Footprints in the Snow Read online

  She actually had the gall to look insulted. “You’re angry.”

  “You could say that.” Angry and sad at the same time. All he wanted from her was an explanation.

  “No matter what you think about me, Henry and Martin might be in danger. We need to do something.”

  Her concern seemed genuine. She cared about those two guys. And about him. In spite of her latest and zaniest excuse, she was a good person.

  With a sigh, he reached toward her. His fingertips brushed a strand of hair off her forehead and tucked it behind her ear, and she inclined her cheek toward his hand as if she wished to prolong their touch. He said, “Henry and Martin will be fine. Jack Swenson is keeping an eye on them.”

  “Your friend who’s a skier?”

  “And a marksman.” Jack would probably do a better job of protecting Henry and Martin than Luke. “Don’t worry. Our boys are safe.”

  “If we were in my time zone, you could have called Henry and Martin on their cell phones. You know, the electronic device I had in my pack? It’s like a walkie-talkie only smaller. Some of them are no bigger than a credit card.” She laughed. “But those haven’t been invented yet, either.”

  “Do me a favor, Shana. Stop talking.”

  She arched an eyebrow. “Make me.”

  Gladly, he silenced her with a kiss.

  Chapter Twelve

  Shana had what she wanted. The truth was out. And Luke was in her bed.

  In a roaring frenzy of passion, they’d torn off their garments and scattered them around the room. Across the dresser. On the foot of the bed. All over the floor.

  Under the covers, they were naked. And their desperate excitement took on a more subtle tone. For a long moment, she lay with her head on the pillow and merely gazed at his handsome face. He had seen so much and fought so heroically. Yet, she saw hope in his eyes. The facets of his irises reflected more brilliantly than polished sapphires. She traced a fingertip across his mouth, pushing his lips into a smile.

  “There,” she said. “Now you look happy.”

  “I am happy. As long as you don’t start talking again, I’m real happy.”

  “I can do that. For tonight.”

  This night belonged to them; they had earned these moments of pleasure that transcended imminent danger and the impossible fact that she was here in this era.

  She glanced down at the angry red scar on his shoulder—a permanent reminder of the ravages of a war he was still fighting. He intended to return to that battle; their time together might be cut short. She stopped herself from worrying about what might happen tomorrow or next week.

  Tonight, she didn’t want to think. Tonight was a time for fantasy.

  He cupped her breasts and teased the nipples into sensitive peaks. Each flick of his thumb sent a thrill racing through her body. His hand glided down her torso and came to rest at the juncture of her thighs. His fingers parted the delicate folds and he stroked.

  Shivering with pleasure, she groaned. Her body was ready for him, yearning for him, needing him with a rawness that defied logic.

  He mounted her, and she welcomed the pressure of his weight on her naked body. Her thighs parted, and he fit himself into that cradle.

  His slow, deliberate movements drove her wild. She writhed beneath him, and when he sheathed himself inside her, starbursts of ecstasy exploded behind her eyelids. With each slow thrust, he heightened her pleasure until she erupted in an elemental explosion, hot and unstoppable.

  Barely able to breathe, she whispered his name again and again as if by repeating she could assure herself that he would always be a part of her, inside of her.

  Though it seemed impossible to achieve another climax, he took her there. Every fiber of her body quivered, and she whimpered. This was too much. She couldn’t take any more.

  He exploded inside her, and her mind shattered.

  HER EYES SQUEEZED SHUT. She heard a symphony of violins and the cascading trill of a grand piano. The notes separated into music, and she recognized Beethoven. Though she didn’t know where the music was coming from, she heard it with perfect clarity.

  Her eyelids opened. The walls were plain and square, painted a pale vanilla color. Through the long, rectangular window, she saw the lights of a city.

  WITH A BLINK, the vision was gone. She was back in the Hotel Jerome, lying beside this incredible man.

  “Did you hear music?” she asked.

  “Only the singing of angels.”

