Chapter 13
Chapter Thirteen
Donovan
As always, I wake at the first sign of dawn, reluctantly crawling out of my sleeping bag to get some water boiling for coffee and cocoa, all while wishing I had gone to bed far sooner than I did. For more reasons than one.
I’m surprised when I see Thiago already awake and dumping hot water into our dispenser, but I’m even more surprised to see three women seated in the sand near the hand wash station. Zahra and two of the college wives, both of whom look like they’re still half asleep.
“You’re all up early,” I say through a yawn and run my fingers through my hair, cringing when they snag on several knots. I must have tossed and turned a lot last night for it to be this bad. Too tired to fix it, I force my hair into a ponytail to deal with later.
“Nature calls,” Zahra says, bouncing one of her knees as she hugs her legs. “I was too scared to go after it got dark.”
“Mmm,” one of the other women mumbles into the palm holding her head up on her knee.
Chuckling, I continue into the kitchen and ruffle Thiago’s hair. “Thanks for getting started, GoGo.”
“Course,” he says and grabs the charcoal chimney for the dutch oven briquettes. He glances at the women, his brow furrowed, then starts counting briquettes.
All three women are still waiting when I come back from the boats with this morning’s breakfast items, and I tilt my head as I start cracking eggs into a bowl. “How long have they been there?”
“Before I was up,” Thiago mutters. “Someone is very sick, or no one is at the Hopper.”
I groan. Most likely, someone forgot to bring the paddle last night, and the ladies have been waiting for nothing. Not that I want someone to be dealing with gastrointestinal issues, but that’s preferable to someone already forgetting the rules.
Morgan has woken and joins the line, and Beth, the woman in the middle, looks like she’s ready to burst, which means I need to intervene.
Sighing, I wipe my hands clean on a towel and head over to the women, walking right past them and up the trail. “Anyone in the Hopper?” I call and pause, listening for any sounds. Nothing. “That’s what I thought,” I grumble and head back to the line. “No one’s back there.”
“You go first, Beth,” the first woman says, and her friend gratefully scurries down the trail in a frenzied waddle.
“You can always find a bush to squat behind,” I suggest to the others in the line.
Zahra wrinkles her nose at me. “No thanks.”
Shrugging, I head back to the kitchen and rejoin Thiago right as Derek wanders over, his hair sticking up on one side and his eyes bleary. “Morning,” I say to him, hoping I don’t start laughing at the sight of him so disheveled. But I can’t help but add, “The river is a good look for you.”
Yawning, he halfheartedly runs a hand through his hair a few times before giving up on taming it. “Thanks. Can I help?”
I’m pretty sure my answer will always be yes, even though I spent a good hour last night telling myself that I need to stop liking this man.
Attractive as he is, he’s not the kind of man who will stick around when the trip is over.
If I’ve learned anything in my years as a river guide, it’s that there are few people who would choose my life.
A summer is one thing, but who would stay outside with me for the bulk of the year?
Not Derek Riley.
And yet my mouth tells him to help Thiago with the hash browns before my brain can tell it to keep quiet.
“What is it we’re making?” he asks as he begins dumping the potatoes into the dutch ovens.
“Pops calls it ‘Trash’,” I reply. “It started as all the leftover breakfast food thrown together instead of being thrown away. Eggs, hash browns, bacon, and enough cheese to clog your arteries.”
Derek chuckles. “Sounds great.”
“It’s my favorite,” Thiago says.
“Which is why he gets a dutch oven all to himself,” I tease.
Thiago says something in Spanish, making Derek laugh again, and I spend a couple of minutes listening to their back and forth with a grin. Thiago will talk to Mason okay, but most of the time he’s quiet and self-conscious. It’s nice to see him opening up to someone.
And dang it if it doesn’t make Derek even more attractive, just like everything he does.
Mason and Farah join us a few minutes later, and it looks like most of the other guests are starting to stir, which means I have plenty of buffers to keep me focused on my job instead of the man next to me sprinkling cheese on the ‘Trash.’
“Why does everyone look so grumpy?” Farah asks as she picks up the first dutch oven to take it over to Thiago. “Rough sleep?”
He takes it from her and shrugs. “Someone forgot to bring the paddle back last night.”
“Seriously?” Mason says with a groan. “The most important rule!”
“Who was it?” Farah asks, returning for the next dutch oven.
“Dunno,” I reply. “Not me, I can tell you that.” Memories of last night spark to life in my brain, and as much as I try to shove them back into the corner I hid them in last night, they are determined to stay front and center like they did most of the night.
Derek holding my hand. Derek listening to me blubber about Cygnus. Derek looking very much like he wanted to kiss me.
Me almost beating him to it.
With heat flashing across my cheeks, I glance at the man, curious to see if there’s any chance he might be remembering last night too.
