Chapter 14
“So, you said you wouldn’t camp,” I say as I shift the truck into park and grin over at Summer, “but that you would hike.”
“Sure, I’ll hike.” She frowns out the window. “Where are we, anyway? I know we’re on the ranch property, but I don’t think I’ve seen this spot.”
“We’re actually not too far from the lake, that way.” I point to the right and get out of the truck, open the door behind the driver’s side, and start gathering some gear. “I want to show you some of the property on foot today.”
“Okay.” She grins and hops out, opens the door opposite of me, and starts changing her footwear from flip-flops to the trail shoes she brought along.
We dropped Lily off at Paula’s for the night, since it wouldn’t be safe to take her with us today. Not only shouldn’t she hike that far, given that she has a flat face and would overheat, but there’s wildlife out here, and I don’t want to take any chances with the little dog.
“I put on sunscreen before we left the house,” Summer says as she sets a hat on her head. “You told me to bring the trail shoes, so I figured we’d be outside.”
“Good idea.” With the backpack full of water and snacks, along with some emergency supplies, on my back, I close the truck door and circle around to her. “You ready?”
“Ready.”
We set off on a path into the woods that my family has used so often over the years that it’s become a bona fide hiking trail. This is a great five-mile hike, with some pretty views, and my mom uses the path to find huckleberries in the summer. In fact, I have a couple of empty containers in my bag to hold the sweet purple berries because when Summer sees the motherlode, she’ll want to pick some.
So will I.
She looks amazing today. She chose wisely, with long jeans—that way she won’t get scraped up by the brush on the trail—and a T-shirt. Her hair is down under the Bitterroot Valley ball cap that she likely got from a gift shop in town.
She may not typically spend a ton of time in the woods, but she’s quick, her footsteps sure on the path, and she looks like a pro.
“Did you mention before that you don’t hike often?” I ask her.
“I don’t love the great outdoors,” she admits with a wince. “I know. I live in Montana, and I should love it, but it’s dirty out here, and there are bugs, and it’s just not my favorite. The view? Yes. That’s my jam. But sometimes, getting outside in nature is good for you. It feels good today, and I’m excited to see where this trail leads.”
“You won’t be disappointed,” I assure her, thinking of the view that I’m leading her to.
“Holy shit, Chase, there are huckleberry bushes!”
I grin as she pauses on the trail and starts picking berries. “Too many for us to eat.”
“I wish I had containers,” she says with a frown, and then smiles in delight when I produce two of them from my backpack. “Well, aren’t you handy to have around?”
“Damn handy,” I confirm, and we both get to work filling the containers.
“What about bears?” she asks.
“What about them?”
“They also like huckleberries. Should I be freaked out?”
“You should never be freaked out, babe. I won’t let anything hurt you.”
She smiles over at me. “That’s one of the things I love about you. But seriously, there have to be bears out here.”
“There are some. The ranch hands try to keep an eye on them as much as possible, but animals wander on and off the ranch every day. To our knowledge, there haven’t been any grizzlies on the property in a couple of weeks.”
That has her stopping with a berry halfway to her mouth, and her gaze whips over to mine, her baby blues wide.
“A couple of weeks?”
“That we know of. I won’t lie to you. There is wildlife out here. Bears, mountain lions, wolves, along with the usual deer and elk. Sometimes we get moose. And all the smaller critters.”
“And you want to live here?”
“Absolutely.” I laugh and snap the lid closed on my container. It’s only half-full, but picking these small berries takes time, and I’m done for now. I slip it into my bag and cross to her, wrapping my arms around her waist. “The animals don’t want to hurt us, Blondie.”
“Are you going to tell me that they’re more afraid of me than I am of them?”
“It’s a cliché, but it’s true.” I kiss her neck, and when she puts the lid on her container, I take it from her and slip it into my bag. “We can come out here just to pick berries whenever you want.”
“The season’s almost over,” she says wistfully. “They’ll be gone in another week.”
“If you want to skip the hike, we can just do this and come back another time.”
“No.” She shakes her head and wipes her hands on her jeans. “We got quite a few—enough for a pie, anyway. I want to see what you want to show me. But I don’t want to run into a bear.”
“We’ll keep talking,” I assure her and take her hand in mine. “And I have bear spray if we need it.”
“What about a gun?”
