Chapter 12 #2
“You don’t have to answer yet, Baby. But you should know, I feel it too.
Our connection. I don’t know if that’s what’s fueling my heart, but I love you too.
I wanted to tell you the moment you told me, but I refused to do it while running down a mountain.
” When I don’t answer and just stare at him in shock, he continues.
“Just think about it, okay?” he asks hopefully.
“I—Uhh—Okay.” I let out a deep breath. Did I really need to think about it? I feel so connected to them both, like if I didn’t marry them and get to keep them, I would go crazy from heartbreak.
I glance back and forth at them.
“Yes.”
“Yes?” Braxton asks, furrowing his eyebrows like he can’t remember the question.
“My answer, it’s yes.” I watch as his eyebrows slowly raise and he stares at me in awe.
“Yes?” Ryker asks, turning my face to search it with his eyes.
“Yes. If you are sure this is what you really want, I want it to. I can’t describe the connection I feel with you both. I’ve never felt even a tenth of this before. It’s like my soul is calling out to grab both of you, hold you close, and keep you forever.”
Ryker’s eyes move to Braxton’s, as they stare at each other in shock.
“I was expecting a little more excitement here.”
Ry tilts my face up as his intense gaze searches my face. “You mean it, Red? You want us? You want to marry us?”
“Yes,” I tell him firmly, a smile breaking across my face. He throws himself on me as his lips press to mine, and I swear I can feel all his love and joy for me through his kiss.
Wow. I’m… engaged? To two men? Can’t say I saw that one coming.
We spent the rest of yesterday talking and cuddling. I tried to explain some of the technology of my world and they told me a little more about this one. I had to admit it didn’t sound like the safest place, and I was happy to have the two of them help me navigate it.
Once the sun had risen, Braxton chose a direction for us to go and we entered the tunnel together, hand in hand. We didn’t want to drain my phone’s battery so instead I would switch it on and shine it ahead and if the path looked clear, we would turn it off and walk in darkness for a few minutes.
It was probably around the two-hour mark when I noticed that I was starting to see things on the ground in front of us.
I lift my head and realize there is a very faint glow coming from the end.
“Look! I think it’s the end of the tunnel,” I exclaim as I drop their hands and run forward.
“Penny, wait!” they call out behind me, but I’m too excited at finding a way out of the tunnel to stop.
As I get closer, I can make out the shape of trees in the distance, and when I finally step out of the cave for the first time since we were closed in by that avalanche, I take a deep breath of fresh air and realize how much warmer it is here.
I immediately start to shed the fur coat that Brax wrapped me up in this morning, as Brax and Ryker exit behind me. Brax takes my fur while chastising me. “Baby, you can’t run away from us like that. There could have been something dangerous out here.”
“It’s fine, Brax, no harm done,” I say as I lift my arms out to the side as if to show him that I’m still whole.
He grunts in response and they both start taking off their own coats.
I move forward a little, it appears we’re not off of the mountain yet, Just out of the snowy terrain.
I take a few more steps toward the edge of what appears to be a giant drop off, and see a valley below, a few hundred feet down.
Surrounding the valley is a forest and past that I can glimpse some stone buildings.
“Is that the village?” I ask, pointing in that direction.
“Penny, get away from the edge!”
“Ryker, I’m f—” my words turn into a scream as the ground literally drops beneath my feet.
I hear my men yelling my name even over the sound of my own screams as I slide down the side of the cliff.
Only my stupid ass is dumb enough to literally fall down a mountain.
Luckily, it’s not a straight drop, but actually has a slight decline to it.
Unfortunately, my butt and hands take the force of my momentum.
I’m pretty sure I don’t stop screaming once the entire way down and I hit the bottom with such force that I fly forward onto my hands and knees, only just stopping my face from smashing into the ground.
The second I realize I’ve stopped falling, my body gives out and I collapse to my stomach, breathing heavily.
I just survived falling down a mountain. I’m a freaking superhero. There is no other way I could have survived that.
Slowly, I roll to my back and look up at the path I just made.
I’ve fallen so far I can’t even see Brax or Ryker at the top.
I hope they don’t try to follow me down, I have a feeling that I got lucky and wouldn’t want to see them injured.
I take a few more deep breaths as I listen and wait.
When I don’t hear anything, I decide I need to figure out where I am and how to get back to them.
I put my hand on the ground to push myself up and hiss at the pain. I look at my palms and see they are totally shredded and covered in blood.
“Ew,” I grimace as I stare at them. Well, damn, this isn’t good. And now that I’ve seen them, it feels like they are a hundred times more painful.
I wonder if there’s water around here to try to clean them off. I know I have some clothing in my bag I can wrap it with. But they are most definitely full of dirt and gravel that I need to get out first.
Dropping my hands to my sides, I take a look at my surroundings.
It seems I’ve landed in that valley I glimpsed from above.
I know that if I walk straight through the valley, there’s a section of forest and then the village.
I think my best bet is to head in that direction and hope that Ryker and Braxton meet me there, as I have no idea how to climb back up the mountain I just fell down.
As I walk across the field, I start to take in all the sights around me.
This might not have been the world I grew up in, but it was very similar.
But the more I looked, the more differences I noticed.
I probably wouldn’t notice at all if I wasn’t really looking for them.
Like how the grass here was a slightly brighter shade of green.
Or how the trees seem to have more sway to them, like they have a rubber element to their trunks and branches.
Or how their bulls had a single horn instead of two curved ones.
Wait, what is that thing? I stop in my tracks and tilt my head at the large animal in front of me. He’s at the edge of the valley. Only thirty feet or so away. And he looks just like a bull, except he has a giant horn on his head that… sparkles?
It’s smooth and white and looks like what I imagine a unicorn horn would look like. What is this creature? A bullicorn?
“Hey there, big fella,” I say softly as I slowly creep towards him. If he’s some sort of magical beast, maybe he’d let me ride him? It would definitely get me to the village faster if he’d give me a lift.
“What do you think, huh buddy? Want to give me a ride?” As I take another step closer, I see his nostrils flare and he turns his head sharply to me, freezing me in my tracks.
He exhales sharply through his nose and I swear he narrows his eyes at me before he starts rubbing his hoof on the ground. Uh-oh. He looks like he’s about to charge. Am I wearing red or something? I look down at my outfit but nope, just my regular black clothes.
I take a slow small step backwards, and that’s all it takes to set the bullicorn off. He charges me and I scream as I turn and run.