by Norah Wilson
He grinned back. “Maybe not this time.”
Her smile faded slowly. “What exactly are you saying? You won’t try to make me go down the mountain?”
“A deal’s a deal.” He shrugged, making the heavy pack on his back lift and fall like it was nothing. “I keep you safe. You stay safe.”
“You won’t stop me from reaching White Crow?”
“I’m still not crazy about the idea, but if you’re determined…” He let that hang, giving her an opportunity to back down.
She didn’t. Instead she shouldered her own pack and adjusted her hat. “I am. But I promise I’ll play it safe, do whatever you say. A deal’s a deal,” she said, repeating his words.
“Good.”
She turned to start up the trail.
He stopped her with a hand on her arm. “And a trade’s a trade.” He nodded over his shoulder at the pack on his back.
It took her a second …
Her manuscript. “You brought it with you?” Why hadn’t he just thrown it into the wood box with the old newspapers and finely-split pine kindling? Or better yet, burned it.
“Of course I did.” He looked up at the sky. “We’d better hurry. Rain’s coming, and it’s not going to let up any time soon. We need shelter. I’m thinking Crooked Man’s Cave is our best bet. We can wait it out there.”
He walked on, expecting her to follow.
She fell into step behind him. The terrain required her to keep her eyes on the ground, but she looked up often. Occasionally, when they came to a hard part, he’d extend his hand and help pull her up. And every time she marveled at how easily he hoisted her. For that matter, he seemed to climb almost effortlessly, even with the weight of that big pack.
How much other weight did he carry on this mountain? The thought stopped her in her tracks.
“Ocean?”
She looked up to see Titus had turned and was watching her with concern.
“You okay to go on?” he asked. “The rain’s coming, but if you need a rest—”
“No, I’m fine.” She waved his concern off and continued toward him. “I just spaced for a second.”
He frowned. “Keep your focus.”
“I will.”
He nodded and carried on.
Despite the assurance, she went back to her thoughts. How much did Titus Standish carry Lacey around with him?
She knew bits and pieces about the day her best friend died. Lacey’s father had called her in New York. Harley Douglas had still been in a state of shock himself, but he’d relayed what he knew. Lacey had popped her knee climbing White Crow Cliff and had called for assistance. Titus had been the first of the Search and Rescue team to make it up there, but Lacey had fallen to her death before he could secure her.
Ocean had booked the first available flight home for the funeral. Despite Harkness’s active gossip grapevine, the details of Lacey’s death remained sketchy, and she hadn’t had the heart to question the grieving parents further.
She’d assumed that Lacey must have decided to try to make her way back down on her own instead of waiting for rescue.
She hadn’t made it.
Given Titus’s reluctance to let Ocean herself undertake the climb, there had to be more to it. It wasn’t easy by any stretch of the imagination, but it wasn’t the freakin’ Rocky Mountains either.
It was time she asked some questions.
Chapter 18
THEY WERE still minutes from Crooked Man Cave when the rain came. It started slow, but with the wind whipping it horizontally, it really couldn’t be called a gentle rain. Titus knew it was going to get worse. A lot worse.
He touched Ocean’s hand to get her attention. “If I told you shelter was only minutes away, could you pick up the pace?”
She looked exhausted but nodded vigorously. “To get out of this? You bet I can.”
They were both breathing heavily when they reached the cave. He took her arm and steered her to one side of the entrance. “Wait here a sec while I check it out.”
“Of course.” She watched as he removed his pack and dug out a flashlight. “In case any critters have beat us to it.”
“Exactly.” She might be New York-slick, but she still had her country girl sense. “They like to get out of the rain too.”
“Just give me a shout if anything big is going to come barreling out of there, okay?”
“If there’s anything that big in here, I’ll be the one barreling out.”
She laughed. With a smile on his own face, he flicked the flashlight on and ducked inside.