“I have that, too, but we won’t need to shoot anyone.”
She nods, and we keep going up the trail. It’s an uphill climb on the way to our destination, but that means that it’s downhill on the way back.
“Wild forget-me-nots,” she says, pointing to the little blue flowers with yellow centers along the path. “That’s my favorite flower.”
“Why?”
“Look how pretty and dainty they are,” she says. “They’re a happy flower. And they come back every year.”
“I didn’t know that. How did you come to know so much about flowers?”
“Well, working in the field for five years will teach you quickly.” She grins over at me and then tips her face up to the sunshine when we come to a clearing. “I told you before that I spent many summers with Aunt Paula, and she taught me, whether we were in her garden or at the shop together. By the time I bought the business, I knew what was native to this area, when they grew, and I knew a lot about what and where to plant flowers, shrubs, trees… you name it. It’s fun and makes people happy.”
“My mom gardens,” I say as I lift a branch out of her way.
“I know. She comes into the shop to ask questions a lot. Most people think that because I’m not a nursery, I don’t know about planting flowers. I sell mostly already cut pieces, but I can help with just about anything.”
“Have you thought about expanding to add a nursery side?” I ask her.
“No.” She shakes her head definitively. “That’s a lot of work and takes expertise I don’t have. We already have a nursery in town. But I love it when your mom pops in to ask questions. She’s a wonderful woman, you know.”
“I know.” I nod, thinking about my mom. “She’s proud of all of us, too. Now that Erin’s taken over the bookkeeping for the ranch, Mom can finally retire, and she and my dad are planning some travel, but I think she’ll want to stay close by most of the time.”
“She’s an important part of our community,” Summer adds. “She’s so active with volunteering and with clubs and groups. I see her in town all the time. I can’t imagine Joy being gone most of the time and missing out on all the things happening in Bitterroot Valley.”
“I can’t either. But she’s earned a vacation somewhere tropical.”
Summer grins over at me, and soon, we can hear the water.
“Is that a waterfall?”
I can’t believe we’ve already made it this far on the trail, but I nod at Summer. “Yup.”
“Oh, my God, I want to see it.”
She practically skips farther down the path and turns a corner, and there it is. The top of the falls is at least thirty feet in the air, and the water rushes down into the creek below.
“I didn’t even see the creek,” she says as she sets her hands on her hips and watches the water.
“We were walking perpendicular to it. We’ll walk along it on the way back.”
She turns to me and then rushes over and jumps up into my arms. My hands land on her ass as she loops her arms around my neck and kisses me, pressing herself against me as we listen to the water, and the cool spray fills the air around us.
“I take it you like it,” I murmur against her lips.
“Chase, it’s gorgeous.”
“And you’re not even looking at it.”
She laughs, and I let her slide down my body, my hands still glued to her ass, and then she turns to take it all in again.
“I love water,” she says, her eyes pinned to the rushing current before us. “I always have. Lakes, rivers, waterfalls. I love visiting the ocean. It’s the sound of it, you know?”
I slip my hand in hers, linking our fingers, and stay quiet as she goes on.
“It’s as if the sound of the water drowns out all the noise in my head, and I can just be. I don’t have to worry or overthink anything because the water calms all those chaotic thoughts.”
She turns to me again.
“How did you know that I needed this today?”
I shrug a shoulder. “The season’s winding down, and I know that the summer was full of stress for you. Between the shop, the weddings, and the bullshit of someone trying to scare you, I figured it was time for a break. For some quiet. Even if it’s just for one day.”
She nods slowly, turning her gaze to the waterfall once more. “I guess it really has been a pretty crazy summer, huh?”
“Pretty crazy,” I agree. “But I’m glad that it has been. Because if those idiots, whoever they are, hadn’t tried to scare you, we might not be here like this.”
“Oh, I like to think that we would have found our way here eventually.” She laughs and moves over to the small wooden bridge that my brothers and I made about ten years ago so we can keep moving on the path. “I would have figured it out. Speaking of figuring stuff out, are there any new leads on my case?”
“No.” I refuse to sugarcoat it for her, and I hate that that one word has some of the light draining from her eyes. “I’m sorry, sugar, we’re still investigating.”
“It’s not your fault.”
“Feels like it is,” I reply absently, but then she’s in my arms once more, her hands framing my face.
