Chapter 8 #2
Wolf waded closer and closed his hands around her shoulders as she touched the mildewed face and nearly went limp.
“It’s a doll. Oh my God, it’s a doll. It’s just a doll.
” She let the thing fall from her hands, turned, and wrapped her arms around Wolf.
“I’m so sorry that happened to you, Wolf.
I’m so damn sorry.” She didn’t mean to cry, but she did, and she felt stupid for crying because this wasn’t about her.
The thought of him lying there with the water lapping over his beautiful face just gutted her every time it came into her mind.
She hugged her arms tighter around his waist, her face pressed to his chest and soaking wet shirt.
He put his hands into her hair and tipped her head up. He had tears in his eyes, too. She lifted her chin ever so slightly, and he lowered his head. When their lips touched, they were salty and wet. They stood there kissing, all wrapped in each other, for a long time.
When they parted, his forehead rested against hers.
He didn’t say anything, and she didn’t either.
They stepped apart, arms still anchored though, as they waded up out of the shallow water.
She moved her light around as they did. Wolf’s flashlight was on the path.
She could see its beam where he’d dropped it.
“Look at all this stuff,” she said as the light’s beam picked out empty bottles, cans, cups, and litter of all sorts forming a foot-wide border between river and shore, but only in this one little spot.
“Garbage,” Wolf said. He steadied her as she got up onto dry land before joining her there. “The current dumps it here naturally.” He looked into her eyes.
“This might be where you wound up, Wolf, but it doesn’t make you garbage. Your mother found treasure here. You were a treasure to her,” she said, nearly quoting the words in his mother’s journal.
He looked at the water for a long moment before he started walking again. “Her first campsite would have been near here, then,” he said. “According to the diaries. We must’ve got pretty close to it when we chose ours.”
“Wait, look!” She pointed to a finger of ground that jutted into the river, forcing it to bend around, a few yards behind them. “That’s where the people were today. Remember? The ones we saw from the cliff? We walked right by it and didn’t realize. Come on.”
She grabbed his hand, and they hurried to the spot. Camellia shone the flashlight around, stopping immediately on a small pile of stones. “That’s not natural. Somebody put that there.” And as she ran closer, Wolf stayed behind.
She knelt near the stones. Wolf whispered, “Camellia, don’t.”
“There’s something underneath, I can see it.”
“Leave it alone. It might be sacred or something. And it’s none of our business.”
His voice shook, though, and when she looked up at him staring at that cairn, she thought she saw fear in his eyes.
Willow Brand, Big Bend National Park
They’d beached their boats at the end of the river ride. Then the canoes were loaded onto a trailer, and Willow and her cousins were all herded into a van and driven back to where they’d started.
The entire time Willow had stayed quiet, and if her cousins seemed uneasy, it was probably because they weren’t used to seeing her so shaken.
Then again, they’d just held a memorial for the dead brother she never knew she had, so she supposed some grieving was to be expected.
Back at the tiny square building that housed the offices of Big Bend River Rides, they stood around their rented van talking while Drew went inside to settle up.
Ethan said, “I felt good about this. Willow, I’m glad you had the idea.”
“Yeah, this was great, Will,” Maria added. “Your brother would be—”
“I’m not goin’ home.” Willow blurted it just as Drew rejoined them. She’d been ready to blurt it for a while now. “I’m staying close.”
“But Willow, why?” Maria-Michelle asked.
“Because…” Willow looked around at all her cousins, then closed her eyes, gathering courage before she spoke again. They were all going to think she’d lost it. “I think he might still be alive.”
Ethan said, “Oh, come on, Will.”
At the same time, Maria said, “Seriously?”
“I think there’s a chance. I’m going back there to that inlet with the refuse, near where we did the ceremony, and I’m gonna find proof, one way or the other.”
“Honey, be logical. What proof could there be after twenty-eight years?” Maria asked.
“Sometimes you have to put logic aside,” said Orrin.
Orrin was the quiet, brooding cousin. Bubbly blond Drew’s equally blond but far less bubbly brother. “I’ll stay with you, Willow,” he said.
“Me, too,” Maria said quickly. “But um, we didn’t bring any camping gear, did we?”
“I texted a friend with a hunting cabin right up against the park’s boundary,” Willow replied, turning her phone face-out to show a shot of the little log cabin her friend had texted her. “It’s even on the side of the park we want. How many are coming with?”
