Chapter 8
Blake
The last thing I expected to come over the radio was a request for emergency medical assistance down at the riverside.
“Couple of guests fell in the water. We’re going to need the paramedics down here to check on them. Non-life threatening injuries so far,” were Talos’s exact words.
I tried to not let my mind run wild while the chattering on the radio continued with rapid-fire questions shooting back and forth from both sides as I heaved myself up from my desk and quickly shoved my shoes back on to sprint out the door.
This wasn’t the first time we had a guest or two take a plunge and most certainly wouldn’t be the last. We’d trained for plenty of scenarios and seldom took new clients up to the trickier spots on the river without at least some kind of professional training under their belt.
While it was never easy to extract people from the river, the life vests were mandatory for a reason, as were the helmets that kept them from cracking their skulls open on any rocks hidden under the swells of water.
Non-life threatening.
That was a good sign.
Talos reporting it was the real problem my mind was latching on to.
All of it could be chalked up to a coincidence.
In fact, there was a strong possibility it wasn’t his group at all that had suffered from the predicament and was a simple case of Talos having gotten onto the radio first to report up to base camp about it.
Whatever guests had fallen into the water sounded like they were fine and simply a little shaken up from the ordeal.
Most likely this was a case of a younger couple eager to prove themselves to their peers.
Hell, maybe it was Marlow’s swinger friends and conveniently would give me the excuse to kick them off the property for violating rule number one when it came to adventure camp: don’t be a fucking idiot and get yourself almost killed.
Wishful thinking, sure, but a guy could dream right?
I hitched a ride down with two of my medically trained staff, following after another golf cart that had my other two, and hung on for dear life as our golf cart careened down the steep pathway to get down to the river’s edge.
The air was much cooler down here than up at base camp, the rapids a soft and distant noise in the background that soothed my weary nerves as we pulled up to the four groups all settled off of an old docking site.
The groups were scattered around the small area, creating a wide berth for us to come through and over to where our river guides were gathered. Two of them were bent over, attending to whomever it was on the ground, while the other two—Talos among them, nodded to the paramedics hustling their way.
As soon as Talos stepped away from the group, giving our first responders room to work, my entire body froze.
An older couple was sitting on the ground, the man’s arm wrapped around his wife’s shoulders while she had looked visibly shaken and drenched from, presumably, taking a nice dip in the river.
Across from her, looking almost as drenched, was Marlow.
My throat burned as I tried to swallow.
“Hey...” Talos nodded to me, heading my way. “Think we might need to call an ambulance after all.”
I forced out a breath. “Someone knock their head?”
“No, but the woman swallowed a lot of water. She threw up some of it when we docked but she’s still looking a little sickly.”
“And... Marlow?”
God, did I even want to ask?
He looked fine from here, but that was from twenty feet away.
The one day I didn’t accompany him on a fucking expedition.
Talos snorted. “You didn’t tell me he liked to play hero, too.”
My brow popped instantly. “What?”
“Dove in head first after her like it was out of some action movie. He swam all the way out to her and pulled her back one-handed. It would’ve been pretty impressive to watch if I wasn’t busy trying to keep the entire raft from tipping over.”
How odd that I could imagine the situation crystal clear without trying.
The determined frown set into Marlow’s face while his decision was made to go after his fellow rafter.
The near perfect form of him diving into the water, bobbing up to the surface moments later.
His study build cutting through the water easily as he paddled over to her.
The strain of his powerful shoulders jaw-dropping while he dragged them both back to safety.
I rubbed a hand over my face to clear my head. “How did any of this even happen in the first place?”
“We got beached on a rock. We were having trouble coordinating altogether, especially with the older couple. They seemed pretty freaked out for whatever reason. Caused us to overcorrect and she went overboard.”
And then Marlow went in after her.
Honestly, it wasn’t at all that far-fetched, given what I knew about him and his boisterous personality. He’d struck me as the hero-type before, yet seeing it put into action was more heartwarming than I expected.
Why I cared if that man was the type to put his money where his mouth was, was beyond me. And yet here I was, trying not to let my rapidly growing smile show while Talos continued to talk.