  He lit a cigarette, and she smiled. Smoking after sex was so 1945. “Actually, I think it was Beethoven.”

  “I heard you.” He laced his fingers with hers and brought her hand to his lips for a light kiss. “I like all those little sounds you make.”

  She decided not to push about the music she’d heard. Telling him that she was from the future was probably enough for one night.

  Still, she had to wonder about that auditory hallucination and the quick glimpse of a vision. This wasn’t the first time. When she first came to Camp Hale, she’d heard the sound of an ambulance. Earlier tonight, she saw roses and heard her father’s voice.

  And the circle of light. Very clearly, she remembered that vision when she was drifting upward toward a glowing white light.

  These experiences had to mean something.

  Luke shifted in the bed beside her, propping himself up on one elbow. “Just suppose that you really were from the next millennium. Would you want to go back?”

  “There are things I like about my time,” she admitted. “The technology is a lot better. Personal computers. Digital cameras. Televisions have hundreds of channels.”

  “What about medicine?”

  “Of course, the vaccines have improved and some diseases have been completely eradicated.” How could she sum up sixty years of advances in medicine? “The most remarkable thing has to be the transplants. Diseased organs can be replaced.”

  “Like a heart?”

  “Heart transplants are common. And kidneys and lungs.”

  “Interesting.”

  She could hear disbelief in his voice, and she didn’t blame him. Even though she was actually here in the middle of a different era, she found the experience difficult to accept.

  “Would you want to go back?” he repeated. “Would you miss all your fancy gadgets?”

  Her life in the twenty-first century had been comfortable. She had a successful career and enjoyed her work. Her bank account held a very healthy balance, and she was able to purchase just about anything her heart desired.

  If she never returned to her own millennium, there were a few people she’d regret never seeing again. With all the travel required in her job, it was difficult to stay in touch with friends. But there were a few girlfriends she managed to meet regularly.

  Her family relationships were distant but not terrible. If she disappeared from the twenty-first century, her greatest regret would be that she never took the time to have an in-depth conversation with her father and to mend fences.

  “I’d be sad if I never saw my friends again. Or my family. And I was doing well in my career.” None of those things compared with the wild, swirling fantasy she shared with Luke. “However, all things considered, I’d rather stay here in 1945 with you.”

  “Even though there’s a war going on,” he said.

  She shrugged. “There are always wars.”

  “Even though you’re in danger from a foreign spy.”

  “Being alive means you’re always at risk. With you, I feel more alive than I’ve ever been before.”

  He leaned down and kissed her forehead. “Same here.”

  “Obviously, we’re meant to be together.”

  She had a sense that this was more than pillow talk. Meant to be together. Destiny. She glimpsed a piece of rational logic that was just beyond her comprehension. If she could only see clearly, she would understand everything that had happened to her.

  Then Luke kissed her lips and pulled her close. All logic faded.<
br />
  AT NINE O’CLOCK the next morning, Luke had gotten his two-jeep convoy on the road, headed back over Independence Pass toward Camp Hale. This time, he went first with Martin and Henry following close behind in their own jeep.

  Though the steep, sharp curves of Highway 82 demanded his attention, Luke scanned the landscape, watching for snipers. Beside him in the passenger seat, Shana sat with the loaded Garand rifle across her lap.

  “Riding shotgun,” she said. “I’m not really sure I know how to shoot this thing.”

  “If we run into trouble, hand the gun to me.”

  “And what should I do?”

  “Stay out of the way.” He hated bringing her back to Camp Hale, back into danger. “Shana, it’s not too late to reconsider. I can take you back to Aspen and leave you with Jack Swenson. He’s a good man, somebody I’d trust with my life.”

  “I’m not leaving you,” she said in the determined tone he was beginning to recognize. Once she set her mind to something—even something as crazy as her time travel story—she didn’t back down. “Besides, I made a deal with those spies. I took their money. Once they figure out that I’ve betrayed them, they’ll come after me. No matter where I am.”

