‘Frankly?’ His mouth twisted into a wry smile. ‘A liability.’
‘A liability?’ She gaped at him and he shrugged without a trace of apology.
‘I don’t need a dizzy blonde distracting me when I’m supposed to be concentrating. It’s the same reason I don’t believe women should be in the army. Men always have protective feelings towards them and that affects the job.’
Dizzy? Stunned into silence, Ally opened her mouth and closed it again. Her voice seemed to have given up the ghost. She tried again. ‘Feel free to stifle your protective feelings. I don’t need them.’
He shrugged. ‘Well, like it or not, you’ve got them. And you’re not going down this mountain on your own.’
She couldn’t believe she was hearing this. ‘I’ve been walking in these mountains on my own since my teens and I’ve never come to any harm.’
He glanced up, his eyes hard. ‘Then you’ve been lucky. If you want to walk, join the Ramblers Association.’
‘The Ramblers…’ She broke off and her small chin lifted angrily. ‘How dare you make judgements when you don’t know anything about me? Dammit, you don’t even know I’m blonde!’
His gaze lifted briefly to the wool hat, which successfully hid all traces of her hair colour and then rested on her face.
‘I do know you’re blonde.’ His eyes smiled into hers for a brief moment. ‘I’m a connoisseur of blondes. Only true blondes have eyes the colour of violets.’
A connoisseur of blondes?
‘And being a blonde makes me dizzy?’ Her whole body was tingling with outrage and something else she chose not to identify. ‘You are the most chauvinistic, misogynistic, prejudiced male—’
‘And I like you, too.’ He smiled complacently and then turned to look at the ravine, totally dismissive of her words, his mind obviously working on the problem ahead. How to evacuate the boys.
‘Look.’ She took a deep breath and deliberately made her tone conciliatory. ‘I may be a woman but I do know these mountains and I can help—believe me.’
Judging from the look he gave her, he didn’t. ‘At a guess you’re five feet nothing and eight stone. The chances of you being able to deploy any muscle to save those guys down there is remote.’
‘Mountain rescue isn’t about muscle.’ Her fists clenched by her sides.
‘No?’ He tilted his head, his eyes hard. ‘Didn’t you say the water level is high at the moment? What if one of them has fallen into a dangerous position and needs to be moved to save his life? Good at lifting bulky teenagers, are you?’
Ally counted to ten. It wasn’t enough so she tried twenty. ‘Well, as you rightly said, someone needs to go for help, so once you give me a brief on their condition I’ll alert mountain rescue.’
With a short laugh he turned his attention back to the rope. ‘You’re not going anywhere. The wind is getting worse, the path is barely visible and you’re going down this mountain on your own over my dead body.’
Ally ground her teeth. The thought was actually quite attractive! ‘I came up it on my own.’
‘Ever heard the saying, Two wrongs don’t make a right?’ He tugged off a glove to get a better grip on what he was doing.
Ally ignored his tone and scanned the items he’d laid on the ground. ‘If you’re really planning to abseil down to them this isn’t the best place.’
He muttered something rude under his breath. ‘You’re trying to give me an abseiling lesson?’
‘Yes.’ She forced herself to hold his stare, refusing to be intimidated by his dry, forbidding tone. Obviously he thought she couldn’t teach him anything, and his arrogance made her grind her teeth in frustration. Except that something told her that, however difficult the abseil, this man would manage it. He was supremely confident, very fit and, judging from the equipment he was pulling out of his rucksack, he obviously knew exactly what he was doing. But he didn’t know the area like she did and it would be stupid to make the abseil more dangerous than it had to be.
‘Do it from further up the gully. There’s a six-metre waterfall directly beneath us and another one directly below that. It’s a double cascade and totally unclimbable unless it’s dry.’
He studied her in silence for a long moment, dark eyes narrowed. ‘You’re telling me you’ve abseiled into this ghyll?’
‘Amazing, isn’t it?’ Her voice was honey-sweet. ‘Even my blonde hair and blue eyes didn’t hold me back.’
He stared at her. ‘You’re saying you can abseil?’