Worth Every Step Read online

  Copyright© 2009 KG MacGregor

  Bella Books, Inc.

  P.O. Box 10543

  Tallahassee, FL 32302

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechani- cal, including photocopying, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  Editor: Cindy Cresap

  Cover Designer: Linda Callaghan

  ISBN 10: 1-59493-142-9

  ISBN 13:978-1-59493-142-0

  About the Author

  KG MacGregor was born in 1955 into a military family in Wilmington, North Carolina.

  Following her graduation from Appalachian State University, she worked briefly in elementary education, but returned to earn a doctoral degree in journalism and mass communications from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Her love of both writing and math led to a second career in market research, where she consulted with clients in the publishing, television and travel industries.

  The discovery of lesbian fan fiction prompted her to try her own hand at romantic storytelling in 2002 with a story called Shaken. In 2005, MacGregor signed with Bella Books, which published Goldie Award finalist Just This Once. Her sixth Bella novel, Out of Love, won the 2007 Lambda Literary Award for Women’s Romance, and the 2008 Goldie Award in Lesbian Romance. In 2008, she proudly announced the return of the Shaken Series with its first installment, Without Warning.

  To KG, there is no better praise for her work than hearing she has created characters her readers want to know and have as friends. Please visit her at www.kgmacgregor.com.

  Dedication

  To the adventurous spirit in all of us.

  Acknowledgments

  When I was thirteen, I fell in love with Africa through Joy Adamson’s stories of the lioness Elsa and her cubs. My visit to Kenya and Tanzania in the summer of 2001 was a dream come true. Over the course of my visit, which included an eight-day trek to the summit of Mt. Kilimanjaro, my admiration for the rich heritage of those living in the shadow of the mountain soared. I thank them for their hospitality, and for giving me the adventure of a lifetime.

  I appreciate editor Cindy Cresap’s hard work in whipping this story into shape. If it makes sense, hangs together and fulfills its potential, it’s her fault. If it doesn’t, she’ll get to say she told me so.

  Thanks also to Jenny for the technical edit, and to Karen for her uncanny ability to see words that aren’t there, and words that are there, but shouldn’t be.

  Prologue

  Never in her life had Mary Kate Sasser faced such a harrowing challenge, a quest so daunting that not even her months of meticulous preparation could quell her doubts. And this was just the plane ride!

  Once they stabilized, she forced herself to loosen the death grip on her armrest. As if holding on would matter should this tin can disintegrate in turbulence at twenty-eight thousand feet.

  Not exactly a seasoned traveler, Mary Kate had no idea what a normal flight was supposed to feel like. All she knew was they were bouncing over a third world country with a third world airline, probably in a plane that had been junked by somebody else after flying a couple of hundred million miles. This flight was much rougher than her first leg, a sixteen-hour adventure over the ocean, where she had been crammed in the middle section between the Michelin Man and a woman with a baby. Her attempts to sleep were thwarted either by the big guy drooping into her space, the baby pulling her hair or her own gloomy thoughts about her crumbling relationship with Bobby Britton. The last bit annoyed her to no end. After thinking about it all the way across the ocean, she had finally solidified the decision that should have made her happy. But instead of feeling as though she were finally in control of her life, she had already begun to second-guess herself about what she was giving up. The closer she got to Tanzania, the more she hoped for resolve.

  At least this time she had a seatmate who stayed on his side of the armrest. He didn’t seem nervous about all this bouncing, and she found that comforting. Her window seat offered little in the way of a view, as they had been stuck in the clouds since Johannesburg. The plains of Africa were down there somewhere, but her first look would have to wait until touchdown, and only then if her prayers for a safe landing were answered.

  In sharp contrast to her gloomy thoughts about Bobby and her fears of hurtling through the stratosphere, Mary Kate had never been so excited. Somewhere underneath all those clouds below was Mount Kilimanjaro, the highest peak on the continent, and her ultimate destination. If they didn’t fall from the sky in a ball of fire, getting there would be worth it.

  She had sucked in every small detail of the trip so far, from the robotic way they had marched through immigration in Johannesburg to the jumbled cadence of Swahili she had overheard as they boarded this flight. This was the experience of a lifetime, and while part of her thought it was a shame to be having that at twenty-four years old, at least she knew she would have it. Hardly anyone back in her tiny town of Mooresville, Georgia, would have an adventure like this to look back on.

  The plane bounced again forcefully and she looked around the cabin for any signs of panic. No one else appeared nervous, and the flight attendants were up and about performing what looked like mundane duties. That had to be good news, she told herself, unless they were trained to act nonchalant at moments of impending doom.

  With a deep, calming breath, she settled her shoulders against the seat back. Africa was all she had thought about for the past six months, ever since seeing a documentary on public television. She couldn’t say why the mountain had called to her the way it had…maybe because Bobby made fun of it, saying it wasn’t all that big a deal if a person could just walk to the top. It wasn’t as if he aspired to scale the ice walls of Everest. His idea of a summer vacation was Myrtle Beach one year and Disney World the next. Repeat thirty times or until you died of boredom, whichever came first. That was all the adventure he needed, and it reinforced the growing realization that they weren’t exactly made for each other. In fact, the whole year they had spent together seemed to her an exercise in trying to fit a square peg into a round hole.

