CHAPTER 6 JORDAN
JORDAN
We make it down the narrow winding road and up Bearclaw Mountain Pass. Lana looks good sitting in my passenger seat. Her thighs press into the fabric of her denim and it’s all I can do to stay focused on the road in front of me.
She puts her arm on the center console and when our arms brush, electric tingles whip through my body. We talk about everything and nothing all at once. I ask about her favorite things like some kind of lovesick teenager.
Lana answers all my questions and still leaves me wanting more. Then she asks me about growing up in Whispering Pines and I tell her all the reasons I’d never choose to live anywhere else.
We wind up the narrow road and Lana winces when she sees the steep drop-offs on either side. I promise her the drive will be worth it. Then because it feels right, I put my hand on hers. She relaxes with my reassurance and that feels good. I want to be her calm in her storm.
The drive ends too quickly for my liking. There isn’t anywhere else I’d rather be than here with Lana. But we pull into the overlook anyway and I turn the truck off.
“We’re here? It’s beautiful, but where is everyone?”
“This place just opened for the season. The State Forest Authority takes their closures real seriously, it looks like the word isn’t out yet.
We’ve got the whole place to ourselves.” Lana grins at me and I get out.
We drop the tailgate and hoist the cooler into the bed.
I unfold the wool blanket that lives in my cab and climb inside. Then I help her up beside me.
“I can see why you love this place. It’s stunning.” Lana looks out at the valley open below us.
The view does not disappoint. Majestic trees stretch out as far as the eye can see. The town sits in the bottom of it like something held in two hands. I’ve seen this view hundreds of times, but with Lana by my side it all looks new.
I hand her a sandwich. “You can see what’s left of the school over there. Then between those trees is the firehouse. You can see the roof of my house too, just to the right of it.”
“Do you come up here often?”
“Have to, it’s practically a requirement of living in Whispering Pines. I come up here to think or get away from it all. I can see my whole damn life from up here.”
“It’s a beautiful life you have out here.” She looks at me from behind her glasses with that pouty smile that makes my heart race.
"It hasn’t always been. But it’s looking better these days.”
She looks out at the valley. “No, I don’t buy that for a second. You don’t have any messy parts. You're just trying to make me feel better since I told you about the mess I’m in with my ex.”
"You’ve got that wrong, sweetheart. My brother Thoran is two years older than me.
He’s a firefighter too, but he left for school in the city and never really came back.
Teachers used to ask me if I was going to follow him.
Relatives, too. I never had a good answer at fifteen.
But somewhere in there I figured out what I actually wanted.
I didn't want to be impressive. I wanted to matter.
To, like, four hundred specific people. By name. " I let out a chuckle.
She watches me. “Mission accomplished then?”
The wind moves through the pines below. “Almost.”
“Not messy at all, just as I suspected.” The right side of her smile curls and she raises an eyebrow at me.
I continue, “I got engaged when I was twenty-two and thought I had life all figured out. We were two months from the wedding and I had already put a down payment on a house we'd picked out.”
“I hate to tell you, but there’s still no mess there. Were you married? Because a divorce is standard practice in America. I have a psycho stalking me, come on. It’s a nice try though.” She giggles.
“I wasn’t married and I’m not done. I threw her a surprise birthday party and she decided that was the right moment to tell me that my small-town dreams were small-town small.
That's the phrase she used. Small-town small. So I stood there in front of everyone we knew with a golden party hat and her tiny dog dressed in a tux. I was crying like a baby. How’s that for messy? ”
Lana goes still. “That’s awful.” There’s a kindness in her tone. “I’m sorry you had to go through that.”
"It gutted me at the time. But I’ve had years to move beyond it. Now I can see it’s better that she told me then before I spent any more time." I keep my eyes on the valley. "I’m not built for casual, never have been.”
“What did you do?”
“I let her go in an instant. I didn't fight.
Because I knew even then she wasn't wrong about what she wanted.
I also knew I was never going to give her any of that.
All I wanted was exactly this." I gesture at the valley.
"Whispering Pines. A small house I'll make a whole big life in.
A wife who wants a big life in a small town. "
It’s crazy but somehow for the first time in a long time that wife in my mind has a face. But I don’t say the words, not after all she’s been through. Instead I take a breath and let the unspoken words between us settle.
She bites her bottom lip. “It’s hard to believe that anyone would say no to that offer.”
She says it lightly, like a joke. But she's not laughing. And she's looking at me in a way that makes the whole valley go quiet.
"Careful, a man could read into a thing like that."
"Maybe a man should." Her glasses slide down her nose, but she doesn't fix them. Her half smile does something reckless to my pulse.
The wool blanket bunches under my hand as I turn to face her, and the cooler creaks. Somewhere below us a hawk rides the air over the town like it's got all the time in the world.
I don't. I've got right now and I’m not going to let the moment pass.
I reach up and slide her glasses off. My movements are careful and slow. I fold them and set them on the blanket beside us and her eyes go wide. Up close I catch the flecks of gold that sparkle in them.
I catch her chin and tilt her mouth up to mine.
Then I plant my lips on hers. Her breath catches.
My heart rate ticks up. Lana leans into me and our kiss deepens.
Her hand fists in my shirt and pulls me closer like she's been deciding this since the fire.
She tastes like the lemonade from the cooler and something sweeter.
Lana makes a small sound against my mouth and I feel it everywhere.
I forget the valley. I forget the four hundred people I know by name. I forget my whole damn life laid out below us, because the only part of it that matters is six inches in front of me with her fingers in my collar.
She makes that sound again, soft and breaking apart against my lips, and it lights me up everywhere.
My hand slides into her hair and I tilt her head to take the kiss deeper.
She gives it to me. God, she just gives it to me, like she's been holding her breath for two years and finally remembered how to let it out.
I could stay up here and kiss this woman until the season closes the pass back down around us.