“It’s not your fault. You didn’t do those things, Chase. Some asshole did. It’s their fault. You’re doing everything you can to keep me safe, to make me feel safe, and I appreciate it so much.” She nuzzles my nose with hers. “So stop feeling guilty, okay?”
“Yeah, okay.”
She smacks a playful kiss on me, wiggles out of my arms, and leads me down the trail.
Is it any wonder that I’m completely in love with her?
“Oh, look!”Summer points down the trail. “This path empties out down by the lake!”
“Yes, it does.” I grin, excited about what I have to show her next. I haven’t brought her out here since before Rem’s wedding, and there have been some changes. Actually, a lot of changes.
“That view is just so great,” she says. She’s panting a little from the exertion of the hike, but her eyes are bright with happiness, and being with her today has been amazing.
Of course, every day with Summer is the best day of my life.
We come out of the woods near my property, and Summer props her hands on her hips while she tries to catch her breath.
“We’re going to have to check for ticks later,” she informs me.
“I can’t wait.” I laugh and take her hand, leading her toward my piece of the lake. “I have more to show you.”
“Are those…is that a foundation?”
I’m all smiles as I guide her to the concrete foundation, and we stop, looking it over.
“This will be the shop,” I inform her. “I’m hoping to have it framed in before the snow flies.”
“You poured a foundation.” She frowns up at me, blinking in surprise. “I didn’t even know that it had been surveyed.”
“That was right before the wedding,” I confirm. “I forgot to tell you, with everything going on. I’m sorry about that. Then, this week, the concrete company had a break in their schedule, and I had them come out. It’s just the shop, but?—”
“But it’s what you wanted,” she says, finishing the sentence for me. “It’s gonna be a big shop.”
“Thank God,” I reply with a grin. “I need a lot of space. But there’s something even better to see.”
“If you tell me that you already built the house, I’m going to be peeved because that’s the fun part, and I want to know all the things. Mostly because I’m nosy.”
If I have my say, she’ll be making a lot of the decisions about the house because she’ll be living there with me.
“It’s not invisible, so no, not the house.” With her hand in mine, I lead her down to the lake and point. “A dock.”
She stops short and covers her mouth with her free hand. “You built a dock. I was too busy checking out the shop to notice this.”
“To be fair, my brothers and my dad helped. Hell, even Brooks and his brother, Blake, helped a bit.”
Brooks has a big family like mine, and there’s always a brother to spare to jump in and help with a project.
“I can’t believe you kept this a secret,” she says as she takes the first step onto the wooden dock and then shivers in the cooler air, so I pull the flannel out of my bag and wrap it around her. “This is gorgeous.”
“I wanted it to be a surprise, and it really didn’t take that long.”
Her eyes are pinned to the last of the surprise that’s sitting on the end of the dock. It’s a table set for two, with candles, flowers, and a cooler where the food for dinner is stored.
“Who was in on this with you?” she asks and reaches out to touch the forget-me-nots in the vase.
“My mom.” I grin down at her. “I managed to get a couple of texts down to her so she’d know when we would be here.”
“And so she’d know to pick these flowers. This is—” Summer swallows hard and then wraps her arms around me and holds on tight. “This is really great.”
“Keep that in mind when we start getting bit by mosquitos.”
“Too late. That’s been happening all day.” She laughs as I hold her chair for her, and then I sit across from her and pour us each a glass of wine. “What’s the occasion, by the way? It’s not my birthday.”
“No occasion, other than it’s a beautiful day, and I enjoy being with you.”
Her smile softens, and she reaches out for my hand and then turns her face to the sun setting behind the mountains.
“We always manage to catch sunsets,” she murmurs.
“It’s our time of day.” I pull her hand to my lips and kiss it. “There’s no better way to end the day than with you.”
“You’re extra sappy today,” she says. “But I like it. What’s for dinner?”
“I don’t know. Let’s see what Mom made.” I open the cooler and grin. “Fried chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy, salad, and it looks like some kind of cobbler for dessert.”
“Wow. This feast with that view? Priceless.”
And delicious.
There’s not a morsel left when we’ve finished eating. We’ve just finished loading everything up into the truck, thanks to the flashlights on our phones, when we hear the call of some coyotes somewhere on the ranch.