  As if belittling her about hiking to the summit of Kilimanjaro weren’t enough, Bobby also had convinced himself and practically everyone else that she couldn’t manage the trip on her own. He seemed to think a Y-chromosome was required for reading a schedule or navigating an airport or bus terminal. She could still hear him warning her that she would be stranded in the middle of nowhere if she missed a ride, and then be sorry for not letting him come along. What Mary Kate couldn’t fathom was why he thought he knew all there was to know about getting around in a foreign country since he had never been farther from home than Branson, Missouri.

  Of course, he wasn’t the only one who had thought her solo trip was a bad idea. Her mother worried that she would plunge to her death from a cliff, even though Mary Kate had tried to explain that this expedition wasn’t like that, that it was more of a steep hike than an actual climb. Then her father read in one of the brochures that Tanzania was primarily a Muslim country, and he immediately started worrying that terrorists would blow up the plane or the bus or the hotel or the café or the tent. And finally, there was her sister Carol Lee, whose biggest concern was that Bobby would break up with her over the whole thing.

  No matter how many times she tried to push him out of her head, Bobby kept popping back up. She had told herself a hundred times since leaving Atlanta that she wouldn’t spend the next sixteen days thinking about him. She was finally growing clear on what she had to do, and she was ready this time…as soon as she got back to Mooresville, or as he put it, once she got this out of her system.

  She was getting worked up again, clenching her fists inst
ead of squeezing the armrests. She didn’t need Bobby’s permission for this or anything else. Still, it was hard to go against him and her whole family over something nobody seemed to understand. No matter how many times she tried, she couldn’t seem to explain why this trip was so important to her. It just was.

  At least her mom had come around a little just before she left. Her Aunt Jean was on her side too, saying she had always wanted to go to Africa and see the wild animals. When Mary Kate told her she couldn’t afford that part of the trip, that she had scraped up only enough to pay for the climb and the plane ticket, Aunt Jean produced a check for two thousand dollars and told her to keep her mouth shut. So thanks to Aunt Jean, she would have a five-night wildlife picture safari before heading back home.

  Her stomach pitched again as the plane did, emptying her head of all thoughts except where she was sitting in relation to the emergency exits. By her watch, they were due to land soon. She hoped that had something to do with why they were suddenly losing altitude. The pilot was saying something on the loudspeaker…the only word she could make out was Kilimanjaro.

  Suddenly, half the passengers from the other side of the plane were standing up, leaning over her row to look out the window. Fearing the wing was on fire, she made herself look, thinking that a request to have her ashes scattered over Africa would be timely.

  “Holy shit.”

  The man beside her seemed a bit surprised at her choice of words, which she hadn’t meant to utter aloud. Jutting well above the clouds below them was a massive tower, a hollowed crater with a glacial ice cap on its highest ridge. Up until that moment, she had managed to suppress her doubts about whether or not she would make it all the way to Uhuru Peak, the top of that ridge. Bleak and foreboding, it looked about as hospitable as the moon, not at all something a normal person with only foothills hiking experience could conquer. “Did he just say that was Kilimanjaro?”

  The man nodded and pointed toward her hiking boots. “You climb?”

  “I…” Going with Bobby to Myrtle Beach suddenly had its merits. “I’m going to try.”

  “Dangerous.”

  “Yeah, that’s what I’ve heard.” People had died on that mountain, most from acute altitude sickness. No wonder. It was just right there under the plane.

  She pressed her face against the window to keep the mountain in sight until the plane banked. Then they were engulfed in white again, bouncing hard against the thick clouds on what she hoped was their final approach. Flight attendants were rushing around, picking up the cups and trash, bringing the seat backs forward and tray tables up.

  Mary Kate tugged her seat belt another notch and gripped the armrests again, not caring at all if she left imprints in the plastic.

  Chapter One

  From the vista point on Rabun Bald, the Blue Ridge Mountains cascaded in the distance, giving way to the rolling foothills. Mary Kate closed her eyes and tried to imagine the view from the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro, the one she would see in exactly twenty-one days.

  As she started down the steep slope, the loose gravel rolled under her left boot, throwing her off balance. She went into automatic recovery mode, jamming the pole into the dirt to stop her slide. Just as she was congratulating herself for avoiding a fall, her right foot skidded out from under her, dumping her on her behind. Tom Muncie was right about the descent being every bit as tough as going up, and requiring far more concentration. Her knees were throbbing, and the heavy pack had pounded into her lower back with each step until she figured out that adjusting the straps across her stomach helped her carry it higher.

  This trial run up the second-highest peak in Georgia had been a success. The blooming bruise on her backside notwithstanding, she had done everything Tom had recommended in the brochure to test herself for the Kilimanjaro climb—two straight days of hiking steep, rugged terrain, fourteen miles in all. She was tired, but not exhausted. With that goal behind her, she was confident there wouldn’t be any surprises two weeks from now when she started up the real mountain.