He’s completely frozen. Like when he almost cut himself last night, he’s standing there without breathing, his wide eyes fixed on the Hopper line and his body tense.
I lean closer, nudging his arm. “Derek?”
A curse slips from his tongue, and he drops the bag of cheese on the table, ignoring the way the shreds spill across the tablecloth. Jaw clenching, he runs a hand through his hair before another curse falls free and he takes two steps back.
I think I just figured out who left the paddle behind. “Hey,” I say, holding a hand toward him. He looks like he’s about to start panicking. “It’s not a big—”
“Derek.” Hunter comes out of nowhere and puts his hand on Derek’s chest, pushing him backward with such force that I’m convinced he’s going to knock Derek into the sand. But Derek’s feet move back with him, taking wide steps as Hunter continues to push until they disappear beyond the tents.
“What in the world was that?” Farah whispers.
I feel like I’m just as frozen as Derek was, staring at the place he disappeared. “I have no idea.”
“Should we go check on them, or…”
I glance at Mason and Thiago, both of whom must have also watched the strange interaction because they’re looking back at me with confused expressions. As far as I can tell, no one else was paying attention, but there’s a chance some of the others saw whatever that was.
If I had to guess, Hunter recognized signs of something Derek wouldn’t want people to see and took control of the situation, moving his boss out of sight and away from everyone.
But what was about to happen? It looked like the beginnings of a panic attack, but I don’t know how a forgotten paddle could trigger something like that.
Nor has the internet ever mentioned Derek struggling with anxiety.
People would eat something like that up if they knew.
So either Derek is very good at keeping things under wraps, or this is something new.
“Hey,” I say to Farah, gesturing for her to come closer. “I’m going to make sure they’re okay. Could you go through the packing process early this morning? The ‘Trash’ will take an hour to cook anyway, so we might as well get people moving while they wait.”
“And distracted,” she guesses with a sympathetic smile.
“Exactly.”
“I’m on it.”
“Thanks, Far.”
Double checking with the boys that they’ve got breakfast handled, I head down the beach in search of Derek. There’s only so far he could go, but I still have to climb around some rocks and through a dense clump of coyote willow before I catch sight of Hunter. “Hey, is everything—”
Hunter grabs my arm, his grip firm but not painful. “It’s fine,” he says curtly.
Leaning to the right, I try to see past him but am disappointed when he leans with me. “Are you sure? Derek looked…” I don’t even know what word to use. “Spooked?”
“He’s fine.”
“If he was fine, you would let me talk to him.”
The bodyguard is too big for me to see anything but his chest, but the canyon wall is too close behind him for Derek to be more than a few feet away.
He can probably hear everything we’re saying, unless he really is having a panic attack, in which case Hunter shouldn’t be standing here blocking me. I can help him.
“Derek,” I say, a little louder. “Are you okay?”
“Yep.” His response is quiet, but it sounds like he’s even closer than I thought.
Strange as it feels to talk to a man’s brawny chest, I do it anyway. “Are you sure?”
“Yep.”
“Donovan,” Hunter says, his tone full of warning. Based on his glare, I only have a few seconds before he forces me back to the camp.
No matter what I say to Derek right now, he’s not going to hear it, so I take a step back, holding my hands up to show Hunter that I’ll leave without his assistance. “I’m not going to push,” I say, though I don’t do a good job of hiding my reluctance. “But everything is okay. I promise.”
This can’t be about leaving the paddle. That’s such an inconsequential thing, and I’m sure everyone will forget about it by tonight.
Even if they don’t, now they know firsthand what happens when it’s left behind, so no one is going to do it again.
If not for his reaction, I would have thought Derek would be the first to own up to the mistake, using his personability to laugh it off and smooth things over with the women who had to wait.
But he didn’t.
With one more glance at Hunter, who furrows his eyebrows, I turn around and walk back to the kitchen, hating that Derek doesn’t trust me with whatever he’s dealing with.
Then again, I haven’t given him any reasons to trust me, and guilt starts building in my stomach.
I’ve been letting my fears and my past guide my interactions, and that’s not fair to Derek.
Everyone deserves a clean slate when they’re out here, the same way I did.
Derek doesn’t come back to camp until right before we start eating breakfast, and he keeps on the outskirts of the group, ignoring the whispers of everyone wondering why he’s less social than he was yesterday.
He only meets my gaze once, when he climbs into the gear boat two hours later and settles at the very back, where I won’t be able to see him, but that look says a lot.
It’s the only time he lets emotion filter into his expression, and what he shows me is fear. A silent plea not to ask.
Unfortunately for him, Pops taught me how to recognize a soul in need, and I can’t stand by and let Derek suffer in silence. Not when I can do something about it. I’ll give him what he wants, but he’s going to get what he needs too.
Hopefully this doesn’t blow up in my face.