“That’s wildlife,” Summer says with wide eyes and hurries to jump into the truck, making me laugh.
Before starting the truck to leave, I reach over and tuck her hair behind her ear.
“Thanks for today.”
Her gaze whips over to mine in surprise. “You have it backward. Thank you for today. I had a great time, and I always love being out here on your property. Specifically, your spot on the lake. It’s just so beautiful out here, Chase. When will you start building the shop?”
“Tomorrow morning, first thing.”
That has her blinking in surprise. “You move fast.”
“We’re already into September, and the snow could decide to fall anytime. I figure I have six weeks, tops, of reliable weather, so I’d like to get it started right away. I’ll be out here on most of my days off, but hopefully, you can join me sometimes, if you’re up for it.”
“I can’t build anything.”
“No, but you can help in other ways, and that’s only if you want to. And if you don’t want to, no problem.” I just like having her close by, no matter what she’s doing.
“I’m sure I can find ways to be of service.” She takes a deep breath and leans her head back on the seat. We’re just sitting here, in the dark quiet, enjoying each other. I don’t know why, but I’m not ready to head back to town quite yet. “It’s so still out here. I bet there are no loud fireworks on the Fourth of July or New Year’s Eve.”
“No, we’ve never done that out here. Fire hazard. It would suck if we had a forest fire erupt, especially if it can be avoided.”
“Has it ever happened before?”
“We’ve had lightning strikes that turned into fires,” I confirm with a nod. “I was a kid, but I remember it was scary, only about three miles from our house, and we had most of Bitterroot Valley out here helping to keep the fire at bay. It took three weeks to put it out.”
“Wow. That’s intense.”
“Hence, the no-fireworks rule. Honestly, we never missed it.”
She sighs happily, and I can see that her eyes are getting droopy. After a long hike and a full stomach, she has to be exhausted.
“Let’s head home.” I start the truck and drive us through the property and out to the highway.
We’re about halfway into town when I see a vehicle pulled to the side of the road with its hazards on. And when I slow down as we pass, I see that they’re not simply pulled over.
They’ve hit a tree.
“Shit.” I turn around in the middle of the highway and immediately reach for my phone to call the station. “This is Wild. I have an accident on Highway 98, approximately seven miles outside of town, eastbound. They’ve hit a tree. Red Ford Explorer, Montana license plate 48-92631.”
“Copy that,” the dispatcher says in my ear. “I have officers responding. Do you need an ambulance?”
“Yes. Two passengers, and I don’t know the status of them. Definitely send the ambulance.”
“Copy.”
I turn to find Summer staring at me, her jaw dropped and eyes wide.
“You stay here, understand me?” I reach into the back and pull my weapon from its holster. “You wait here, and if I signal, you call 9-1-1.”
“Jesus, Chase.”
“Do you understand me?” I ask again, needing to be sure that she hears me.
“Of course. Should you wait here with me until help arrives?”
“I need to see if they’re dead or how badly they’re hurt.” I reach over to cup her cheek, thinking back to last winter and the accident that took Jake’s parents’ lives. “I mean it, Summer. Stay here. If it’s bad, I don’t want you to see it.”
“I’ll stay,” she assures me. “But please, be careful. It’s dark out here.”
“I’m going to keep the headlights trained on the vehicle,” I reply and reach back for the yellow vest I keep in the truck for emergencies like this. “And I’ll wear this so I’m visible. I’m also going to set out flares.”
“Okay.” She licks her lips. “I feel like I should do something.”
“You’re doing it. Stay put.”
And with that, I get out of the truck and, shrugging into the vest, hurry over to the SUV. There’s steam coming from the crumpled front end, and when I shine my flashlight into the cab, I see that both passengers are unconscious. One of them must have passed out after turning on the hazard lights.
Opening the driver’s side door, I reach in and check for a pulse on the driver, relieved when there is one. He also reeks of beer.
“Fucker,” I mutter and rush around to the other side of the SUV, open the door, and check the woman for a pulse.
It’s thready, but it’s there.
“Were you both drinking?” I wonder out loud as I hear the sound of sirens coming this way. Hurrying over to the road, I pick up a flare and wave it back and forth so they know where to go.
“Chase!” Jerry Coltrain, a fellow officer, hurries out of his vehicle toward me. “What’s going on?”