Chapter 24 #3
“It’s just the adrenaline. I promise I’m okay. I freaking did it, though! I was prepared to judo chop her if I needed to, but thankfully, you showed up just in time.” I grin, and he flashes me a dazzling smile in return.
“You did so well, Lo. You should be proud of yourself.” He steps closer like he’s going to hug me, then stops and clears his throat instead, to my disappointment.
The thing is, I am proud of myself. For the first time in a really long time, I’m proud of the decisions I made instead of hiding or second-guessing them.
And I kind of wanted to prove to Jack that I’m not a liability and that I won’t be one in a relationship.
But as much as I’m willing to fight for something with him, there has to be something to fight for.
And maybe, to Jack, I’m just not worth fighting for right now.
“Thanks.” I nod, rolling my lips in. “So, you tied Chad up?”
“Seems Jerrica had already taken care of that for me.” He tips his head in her direction. She’s rolled herself to a sitting position, sending death glares our way.
“She found him trying to make his way to the rim, then tied him up and left him in a cave…while we were…” His eyes bounce to the side and then the ground before he lowers his voice a fraction. “Distracted.”
“You’re the one who shrieked,” I say, turning to Jerrica, “To separate us. But when you saw Jack without his backpack, you came after me.”
“We really would make a good team, you know.” She hangs her head, sinister eyes peering from under hooded brows and half a smile. “It’s not too late to get those matching uniforms.”
Jack is busy typing on his SAT phone, probably checking on the ETA of the helicopter. I fold my arms as well as I can with one in a sling and turn to scowl at Jerrica, because her selfish motives have officially ruined my last chance at walking out of here.
Jerrica still looks a little too smug for my liking as Jack hauls her to her feet. “You’re looking at jail time, you know that, right? I hope this was all worth it,” he tells her.
“It still might be,” she answers, that unnerving tilt to her lips making the hairs on my neck stand up.
“And what about the murder charges?”
She scoffs. “I tied the man up, I didn’t kill him.”
My mouth pulls down in a frown, and I’m ready to ask her what she did to Brandon, but I snap my mouth shut when Jack signals with a small head shake from behind her.
Are you freaking kidding me? I never thought I’d pray that the person standing two feet away from me is a murderer, but this seems like a rather the devil know than the devil you don’t kind of situation.
Which means this drama still isn’t resolved. Someone is lying.
Did Chad kill Brandon and fake the whole being oblivious thing?
Jack secures his backpack, helping me with my deflated version of Marigold before he gets Jerrica standing.
He checks his phone one more time before leading the way and shoving Jerrica out in front of him, keeping some space between us and making it less likely that I’ll scratch her eyes out if she sneers at me one more time.
The canyon has awoken feisty Willow.
Adrenaline paints the rocks with rich oxide reds, highlighting its harsh, unpredictable bends and folds. The canyon has claimed another life, showing no remorse. It’s an untrainable force that no one will ever tame, and it demands respect.
Slopes that felt gentler a few days ago are now more jagged, resisting the chafing of the wind. Whether or not the canyon was willing to share some of that fierceness, I feel it. I can take a bit of that strength and immovability, welcoming that undeniable strength in myself.
“I’m sorry for shouting at you,” I say to the canyon with a pout.
“Shouting at me?” Jack purses his lips over his shoulder. A very nice shoulder, I might add.
“Oh, I was talking to the canyon.”
He gives an endearing smile before turning forward. “Of course you were.”
“Where are we going?” Is it concerning that I’ve been following for over ten minutes without questioning? I blame it on fatigue, not the fact that I’d follow this man into an active volcano.
“We’re escorting Jerrica for a stay in the cave she left Chad in.”
“What? You can’t just leave us there!” Jerrica snips.
For the record, I’m on team ‘leave ‘em there’.
Jack snorts. “You had no problem leaving Chad behind.”
“I knew you’d find him. It wasn’t forever.”
