Rekindled Ember

by Sara Arden

  "That's reasonable." She nodded. "Ziplining?"

  "Yeah! When are we going?"

  "Tomorrow, I think."

  "I'm excited about this, but I think I might need someone to push me off the platform. I want to do it, but I get a bit of vertigo. So if you could just shove me off."

  "If that's not a metaphor, I don't know what is." Sophie flashed her a crooked grin.

  "We totally failed." She gave a dramatic sigh.

  "I don't think so. Right now, the most important things we're both dealing with are Cole male related. It's not like we don't have other interests or concerns, but I'm getting married. And you're coming back to life. Royce is a big part of that."

  "Okay, you're right." She kicked her feet again. "I am however, about to gnaw my arm off. Goddesses of all things sugary and good don't smite me for saying this, but I need something more substantial than a cupcake."

  "Me too. I ate a salad on the way up and now I'm starving. It was just a tease."

  They headed up the stairs and toward the deck where they found Hayden manning the grill. "Oh thank God, I'm starving."

  Hayden gave her a knowing smile. "I knew you would be."

  "I was just telling Sophie that I need something besides cupcakes. I didn't have much of a breakfast this morning. Too many chocolate strawberries."

  "We'll get old school back to nature on this trip. Tonight, we're only going to eat what we catch." She couldn’t tell if he was serious, or teasing.

  "What if we're bad fishermen?" Sophie said.

  "Then it'll be a good thing that Royce and I are not." Hayden turned the hot dogs over.

  "Burn one for me? Just a little?" Sophie said.

  "I'll burn them all for you." He turned to Livie. "How do you like yours? I could leave one uncharred."

  "Don't you dare. What kind of person doesn't like burned hot dogs?" That was sacrilege, really.

  "Good, good."

  "Okay," Royce said, after he joined them. "That's everything. Are we ready to sail for uncharted waters?"

  "Uncharted?" Livie quirked a brow.

  "Uncharted by us," Royce answered.

  "That's fair." Livie paused. "You know, I was trying to come up with something slick to say. Pirate slang, but I got nothing."

  "How are you going to captain the ship if you can't even muster a good comeback? I don't know." Royce sighed.

  "I am definitely going to drive."

  "Captain."

  "Drive. It has a motor. You drive things with motors." It made sense to her.

  "I think we should put it to the crew," Royce said.

  "I do not want any part of that argument. That is between you and your cabin girl." Hayden turned the hot dogs.

  "Cabin girl?" She wrinkled her forehead.

  "Scullery wench?" Royce offered, but she couldn't even pretend to be irked at him when he smiled at her like that.

  "If you're lucky."

  "I am very lucky. I'm the luckiest man alive."

  "Stop being cute. It's gross." But it wasn't gross at all. His words made her bloom and she knew she had to have some kind of glow because her insides were filled with zinging lights.

  "You know what else is gross?" He took her hand.

  "I'm afraid you're going to tell me."

  "That I don't care if you're driving or captaining. As long as I get to come with you."

  "You're not real."

  "I most certainly am." He led her to the navigation platform and put her hands on the wheel. "Take us out to sea."

  "I have no idea what I'm doing." But that was pretty obvious.

  "I thought you said if you could drive a car, you could drive a boat."

  "I may have been a bit hasty." Maybe driving this thing, being responsible for the safety of everyone on it wasn’t the best idea.

  "Do you want me to help you?"

  "Just getting away from the dock. Then out where we can't hit anything, I'll take over."

  He moved behind her and put his hands over hers. "We'll do it together."

  Livie liked together.

  "So here's what we're going to do. We're going to back away from the dock at the lowest speed and come around aft to straighten out, okay?"

  She wanted to learn. She should've been paying attention, but all she could think about was his hands on hers, the breeze on her face, and the warm sun at their backs. The excitement that trilled through her as the engine chugged and the boat began to move. As the boat started moving faster and the shore got farther away, so did all of her worries. It was like she'd taken the heavy chains from around her neck and dropped them at the dock. They couldn't touch her out on the water.