The cave was empty, at least the part they could fit in. There could be tiny critters or creepy-crawlies further back in the narrow reaches, but nothing that posed a threat to them. And nothing that Ocean needed to know about.
He went to the mouth of the cave and gestured for her to come in. “All clear.”
“Thank God.” She trudged past him and dropped her wet bag.
He brought his own rucksack inside. He’d left his tent fully assembled back at the cabin, so he didn’t have his groundsheet with him, but he did have a light tarp that should be sizeable enough to block the entrance to keep at least some of the wind and rain out. Normally, this wasn’t a measure he had to take. The rocky overhang that formed the cave’s roof was plenty adequate to keep the place reasonably dry during most storms. Not today, though. Not with that driving rain.
Blue tarp in hand, he stood. He glanced at Ocean, who was shivering, her arms curled around herself.
“I’m going to block off part of the entrance,” he told her. “Then I’ll get a fire going and we can dry off and warm up, okay?”
She nodded and he went to work. Thanks to the hooks he’d screwed into the roof of the cave years ago, he was able to make fast work of it. He threaded a length of rope through the grommets on the tarp, then lashed it to the hooks so it draped like a curtain. Selecting some stones from the back of the cave, he used them to pin the bottom of the tarp to the ground, and voila. Shelter.
Well, sort of. It only covered about two-thirds of the entrance. But it was a huge improvement.
He stood, wiping grit from the stones on his wet jeans. When he turned, Ocean was watching him. She was no longer hugging herself, which he took as a good sign.
“Wow, that was fast. Thank you. It’s warmer in here already.”
He felt inordinately pleased at her praise. “You’re welcome. The fire might take a while,” he warned. “The fuel is probably a little wet.”
“Can I help?”
“I’ve got it,” he said. “But while I’m doing that, maybe you should phone your mom.” He dug his satellite phone from his pocket, turned it on and held it out toward her. “With this storm, she’s probably beside herself.”
She tugged off her gloves. “Shall I tell her you found us a double-wide cave with separate bedrooms?”
He snorted. “Better just tell her that given the storm, we won’t risk coming down today as planned, and that we’ll overnight on the mountain again. You might not want to tell her that even with a fire, we’re going to have to bundle up for warmth when we sleep.” He put the phone in her hand, letting his fingers linger the merest extra few seconds. Her gaze came up to meet his, and the way her eyes widened made his heart kick.
“Bundle up?”
“Together.”
“Of course,” she said, a little breathlessly. “Hypothermia. Can’t have that.”
Ten minutes later, using sticks he’d stashed there on his last visit, he’d nursed a decent fire to life in the permanent fire grate his brother had built on one of his solo treks up here. Scott had situated it beneath a hole in the cave’s roof that acted like a natural flue. Three years ago, Scott had added a sort of range hood, a tin creation of his own making that helped funnel even more of the smoke up and out, and kept less rain from getting in. Their clothes were going to reek of wood smoke when they left here, but they wouldn’t be in any danger of expiring from carbon monoxide poisoning, even w
ith the tarp blocking part of the entrance. He sat feeding bits of moderately damp sticks to the fire, building it gradually. As he worked, he tried his best not to listen in on Ocean’s telephone conversation with her mother. But short of going out into the storm, he could hardly tune it out.
She’d had her back turned to him for most of the conversation, but as Faye Siliker’s questions got more...uh...probing, she turned to grin at him.
“Mom, please. He is the perfect gentleman… Yes, I know you’d call his father if he wasn’t. I’ll be sure to tell him that.”
Perfect gentleman.
If Mrs. Siliker only knew Titus’s thoughts, Arden Standish’s phone would be ringing off the wall.
Ocean laughed into the phone, then turned away again as she continued to talk to her mother about more mundane things. “I’m pretty sure you’re thinking of River, Mom. That sounds like something my sister would do, not me. Remember that time at the lake when she—” After a small pause, Ocean laughed again. “Okay, that definitely wasn’t me.”
Even her laugh aroused him.
