Alaska Reunion

by Jennifer Snow

  Alisha had met him on a rock climbing team building exercise with the hospital staff and had fallen hard and fast. Their sense of adventure had been in sync. She loved to climb and surf and ski and all things outdoors that provided an adrenaline rush.

  Arron had been one hell of an adrenaline rush.

  She took a deep breath and continued. “Then his twin brother, Langdon, died of a brain aneurysm and Arron was devastated. He seemed lost and depressed one minute and almost manic the next. He quit his job at SnowTrek, sold off everything in a matter of days, bought an old Volkswagen sleeper van and decided to travel the world.”

  He didn’t exactly ditch her. He’d asked her to go with him, and the memory of that moment continued to haunt her. At the time she’d thought he was asking the impossible. She had a career, an apartment, friends, family and a life in Wild River. They’d only been seeing each other three months. Giving it all up had seemed impulsive. His actions had appeared to be on the brink of reckless and the whole thing had terrified her. She had been unable to go with him and he’d left...but they’d never really ended things. They’d never talked about what happened next for the two of them. If there was a way to make things work...

  “There was never any real closure.” After he drove away, she’d never heard from him again. Pain and pride had prevented her from reaching out.

  “Well, maybe it’s time you get that,” Cheryl said in her best life coach tone. Twelve hours after childbirth and she was already back in action as Alisha’s best friend and sounding board.

  Alisha’s heart raced. She wasn’t sure she wanted advice right now. Especially when it was obviously the right advice, which was notoriously difficult to follow. “How?”

  “Call him. Right now. Say the things you didn’t get to say and then tell him it’s officially over.” Cheryl’s instructions made it sound so easy.

  Alisha stared at the ground as she mumbled, “I don’t even know if I still have his phone number.”

  “Bullshit.”

  She sighed. “Okay, so maybe it’s still on my speed dial.” Another thing that had pissed off Nick. The guy deserved a medal for sticking it out as long as he had.

  “Well, do it. Like pulling off a Band-Aid.”

  Yeah, a sixteen-month-old Band-Aid that was likely covering an open wound.

  Could she really do that? Call up the only man she couldn’t stop thinking about, dreaming about, reminiscing about...and finally close the door on a relationship she obviously never wanted to be over?

  Unfortunately, it seemed like it might be the only way she could ever move forward.

  * * *

  HIS THIRTIETH FREE CLIMB, to mark his thirtieth birthday, had to be epic. So, naturally, Arron Bosch was back in his hometown of Wild River, Alaska. Or more accurately thirty minutes outside town, staring up at the base of Denali Diamond. This mountain had always eluded him, with its menacing height and dangerous terrain, and while the goal wasn’t to climb to its very peak, this free climb would be one of the very few attempted on this rock face.

  This had been the plan for almost five years. The pact he’d made with his twin brother, Langdon. They’d been working their way up to this climb. Training for it, preparing for it. To mark their thirtieth birthday, they’d tackle one of the world’s most formidable mountains with the most challenging climb of their lives.

  Langdon was gone, but Arron was determined to fulfill the promise. A way of honoring his brother’s memory. He’d spent the last sixteen months traveling the United States, climbing peaks from California to Colorado to Maine. Alone, in his old sleeper van, living on his savings and picking up an odd job here and there, he’d made his way from north to south, from east to west and now back home again.

  He stared up at the mountain in front of him. This was it. He was ready.

  No harness, no safety net. Just him and the rock face.

  He took a deep breath, checked his gear and started his climb. His muscles were ready—he’d been endurance training for six months. His mind was ready—razor focus could mean the difference between life and death. Sound decisions, careful calculation, never taking a foothold or handhold for granted. There was a spiritual element to these climbs, a connection to nature, a respect for the danger these skyscraping mountains could evoke.

  This climb would take over forty hours, so he paced himself as he went higher and higher. There was no rush. The goal was to complete the ascent, not break any records. And he wanted to enjoy it. His climb path would take several days and he’d be portaledge camping after the sun went down.

  About two hours and two hundred feet from the bottom, he paused and took in the breathtaking view of the valley below and the snow-covered mountain peaks in the distance. Rivers and lakes reflected the sun’s warm glow and midafternoon shadows fell over the forest areas. This sight never got old. Wild River had some of the best experiences and scenery in the world. Surreal majesty enveloped him as he continued the trek upward, letting his mind and body come together as he pushed through the more difficult aspects of the challenging climb.

  This was living. And he was determined to do as much living as possible. Langdon had taught him the importance of not wasting a single moment.

  His twin brother had been the adventurous one growing up—the daredevil, the wild child. Arron had been more afraid to try new things, but his brother always refused to do something if Arron didn’t do it too. Langdon had helped him overcome his many fears, and after they both graduated college with matching physical education degrees, they’d moved to Alaska to operate their own free-climb clinics in partnership with SnowTrek Tours.

  They were twins. They were brothers, so naturally they were close, but they were also best friends because they respected one another. They’d had each other’s back.