  "Where do you want to go?" he asked her.

  She didn't know. Anywhere. Everywhere. She just wanted this feeling to last forever. "This way?" she said, laughing.

  He took his hands off of hers, giving her the wheel, but she didn't want it alone. "You can steer too."

  "You don't think that's too many cooks in the kitchen? Doesn't a boat have one captain?" he said softly.

  That was something Ben had said often and he'd been wrong. "No, I think we do a pretty good job captaining together, don't you think?"

  "Yeah, I do." His voice was low and quiet.

  She knew he was talking about more than the houseboat, but so had she, without meaning to. She guessed Sophie was right. Things that wanted to be known would assert themselves no matter what she, or anyone else had to say about it. A strange feeling of gratitude overwhelmed her.

  "Thank you."

  "For what?"

  "For being you. For this weekend. For everything."

  "I expect compensation."

  "What?" she whipped her head around to look at him, almost cracking him in the nose with forehead. That would've been unfortunate.

  He laughed.

  "What are you laughing at? The fact that I almost killed you with my head or the incredulity on my face?"

  "Both, if we're being honest."

  She loved the way his mouth quirked up in that little half smile that wasn’t exactly a smirk, but it damn sexy. "So what kind of payment do you expect?"

  "Just a kiss from my lady." He pointed to his cheek.

  "I guess." She stood up on tiptoe and pressed her lips to his cheek. Everything about the moment was perfect. Even him laughing at her. If their positions were reversed, she'd be doing the same.

  But the thing about perfection was, it didn't last. It couldn't. It wasn't a natural state.

  Everything came back to center eventually.

  She couldn't help but wonder if this was the pendulum swing in the other direction to make up for what happened with Ben, but when things evened out, when they righted themselves, where would that leave her?

  14

  Sunday morning found them fitted out with gear and standing on top of the ziplining platform. Royce had no problem looking down, in fact, he got a great kick thinking about flying through the canopy. This wasn't the highest point he'd ziplined from, nor was it the longest, but it was one of his favorites. He loved the Ozarks. The smell of the woods, the feel of the place that was largely untouched.

  Livie looked uncertain. "I really want to do this, but I don't know if I'm going to be able to overcome logic."

  Royce laughed. "What, you mean it's not logical to jump off a platform with only a little wire holding you up?"

  Her face was pale. "I think you're going to have to push me."

  "Sweetheart, you don't have to do it if you don't want to." He'd be disappointed if she didn't do it, but he wasn't going to make her.

  He had a hard time not feeling like this was a kind of metaphor.

  Their guide, Kevin, he was the same guy who'd come out and showed them how to use the dive equipment. He said, "If you go, you have to go yourself. We offer tandem, but not on this line."

  "Really? You can't just, you know, give me a little nudge?" Livie looked hopeful.

  "Nope, sorry. For insurance purposes. You have to take that
leap yourself. You’d probably be surprised how many times we get that question.”

  "What about if you maybe turn your back so you don't see me push her?" Sophie offered helpfully.

  Kevin was obviously amused, but he just gave Sophie a disapproving look.

  "Okay, okay. I'm just trying to help a girl out." She turned to Livie. "I tried."

  "I do need to do it myself. I guess I won't know if I can do it myself, until I do."

  "I'll go first," Hayden volunteered.

  "Me next!" Sophie said.

  Hayden was all strapped in, his harness attached to the line. Royce watched and mentally double-checked the safety protocol as Kevin went through each step. Royce loved the adrenaline rush, but he also loved knowing his baby brother was going to make it to the other side, unharmed.

  "You ready?" Kevin asked him.

  Hayden gave him the signal and leaped off the platform and disappeared into the tree cover. Sophie was up on deck next.

  "So, if I decide I don't want to jump, how do I get down?" Livie asked.

  "Same way you came up. If you're freaked, we do a makeshift lift we can use. You can close your eyes and ride it down," Kevin said. "And hey, if you change your mind, it's no big deal. Happens all the time."