Her laugh. Her smile. Her hair.
Her hair. He could still see the way she’d looked when he’d locked his fingers in that silky mass, her eyes fixed on his mouth, her own lips parting in a gasp…
Then there was the way she’d looked when he’d crawled back out of that bed. Hurt. Frustrated. Angry.
Ocean Siliker. Why her?
Of all the women on the face of the earth, why did it have to be her lost up on Harkness Mountain this weekend? Her in the bed at the cabin? And her standing there now in the intimate dimness of the cave.
“No, no, I was warm enough. The bed? Comfortable. Roomy.”
Roomy? Well, that was code for I slept alone if Titus had ever heard it.
He renewed his efforts to tune out the conversation.
At least Ocean’s bruised side seemed much improved today. It had to be a lot better, or she couldn’t have double-timed it over that last stretch when the rain had started.
Or maybe she hadn’t been that badly injured to begin with, as she’d insisted last night.
And there he went again, reliving those few minutes on the old camp cot with Ocean.
Shutting the motion picture down, he went to his pack and detached the bedroll and self-inflating mat that had kept the sleeping bag reasonably dry. Unrolling the works, he placed them against a huge rock that could serve as a backrest. Then he pulled his canteen out of his pack, along with two bags of rations. While Ocean talked away, he stripped his jacket off and pinned it to the wall with a forked branch. Hopefully, it would dry out there, close to the fire. His jeans would have to dry on him.
He dug his waterproof poncho out of his pack and spread it on the bedroll before plunking himself down—no point getting the sleeping bag wet—and looked out the mouth of the cave. Even with the tarp partially blocking the view, he could see White Crow Cliff in the distance. It was roughly forty minutes away. Well, for him. Down this last ravine and then a steep, narrow climb. Sighing, he reached for his canteen and took an overdue drink of water.
“Your phone.”
He glanced up to see Ocean holding his satellite phone out to him.
He took it and laid it on the bedroll beside him. “How’s your mom?”
“Relieved. I mean, she wishes I was home, dry, and warm instead of facing another night out here, I’m sure. I’m equally sure she’s cooking up a storm. We Siliker women tend to do that when we’re stressed, especially Mom.”
He frowned. “I hope she’s not too worried.”
“Not nearly as worried as she’d be if you weren’t here with me. She feels safer knowing you are.”
“And that I’m the perfect gentleman?” He raised an eyebrow.
“About that, I gather Scott must have suggested there might be something going on with us.”
“What? That rat. He’s just trying to get me in trouble.”
She grinned. “I think Mom’s wiser to Scott than he imagines. And I don’t think your dad will be getting any indignant phone calls.”
“Good to know.”
“Good to know what? That your dad can rest easy or that your brother has been raising an old lady’s suspicions about your designs toward her eldest daughter?”
“Both. One because Dad needs his rest, and the other because…now I can kill my little brother,” Titus joked. “Justifiably, I mean.”
“Not a jury in the land would convict you?”
He shook his head. “Nope. Not if your mother taught any of them.”
She laughed. The infectious sound of it had him chuckling too.
Then her face slowly sobered. “Actually, she knows I’ll be safe with you, but she probably has doubts about the safety of your virtue.”
He’d just raised the canteen to take a sip of water, but wound up choking on it.
“What?”
She shrugged. “She knows what a crush I had on you when I was a kid.”
He said nothing. Just looked back at her.
“What?” she said “Don’t tell me you didn’t notice.”
He thought about pleading ignorance. That would probably be safest. To do otherwise felt like it could open a conversational minefield. But something about those blue eyes compelled him to answer honestly. “I might have noticed you biking past the place a few times more than seemed necessary.”
She snorted. “Yeah, like constantly, trying to catch just a glimpse of you.”
“Well, that one summer, anyway.”
“What else was a girl to do? With school out, I couldn’t get my fix on the bus anymore.” She groaned. “I was such a dweeb!”
Twit…dweeb…way to self promote, Osch!
