Run into Trouble Read Free Page A

intensity. He would recognize that
face and musical English accent anywhere, even though the words
were far from musical. It was Melody. Or her ghost.
    “Aren’t you going to invite me in?”
    “Come…come in.”
    She was approximately the last person in the
world he had expected to see, this apparition that walked lightly
into the room, almost without leaving footprints, and closed the
door behind her.
    “If it’s any consolation, I’m glad you
weren’t killed today.”
    She still looked the same, her slim body
hidden inside a warm-up suit, belying not only her curves but the
strength within, both physical and mental. The sandy hair caught in
a ponytail, ready for a run; the pert nose framed by a sprinkling
of freckles on the small face.
    “Do I have to carry this conversation all by
myself?”
    “Sorry.” Drake sat down hard on the bed. His
legs would no longer support him. “I…I didn’t expect to see you
here.”
    “Don’t feel like the Lone Ranger, as you
yanks would say. They didn’t tell me about you, either, until they
were forced to by the accident. All the other runners had partners,
except me. When they finally divulged the secret, I almost walked
out, just the way you did six years ago. For some reason that I
can’t attribute, I waited around to see whether you were alive or
dead. I must say, you look more dead than alive.”
    “I’ll recover.” At least from the collision.
“I guess I owe you an apology.”
    “You owe me a lifetime of apologies. Let’s
see. You leave me with no message and no explanation. I’m frantic,
thinking that you’re dead, or at the very least a prisoner in a
Soviet Gulag camp. Finally, after months of searching and talking
to everybody I can think of, a sympathetic bloke at your embassy
does some checking and lets me know that you’re all right but
doesn’t know where you are. I wait for word—and wait. For six years
I’ve waited. In vain.”
    “I had no choice.” Drake felt miserable. “I
was ordered to secrecy.”
    “Yeah, I remember bloody government secrets.
Your government and mine. Don’t let the right hand know what the
left hand is doing. But I take it you’ve been out for several
years. Why did you quit?”
    “It got to the point where I had a hard time
telling the good guys from the bad guys.”
    “I know the feeling. Would it have hurt you
to drop me a line?”
    “I didn’t think you wanted to hear from me.
And I didn’t know where you were.”
    “Poor excuses for excuses. You could have
written my mum in Rotherfield.”
    “How long have you been in the U.S.?”
    Melody sat on the edge of the bed beside
Drake and appeared to deflate, like a balloon.
    “Two years. Our little island became too
small for me. I knew where too many bodies were buried, literally
and figuratively. So I came to the land of the free and the home of
the brave. I may even become a citizen someday.”
    “Where are you living?”
    “Denver. Running at high altitude is great
conditioning for running at sea level. I’m working at a Jack
LaLanne health club as a fitness instructor and running the
occasional marathon, when I can find one that accepts women. What
about you? Tell me your recent history in two sentences or
less.”
    Nonstop physical activity. That sounded like
the Melody he knew. If anybody were in shape for this race, she
was.
    “I resigned four years ago. I’ve been living
with my sister and brother-in-law in Idyllwild, which is about a
hundred miles from here. It’s also in the mountains, a mile high,
same as Denver. I’ve been selling real estate and working out. I
ran Boston last spring.”
    “Fancy that. We’re both running marathons.
I’m planning to run Boston next year. We might have run into each
other, sometime, if you’ll excuse the little joke. Except for your
face, you look fit. Well, I guess the first thing we have to decide
is whether we’re going to quit while we’re behind or have a go at
this.”
    “What did they tell you