Cover

Dedication

For my mum and dad. Mountain people.

Le Rocher Map

PROLOGUE

It’s that time of year again. The time the glacier gives up bodies.

The immense mass of ice up there is a frozen river that flows too slowly for the eye to see. Recent victims brush shoulders with older ones in its glassy depths. Some emerge at the top, others at the snout, and there’s no way of knowing who will come out next.

It can take years for them to reappear. Decades even. A glacier in neighboring Italy made the news recently when it produced the mummified corpses of First World War soldiers, complete with helmets and rifles.

Still, what goes in must eventually come out, so I’ve been checking the local news every morning.

There’s one particular body that I’m waiting for.

CHAPTER 1

“Hello?” My shout echoes around the concrete cavern.

The familiar red-and-white cable car sits in the bay, but there’s nobody in the operator booth. The sun has disappeared behind the Alps, the sky is pink, yet there isn’t a single light on in the building. Where is everyone?

An icy wind blasts my cheeks. I huddle deeper into my jacket. It’s the off-season, and the resort doesn’t open for another month, so I didn’t expect the other ski lifts to be running, but I thought this one would be. How else are we going to get up to the glacier? Have I got the wrong day?

I dump my snowboard bag on the platform and pull out my phone to check the email again. Know it’s been a while but are you up for a reunion weekend? Panorama building, glacier du Diable, Le Rocher. Meet at the cable car, 5 pm Friday 7th November. C. x

C for Curtis. If anyone else had invited me here, I’d have deleted it without replying.

“Yo, Milla!”

And here’s Brent, loping up the steps toward me. Two years younger than me, he must be thirty-one now, and he still has his boyish charm—the floppy dark hair, the dimples—though he looks worn and tired.

He lifts me off the ground in a bear hug. I hug him tightly back. All those cold nights I spent in his bed. I feel bad for not getting in contact with him. But after what happened . . . Anyway, he didn’t contact me either.

Over his shoulder, sharp peaks loom, in shadow against the darkening sky. Do I really want to do this? It’s not too late. I could make excuses, jump back in my car, and drive home to Sheffield.

A throat clears behind us. We pull apart to see Curtis’s tall, blond form.