Page 57 of Mountain Summons

“Kitchen’s yours if you want anything,” he said softly.

She flashed him a small smile over her shoulder. “I know. I’m going to make some tea. Would you like a cup?”

“Sure,” he said. “Let me make it. Why don’t you go sit down?” He’d taken off his boots and socks, and she couldn’t help but stare at his strong, wide feet.

“Stop treating me like I’m breakable, Tristan. I’m worried about my father, but I’m okay.”

“Of course you are. It’s just been … a long weekend. I know my parents can be a lot.”

Lena laughed at the euphemism. “I don’t think they liked me much. I’m sorry,” she said. She really was. She’d wanted them to like her, because … well, because they were Tristan’s parents. Because this—with him—felt real. And then she’d embarrassed them in front of their friends. She cringed at the memory.

Tristan shook his head, already filling the kettle. “Don’t apologize. You were great. You held your own in a room full of people who measure their self-worth by what’s hanging from their wrist.”

Lena leaned her hip against the counter, watching him move around the small, functional kitchen. She reached for two mugs and put them on the counter. “For what it’s worth—” she began, but was interrupted by a loud knock.

Tristan tensed. He moved fast, his bare feet silent on the wooden floor. A quick glance out the window, and then he opened the door. Three tall, broad-shouldered men strode in. If they were surprised to see Lena there, they didn’t show it.

Tristan shook hands with each man in turn.

“Lena, you remember Alex, Ry and Lorenz?”

Lena nodded and murmured a greeting. Her face flushed in embarrassment, and she wondered if it would always be like this. If, every time she saw them, she’d have a flashback to being lost in the mountains.

“How’s your wrist?” she asked Lorenz, looking for something—anything—to take her away from her most humiliating memory.

“Almost as good as new,” Lorenz smiled, raising it to show her the splint.

“What are you guys doing here?” Tristan asked, ushering them inside.

“We figured we’d order dinner and catch you up on things before you come back to work tomorrow,” Ry said, pulling out a chair and straddling it.

“We already know the colonel’s house was broken into,” Tristan said. “The colonel called us on our way in.”

“Vincent and his team are still there. But the break-in is the least of our concerns,” Alex said, then looked at Lena quickly. “Sorry, Lena. I mean?—”

“It’s okay. In case it’s not clear, I’m not here to spy on my father,” she said, with more bravado than she was really feeling.

Tristan took her wrist and pulled her gently onto his lap. “We know,” he said cockily. “You’re here because of me.”

Lena smiled, allowing herself to lean against his hard chest. “I guess I am.”

“So. What else is going on?”

Alex was the first one to speak. “The forensic scientists finally identified the man whose body you found.”

Lena inhaled sharply. “They know who he is?”

Alex nodded. “Maxim Jubert. A lawyer who disappeared seventy-three years ago.”

Seventy-three years. Lena’s stomach twisted. Seventy-three years hidden in the mountains. Nearly three-quarters of a century, buried beneath snow and silence.

She shifted slightly on Tristan’s lap.

“Was it an accident?” she asked quietly. “Or…”

Alex glanced at Ry, then at Lorenz. “They don’t know yet,” he said. “He had a broken femur, which wouldn’t have killed him if he’d gotten help. But the back of his skull was also caved in, and that may—or may not—have been an accident.”

Tristan swore under his breath.

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