Chapter 13 #3
“I gave them a new radio.” Meg kept her voice steady. “Noah will reach them.”
The nurse seemed satisfied for the moment with Liam’s numbers. “I’ll call Dr. Carlson. But you must stay calm.” Then she disappeared out the door.
Meg nodded at the nurse, then turned back to Nimue and Liam. “But why would Kyle sabotage your radio? Why would he hurt Trey? What’s his endgame?”
“I don’t know. Maybe the gold.” Liam’s eyes closed briefly—exhaustion and pain and frustration all warring across his features. Nimue ran a soothing hand over his arm. “But whatever it is, Eden and Teague are in danger. Marcus too, if he gets in Kyle’s way.”
Noah reappeared in the doorway. His face had gone grim. Hard. “Xander’s at South Rim dispatch. He says they haven’t been able to reach anyone down in the canyon since early this morning. He thought it was just residual effects from the solar storm, but—”
“It’s not the storm.” Liam tried to sit up, muscles straining against the sheets, but Meg pushed him gently back down with a firm hand on his shoulder.
“Stay down.”
“It’s Kyle.” His voice cracked on the name. “And they don’t know.”
Meg’s gaze met Noah’s across the room. In his brown eyes, she read the same terrible calculation running through her own mind. How far behind are we?
And what happens if we’re already too late?
Eden had a gift for reading people. For spotting danger. For knowing exactly who to trust.
At least, that’s what she’d believed before this week proved her catastrophically, humiliatingly wrong.
The man she’d been so sure was dangerous? He’d just been desperate to find a letter from his dying grandfather. A personal message that had nothing to do with sabotage or violence or any of the dark scenarios she’d constructed in her head.
Marcus’s tears when he’d read those words. The map that promised that the real cache was close. The way his hands had finally stopped shaking.
She’d been so confident in her assessment.
And she’d been completely, utterly wrong.
They made their way down the cliff face in silence. Eden moved carefully, methodically—finding holds, placing feet, trusting the rock—but her mind was elsewhere.
They reached the canyon floor as afternoon shadows lengthened, the light turning golden and soft. The four of them gathered near their gear, and for the first time in days, the mood was lighter.
“I don’t know about you all, but I’m glad to put this to rest.” Kyle studied the map Marcus had spread across a flat rock. “You’re right—it’s not far. That’s incredibly close.”
“According to this, there’s a rock spire in the northern section.” Marcus traced the route with his finger, his hands steadier than they’d been in days. “It shows it connected in my grandfather’s map, but that has to be it. The bridge must have fallen in the last fifty years.”
Teague eyed the map. “That one wasn’t even on our list.”
They spent the next twenty minutes organizing gear, redistributing weight, preparing for the final push. Even Kyle seemed relaxed, joking with Marcus about family legends and hidden treasures.
“We need more firewood.” Eden stood, stretching muscles that ached from the climb. “If we’re hiking until dark, we should eat first.”
“I’ll help.” Teague was already moving. “You two get the food organized. Back in ten.”
They walked upstream, following the creek bed away from camp. Eden kept her pace casual, her body language relaxed. But as soon as they were far enough away—the sound of the water covering their voices, the scrub brush blocking any view from camp—the silence between them shifted.
Charged with everything unsaid.
“Eden.” Teague stopped, turning to face her. The afternoon light caught his auburn curls, turned them to copper. “About this morning—”
“I wasn’t taking Kyle’s side.”
“I know.” He stepped closer. Close enough that she could see the darker flecks in his green eyes. “And I was wrong. About Marcus. About Kyle. About assuming the worst.”
“You were being cautious.” She toyed with the end of her braid. “That’s not wrong.”
“But I didn’t trust your judgment.” The words came out rough. “I made you feel like you had to choose between me and doing the right thing.”
Eden looked up at him—at the tension in his jaw, the shadows under his eyes. At the man who’d positioned himself as a wall between her and danger, even after she’d broken his heart.
“I shouldn’t have said you didn’t care about protecting me.”
“Eden—”
“That wasn’t fair. You do care. I know you do.” She took a breath that shuddered on the way in. “I was hurt and scared and I lashed out.”
“I jumped that gap.” His voice was quiet. Honest. “You said I was reckless, and you were right. You said I would have done it again.” A pause. “Still would.”
“I know.” Her chest tightened. “And that terrifies me.”
“Because of Landon.”
“Because I can’t watch someone I care about destroy themselves.” Her voice cracked. “Can’t sit there waiting for the day you push too far. Can’t survive another phone call that starts with ‘I’m sorry’ and ends with everything I love being gone.”
He was quiet for a long moment. The creek babbled beside them, indifferent to the weight of the conversation.
“Marcus said something earlier.” Teague’s voice softened. “About grief making us do crazy things. Making us push away people we need.”
“Maybe Marcus is smarter than we gave him credit for.”
“He said the question isn’t whether you were right to end it.” Teague’s green eyes met hers—vulnerable in a way she’d never seen. “It’s whether I’m willing to change. To actually trust God instead of myself.”
He swallowed hard.
“I mean, I do in my head. But my actions say I’m still trusting myself, and I don’t know how to stop. But for the first time…I’m starting to believe I need to.”
The honesty in his voice made her throat tight. Made her eyes sting.
“You’re enough, Teague.” She stepped closer despite everything—despite the fear, despite knowing this was probably a mistake. “You’re more than enough. But I need you to believe that too. To believe your life is worth protecting. Not just everyone else’s.”
He moved closer still. Close enough that she could see the way his pulse beat at his throat.
“Teague—”
“I left you at that gap.” His hand came up, hovering near her face. “Made you feel like you didn’t matter. Like saving a little time was worth more, instead of…”
“Instead of what?”
His thumb brushed along her cheekbone, and Eden felt the touch everywhere. In her fingertips. In her chest. In the hollow of her throat.
“Instead of the person I can’t stop thinking about.” His voice was rough. Low. “Even when I’m supposed to be keeping watch. Even when I should be focusing on keeping everyone safe. You’re there. In my head. All the time.”
“That sounds distracting.”
“Incredibly.”
“Probably a safety hazard.”
“Definitely.” His other hand found her waist. “You’re terrible for my focus.”
“And yet here you are.”
“And yet here I am.” His eyes darkened. “We’re a mess, Eden. We’ve spent the last several hours hurt and angry and yet everything about you consumes me.”
“That’s either very romantic or very unhealthy.”
“Probably both.”
“I can work with both.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.” Her hand found his chest, feeling his heartbeat under her palm. Strong. Steady. Alive. “Even though you’re bound to do something else reckless.”
“At least I’m finally being honest about it.”
“Progress.” She smiled despite herself. “We’re all works in progress.”
“So does that mean—”
“It means I still want to kiss you. Even though you drive me crazy.”
“I drive you crazy?”
“Absolutely insane.”
“Good.” His grin was slow. Dangerous. “Mutual.”
Teague closed the distance between them.
His mouth found hers with an urgency that stole her breath.
This wasn’t careful or tentative—not like their first kiss on the plateau, all golden light and gentle discovery.
Not like the second that had a touch of hunger and desire.
This was desperate relief and all the tension that had been building between them finally finding release.