Despite the Lacey-speak in her head, Ocean went on, “You must have wanted to swat me like one of those pesky flies that buzz around and around and never land.”
“No way. It was kind of sweet. And it’s not like it lasted very long. When school started up again in the fall, you were back to normal, ignoring me and giggling with your girlfriends, or more often, head down, nose buried in a book.”
“Oh, dude, I was so not over it. I just got better at hiding it. I crushed on you the rest of your senior year. I was devastated when you left for university in Fredericton.”
“Seriously?” He felt his shoulders tense.
She gave him an exaggerated eye roll. “Titus, I was in the eighth grade and listening to emo music twenty-four/seven. Of course it was serious. And dramatic and tragic. It had all the makings of an Alanis Morrisette song.”
“Emo.” He groaned. “Oh, God, I remember Ember at that age. She was always shooting down the head-banging stuff Scott and I listened to and trying to convert us.”
“Yeah?” A thick section of glossy black hair fell forward when she tipped her head, and she pushed it back. “This might still be a state secret, but Ember didn’t really hate that metal and stoner rock as much as she let on.”
He grinned. “I know. And I actually like some of Ember’s music. Well, Elliott Smith.”
A particularly strong gust of wind tore at the tarp, driving one of the corners back. Grateful for something to do, he hopped up, grabbed some more stones and went to secure it. Instead of going back to the bedroll, he stood looking out at White Crow Cliff. If he’d hoped to put some distance between them, Ocean was having none of that. She came to stand beside him.
“Wow, that’s some wind. Thank you for getting us to shelter. Again.”
“You’re welcome.” Lord, she smelled good. The rain must have released the smell of her shampoo or something. He took a step backward. “I’m about to go out there again to rustle up a few more sticks for the fire, let ’em dry out a bit before we burn them. I was going to do it earlier, but you were on the phone and I didn’t want to interrupt, nor did I want to disappear on you without explanation.”
“Want some help?”
“Nah. I’m used to this, and I have a rain poncho.” He strode back to the bedroll and r
etrieved it. “You should peel off your coat, hang it up there with mine by the fire. But make sure that stick is wedged tight against the cave wall, leaning away from the fire pit. Don’t want our coats to become fuel if the stick were to fall.”
“I will.” She glanced around. “But there must be something else I can do.”
He nodded toward his canteen and the rations. “You could always eat.”
She shook her head. “I’d rather wait for you to come back so we can eat together.”
He had a flash of the two of them sitting on the bedroll, heads close together as they shared their meal. It was enough to make his heart beat faster and his breathing quicken. Which was stupid. No point starting something. He was getting out of Harkness while he still had a chance and she was fixing to stay. She’d said it herself, practically the first words out of her mouth when he’d caught up to her yesterday. Something about New York not working out and being home to stay this time. And it made sense. Her mother wasn’t getting any younger. She’d need her daughters around her. Or one of them, at least. He doubted very much that River would be moving home any time soon.
He would just have to keep his distance. Although something told him Ocean wasn’t going to make that easy.
“Titus?”
He cleared his throat. “Um, maybe you can check the fire, feed it another stick.”
She nodded. “Will do.”
He hauled the poncho on and went out into the storm. It took him probably twenty minutes to scrounge up a decent armful of deadwood. If they could just keep a fire going until their clothes dried and get them through the day, they could probably do without the fire that night. But with or without a fire, they were going to have to share that sleeping bag for warmth.
Jesus, and there he’d been, worrying about the intimacy of a shared meal. What he should be worrying about was how he was going to keep any distance between them in a bedroll. Oh, he could keep his hands to himself…as long as he was awake and aware.
And what about Ocean? How much distance was she going to allow? When he’d broken the news that they’d have to pool their body heat, she’d gotten flustered.
Because you intended her to be flustered. You were flirting with her, dammit. And now you’re trying to figure out how to keep it platonic? Nice, Standish. Way to blow hot and cold.
