Chapter 10
Ally
The snow stops at last sometime before dawn.
The silence is the first thing I notice; no wind, no distant groan of shifting drifts, just a quiet so deep the cabin itself feels like it’s holding its breath.
The second thing I notice is the ping. A tiny, blessed, treacherous ping from my phone on the nightstand.
Signal. At last. Too soon.
Civilisation. Contact. Consequences.
Reality.
I groan and burrow deeper into the blankets, but Nate’s arm tightens around my waist, dragging me back against his chest.
“No,” he mumbles into my shoulder. “Ignore it. Cabin rules.”
“Cabin rules don’t apply to returning phone signal,” I whisper. “That’s the law.”
“Coward.”
“Smart woman,” I say, echoing his response earlier.
His breath huffs against my neck, half laugh, half resigned exhale. “Fine, fine, fine. Grab it. Let’s see how much our lives are about to fall apart.”
I roll over, kiss the tip of his nose because I can, then reach for my phone.
Fifty-three notifications. Fifty. Three. I make a sound like a dying teakettle.
Nate winces. “That bad?”
“I don’t know yet. But it looks like it.”
I sit up, pulling the blanket with me. He follows, propping himself on one elbow, warm hand sliding absently down my spine. “Who first?” he asks.
“Mum,” I say immediately. “Otherwise she’ll kill me before Mac can.”
He kisses my shoulder, slow and grounding. “I’m right here.” It shouldn’t help. But it very much does.
I hit call.
Mum picks up on the first ring. “Allyson Montrose, if you ever disappear into a snowstorm again without answering your phone I will personally fly to Montana and beat you with a frozen fish.”
“Mum -”
“And Mac is beside himself,” she barrels on. “And the Olympic committee has been calling non-stop. They’re losing their collective mind. And Josh posted something cryptic like he’s a wounded Victorian poet, and not a very good one. Tell me you’re alive and whole, or I’ll start drinking.”
“Mum,” I cut in. “I’m alive. And I’m all right.”
There is an enormous, shaky exhale on the other end. “Thank God.” A beat. Then, in a deadly, suspicious tone: “So why do you sound… weird?”
I glance at Nate. He mouths, Your call.
Fantastic.
“Mum,” I start carefully. “There’s something I need to tell you.”
“What,” she says flatly.
“I’m not alone.”
She’s silent. “I know. Mac told me you were in the cabin. And I’d already sent Nate there without knowing, so I figured you were probably safe with him, hence the lack of rescue helicopters combing the area for any trace of you, you’re welcome, by the way.”
“Uh, yeah, thanks.” Mum absolutely would have called the National Guard and screamed at them to find me, so I guess Mac talked her down?
Which is, in itself, interesting.
“There’s… more to it, though,” I mumble.
“Oh.” She sounds surprised. “Is there someone else with you both?”
“No, just us.”
There is a long, long pause. “Wait…”
I cringe. Nate squeezes my hand.
“More to it in what way?” She gasps. “Don’t tell me you two finally got it together?!”
I make a choked noise. “What?!”
“Oh, don’t give me that. You and Nate have been driving me mad with all that unresolved romantic tension dancing in the air like crazed bees. Christ on a pogo stick, it wasn’t exactly subtle.”
I bury my face in my hands.
Nate leans forward, voice gentle. “Hi, Fallon.”
“Nate, you absolute menace!” She laughs darkly. “Not exactly what I had in mind when I suggested seclusion, but I couldn’t have designed it better if I’d planned it!”
Nate stares at me. I stare back.
“You are keeping each other warm, I take it,” she adds mischievously.
“Mum,” I moan.
“Oh, pfft. You’re a grown woman, and he’s a grown man. You aren’t related by blood, or even marriage anymore, not that the latter would actually make any difference to your DNA.” Her voice gets softer and less raucous. “I’m not angry. I’m behind you both one hundred percent, OK?”
“We…” I have to pause around a tight throat and the threat of tears. My mum. My lovely, supportive, fiercely funny mum. “We wanted you to hear it from us first.”
Something thuds on Fallon’s end. A rustling. A muffled gasp.
“PUMPKIN?!?” Mac’s bellowing voice fills the phone like someone kicked open the gates of hell. “ARE YOU INJURED? IS NATE THERE?!?”
Nate mouths, Oh, shit.
“Mum put it on speaker,” I whisper.
“Hi, Dad,” Nate offers wearily.
“NATE! IS SHE OK?”