“Luckily for you, you’ll both be getting a chartered flight out of here…right into a holding cell.”
Shadows from the late afternoon sun linger, blending rusty tones into magenta by the time we reach the cave. The walk takes much longer than it did before, when Jack sprinted here and back, this time with an invalid and a criminal in tow.
We arrive at the mouth of the cave that I refuse to enter, deeper than the outcrop Jack and I camped under last night.
That feels so long ago, before a bullet grazed my arm and ruined what would have been a perfect kiss and a path to happily ever after.
Okay, I know we were miles away from that kind of commitment.
But for the first time in my life, I could see the possibility of something long-term, if it weren’t for the pretty yellow backpack with the useless, insanely priced dagger hidden inside that may have ruined my chances.
Still, this man has been doing all the things that make my heart flutter. If only he weren’t still holding back.
His physical comfort with me is evident, but it’s not the same as before. I feel like I must be out of my mind, getting so invested after only four days of knowing someone. But we’ve been inseparable for most of that time, so really it’s like going on twenty dates in very close succession, right?
Jerrica grumbles, moaning about her arms being uncomfortable behind her back. Jack ignores her and turns to check on me, and I nod my head for him to lean closer. I love that he doesn’t even stiffen or hesitate one bit before releasing Jerrica and stepping near with a hand on my lower back.
“Are we getting flights out of here, too?” I whisper.
“Let me get her settled in her cave, then we’ll talk.” He nods his head in the direction of the cave’s entrance. “Wait here,” he instructs before pulling out a set of handcuffs. Goodness, his backpack is more magical than Mary Poppins’s carpet bag.
As soon as he moves, Jerrica burns a hole in my head with her death glare. Jack scowls, cutting off her view of me before nudging her forward.
He emerges from the cave a few minutes later as curses and shouts echo from inside.
“That sounds pleasant,” I muse. “Are we seriously leaving them here?”
“I handcuffed her ankle to his wrist. That’ll make them think twice about trying anything. But they won’t be there long, anyway. The chopper is only twenty minutes out.”
He moves closer, but not as close as I’d like.
“And we’re really not going with them?”
He gazes at me like he thinks I could pick the mountain up and carry it on my back if I wanted to. It’s a heady feeling. No one has ever shown this unrelenting belief in me before, and I can’t help but wonder where or what I’d be if I had just a little of that confidence in myself.
“Look, Willow…I know you’re beat up. And you definitely need to see a doctor,” he pauses to catalogue each of my injuries with a furrowed brow, “But you came here to finish a hike. And if that’s still what you want, I’ll do everything I can to make that possible for you.
When we get to the North Rim, a crap storm will unfold.
It’ll be intense for a little while, but it’ll feel like an eternity.
I’ll try to make it as easy as possible.
You’ll be questioned. I’ll be debriefed—extensively, due to our…
closeness. But I don’t want that urgency to rob you of something you came here to do.
So if you want, we’ll finish this hike first. We only have a couple miles left. ”
Is it possible to ache at the loss of a future robbed of getting to know this man better? There’s so much in him that I’m sure I could spend an eternity unraveling.
I’m not certain I’d have put up much of a fight if he’d insisted on carting us both out of here. My body is exhausted on a level I’ve never experienced, and finishing this hike with Jack at my side feels like the easiest and hardest yes of my life.
“And we’ll talk…you know, after? You won’t just disappear on me once I’m thrown into an interrogation room, will you?” I quirk my mouth playfully, but my heart knots with the fear that he’ll take the easy way out, using the case as an excuse to vanish.
“We’ll talk. Soon,” he says, the gray in his eyes glowing in the dim light. That word, soon, doesn’t give me any comfort. But the promise in his voice, the same supportive steadiness he’s shown me, makes me want to greedily latch on to any time he’ll give me.
“Sounds like we have a hike to finish, Jack Reacher.”
He grins, and I smile back, fighting the urge to throw myself at him.