Chapter 9
Chapter nine
Tabitha
If she marched away stiffly enough, maybe Tabitha wouldn’t give away the wobble of her knees.
Of all the things she expected on this assignment, having to play nice with the man who broke her tender, young heart nearly two decades ago wasn’t on the list. It wasn’t even on the waitlist. Yet there he was, in the large, imposing flesh, boasting far more muscles and hair than she remembered.
“Are you all right?” Frankie asked as Tabitha hauled her bag onto the picnic table.
“Yes,” she huffed. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe because of . . . whatever that was?” The guide pointed across the clearing.
“You’re wasting your breath, Frankie, my love. This gal gives a steel trap a run for its money. I tried to get the deets out of her last night. Not even tequila shots could loosen those lips,” Lark provided, wincing a little under the stab of Tabitha’s warning glare.
Frankie’s attention pinballed between both woman and Zac, until she finally raised her hands in defeat. “Fine. Fine. Why don’t we go meet the rest of the group?”
A short while later, after a round of brief introductions, the women were paired off and tasked with skills practice.
Before anyone was allowed to leave the ground, their belaying and clipping technique had to be solid.
As an experienced competitive climber, Tabitha could have taught the course herself, but she patiently followed along and took directions without complaint.
Getting the full experience would be beneficial for the article.
This class was specifically for climbers taking their first leap outdoors.
And perhaps the refresher would be the reset she needed to shake her anxiety.
She could be patient and observe.
Unfortunately, she couldn’t say the same for her practice buddy, Beck.
“Yaaaaaaawn,” the young woman bemoaned. “This is boring.”
Tabitha shrugged and continued feeding rope as Beck pulled at random intervals to simulate leading a route. “It’s part of the course.”
“What are you even doing here?”
Tabitha looked up in surprise. “What do you mean?”
“You don’t need this class,” she mumbled. “Take.”
With deft motions, Tabitha pulled up all the slack and held firm to the rope. “What gave me away?”
“Besides your calloused hands, arm muscles, the bruise on your knee, and your wildly aggressive shoes?”
“I’m that obvious?” The assessment was spot on, and Tabitha was impressed the young woman so hell bent on getting on the wall was paying attention to anything else.
“Oh yeah.” Beck giggled.
Zac strode by, analyzing the rhythm the two women had developed and nodded approvingly. “Well done,” he praised. Tabitha felt a slight ripple of pleasure trickle down her spine as he winked and continued down the line.
“Aaaand then there’s that.”
“That what?” Tabitha scoffed.
“Our instructor has the hots for you.” She wiggled her eyebrows.
“I don’t think—”
“Come on. He’s been eye fucking you since the moment you joined us.”
“He hasn’t—”
“Do you guys have history or something? Oh! Or is it instalove?”
The sudden pinch in Tabitha’s heart arrested her breath.
A forgotten, yet familiar longing crept in and settled.
She glanced over her shoulder, watching Zac stride down the line of climbers.
His solid hands rested with authority on his hips, hands that had traced every inch of her body once upon a time.
Years had fogged her memory, but the sudden reminder caused rich sensation to flood back in.
Click click click.
The rapid succession of Lark’s camera broke the spell, and Tabitha spun toward her photographer. Her mouth gaped in irritated shock as Lark grinned mischievously at Tabitha’s scowl then down at her screen. “These are so good. The camera loves you, babe.”
“Tabitha,” Beck whined.
“What?”
“I said ‘take’, like, five times, and now I’m dead. I fell and decked and maybe took out a nearby belayer in the process, which means her climber’s done for too. It’s a massacre,” she complained with bored exaggeration.
“I was distracted," Tabitha explained, trying to ignore the drop in her stomach and her suddenly dry mouth. More for her own comfort than Beck's she continued, "No one's going to get hurt—"
“It's a real possibility while climbing. Jeez I thought you knew what you were doing.”
Tabitha pulled up slack with a bit more force than was necessary and grumbled to herself about the clusterfuck of a morning.
Despite her irritation, she knew Beck was right.
Her attention had been all over the place since the moment she’d run into Zac at the bar last night.
Instead of shaking it off like an adult, she’d been flustered and acting out of character.
She had to get back on track. Immediately. Or someone would get hurt.
“You’re right.” She appeased her partner. “I should be taking this more seriously. You have my full concentration.”
“Fabulous.” Beck nodded and began drawing out more rope. “Does that mean you’re going to answer my questions about Zac?”
“No.”
“Pretty please?”
Tabitha shot a death glare at the young woman, who promptly zipped her lips.
Following another hour of practice and a quick lunch break, the group was finally able to get their feet off the ground.
“Next we are going to practice falling properly,” Frankie called out to the semi-circle around her.
“Uhhh,” one of the women warbled with her hand raised.
“Yes, Charlotte?”
“Shouldn’t we try not to fall?”
“When you’re doing the actual climbing bit, yes. But before we let you loose, you need to learn how to bail safely. You can’t always control if you fall, but you can set yourself up to be in the safest scenario possible if you do fall. Does that help?”
“Sure.” Charlotte sounded about as confident about falling on purpose as Tabitha felt about spending the entire week with her ex.
Frankie and Zac set each other up, donned helmets, performed safety double checks, all while giving verbal confirmation of the process.
After a few demonstrative set-ups and falls, they split the group in half to practice.
Tabitha practically shoved into Frankie’s group.
She knew she’d have to spend time with Zac at some point, but if she could keep it to a minimum that would be the best scenario.
Around mid-afternoon, the guides gathered the class together.
“Who’s ready to lead?” Zac asked. A few hands shot into the air while a couple tentatively peeked above the group. “Partner up and find your spot.”
Tabitha hadn’t noticed Beck creep up beside her until the young woman wrapped her arms around Tabitha’s waist. “Dibbs,” she shouted, squeezing with ferocity. “Will you be my buddy again? I can’t wait to see you in action.”
“I’d like that,” Tabitha chuckled, absorbing some of her climbing partner’s enthusiasm.
She recalled the early years—especially when she used to compete—when climbing was exciting and filled her with the same level of joy.
Lately the zest for the activity was lacking.
She enjoyed connecting with the ladies at the gym each week, but doing the same routes over and over quickly got stale.
She used to get such a rush from climbing outdoors . . . of course that was before.
“Change of plans, ladies,” Zac called out. “Charlotte is going to sit this one out, so we are going to mix the groups up a bit. Tabby—er—Tabitha and Beck, would either of you partner up with Nevaeh? You two are the most experienced, and I want someone strong with her.”
“Who will the other person climb with?” Tabitha asked.
“Me,” Zac said, lips curling into a cocky grin.
“I’ll take Nevaeh!” Beck shouted unreasonably loudly before Tabitha could register Zac’s words. She turned back to her abandoned partner as she skipped away. “Have fu-un.”
“Well, damn,” Zac crooned, smooth and rich as molten dark chocolate. “Looks like it’s finally you and me.”