Chapter 21
21
DAISY
I don’t know why I thought a hike would be a good idea.
When I was a teenager, this would have been my idea of a regular workout. At one point, I was spending two hours a day running through the wooded areas outside of town, taking in the fresh air and burn in my calves and chest.
I never ventured up the mountains, though. My moms took to threatening me with Johnny’s mandatory company on my runs if I even dared think about heading up one on my own. The threat worked because there was no way my twin brother—who might actually run slower than our ninety-year-old grandmother—was going to ruin my afternoon routine. Kiki loathed exercise and was out of the question, and Josette was my only sister still at home. She was too busy volunteering as the photographer for all the school sports teams to join me.
Then, by the time I headed off to university, I stopped running, and the prospect of hiking the beautiful mountains I grew up gawking at seemed completely impossible.
Until I blabbered to Bryce.
And now, I’m paying for my loose lips.
Folding my body over a massive rock, I heave breaths into my tight, burning lungs and wipe the sweat from my forehead with the bottom of my shirt.
“Will you make it to the top?” Bryce asks with a tinge of humour.
I shoot her a weak, playful glare. “How are you so unbothered right now? Don’t tell me you’re secretly a pro hiker.”
She props her foot onto the trunk of a tree and leans forward to grab the toe of her sneaker for a stretch. Like the first time I saw her in workout gear, it’s a completely different experience than the typical jean skirt or work blouse.
Even with the fall chill in the air, she opted for a pair of tight, high-cut spandex shorts and a cropped shirt that’s been torn at the arms in the same style my brother loves. It reveals the muscles in her biceps, the band of her black sports bra, and the detailed artwork all over her skin.
I settled for regular leggings and an old, baggy shirt that I’m pretty sure belongs to my brother. It wasn’t until I was digging through my dresser drawers after work today that I realized I don’t own any allocated gym wear, and that told me all I needed to know about how this hike was going to turn out.
“Poppy keeps me in shape. Pole is the hardest workout I’ve ever done.”
“Really? I’ve never tried. But from the fact I could collapse here and not get up ever again, I don’t think I’d do very well,” I joke.
“She isn’t at the Cherry Peak BB location much. If you want to attend one of her classes, you should head to Calgary.”
“Is that where you go?”
She drops her leg and props the other, stretching it just as hard. “No. I haven’t gone a lot since Poppy left. If I go, it’s when she’s in town and is leading a class.”
“Do you not like the new instructor?”
“I like her fine. It’s more so that I don’t want to attend with anyone else.” She stares straight ahead at the tree trunk, stuck in her thoughts for a moment. “It was our thing. I started out of support for her, and it’s not the same now. Anna thinks it is, and she attends class here more than I do. It’s just not as easy for me.”
My smile is one of understanding. “I get it. It’s sacred to you.”
She sets her foot on the ground and reaches behind her head to tighten her ponytail. Her eyes flick between mine. “Yeah. Exactly.”
“Well, I’d love to go up sometime and try one of her classes. Maybe we could go together? The next time you go up to Calgary?”
It’s obvious that I’d like to be her friend. We may be pretending to be something more than that, but I enjoy Bryce’s company outside of that agreement. She’s surprising. A person that I didn’t expect to be able to find such a calm and comfortable connection with but have. I’ve already begun holding that bond close to my heart.
Bryce holds my eyes for a few beats longer before nodding. “I’d like that.”
She’d like that. Not just a simple yes.
Success.
I beam at her and plant my hands on my waist. Jerking my head at the sloped trail we’ve swerved off, I say, “I guess I should get in better shape first.”
“I was terrible at it for a long time,” she reveals, falling into step beside me as we start up the trail again.
Given that we chose to go after I finished work, there isn’t much time left before the sun begins to set on us. I’m not familiar with this trail, but Bryce seems to be, and that’s good enough for me. Getting stuck in the woods after dark isn’t on my bucket list.
“Is pole where you got your abs from?” I ask, stepping over a thick tree root.
She curves a manicured brow and glances over at me. “Have you been checking me out?”
“As if you don’t have people checking you out all the time. You’re gorgeous,” I blurt out, waving a hand down her body to emphasize my point.
Bryce cuts me a surprised look, her cheeks taking on a deep red hue. My stomach pinches, happiness flowing freely through me.
“So are you,” she murmurs, dropping her head, eyes on the dirt trail.
Mischief twirls through the happiness, creating a mess of bright and exciting feelings. “I didn’t take you for the shy type.”
“I’m not.”
“You can be.”
“Don’t tell anyone. It’ll ruin my reputation.”
Despite her attempts to hide her face, I catch the twitch at the corner of her lips.
“Your secret is safe with me,” I promise.
She points to the right at the fork in the trail, and we pause. “There’s a mountain-fed river about a minute down that path.”
