Chapter 21 Nate
NATE
The falls had always been my favorite part of the park. Mainly because they were loud enough to drown out whatever was rattling around in my head. Today, that was a long fucking list.
Maya crouched a few feet away, photographing the rock formations along the base of the trail while I reinforced the railing on the lookout platform.
God, I wanted her. Which wasn’t exactly news, but it was burning me up, from the inside out.
I’d stopped trying to argue myself out of it somewhere between the dance and the kiss and every single night since, when I’d lie in bed staring at the ceiling, my body in flames.
So yeah, the wanting wasn’t the problem, exactly. It was what the fuck I should do about it. I’d told her I’d think about it and I’d done little else but think about it.
She deserved someone who’d thought it through. Who wasn’t just riding the high of having her close again after all these years, chasing a feeling that might burn out the second real life got in the way. I owed her more than that.
So I was thinking it through. Carefully. Deliberately. Like a guy who absolutely had not replayed that kiss four hundred times in the last week.
Maya shifted beside me, angling her camera toward the water, and the afternoon light caught the curve of her cheek. I looked away and drove a screw into the railing with more force than necessary.
At least Maya was giving me the space to work through it. It was far less torturous.
As we worked, I let my mind wander, the way it always did when I was out here.
It landed on an image of Maya at twelve, standing on that ledge with her arms spread wide and a grin that could’ve powered the whole town.
Brody dared her to jump. She hadn’t hesitated.
Then she’d climbed back up and dared him right back.
He did hesitate, but once she’d suggested he was too chicken shit to do it, he had no choice.
Moments after he’d jumped, she’d followed right after.
I wiped my hands on my jeans, a half-smile on my lips. “You remember when you used to launch yourself off that ledge like gravity was just a suggestion? And that time you dared Brody. Then you talked Jensen into jumping once and the guy cried the whole way down.”
I’d meant it as a throwaway line, something you say when a place pulls up old memories. But her expression shifted. It was quick, there and gone, a flicker behind her eyes before she covered it with a half-smile that didn’t quite land.
“Yeah, well.” She shrugged, turning the camera over in her hands. “That was a long time ago.”
“Not that long.”
She carefully placed the camera on a rock and stood slowly, brushing off her knees, and wandered over to the railing. Her fingers curled around the wood as she leaned forward, staring down at the pool below.
“Long enough.”
She held herself for a beat, just a fraction too still, and the shrug had been too casual to be casual at all. Something had changed, and she was working hard to make it look like it hadn’t.
“What happened to that girl?” I kept my voice easy, but I refused to drop it. Not when she looked like that.
“She grew up, Nate. People do that.” The edge in her voice was faint, but it was there.
I set down the drill and walked over, leaning against the railing beside her. “Growing up and shutting down are two completely different things. And we didn’t call you Slayer for nothing. So, tell me. What happened?”
Her eyes cut to mine, sharp and defensive, and for a second I thought she was going to tell me to mind my own business. But then she let out a breath, something caught between a laugh and a sigh, and her shoulders dropped.
“I don’t know what happened. That’s the stupid part.
” Her gaze slid away. “It’s not like there was some big moment.
No dramatic back story. I finished high school and dreamed of going somewhere out of state for college.
Or having a gap year abroad. But when it came time to make the move, I just couldn’t do it.
Everything and everyone I love is here and I’m not brave enough to be on my own, I guess.
So bit by bit, I stopped being the girl who jumped off cliffs and…
here I am.” A humorless laugh. “It’s not exactly a compelling origin story, right?
I can’t even be properly messed up about it because there’s nothing to point to.
I just got... smaller. And I didn’t even notice it happening until it was done. ”
The frustration in her voice pulled at me.
I leaned against the railing beside her, close enough that our arms almost touched. The falls roared below us, all that water crashing against rock, relentless and unconcerned with anything as insignificant as two people standing above it.
“So, stop being smaller,” I said.
She looked at me like I’d suggested she sprout wings. “Oh, just like that?”
“Yeah.” I held her gaze. “Just like that.”
She shook her head, a tired smile pulling at the corner of her mouth. “You make it sound so simple.”
“It is simple. Doesn’t mean it’s easy.” I straightened up from the railing and looked over the edge at the pool below. The water was deep enough here, always had been. We’d jumped it a hundred times as kids and never hit bottom. “When’s the last time you jumped?”
Maya blinked. “What?”
“Off the ledge. When’s the last time you did it?”
“I don’t know. Years. Nate, I’m not going to just...” She trailed off as I pulled my shirt over my head and tossed it onto the platform. “What are you doing?”
“Going for a swim.” I kicked off my boots and peeled my socks off. My jeans followed, and I stood there in my boxers with the late afternoon sun warm on my skin and the roar of the falls filling the space between us.
Maya stared at me, her lips parted. Her gaze tracked down my chest and snapped back up. The flush that crept across her cheeks almost made me lose my train of thought entirely.
Almost.
“Come on, Slayer.” I tilted my head toward the ledge. “Jump with me.”
“You’re insane.”
“Probably.” I took a step backward toward the edge, keeping my eyes on hers. “But I’m not the one who’s chicken shit.”
That landed exactly where I’d aimed it. Her jaw tightened and her eyes sparked. She radiated the energy of the girl who used to dare Brody off this very ledge.
Her shoulders rose and fell as she dragged in a breath. Then her fingers went to the hem of her shirt before she stopped, glancing down at herself.
“I’m in my underwear under this, Nate.”
“I should fucking hope so, because seeing you in all your naked glory would absolutely break me. And besides, I’m standing here in my boxers, so I’d say we’re even.”
She held my gaze for a long beat, her chest rising and falling a little faster than normal.
Then she pulled her shirt over her head, kicked off her boots and peeled her khakis off.
Now she was just in a thin singlet and panties.
The sight of her knocked the air out of my lungs.
Long legs, bare skin, that stubborn set to her jaw.
I turned toward the ledge and held out my hand.
“Jump with me, Maya.”