“I’ll call it in so we can have an ambulance waiting for us up there by the time we get them driven back up.”
I nodded for one of the golf carts. “Take the couple up. I’ll talk to Marlow and see how he’s doing.”
With that, my second nodded and stepped off to the side to call up to base camp.
Normally, I tried to avoid bringing ambulances down to the grounds at all costs—mainly because it tended to freak the guests out no matter what we said to try and calm everyone down.
Worse case scenarios were a frequent topic of gossip whenever something like that happened and no amount of debriefing anyone stopped the rumor mill from churning.
Judging by how shaky the woman still was after she was helped back onto her feet, I’d have to agree with Talos that getting her to a hospital was the best case scenario. Even if it was overkill. In this instance, I’d rather be safe than sorry.
I waited until my staff had the woman and her husband loaded onto the back of the golf cart to head over to where Marlow was still sitting on the ground. His eyes were focused on the couple, a pinched expression pulling at his features.
His hair was still plastered to his head, though the ends of it were starting to curl from where it was drying. It made him look boyish, a stark contrast to the expression he was wearing.
“You doing okay?” I asked.
His head snapped over to me, eyes widening briefly before he flashed me a charming, dimpled smile. “Mr. Director. What a pleasant surprise.”
He rolled to his feet easily, a small hop in his step I wasn’t expecting but was glad to see nonetheless.
Seeing Marlow so chipper after a, what could be argued, scary ordeal had my body relaxing instantly.
Before this, I’d barely noticed how tense I’d gotten the entire way down from my office to here.
Now, though, the world felt right again.
“Don’t tell me you came all the way down here to check on little old me.” He grinned.
To save myself the embarrassment from admitting that yes, I did in fact do that, I simply shrugged and said, “Part of my job is to make sure everyone survives long enough to leave my campgrounds.”
“Yeah, I guess that makes sense. It wouldn’t exactly be fun to have a bunch of ghosts haunting this place.”
I quirked my brow. “You believe in ghosts?”
“Petrified of them. You’re not scared of being haunted?”
I narrowed my eyes. It was hard to tell if he was being serious or not.
I had a hard time believing Marlow was scared of anything, let alone something imaginary like a ghost. Tangible fears were far more unsettling than a bedtime story told to kids to keep them from wandering out of their beds in the middle of the night.
“Can’t say I am,” I drawled. “But I’ll be sure not to invite you to the Halloween weekend we throw every year. Wouldn’t want to send you to an early grave by scaring you to death.”
He threw his head back and laughed. “Now, now, don’t be hasty. I’m always up for a good party. And slutty costumes.”
“Can’t forget those,” I mused.
Fuck, I was too happy to see he was all right.
Far beyond the scope of simply being the director of this place and stressing about a potential lawsuit on the horizon.
In all of the years Austin Adventures had been open to the public, there was only one time where we’d gotten a knock at our door by a process server and subsequently slapped with a ninety-page document stating we were being sued.
Settling that had been a bitch and a half for my granddad, but since then, we’d been scot-free.
“We should get you checked out either way,” I said, my gaze running over his body.
No scratches.
No bruising.
No holes that were bleeding.
Impressive, to say the least. That river wasn’t for the weak and even though this group had started farther down where the rapids weren’t so severe, it was still a rough ride. That’s what made it fun—on normal adventures, at least.
He leaned back slightly, almost like he was preening. “I’m all good. But hey, if you want to pat me down to check, by all means.”
My cheeks flushed with heat.
Jesus, I needed to stop reading into everything that came out of that flirtatious mouth of his. Especially, since I was hoping not even ten minutes ago for a chance to kick his swinger friends off the property.
Get it together.
“Come on.” I nodded for him to follow, spinning around on my heel. “Jay, can you make sure everyone’s accounted for before you guys head back up to base?”
The last thing we needed was for a straggler to be left behind. Or worse, not accounted for and somehow having wound up in the river without anyone noticing.
“Roger that,” the staff member closest to me replied.