up a chat.”
“Nah, man. We agreed there would be no strings. I don’t want to be the one to break the rules first.”
Segal, who was sitting behind them, stuck his unshaven face between their two seats. “Have fun snuggling up with your pride, Jones. I’m sure it keeps you warm at night. What’s that old Jewish proverb? Oh, yeah. ‘Pride goes before a fall.’”
Thor chuckled. “I saw how broken up Kristi was when we left. What if she’s afraid she’ll piss you off if she reaches out? You need to be the one to get in touch.”
“Why does it have to be me?”
“Who made the ‘no strings’ rule?”
“We both did—though I guess I’m the one who brought it up first.”
Thor had thought so. “In that case, you need to be the one to make contact.”
“There’s really no point.” Jones pulled out his phone, started scrolling. “She wants to see the world, so she signed up with some kind of humanitarian healthcare agency. She’s going to work for a year as a nurse in Nigeria.”
“Nigeria?” That wouldn’t be Thor’s first choice for a nurse. “Weren’t several aid workers abducted and murdered there recently?”
“Yeah.” Jones went quiet, his expression troubled.
“Don’t paint the devil on the wall. I’m sure they’ll keep her safe.”
“Don’t … what?”
“You don’t have that expression in English?”
“Paint the devil on the wall?” Jones arched an eyebrow. “Uh… No.”
“It means don’t expect the worst—or something like that.”
“Crazy Viking.” Jones shook his head, went back to his scrolling on his phone.
Thor faced the window again, missing Samantha more than he could say.
Four months later
Samantha walked through the airport in Christchurch in search of the gate for her connecting flight, her carry-on in tow. Eight hours of flying behind her. Only twenty-three to go. She wasn’t sure there was enough coffee in the airport for that.
It had been a smooth flight, though she’d been acutely aware of the empty seat beside her. Patty ought to have been sitting there. The two of them would have spent those eight hours talking. There would be an empty seat on Samantha’s connecting flight to Chicago and in their shared office on campus, too. Patty’s parents had flown to Chicago and collected Patty’s belongings from the apartment, so there would be empty spaces there, also. So much emptiness.
Patty’s death had left gaping holes in Samantha’s life—and in her heart.
Returning to the real world wasn’t going to be easy this time.
And yet, Samantha had so many reasons to be grateful. She and Thor were alive. Months of hard work had resulted in discoveries that would keep her busy for the rest of her career. She’d overcome her shyness and had friends she’d be in touch with for the rest of her life.
As she walked through the airport, she spotted other winter-overs here and there. Ryan and Kristi in the line at the coffee shop. Jason plugging his phone in to charge. Bai and Kazem walking hand in hand. Lance looking up at the Departures display.
She waved, and they waved back.
She wanted to get to her gate, sit down, and check her email. She hadn’t heard from Thor for the past few days. She told herself he was on assignment and that he probably couldn’t communicate. Still, she couldn’t help but worry.
God, she missed him.
They’d done their best to stay in touch, but seeing his face on the screen and hearing his voice, as wonderful as that was, couldn’t replace face-to-face contact.
While she’d been at the South Pole, Thor had been around the world—Afghanistan, Pakistan, South Korea, Egypt, Syria, Kenya. He was never able to say much about his work, though he shared what he could. Malik had emailed her a photo of Thor looking incredible in a suit and tie as part of some businessman’s security detail, his face clean-shaven, his hair cut short, his skin tanned. He could have been a movie star.
Her therapist had warned her that her relationship with Thor was heading into new territory. They would both be in the US, at least when Thor wasn’t on a mission. That meant setting new parameters for contact and discussing their expectations.
Did he want to be with her as much as she wanted to be with him?
She didn’t know. She wasn’t even sure when she’d see him again.
Without discussing it with Thor, she’d looked into jobs in Colorado. The University of Colorado in Boulder had a prestigious astrophysics and planetary sciences department, which was attached to JILA—the Joint Institute for Laboratory Astrophysics. They’d had a