  All of her new equipment had checked out. The backpack she had ordered over the Internet was perfect for a day hike. It had a built-in water bladder that held two liters, with a hose that clipped to her shoulder strap so she wouldn’t have to reach around for a drink. The deep inner pouch was big enough for a fleece jacket, a rain poncho and an extra pair of shoes and socks, none of which she had needed this weekend, but she wanted to get used to carrying them. Her first-aid kit was stuffed into one of the pouches, along with a few snacks and an extra bottle of water. The webbed pockets on the outside held her camera and binoculars.

  The best news was that her feet felt great, thanks to the fact she had worn her boots practically everywhere but church for the last three months. Tom said the loudest complaints on Kili came from hikers who bought brand-new boots and didn’t break them in. Now she had done everything she could to prepare. The rest would come down to how well she handled the altitude, which was four times higher than she had hiked today in the Smokies.

  She couldn’t believe it was almost time to go, her six months of planning and preparation nearly over. She wished she were leaving tomorrow, but that had more to do with getting away from Mooresville than with going to Africa. She was tired of trying to explain to practically everybody why she wanted to do this, and especially why she didn’t want Bobby to come along.

  If only he had been reasonable last February, when she watched the documentary at his apartment. He had been working on the school budget that night, paying little attention to the television. From the get-go, he said it was stupid, that it wasn’t such a big deal to climb Kilimanjaro because practically anybody could do it. But Mary Kate was fascinated by the idea and asked him right then if he would do it with her. He said no, that he would rather spend his vacation relaxing on the beach. Unable to get it out of her head, she checked out a few of the tour companies on the public TV Web site and found one that claimed a high success rate to the summit. Some of the routes had only a forty percent summit rate, and she showed that to Bobby so he could see that it wasn’t as simple as he thought. He blew her off again, but by that time she was burning to do it, even if it meant going by herself.

  Then out of the blue he changed his mind, announcing just last week that he had decided to come too. He said he didn’t want to have to worry about her the whole time she was gone, and if he went, he would make sure they made all the connections and met up with their group. The way Mary Kate saw it, that would have been marginally okay—his natural condescension aside—if he had changed his mind a few months ago and started working out with her and taking the whole thing seriously. The fact that he waited until the last minute to be patronizing pissed her off. And of course, he had made his big declaration during Sunday dinner in front of her whole family, prompting her mom and dad to say how relieved they were. Her sister Carol Lee had practically swooned.

  That’s when the fireworks started, because Mary Kate had simply said thanks, but no thanks, and to pass her the cornbread. Everyone at the table froze and looked at her as if she had asked for heroin, so she just leaned over and got the cornbread herself. Then they started talking all at once, and after she had her bread buttered, she explained that she wanted to go by herself, that’s how she had planned it for five months, and now she was looking forward to doing it on her own. Besides, he hadn’t trained at all, and she didn’t want to have to keep stopping and waiting for him to catch his breath.

  She could still hear him whine, and couldn’t resist mocking him, even though he wasn’t around to hear it. “It’s just a hike, Mary Kate. Anybody can do it.” She shook her head thinking she needed to stop thinking about all of this if it was going to make her talk to herself. Besides, this weekend wasn’t about him. It was about her making sure she was ready to go.

  Her best friend Deb Demers had suggested this place for her trial run. Rabun Bald, at almost five thousand feet, was the ideal place to try out her gear and test her stamina. They had done
this hike together four years earlier when Deb was going to college not far from here. Today was almost like old times, except Deb was waiting for her on a ridge down below. They had gone to the summit together yesterday, but Deb had been cussing her out ever since, especially last night when she was soaking in the tub at the motel. No way was Deb going to do another seven-mile hike today.

  Other than her penchant for occasionally taking Mary Kate’s name in vain, friends didn’t come any better than Deb. When Bobby first said he didn’t want to go to Africa, Mary Kate had asked Deb to come, but Deb’s mother was sick with lupus, and sixteen days was too long to be gone.

  The two of them had been practically inseparable in high school, which prompted a few spiteful rumors about them being lesbians, but they weathered that storm, thanks to Mary Kate’s mom being a teacher and basically telling everybody to knock it off or else. That had led to a humiliating mother-daughter talk, in which Mary Kate was advised to take a cue from her other classmates and go out with a few boys.

  Of course, her mom didn’t know then what Mary Kate knew, which was that Deb really was a lesbian, and that she had seriously considered the possibility that she might be too. She had never been all that interested in boys, at least not like most of her friends were. The closest she had ever come to a crush back then was a fascination with Darcy Mathis, the prettiest girl in her high school, and again in college with her roommate Jessica. Her curiosity had led her to test the waters in college with Becky Dugan, a basketball teammate, but the spark wasn’t there. It was there for Becky, though, and Mary Kate hadn’t minded all that much. Gay people were just like everyone else as far as she was concerned, and she didn’t care what people at college thought about her. The people in Mooresville were a different matter, though, because that reflected on her whole family.