Mountain Man’s Honeysuckle Darling (Wildwood Valley Rapids #5)

1. Kyron

KYRON

That was the part of the day I lived for. No schedule board, no equipment check, no one needing directions to the bathroom or asking whether the Class III section was “really that rough.” Just the paddle and the current and the sound the water made when there was nothing else competing with it.

I didn’t think too hard about what that meant.

The Alderman cabin came into view on the second bend—weathered gray siding, the back deck hanging over the bank the way it always had. I’d run this section of river so many times I could do it eyes closed, every landmark exactly where it was supposed to be.

She was on the deck the first morning. Dark hair down her back and a mug in both hands. She wasn’t watching the river so much as listening to it.

I’d taken note and kept going. Not my business.

Second morning, same thing. Earlier, this time. The light hadn’t shifted yet and she was already out there.

I noticed that too and told myself I wasn’t.

The third afternoon, I came around the bend and she wasn’t on the deck.

She was on the bank.

One hand was trailing into the honeysuckle that climbed the low retaining wall below the cabin.

She wasn’t doing anything in particular.

Just there. Some people knew how to exist somewhere without making a production of it.

I’d met maybe four people in my whole life who had that quality.

She looked like she’d been born with it.

I pulled up without deciding to.

She heard the paddle and turned. Green eyes. That was the first thing I registered and the first thing I wished I hadn’t, because I was going to be thinking about that color later whether I wanted to or not.

“That stand’s been there longer than the cabin has,” I said.

It didn’t occur to me until the words were already out that I’d skipped straight past any kind of introduction. She didn’t seem to mind. Her chin lifted slightly—taking that in, saving it somewhere—and then she looked back at the honeysuckle like she was checking it against what I’d said.

“How much longer?”

“Ten, twelve years. It was here when they built the dock.” I nodded at the weathered posts where the bank met the water. “Grew in from the tree line. Nobody planted it.”

“It looks planted.”

“That’s just how it grows when it’s happy.”

She looked at me again. Something moved through those eyes that I didn’t try to read.

“Kyron Gibbs,” I said. “I run equipment and logistics for Wildwood River Co.”

“Suri Martin.” She pulled her hand out of the honeysuckle and tucked her hair back from her face. “I’m staying at the cabin.”

“I know.”

The corner of her mouth moved. Not quite a smile.

“You know.”

“I run this section most days. Noticed you on the deck the last couple mornings.” I kept my voice flat, matter-of-fact, the same way I’d tell someone the water level was running high. “Didn’t want to bother you.”

She watched me a beat longer. “And now?”

“Now you’re on the bank.”

She did smile then, real and quick, and I looked at the honeysuckle so I’d have somewhere else to put my eyes.

She asked about the river, and I told her.

Not the customer version or the liability-conscious guided trip rundown, but the actual river.

The way the current shifted in July when the water dropped.

The bend upstream where the temperature ran four degrees colder even on the hottest days.

The heron that had been working the far bank all summer, reliable as anything I’d ever known.

She tracked what I was saying without looking for a way in. No nod-and-redirect, no waiting for a gap to fill with her own thing. Just still and steady and actually hearing it.

She’d been coming here since she was a kid, she told me.

Every summer, same cabin, same week. Her parents used to bring her and she’d kept coming on her own.

She knew which floorboard on the porch had a soft spot and which window stuck in humid weather.

She knew the deck faced the right direction to catch the morning light without the full heat of it.

She talked about this place the way I talked about equipment I’d spent fifteen years learning—not showing off, just knowing.

I asked how long she was staying.

“Four more days,” she said. “We leave Sunday.”

I let that sit for exactly one beat. “Who’s we?”

“My friend Sunnie.” She tilted her head slightly, like she’d caught why I asked. “She’s inside. Reading.”

“Hm.” I kept my voice level. “Then back home?”

“Then back to Charlotte.” Her expression shifted, but I couldn’t quite make out what it meant. “Big summer coming up.”

I’d seen the blue sedan parked up at the cabin on my morning run-throughs. North Carolina plates, a film of road dust on it. I noted it the way I noted water levels and weather—information that might matter later.

I waited. She didn’t elaborate, and I didn’t push. That was fine. People told you what they wanted to tell you. I’d learned that a long time ago, and I’d stopped being bothered by it.

What I noticed was the shift itself. The way her shoulders had changed, just slightly, when she said it. A weight she was carrying that she still carried, even out here. I didn’t comment on it.

The light had gone slanted and gold by the time I picked up my paddle again. That happened fast out here in the summer—the afternoon stretched and then it didn’t, and suddenly the shadows were long and the air had that coolness that came off the water when the sun lost its angle.

“I’ll probably be out here tomorrow,” she said. Not an invitation exactly. Just information.

“River’s always running,” I said.

I paddled back toward the outfitter with the steady stroke I used when I had nowhere to be. The honeysuckle scent followed me longer than it should have.