She looked around at each face. She saw worry in their eyes, yeah, and doubt too, but mostly resignation. If one Brand was staying, they were all staying. She hadn’t even needed to ask.
Wolf
Wolf laid on his back, the sleeping bag tight around him. He was cold. His tent mate, however, was shivering. He could feel her shaking right beside him.
“You’re freezing, Camellia.”
They had returned to the tent, soaked and frozen by the time they got there, then quickly put on dry clothes and zipped themselves into their respective sleeping bags. “I h-have a p-portable h-heater somewhere.”
“We didn’t expect it to b-be this cold.” He got out of his sleeping bag, found the small heater, and turned it on. Nothing happened. “I thought we got batteries.”
“Shoot, I f-forgot. That one’s rechargeable,” she said.
And uncharged, so he dove back into his sleeping bag.
They had not discussed their passionate, river-soaked kissing. He didn’t know what to say about it, and he hoped she still felt safe with him after all that, because he was about to put it to the test.
He sat up fast, unzipped his bag, and said, “Come on, we have no choice but to double up. I promise I won’t turn into a Neanderthal in my sleep. You can trust me.”
“It’s n-not that,” she said, but she sat up, unzipped, and offered him the end of her sleeping bag.
There was nothing very sexy about it. They’d both donned sweatpants and shirts to try to get warm.
He quickly zipped his bag to hers, duck-walking all the way around the shivering woman to create a large double sleeping bag.
He left his side open just enough to slide in.
His legs brushed hers as he did, but there was no helping it.
He got settled more or less, lying on his back, stiff and still cold. “It’s okay. I don’t blame you for not liking this. We haven’t known each other that long.”
“It’s not that.” She sat up and pulled a green hairpin from her hair, and the waves fell around her like a butterscotch waterfall.
Wolf’s breath escaped all at once and every thought in his head ground to a halt.
He’d been wanting to see her hair down ever since he’d met her, which yes, was weird, but he chalked it up to curiosity and an appreciation of natural beauty.
Nothing personal about it. Except now he knew better, and especially since that kiss.
Whatever was brewing between them was very personal.
Her hair was longer than he’d guessed, and he’d guessed long. It fell, all waves and gentle curls, past her shoulders and halfway down her upper arms. And as she shook it gently, freeing it from its daytime clusters, she said, “Shoot, after that kiss earlier, I’m not sure I trust me.”
He turned his head toward her sharply, not sure he’d heard her right.
“We’ll just have to do the best we can, though.”
Well, what the hell did that mean?
She rolled toward him and snuggled right up close, resting her head on his chest, draping her arm across his waist, with her legs pressed to his for warmth.
He closed his left arm loosely around her shoulders, because with her lying in its crook, there wasn’t much else he could do with it.
He prayed he wouldn’t wind up poking her with an erection before dawn and laid perfectly still.
After a few moments, she stopped shivering and released a long, heavy sigh, with a delicate snore at the end. He laughed in spite of himself, but kept it silent and hoped the movement of his chest wouldn’t wake her.
It didn’t. She was sound asleep, and he finally relaxed. As soon as he did, her warmth suffused him, and he found he wasn’t cold anymore. She snuggled a little closer, and he just let it happen. All that glorious hair was on his chest and tickling his chin, and he resented the shirt he’d put on.
Camellia in his arms felt better than anything had in a long time—not counting the kisses, which had felt like pure fire.
By the time morning came, they were tangled around each other like a pair of spider monkeys, but warm, cozy, comfy.
She had a leg over one of his and under the other, and he was hugging her like she’d float away if he let go.
Dang, he didn’t want to disengage his limbs from hers and get out of their nest to face the chilly morning, but he figured it best he do so before she woke up.
Then she did, and it was too late. She lifted her head off his chest, looked up into his face from within that mass of glorious hair, and beamed him a smile. “Guess we stayed warm enough.”
“Downright snug,” he replied, but he couldn’t roll over and get out, because she was still mostly on top of him—and his blood was heading to places he didn’t need it to be heading just then.
“Okay, easing out now,” he said. He lifted her shoulders off his chest so he could slide out from under her.
She made a sad noise, but she let him go. He rolled out, then turned around, looking for the clothes he’d left close by for quick dressing.