“She is fine,” I retort dryly.
“I’d say a damn site better than fine, if your boy is anything like you,” Mum quips.
Mac booms, “NATHAN WOODRUFF, WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON?”
Wait a minute.
Wait a goddamn minute.
“Mum,” I ask archly, “why is Mac where you are? I thought you were in Leeds with Aunt Linda?”
There’s pin drop silence from the other end of the line.
“Mum…” I say in a stern voice as Nate’s jaw drops. No way, he mouths.
“It’s… Er…”
“Um,” Mac adds helpfully.
Nate snorts. “So, are we going to be current step siblings again, or…?”
“It’s - shut up,” Mum grumbles.
“We’re not talking about us, we’re talking about the two of you,” Mac cuts in.
“Yeah, nice try, old man,” I drawl. “Get comfortable on the floor, cos you don’t have any legs to stand on.”
Mac makes dad-noises as he tries to regain his footing. “I love your mother,” he mutters.
“Shut up, you stupid old fart,” Mum barks.
“And there’s a prime reason why,” Mac snorts.
“Yeah, well, you love Fallon; I love Ally,” Nate adds like kerosene to an established bonfire.
I blink. “You… Whoah.”
“Yeah,” he admits, going pink. “It’s not just sex for me. I love you.”
I gulp. Can it really be that simple?
“ALLYSON MONTROSE, YOU TELL THAT SWEET BOY YOU LOVE HIM BACK, OR SO HELP ME I’LL - ”
I end the call, cutting off Mum’s rant.
“You don’t have to say it back,” he says sincerely, tucking my hair behind my ear. “I just wanted to…” Nate sighs. “I just wanted to say it out loud. Just once.”
I melt. Faster than snow in a furnace.
And, thanks to signal, parental embarrassment, and my brave, honest Nate, everything becomes crystal clear. Everything becomes beautifully, perfectly simple at long last.
“I love you,” I breathe.
His eyes light up. “Even though you just broke up with - ”
“With a dickhead. And then I walked straight into the arms of the guy I’ve always wanted. Yes, I love you, doofus!” I throw my arms around his neck, feeling like I’m finally where I belong.
“Thank fuck,” he sighs into my hair. “I’ll never want anything else again.”
As I turn my head to kiss him, he meets me halfway, and the rest of the messages on my phone get forgotten for a while as we gasp and moan and seal the deal.
Twice.
***
“So,” Nate says once he’s caught his breath. “Your mom. My dad. Again.”
I nod, tangling my fingers with his above our heads. “That was unexpected.” Mum normally doesn’t give men second chances. “I’ll catch up with her later.”
“Good luck.”
OK, I can’t put it off any longer. “I still have to talk to my team.”
His expression sobers, and he kisses my forehead. “I’m right here.”
I pick up my phone again and scroll through the messages more thoroughly now Mum knows I’m safe and well. There are twenty from teammates, none of them Olivia. Seven from the coach. Three from the federation.
One from Josh, which I delete without reading.
My stomach twists when I see an email from the committee, sent the day after I arrived here.
The words blur as I read. Then sharpen.
Then hit like a truck.
Allyson Montrose — Notice of Removal from US Women’s Olympic Archery Team
Reason: Unprofessional conduct but unfortunately his hands are tied and the committee aren’t going to change their minds.
He’s not, however, in the least bit surprised by Team GB’s offer, and wishes me well.
We call Nate’s agent next, who gets over initial surprise at Nate’s ambitions with a scream of delight.
Theater credibility will make him solid gold, apparently, and I imagine we would see dollar signs in her eyes if this meeting was face to face.
She emails him some West End contacts before he’s even hung up.
Finally, when it’s all done, when the avalanche of adulting finally settles, Nate leans back against the headboard, exhales, and pulls me into him.
“We did it,” he says with soul deep satisfaction.
“We did,” I whisper, at peace for the first time in too long.
“It’s terrifying,” he adds.
“It is.”
“And exhilarating.”
I chuckle. “It really is.”
“And remarkably simple. Simpler than I’d thought, all these years.” He threads his fingers through mine, our hands resting over his heart. “So what now?” he murmurs.
I smile into his shoulder. “Cabin rule five,” I say. “We stop pretending this is temporary.”
His hand tightens in mine.
And outside, in the deep white quiet of Montana, the world begins to shift around us, melting, opening, and rearranging itself into something entirely new.
Something we’re choosing.
For both of us.