“Let’s go!”
I’m already headed down the path when she huffs a laugh and jogs to catch up. I take a deep inhale of the mountain air and make a promise to myself that I’ll come out here more often. We live in one of the most beautiful places in the world, and I haven’t been taking advantage of it.
“How many times have you hiked this trail to be able to remember where this river is?” I ask.
“Too many to keep track of. But I haven’t come here in a couple of years. I’ve been too busy with work to find the time.”
“Office work keeps you that occupied?”
She kicks a rock off the trail. “No. I do other work on the side. My job at the office isn’t important. To the town or me. It’s just something I agree to do in order to keep my parents off my back about the tattooing. There are other people who work for the town that do everything from home. I’m just a face for the front desk.”
“Tattooing? You mean you tattoo for a living too? ”
Why didn’t I know that? It seems like something a girlfriend should be aware of.
“It’s just a side gig. Something I do to keep myself busy and scratch an itch.”
I know she’s playing it off. If tattooing wasn’t something she truly loved, she wouldn’t be sacrificing her soul working at the town office just to keep your parents from giving her hell about it.
“If you love it the way it seems you do, then you should be tattooing full-time, Bryce. Your work is phenomenal. It’s the best I’ve ever seen,” I tell her, not a trace of a lie in my words.
“It’s not possible in Cherry Peak. The town is too small.”
“It could be. I mean, how many people do you have that are requesting house calls?”
A sound of rushing water becomes audible the further we get down the path, and I swing my head to the right just in time to spot a flash of turquoise blue amongst a forest of deep green.
I spin to face Bryce, excitement leaking from my every pore as I pick up my pace.
“Be careful, Sunshine. I can’t fake date a dead woman,” she warns.
“I’ll be fine. Now, answer my question before I get too distracted by the pretty blue water and forget about it.”
I watch her contemplate allowing me to do exactly that, but when I threaten her with a stiff pointed finger, she rolls her eyes and answers me.
“I have ten clients that are on a steady rotation. But even that isn’t enough. Not when a steady rotation in the tattoo world is having an appointment every few weeks. It’s not a cheap hobby.”
“How many would you need? Eleven?” I ask, waggling my brows.
“You’d let me tattoo you?”
“Is that so surprising? ”
Her throat works with a strained swallow. “You don’t have any tattoos.”
It’s my turn to tease. Before we leave the cover of the trees and cross onto the rocky slope surrounding the river, I pause, tipping my lips in a smirk.
“Have you been checking me out, Frosty?”
“I already said you were gorgeous, didn’t I?”
She passes me then, holding my gaze as our shoulders knock. I’m a breath away from reaching for her in an attempt to keep her close when she stares past me, wonder lighting her eyes.
I turn, too curious to learn the reason behind her reaction. My mouth falls open at the magnificent sight in front of us.
“Yeah,” she whispers knowingly. “It makes the hike worth it.”
It’s jaw-dropping. From the crystal clear, bright blue water that nearly matches the exact shade of the sky to the small but fierce white rapids that crash amongst the tallest rocks and the floor of dainty pebbles beneath the surface, it’s a spot that’s impossible to forget.
A sanctuary guarded by lush greenery and endless patches of flowers. White, purple, yellow. They’re everywhere, scattered along the riverbank and threaded through the forest that’s home to the various chirping birds and wildlife that I’d bet are watching us right now.
“That’s an understatement,” I murmur in awe.
Not wasting any time, I toe off my sneaker and remove my sock before moving to the water’s edge. The river is freezing when I dip my toe into the lapping current and grin.
“Mission accomplished,” I announce.
Her next exhale is heavy, a weighted noise that draws my attention. She follows me and stares out at the river, lips parted and the cold nipping at the tip of her nose. I grow entranced at the sight of her fully relaxed, as if that exhale was her way of expelling every one of her troubling thoughts in the safety of this piece of paradise .
Folding my fingers in the hem of my shirt, I let myself lean closer to her, just enough for our arms to touch.
“Thank you for sharing your special place with me, Bryce.”
She turns her head, eyes calm as they brush over my features, the storms from within them gone for this moment in time.
“It’s not just my place,” she argues half-heartedly.
My sigh is soft in the river-kissed air. It’s not nearly as cold anymore with her by my side.
“It’s somewhere special to you. That makes it somewhere worth sharing. Even if it is just with me,” I declare.
“It’s not just you, Daisy. It’s only you. I’ve never brought anyone else here, and I don’t want to. I like it like this. With only us.”
I do too.
I creep out of my room and down the hall, careful not to make a sound once I realize Bryce’s bedroom door is cracked open. It’s late, but insomnia doesn’t care much about the numbers on a clock. Apparently, the same can be said about Bryce since there’s a soft light escaping the crack in her door.