  Last night, they’d opened the envelope and found that it contained two thousand dollars. A substantial amount for 1945.

  “About that money,” he said. “It’s better if we don’t mention it to Captain Hughes. Or to anybody else.”

  “Why? It’s not like I’m going to keep it.”

  “They still think you’re a spy. They don’t know you the way I do.”

  “I should hope not.”

  Her amused little chuckle reminded him of their lovemaking. The sounds she made in bed—her whispers, her giggles, her gasps and groans—excited him. She wasn’t one of those women who stood by and let him do all the work. Shana was an eager participant; she’d even taught him a few things.

  “Believe me, Luke. Nobody knows me the way you do.”

  “I don’t suppose you’ve told anybody else about this time travel thing.”

  “Not a soul.”

  “Lucky me,” he muttered.

  When they emerged from the forested area, he breathed a little easier. Along this open stretch of road, there were few places for a sniper to hide.

  The weather today was as temperate as yesterday with only a few wispy clouds trailing across the intense blue skies. Springtime was in the air. Soon, the snowpack would be melted except on the highest peaks, and the hillsides would turn lush and green. He wished he could spend the summer with Shana, lying beside a rippling mountain stream with her at his side, naked and willing as a heathen wood nymph.

  “About the time travel,” he said, “that’s another thing you should keep to yourself.”

  “I’d like to talk to Fermi about it. In a hypothetical kind of way. I mean, he’s one of the most brilliant theoretical physicists of all time. He might be able to give me an explanation.”

  “Be careful what you say,” he warned. “And not a word about this to Captain Hughes or any of the other G.I.’s.”

  “Agreed.”

  “If Fermi tells you time travel is impossible, will you believe him?”

  “Of course not.” Once again, her tone was determined. “I’m living proof that it happened. I didn’t make up the past thirty-two years of my life.”

  For a moment, he took his eyes off the road and glanced over at her. Her cheeks were rosy from the cold. Her eyes sparkled, and her full lips were the color of fresh raspberries. She looked sweet and beautiful—nowhere near as complicated as she really was.

  He almost believed her story about coming backward in time. Almost.

  She sat up straighter in the seat and pointed. “There’s the burned-out Studebaker.”

  The car he’d blown up with his grenade had been dragged off to the side of the road. A twisted wreck of scorched metal and busted windows. He grinned. “Oh boy, that’s cool.”

  “It’s grotesque,” she said. “I’m amazed that nobody was seriously hurt in that explosion.”

  “Yeah, too bad.”

  On the opposite side of the road from the wreck, he could still see the trail of four skiers leading downhill into the forest. Because they hadn’t shown up on any hotel registries and—according to Jack Swenson—they hadn’t made an attempt to purchase another vehicle, Luke concluded that they had a local contact.

  He wondered if the county sheriff had come up here to investigate. Though Luke would have felt better about following procedure and reporting the details of what had happened, that meant explaining the spies and why they were sniffing around Camp Hale. Which ultimately led to top secret information about Fermi and his Project Y that Shana had referred to as the Manhattan Project.

  Earlier this morning, when he’d talked on the telephone with Captain Hughes, Luke had been ordered not to file a report with the local authorities. He didn’t like the captain’s way of disregarding the stated laws of the land, especially when it came to the dead man whose body was stored in the shed. Why had that dead Russian been poking around in the captain’s office? Why had he offered Captain Hughes a bribe?

  Maybe Shana could bring a new perspective to those questions. Though she had some crazy ideas, she was smart. “Here’s a hypothetical for you,” he said. “Suppose I told you that there was another spy. A fifth man. Suppose he was sneaking around in Captain Hughes’s office. What would he be looking for?”

  “Official records and communications,” she said. “If there was information about troop deployments or strategy, that could be valuable to a spy.”

  “But most of the troops have already shipped out from Camp Hale. We’re down to a skeleton crew.”

