Chapter 28
Juniper
She was right. She knew she was.
Juniper read the passage again, tracing the words with her finger.
I wrote all day today. I believe this might be my best work. That sounds silly and arrogant when I’ve only finished one novel,
but I believe The Forgotten Road rings with truth and heartbreak. I’m not sure if this story will ever be finished, or if it’s even meant to be. It feels
more like a confession than a book. Still, I keep writing, chasing her ghost on the page.
June knew Beneath the Dusty Sky , his second published book, even better than she knew Purgatory River . She had once written a paper on it for her advanced placement English class in high school. It was a coming-of-age story
about a teenage orphan in the 1960s who sets off on a quest to find his only living relative.
While there was a small romantic element to the story in the brief innocent relationship between his protagonist and the older
girl he befriends along the way, she certainly wouldn’t have called it a love story, and she couldn’t imagine anyone else
saying so.
She was immersed again in the journals when she heard the doorbell ring and caught her breath. She had almost—but not quite—forgotten
that Beck had texted the night before to tell her he had to put aside the table she had watched him start while he finished
an earlier project. She was still welcome to watch him, but it wouldn’t be the same project.
When she said she would stay and work on the journals, he had offered to stop by in the afternoon to take her on a short hike above the ranch if she wanted.
She rose, rotating her neck and her shoulders. Who knew that spending hours poring over a man’s journals could be so physically
demanding? She should set a timer to remind herself to move a little more, as she tended to become completely absorbed in
Carson Wells’s words.
She wished she could have met the man.
It felt truly odd to be living in the house of a stranger while still feeling as if you knew his inner thoughts and emotions.
She answered the door and had to smile when she saw Hank sitting on his haunches there with a few wildflowers tucked into
his collar.
“For me? Oh, Hank. You shouldn’t have.”
“He picked them himself,” Beck said. He looked lean, rangy, with a baseball cap hiding his dark hair and sunglasses concealing
his expression.
She smiled at him, too, though she was fiercely aware of him, and her mind instantly filled with memories of their kiss.
“Did he? I’m curious how he might have stuck them under his collar without opposable thumbs.”
“I might have done that part,” he admitted, charming her completely. “Are you still up for a short hike today?”
“Sure. I could use a break. Let me put these flowers in some water and grab my shoes.”
She found an old jar in the cupboard she had noticed earlier, filled it with water and plunked in the flowers.
They immediately brightened up the cabin, she thought.
“Have you been up to the old homestead site yet?” Beck asked. “It has a great view overlooking the whole ranch.”
She shook her head. “Is it far?”
“Not far at all and it should be mostly shady all the way. There is a slight elevation gain, but nothing too arduous. We can
always turn back if you feel like it’s too much.”
She wasn’t sure about any elevation gain, but decided she couldn’t avoid hills forever. Life was full of them, wasn’t it?
“Sure.”
He waited while she slipped into her tennis shoes and grabbed her water bottle and the same baseball cap he had given her.
Outside, the air smelled sweet and clean. She soaked it into her lungs. It would be hard to leave this restful paradise in
a few weeks to return to Seattle and the hectic frenzy of her life there.
“Make sure you tell me if I’m going too fast,” Beck said, then took off behind the cabin in a direction she hadn’t yet explored,
following a trail through the woods that sloped up a low hill.
She was relieved she had no problem keeping up with him, though he paused a few times along the way, ostensibly to point out
something in the terrain, but she knew it was mostly to allow her to catch her breath.
After a short walk, much of it uphill, they reached a clearing and what looked like an old stone foundation about twenty feet
by twenty feet.
It was positioned at the top of a small hill with commanding views in every direction.
“How beautiful. I had no idea this was up here.”
“It’s well hidden by the trees. You have to know where you’re going or you will miss it.”
From here, she could see the rooftop of the large ranch house where Ali and her grandmother lived and the smaller cabin where
she was staying.
The two of them sat on the higher of the foundation remnants, the one wall that remained about thirty inches above the ground.
She pulled out her water bottle and sipped. “Why would they move the ranch house from here? It’s so beautiful.”
“The spring that used to be here dried up. As the ranching family living here at the time had to dig a new well anyway, they moved down the hill. It’s better protected from the elements, too, especially the wind.”
“That makes sense.”
They sat in silence, enjoying the soft breeze while Hank sniffed at everything in sight.
She was intensely aware of him beside her. “Thank you for bringing me up here. I’ll definitely come back.”
“It’s a bit of a climb. If you’re worried about making the trip on your own, I’m happy to come with you.”
She studied him in the afternoon sunlight. “Why are you being so nice to me? Everyone around here is so nice. I can’t figure it out.”
“You say that like it’s unusual in your life. Why shouldn’t we be nice?”
“It all feels so... over-the-top. Alison has invited me to stay in her father’s writing cabin, and the two of you have
given me a task I value by trusting me to look through Carson’s papers. You have also let me watch you work when you obviously
didn’t want to, and twice now you’ve dropped everything to take me on a hike.”
“I wouldn’t exactly call this hiking. We walked five hundred yards up a well-worn path.”
“Well, thank you, anyway. I am grateful for your kindness, even if I am not sure I will ever understand it.”
“You’re welcome,” he said. “And I’m sorry more people haven’t been kind to you in your life.”
He spoke with a sincerity that made her want to turn to him, wrap her arms around his neck and rest her cheek against his
broad chest.
The impulse shocked her, especially after she had spent nearly an entire day telling herself all the reasons why nurturing
this attraction to him was a bad idea.
“We can head back down whenever you’re ready,” he said.
Pushing away the sudden yearning, she focused on the captivating view for another few moments before standing up.
As before, Hank led the way down the trail.
If she hadn’t been admiring the chaos of wildflowers growing around them, she might have noticed the softball-size rock on
the path. Instead, she didn’t know it was there until her foot came down unevenly on it and she started to stumble.
She might have pitched forward if Beck hadn’t reached for her, his hands sure and steady.
“Easy there.”
“Thank you,” she said, painfully aware her voice sounded far more breathless than it should have, simply because she suddenly
found herself in the arms of her very attractive temporary neighbor.
“You’re welcome.”
Was it her imagination or had his voice lowered a few notches?
She stared up at him, aware he was still holding her. The vivid memory of the kiss they had shared flashed through her mind.
She wanted to do it again.
What was it about being with this man that made her feel more alive than anything else since her cardiac arrest?
She leaned forward, her lips parted slightly and her hands still pressed against his hard chest. A few inches. That was all
it would take to kiss him again. She was tall enough that she didn’t even have to stand on her tiptoes.
Before she could act on the impulse, he released her and took a step back.
“Better now?” he asked.
She blinked, battling a mix of disappointment and relief.
“I... Yes. I’m good. I guess I wasn’t watching where I was going.”
“That can happen easily on these trails around here, especially on the downhill.”
“Good thing you caught me. I would have hated to add a broken bone to my extensive list of medical issues right now.”
He smiled and they continued walking back to the cabin.