  Unfortunately, there was no fighting the brain aneurysm that had taken his brother’s life. Langdon had led a life of activity, geared toward good health and body positivity. The one day he was at home with a minor head cold, chilling in front of Netflix, he’d died suddenly, without apparent cause. The autopsy report had shocked them all. How could someone so healthy, so full of life, just die?

  Arron’s life had changed in that split second. He hadn’t known what to do. Fear unlike any he’d ever experienced had gripped him, making it hard to breathe, hard to focus, hard to sit still... He’d needed to escape the pain, so he’d left for the road trip of a lifetime, hoping to find peace in a world without his brother.

  Whether it had been the right thing to do...maybe he’d never know, but lately he’d found himself second-guessing his decision more than he’d like.

  The sound of a ringtone came from his backpack—one that he hadn’t heard in sixteen months. He attempted to take the next step upward but lost his footing. He frantically reached higher to try to steady himself against the rock face, but the ledge above him was too narrow. Without a firm grasp, his fingers slipped, and the one hand holding his body weight gave way.

  A second later, he was free-falling.

  CHAPTER TWO

  ALISHA YAWNED AS she headed toward the locker room. Her last twenty-four-hour shift for the week was over, and she was looking forward to three days off. She needed time for self-care. An at-home spa day and maybe a new hairstyle would help her rebound from the breakup...and get her head on straight to prevent any more impulse dials to ex-boyfriends. As soon as she got home, she was deleting contact details for all former flames from her cell phone.

  Thank God Arron hadn’t answered her call. What the hell would she have said?

  Cheryl was right—she did need some kind of closure if she was going to move on with her life. But maybe that closure had to come from within. Maybe the fact that they hadn’t found their way back to each other after so much time was enough.

  Did she really need to hear him say he didn’t love her?

  The thought made her sto
mach drop. She changed quickly, grabbed her purse and headed out of the locker room. Pizza, cheap Chardonnay, pajamas and a face mask held the cure to all her problems. And maybe she’d grab some cleansing herbs from the apothecary store on Main Street to reset the balance in her apartment.

  As she approached the front doors, she waved to the staff at the triage desk and paused to rearrange the stack of magazines in the waiting room. For three days, this place would not be her problem. She’d unwind and relax and not give work a second—

  The emergency doors swung open, and the sight of a stretcher being rolled in had her moving toward it. She wasn’t sanitized or dressed to deal with the patient, but her oath as a nurse prevented her from simply leaving the hospital when she might be needed. “What do we have?” she asked one of the paramedics.

  “Male. Late twenties. Climbing accident,” he said. “Several broken bones for sure. Internal bleeding and concussion suspected.”

  Alisha glanced at the man. “Is he unconscious?”

  “Induced. He was in a lot of pain.”

  She walked alongside the stretcher as they made their way down the hall toward surgery, and when she looked at his face, really looked this time, her heart stopped. The man she’d been trying to call an hour before was now lying there severely injured.

  Fate had the worst sense of humor.

  It was irrational to be mad at someone on a stretcher, but damned if she could control the feelings of rage flowing through her at the sight of Arron lying there damaged and broken. She wanted to yell at him for getting hurt. But in the next instant, she had to resist the urge to grab him and hug him in relief that it wasn’t so much worse. Her stomach felt queasy as she forced a calming breath and tried to take in the situation as a professional caregiver and not a woman seeing the love of her life for the first time in months under terribly unfortunate circumstances. It was nearly impossible.

  She swallowed hard and took a deep breath. “Thirty.”

  The paramedic frowned. “Excuse me?”

  “Not late twenties. He’s thirty. His birthday was a week ago today.”

  * * *

  IF HE COULD just feel his toes, he’d know he was okay.

  Unfortunately, Arron couldn’t feel anything at all as he lay in the hospital bed, staring at the ceiling. The last thing he remembered was reaching for the rock face just barely wide enough for his fingertips, then free-falling. It was every climber’s nightmare. Reaching for the mountain and feeling nothing but air.

  The monitor next to him beeped and he slowed his breath. He was no stranger to hospitals, but that didn’t mean they didn’t stress him out. Between him and Langdon, his parents has been back and forth to the hospital dealing with broken bones and concussions at least once a month. There wasn’t a bone in his body that he hadn’t bruised or fractured at one point.

  Unfortunately, the last time he was here hadn’t been for one of his injuries. The day Langdon was taken in and pronounced dead on arrival was etched in his memory, and the sights, sounds and smells of the hospital made his chest ache. He couldn’t determine how long he had been here. He felt as though he’d slept a long time.

  The door opened, and Dr. Sheraton entered the room. He forced a relaxed smile as he asked, “How bad is it?”

  “Not bad. Horrible,” she said. He’d never been under her care before, but he’d heard the young head of surgery didn’t exactly sugarcoat things. She was supposedly working on her bedside manner. If this was progress, he’d hate to have been a patient before.

  “What’s broken?” he asked.

  “What’s not?” she replied with an annoyed look. “Femur, wrist, ribs...”

  “Okay, I get it, I’m basically Humpty-Dumpty.”

  She frowned, not getting the joke.

  “Anyway, I’m alive, so that’s a good thing.”