  “Your captain is still in touch. He knew when men from the 10th Mountain Division were killed in action.”

  “He gets reports after the fact,” he said. “But nobody in Europe is going to consult with an army base in Colorado before making strategy decisions.”

  “There could be some kind of top secret files,” she said. “Certainly, there were communications about Dr. Fermi’s visit to the uranium mines.”

  “Bingo,” he said. “It always comes back to Fermi.”

  “That’s why the spies are here,” she said. “Every country in the world would like to sink their talons into him. His project is about to change the world.”

  THE REST OF THE RIDE back to Camp Hale was uneventful, and Luke reported immediately to the barracks building where the offices were housed. Though the door to the captain’s office was open, Luke had the sense that he was intruding.

  Captain Hughes sat behind his desk with his elbows propped on the top and his forehead pressed against his fingertips. He was a mess. As General Sherman said, “War is hell,” and Hughes looked as though he’d taken up permanent residence in Satan’s realm.

  Stepping into the doorway, he snapped a salute. “Sir.”

  “Come in. At ease.” Hughes looked up slowly as if the simple act of lifting his head was exhausting. “No need to be so damned military.”

  When Luke approached the desk, he smelled whiskey, though it was before noon. His training as a soldier taught him to respect the chain of command, in spite of the obvious fact that his commanding officer appeared to be half drunk and incapacitated.

  Common sense urged him to shove Hughes aside and take over the operations of Camp Hale. “Sir, were you able to arrange for an aircraft to evacuate Fermi and the other scientists?”

  With a clumsy gesture, the captain shoved aside the mass of paperwork on his desk. “I’ve been talking to those idiots at Lowry for half the morning. Bunch of damned hotshots in the Army Air Corps. You’d think I asked for the world instead of one stinking little plane. I’m sick of the army. Sick of the war.”

  “We all are,” Luke said. “It’s gone on too long.”

  “Too many men have died. Good men.” He focused on Luke through bloodshot eyes. “How much do you know about this project Fermi is working on
?”

  The only details Luke had came from Shana. “That information is top secret.”

  “A bomb,” Hughes said. “A powerful bomb that can destroy an entire city. An atomic bomb.”

  That was exactly what Shana had said. How would she have that knowledge? If she was a spy, she’d know.

  Luke immediately rejected that notion. She wasn’t a traitor. He’d been wrong about women before, especially about his former fiancée, but he’d seen into Shana’s soul. With all his heart, he believed she was a good person.

  But how did she know about the bomb? Much as he hated to think about her lunatic claim about time travel, he had to take it under consideration. She might know about Fermi’s project because—in her era—the bomb had already been dropped.

  “We don’t need more bombs,” Hughes said. “It’s time for all the killing to stop.”

  Considering that the captain had gunned down an intruder in cold blood, his sentiment lacked sincerity. He thought everybody else should hang up their weapons, but it was okay for him to kill a man and stash his body in a cold, dark shed.

  “About the plane,” Luke said.

  “Tomorrow. We’ll have a plane by noon tomorrow. Frankly, I can’t wait to get that son of a bitch Fermi off my base.”

  Waiting until tomorrow created a problem. Shana was supposed to deliver Fermi to the spies tomorrow morning. If she didn’t fulfill her end of the bargain, they might make a move on their own. Even worse, they might come after her.

  “Sir, I suggest that we double the guards on Fermi until his departure.”

  “Take care of it.” He flapped his hand in a dismissive gesture. “Hey, what happened with the girl? Did she make contact with the Russians while you were in Aspen?”

  Luke looked his commanding officer straight in the face and lied. “No, sir. She did not.”

  His brow lowered in a scowl, and he seemed to be considering Luke’s words. Even in his debilitated state, he might be able to recognize a deception. “What are you telling me, Rawlins?”

  Luke phrased his statement carefully to avoid lying. “I didn’t observe Shana making contact.”