With a flick of the lights in the kitchen, I roll some of the soreness out of my shoulders. It’s not the part of my body I expected to be sore after a hike, but honestly, every inch of me is sore.
The hour-long bath I took shortly after we got home didn’t do much for me other than tease sleep I knew wouldn’t come.
My favourite brand of iced tea—the kind in juice boxes—is stocked in the fridge, and I grin at the twin rows of them on the top shelf beside Bryce’s cans of Fanta. She must have picked them up earlier because I remember taking the last one with me to work this morning.
I steal a box and rip the straw off and out of the wrapper before plunging it deep. The cool, sugary liquid coats my throat as I gulp it down, and my eyes droop. Another tease. I’ll be half-asleep out here before heading back to bed and spending the next three hours staring at the ceiling.
My inability to sleep is an on-and-off issue that I only started suffering from in my late teens. Like a timer finished ticking, it hit out of the blue, taking nights of peaceful sleep with it.
I finish my drink too quickly and pull open the fridge to grab another. Only this time, I hover my hand over a chilled orange can, contemplating bringing it to Bryce as another thank you for today. Even if I already know she’ll tell me not to waste my time thanking her again.
It wouldn’t be a waste, though. Not to me.
Decided, I turn off the light and retrace my steps. When I reach her door, I ignore the way my pulse speeds with nerves and knock twice, keeping it quiet in case she just fell asleep with the light on.
No answer comes, so I do it again. Another minute passes without a word, so I push open the door just an inch and peek inside.
I think my stomach tries to climb out of my throat.
Blood cranking to a boil beneath my skin, I try to turn and leave but find that I can’t. My feet are glued to the floor while I focus on what’s happening, unable to do anything else.
The buzz is nearly silent. So quiet I only pick it up when I strain to hear, my fingers wet with sweat as I grip the edge of the doorframe. Tension coils in my belly, my nipples tightening and scraping against the soft material of my nightshirt.
Bryce is turned away from me on the bed, one hand draped down between her legs while another grips onto the headboard so tight her knuckles and biceps strain. The slow, controlled rocking motion of her body makes it obvious what she’s doing, even without the low buzz of the vibrator.
She’s a straight line from the base of her spine up her neck, rigid in a way I’ve never seen her. But this isn’t the same rigidity as when she’s uncomfortable or frustrated .
This is from pleasure. A drive to find release.
I gulp down the moisture in my mouth and press a hand to my chest, the innocent touch feeling anything but. My teeth scrape my bottom lip as I slide my hand an inch to cup my breast, squeezing just once.
Bryce releases a heady, desperate moan and drops her head forward, her rocking growing in intensity. I wish I could see past the mountain of blankets at her feet just to catch a glimpse of what she’s using between her legs. What’s prying these sounds from her throat and transporting her somewhere far outside of this dark room.
A deep blue shirt hangs off her body, hitched at the hips and sagging off one shoulder. The top curve of her ass is exposed, bare for my prying eyes. While pale like the rest of her, it’s completely uninked. My fingers twitch to whip off the blankets around her to see if the rest is as void of designs.
My head swims, emptying of warnings and demands for me to leave. It’s an invasion of privacy to be standing here, but I’m not thinking logically. If I were, I wouldn’t be slipping a hand between my legs to press a single finger against the slick material of my panties, feeling how it molds to my slit and makes my knees shake with the force of the sudden relief.
The headboard creaks, thumping against the wall once as she shakes and lurches forward. Muscles straining in her jaw, she lets her mouth fall completely open and whimpers, the entire length of her body trembling.
“Fuck.” She bucks, abandoning the space between her legs and using both hands to gain balance against the headboard. Her head turns my way slightly, but full, dark lashes brush her cheeks, giving the appearance that her eyes are closed. “Fuck— Daisy .”
Panic restricts my airway as I duck out of the doorway and hightail it back to my room. I don’t make a sound as I close the door behind me and sit on the edge of the bed. Pressing my thighs together, I try and ward off the incessant throb between them, but it doesn’t work.
I’m flushed, so hot beneath my shirt that I rip it off and throw it across the room. My nipples are sore and as hard as the pebbles in the riverbed earlier.
Disbelief rattles my every thought. Fear follows when everything starts to sink in. She saw me. She had to have known I was there. My name was a warning because she was . . . orgasming, and it was too late to yell at me to leave. Right?
I press a hand to the mattress and shake my head.
No.
I’m going to forget this ever happened and hope that she does too. If not, I’m going to be packing my things up tomorrow and crashing back at my brother’s house.
Bryce and I have made too much progress to revert back to how we used to be. I won’t let it happen.
It’s only one more thing I have to pretend, so why does it feel like the most challenging of all?