  "I feel like such a wuss." Livie sighed.

  "It's really no big deal. You've never done this before. If you have a few false starts, or you never do it, it's not for everyone."

  "But you love it, right?" Livie asked.

  "I fight fires, too. That doesn't mean you have to."

  "No, but... I just feel like I have to."

  He pulled her into his arms. "You don't have to do anything you don't want to do. Ever."

  "Ever?" she looked up at him. "I don't want to go back to the bar."

  "So don't."

  She laughed, and he loved the sound of it. "If only it was that easy."

  "It really is. This weekend was about letting go of supposed to, isn't that what you said?"

  "Maybe... don't use my words against me." She grinned.

  "Livie, if you want to jump, do it. Take it for yourself with both hands. Don't let anything stand in your way. Even yourself. But that's provided you want to jump, but you need to choose. If you go, you're up next."

  "What if I want you to go first?"

  "Nope."

  "What?" She narrowed her eyes at him.

  "I'm not leaving you here alone. I know you won't jump if I go first. You'll be left here by yourself and you won't choose what you actually want. You'll go with the safe answer."

  She leaned into his chest, obviously taking comfort there and it made him feel ten feet tall, like the hero she was afraid he'd be.

  "You know me so well. Maybe better than I know myself." She pulled away from him. "I'm going to do it."

  Kevin helped attach her harness to the line, but stepped back for Royce to do her safety checks. He seemed to know that they both needed that reassurance for themselves.

  She stepped to the edge of the platform.

  "You ready?" Kevin asked.

  She shook her head, but then closed her eyes and jumped.

  Royce could hear her shriek even after she disappeared in the foliage, but then she laughed. A good, solid belly laugh that made him feel like everything was right in the world.

  "You ready, man?" Kevin asked him.

  "More than." He hooked himself up and allowed Kevin to do the safety checks.

  "I'll be right behind you guys. If your girl liked this line, we have another that's similar a few miles over that goes a small lake. At the end, you don't hit another platform. It drops you right into the water."

  "I think I did that one with another tour." Royce nodded as he remembered. "Yeah, she'd love that."

  "Good, I'll get it set up. All four of you?"

  "Yeah. Let's do it."

  Royce took his jump and for a single moment, he was flying. The earth below, and he was part of the sky until the canopy of trees swallowed him. It was darker, shadowy, and filled with wonder. The scent changed the deeper he went into the arms of the forest. It was an earthy scene, and he breathed deep. The next platform came up all too quickly and the ride was over.

  Usually, at the end of these, even though his adrenaline rushed, and his heart thudded, he had a kind of drop, but he didn't feel that this time because Livie was waiting for him. Her face was flushed, her hair wild, but there was a light in her eyes and he knew she'd loved every second of it.

  He made his landing smoothly and the guide on that end helped him detach his harness.

  "Kevin radioed over and said we're going to the lake line. That right?"

  "Lake line? We can do it again?" Livie perked.

  "Oh, yeah! I can't believe I forgot that," Hayden said. "We did that on one of our other trips. It'll drop us right in the lake."

  "I didn't put my suit on underneath." Livie frowned, but it quickly disappeared. "Screw it, right? No supposed tos."

  "That's right." Royce pulled her close again to whisper in her ear. "Fuck supposed to. We've only got this short time on this pretty ball. We should do with our time what we want."

  She looked up at him, eyes luminous and full of something he couldn't name.

  After Kevin joined them, they piled in the zipline tour company trucks and took a winding road much higher up the mountains. It only took about ten minutes, and the higher they went, the more concerned he was for Livie.

  This might not have been the best idea. He realized this line might be pushing too hard, too fast. Just like their relationship and the plans he had for their future.

  But she didn't hesitate.

  Not even when they climbed all the way up the new platform and were refitting their harnesses and double-checking their gear. Excitement seemed to outweigh her fear.

  "You okay?" Sophie asked her.

