He remembered what had first drawn him to her. She was utterly arresting, with her raven hair and emerald-green eyes. She had the fiery temper bequeathed by her Irish ancestry, not to mention the typical wicked Irish sense of humour.
In short, she had been beautiful, sexy, smart and invariably the centre of attention at any social gathering. Indeed, he’d met her at a friend’s party where she was holding court – not that he’d always warmed to the company she tended to keep.
A diehard environmentalist, Ruth had surrounded herself with the kind of crusty Greenpeace crowd that didn’t always sit well with Jaeger and his friends. Elite soldiers and the tree-hugging brigade – they weren’t natural soulmates.
Jaeger was a bit of an exception, of course. He’d always been drawn to the wilderness and nature. In fact, he shared some of Ruth’s fiercest passions. And he guessed that was what had pulled them together.
At first, she’d hated him. Railed against his macho ways. Or at least she’d presumed he had to be the macho type, being a member of the SAS. Then fate had thrown them together. Ruth was paying a visit to a rural school in Devon to give them a talk about ‘going green’. Jaeger had offered to accompany her. His excuse was that he had to see some mates at the Commando Training Centre in Lympstone, and she was driving most of the way there. In truth, he’d just wanted to spend some time in her company, to see if he could break through her beautiful but frosty exterior.
He’d worked hard over that long bank holiday weekend. Typically, he’d used his cheeky, teasing humour in an effort to breach her defences. And finally it had worked. On the way back to London, they’d stopped at her parents’ country home, and they’d ended up sharing the spare bedroom.
Officially, Jaeger had slept on her parents’ fold-down sofa bed.
In reality, their night of passion had been all-consuming.
They say opposites attract. That night was the proof of it.
But now – where had all of that gone? Where had the love gone? When exactly had the incredible passion and joy in each other withered and died?
Jaeger just didn’t know. All he was sure of was that he was at the end of his tether. She was the mother of his son. He feared that was the only reason they were staying together these days, and it just wasn’t enough.
He steeled himself, grabbed his cell phone and dialled. It was late in the evening and typically the call went to voicemail. She seemed to spend so much of her time sleeping. Maybe it was the drugs the clinic prescribed to help with the trauma.
‘Ruth, it’s me. Uncle Joe and I have decided to extend our stay. There’s a few things we’d like to see. I’ll be back a day or two later than scheduled – Thursday instead of Tuesday. If it’s an issue, maybe you can call Jennie and get her to pick you up. Either way, let me know.’
He paused uncomfortably. ‘Cheers for now.’
That pretty much summed things up. He couldn’t even bring himself to sign off with their signature ‘Love you.’ He felt plagued by guilt. And mostly because he knew in his heart that he was falling for another woman.
Ruth suspected. Lord only knew how. Call it feminine instinct. Sixth sense.
Jaeger placed the phone by his bed and went to wash. They had an early start and he would be doing all the driving. He needed a good night’s rest.
From the bathroom he heard his phone trilling. He went and checked the caller ID. It was Ruth. Well, that was an improvement. At least she’d bothered to return his call. A rarity these days.
‘Ruthie, how are you?’ he answered.
‘Alive,’ she said. Not even a hello. Her tone distant, unreachable, as it always seemed to be these days.
‘I’ve been talking with Joe,’ Jaeger explained, ‘and we’ve decided to go visit some newly unearthed tunnels. Some kind of secret Nazi super-weapon facility.’
There was a long-drawn-out silence that he sensed was fraught with emotion.
‘I could do with you here.’ Ruth’s voice sounded pained, as if she was in a really bad place. ‘Here with me now, not off on some crazy search…’
Jaeger sighed guiltily. ‘It’s just two more days.’
‘I’m losing it, Will. Really losing it.’ A beat. ‘Like I said, I could really do with you here…’
Jaeger fought against the temptation to give in. She could be like this – soft, distant, tantalising – then just as quickly flip into a violent mood swing and turn on him. No, he needed a few extra days’ break, and the call of the tunnels – Kammler’s secrets – was just too compelling.
‘It’s only two days,’ he remonstrated. ‘There’s been this new discovery. We’re so close – we might not get another chance like this.’
‘Off searching for a bunch of dusty Nazi memorabilia…’ There was an intake of breath, heavy with sadness and despair. ‘I guess that means you’ve got your priorities sorted.’ A pause. ‘Tell me, Will, when did everything between us… go so wrong?’
Jaeger could hear her voice breaking. It tortured him. He ran a hand across his brow. ‘You know something, the first moment I laid eyes on you, I knew we’d fall in love. I’ve loved you ever since. But…’ He paused. ‘I just don’t know any longer.’
‘And you’re surprised? After all I went through. Waiting for the rescue that never came. For you.’ A beat. ‘When have you ever taken the time to really try to understand? To get to know the new me? What drives me. And what haunts me…’
Her words tailed off to nothing and she started crying. Jaeger was used to the fits of chest-racking sobs. And if he were within reach, her mood turning so that her fists pounded on his chest until he was forced to physically restrain her.
‘People change.’ She spoke through her tears. ‘I’ve changed. You think I like the new me? I didn’t ask for this to happen.’ A beat. A surge of emotion. ‘But you, you’ve just stayed the same. The same old you.’
It was true. Jaeger had always been constant, and in his book, constant was good. A strength. But seemingly not in hers. In Ruth’s mind, he should have changed in some indefinable way to keep in step with the new her.
Well, where would that leave the boys? All at sea. Totally messed up.
No. Jaeger had no doubts. He had to stay constant for Luke and Simon. He needed to. And if that meant losing Ruth… In truth, he feared he’d lost her already.
‘Look, we’ll talk when I get back,’ he told her. ‘Try to get some rest. It’s just two days.’
‘What you really mean is: take your pills,’ she sobbed. ‘Get some rest. As if that makes a blind bit of difference. I don’t need more pills.’
‘Look, I’ll be there Thursday,’ he told her. ‘It’s the best I can do.’
‘Well maybe I won’t be here by then. Maybe I’ll be gone. I get a sense that’s what you’d like me to do – disappear.’
Jaeger was used to her outbursts by now. Her threats. Mostly they didn’t amount to anything. Mostly they were just cries for help, not that he felt he could help her much any more. She needed professional help, that much he understood.
‘I’ll see you Thursday,’ he repeated. ‘It’s a couple of days, that’s all.’ He ended the call.
He was used to her unpredictability; her mood swings. But this sense of her slipping away from him still hurt. He didn’t know how to reach her any more. The woman he had once loved seemed lost to him completely, and the realisation hit him hard.
He knew that this was Kammler’s ultimate revenge.
11
‘Hello! Anyone here?’
Jaeger’s voice echoed around the rocky hillside. No answer. If anything, the landscape here was even more rugged than that around the Berghof. He noted that he had zero mobile signal. To left and right, massive peaks towered into cloudless skies.