  “You may not feel that way once the morphine wears off,” she said, checking his vitals.

  Wow.

  The door opened again and Alisha entered. His tongue seemed to swell in his mouth at the sight of her. She was dressed in her pale green hospital scrubs, her blond hair in a braid down her back and her face free of makeup but full of unconcealed concern. He struggled to find a breath. He hadn’t seen her in sixteen months. Sixteen long months.

  At least not in person. He’d cyberstalked her quite a bit. Whenever his heart could handle the sight of her with another guy anyway. When the photos of her and some guy named Nick had started to appear on her social media, he’d hoped it was just a fling, a rebound, revenge even for the way they’d left things, but then he’d realized that was all just ego. As months went by and the two seemed to fall more and more in love, he realized Alisha had found the real thing...and it wasn’t him.

  And now here he was lying there at her mercy.

  “Hi,” he said dumbly.

  “Hello,” she said coolly, barely glancing his way, then turned to Dr. Sheraton. “Mrs. Dorsey is ready for her foot surgery. I’ll finish filling in the chart.”

  Dr. Sheraton nodded, and then, forcing what was obviously fake enthusiasm in the presence of a coworker, she touched his leg gently, briefly. “You’re going to be fine.”

  “Thanks, Doc,” he mumbled. After the door closed behind her, he turned to Alisha and whispered, “She wasn’t that nice before you came in.”

  Unfortunately, it didn’t earn him the laugh he’d been going for. In fact, her body language suggested she was pissed at him. This reunion wasn’t exactly ideal. He hated that this was the way they were seeing one another for the first time in forever, but he couldn’t help being happy to see her.

  “She’s the best surgeon in this hospital,” Alisha said. “You can thank her for the fact that your hand will continue facing the right direction once the bones set and heal.”

  Was there a new tough love policy at Wild River Community? Maybe he couldn’t expect sympathy when his accident was due to extreme sports. Or maybe he just couldn’t expect sympathy from his ex-girlfriend. He cleared his throat. “How are you?”

  “Not in a hospital bed,” she said, avoiding his gaze as she wrote down his vitals in his chart.

  Her skin was smooth as silk and her beautiful emerald eyes had him craving that they’d look his way. But she seemed intent on doing her job with as little interaction as possible. “How’ve you been, I mean?” If this was the only time he’d get to talk to her, he didn’t want to waste it.

  She closed the folder and turned to him. “I’m good. Great, actually.”

  He nodded. “Good. I’m happy to hear that,” he said awkwardly. Then something hit him. “Wait, you were calling me.” He remembered now what had caused him to lose focus. His phone ringing. Her ringtone.

  She shook her head quickly. Too quickly. “No... I don’t think...”

  She was lying. She always licked the side of her upper lip when she was lying. “You were. When I was climbing.”

  She winced. “I don’t recall that.”

  “Should we check my cell phone?”

  She stared at her shoes and shrugged. “Must have pocket-dialed you,” she said lamely.

  He wasn’t buying it. After over a year of no contact, he’d thought she had deleted his phone number. The prospect of calling and having her not know who it was had been the only thing preventing him from reaching out. That fear of having been forgotten.

  He knew she was dating someone, and it was obviously serious, so out of respect, he’d let things just lie...but now, seeing her again, he knew he was far from over her. And suddenly he wasn’t so okay with the way they’d just left things. Suddenly there was so much he wanted to clarify, so much he wanted to say.

  Unfortunately, the right words refused to come to mind.

  And she used his silence to change the subject. “Dr. Sheraton says they’d like to keep you in for a few days...”

  He sho
ok his head and immediately tried to get out of the bed. “No can do. My health insurance expired, and I suspect I’ll be paying for my reset bones until they’re six feet under, so I have to check out.”

  Her mouth gaped. “You do what you do and you don’t have health coverage?”

  “I usually don’t fall,” he said with a wry grin. He’d tried to get insured, but no company would touch him without insanely high premiums. He slowly inched toward the edge of the bed, scanning the room. This would be challenging, but what choice did he have?

  “Wait. No. You can’t be on your own yet...in your van...” She reached out to steady him when he nearly fell out of the bed.

  Can’t be on my own... His heart raced as his mind reached an illogical conclusion. It was worth a shot. He shrugged casually. “Okay, you’re right. I guess I’m rooming with you while I recover.”

  Her head shot up. She rapidly blinked several times as though her brain was trying to process what he’d just said. “Um...no. Why would you assume that would be okay?”

  “I fell because of your call. So, technically this is your fault and you feel guilty.”

  “No, I don’t. You shouldn’t have had your cell phone on you.”

  “If I hadn’t, I’d still be lying in a crumpled heap at the bottom of the cliff.” His cell phone’s screen had been shattered, but miraculously it had still worked to dial 911.

  She winced.

  He waited, watching her battle with her common sense and her emotions. He knew she’d agree. She was far too caring to allow him to be on his own, and his closest family was five hundred miles away. Her chest rose and fell in a deep sigh.

  “Fine,” she said, pointing a determined finger at him. “You can stay with me until you can take care of yourself, but not a second longer.”