  "Um, hell yes. I mean, I'm kind of scared, still, but the last time? That rush was amazing. I want to feel that again, but more."

  "That's how I feel about you," he said into her ear.

  She turned to look at him. "Me too."

  "Oh, good. You feel that way about you, too?" He couldn't resist teasing her.

  She smiled. "Kind of. But yeah, you too, and you know it. You just wanted to hear me say it."

  He hadn't realized how much he'd needed to hear her say it. He'd wanted her to say it, yeah, but he'd needed it. More so than saying she wanted to try a relationship with him, something about her words, the look on her face... maybe it was because he kept likening what was happening between them to this ziplining experience, but it was as if a puzzle piece had snapped into place.

  "I'll take first again," Hayden said.

  "Uh, no. Excuse you. Me first," Sophie argued. "You got to be first last time."

  "By all means," Hayden allowed her to step up to the edge.

  "Chivalry isn't dead." She jumped and everyone watched her until she disappeared through the trees and then saw her again when she was a small dot on the horizon against the blue of the lake beyond.

  "Me next!" she cried. "I'm kind of scared I'll lose my nerve if I don't do it now," Livie said.

  Hayden shrugged. "Go for it, Liv."

  Something twisted in his gut as he watched her and he didn't double check her safety harness. The guide had done it and she had jumped without waiting for him.

  But that was what he wanted. He wanted her to be able to stand, or jump, as the case happened to be on her own.

  His brother took his turn next and Royce was last again, but he was okay with that. Royce chased the high again, allowing himself to bask in the rush as the ground raced toward him and the blue water came up fast.

  It was crisp and cool, a complement to the adrenaline high that washed over him.

  His brother, Sophie, and Livie were already splashing around after having put their vests on the little island dock.

  "The sunscreen holding up okay?" Hayden asked Sophie.

  "Yeah, it seems to be fine, especially since
I kept on the long sleeve shirt."

  "We'll go whenever you're ready," Hayden reassured her.

  "I'll tell you."

  His brother was always mindful of Sophie's burn scars, maybe even more so that she herself was.

  Then she splashed him.

  "Woman," Hayden threatened her.

  "What?" She flicked water at him again and promptly swam away and Hayden gave chase, leaving them alone.

  "Today has been awesome! Tell me when we can do this again."

  "Well, the next time I have a weekend off, if you can get someone to cover the bar." He shrugged. "Why not?"

  "So, we can just leave for the weekend, whenever? You don't feel like you have to stay even on your days off?"

  "Hell no, Liv."

  "But you didn't do this before. You were always...oh."

  He saw as recognition dawned on her.

  "Me. You didn't go anywhere in case I needed you."

  She seemed so startled by it, but he didn't see what the big deal was. She'd needed help. He wanted to help. He's sworn to help. So that's what he'd done. Royce was suddenly uncomfortable with her scrutiny.

  "Yeah, well. You know. I don't need a cookie or anything. It's what you do, right?"

  She paddled over closer to him and draped an arm around his neck. "I feel like we're in high school again and you're asking me to the dance."

  "Baby, I don't know what else to do to prove it to you." She felt good in his arms, her fingers toying with his hair at the nape of his neck.

  "That's the thing. The more you prove it to me, the more unreal it becomes."

  "So, should I come over put my feet up on your coffee table and ask where my dinner is? Oh, and tell you that you look bad in whatever you're wearing?"

  She laughed. "No, I just... I don't know."

  "The things I do for you aren't special." He realized how harsh that sounded. "Wait, that sounded bad. It doesn't mean you're not special, it just means that anyone who cared for you should be doing those things. Should be helping you when you ask for it, and what you ask for."

  "I didn't ask for the Widows and Orphans fund." She shot him a pointed look.

  "Holy hell, woman. We're going to be ninety and you're still going to be mad at me for that." He hadn't meant to say that. It implied they'd be together forever and while that's what he wanted, neither one of them needed the pressure of expectation.