. Up there will be safer. Buongiorno!’ he called to the other climbers. While he discussed the plan for overtaking, Sophie tucked her tongue between her lips and hauled herself up after him. ‘Clip in here, past the pole at the top,’ Andreas called down to her from where he was partially obscured by the rock.

Sophie was surprised to realise she’d been planning to do exactly that. He’d taught her well all those years ago, when she’d hung on his every word. He spoke more on the mountain than in the valley. After he’d ended things, she’d been embarrassed to realise that he’d treated her like a climbing partner and not a romantic one, but that seemed for the best, now.

As she clipped her carabiners above her head, she realised Andreas treatedeveryonethat way. Was he close to anyone? She thought of Miro with a twinge. She hadn’t been there when Andreas had returned from Gasherbrum and it was a gap in her understanding of him that she suddenly resented – not that he would ever talk to her about it.

But two nights ago, he hadn’t treated her like a climbing partner. She shook off the memories of that scorching kiss before her knees turned weak. Andreas had kissed her hundreds of times. What was one more?

Ever since they’d kissed, her stomach had been in a slow freefall, buffeted every time his gaze connected with hers. Something about their time together hadn’t been closed off yet – a thought that sent twinges of remorse through her and triggered other feelings she hoped would stay buried, feelings about marriage.

Dragging Andreas around to discuss ribbons and boutonnieres had only made everything worse, reminding her why she shouldn’t want him.

Now he was praising her in his smooth, mountain-guide voice and she didn’t understand how that sound could both melt her bones and turn her spine to steel.

Gripping the cable that ran along the ridge, she scrambled all the way up, hauling herself to her feet, and then the world began to spin. She slammed her eyes shut, but it turned out the spinning was actually in her head and didn’t stop, so she forced them open again and then her stomach dipped at the same time as her heart leaped and for a moment, she wondered if she were falling.

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