River's End

by Nora Roberts

  “No, I didn’t.” He fell into step with her and thought how easy it was to slide back into a rhythm with her as well. “You’re starting to like me again, Liv. You’re not going to be able to help yourself.”

  “I may be edging toward tolerate, but that’s a long way from like. Now here, if you watch the trail, you’ll notice oxalis, liverwort—”

  “I can never get enough liverwort. You ever get down to L.A.?”

  “No.” She flicked a glance toward him, didn’t quite meet his eyes. “No.”

  “I thought you might go visit your aunt now and then.”

  “They come here, at least twice a year.”

  “I got to tell you, it’s tough to imagine Jamie tramping through the woods. That’s one very impressive lady. Still, I guess that since this is where she grew up, she’d slide back in easily. What about her husband?”

  “Uncle David? He loves her enough to come, to stay and to let my grandmother haul him off to fish on the lake. That’s been the routine for years, even though everyone knows he hates fishing. If his luck’s running bad, he actually catches some, then he has to clean them. Once we talked him into camping.”

  “Only once?”

  “I think that’s how Aunt Jamie got her pearl-and-diamond necklace. It was his bribe that she never make him sleep in the woods again. No cell phones, no laptops, no room service.” She slid him a sidelong glance. “You’d relate, I imagine.”

  “Hey, I can give up my cell phone any time I want. It’s not an addiction. And I’ve slept outside plenty.”

  “In a tent pitched in your backyard.”

  “And in Boy Scout camp.”

  The laugh bubbled out without her realizing it. “You were never a Boy Scout.”

  “I was, too. For one brief, shining period of six and a half months. It was the uniforms that turned me away. I mean, come on, those hats are really lame.”

  He was getting a little winded, but didn’t want to break the flow now that he had her talking. “You do the Girl Scout thing?”

  “No, I was never interested in joining groups.”

  “You just didn’t want to wear that dumb beanie.”

  “It was a factor. How’re the boots holding up?”

  “Fine. You can’t miss with L. L. Bean.”

  “You’re starting to chug, ace. Want to stop?”

  “I’m not chugging. That’s Shirley. How come I’m supposed to use your name, but you don’t use mine?”

  “It keeps slipping my mind.” She tapped a finger on the water bottle dangling from his belt. “Take a drink. Keep your muscles oiled. You’ll note here that the vine maples are taller, more treelike than they are on the bottomland. You can see patches of soil through the mat. We’ve climbed about five hundred feet.”

  The world opened up again, with smoky peaks and green valleys, with a sky that was like burnished steel. The rain had stopped, but the ground beneath his feet was still moldering with it and the air tasted as wet as the water he swallowed.

  “What’s this place?”

  “We switched over to Three Lakes Trail.”

  He could see how the river, the winding run of it, cut through forest and hill, the jagged islands of rock that pushed up through the stone-colored water like bunched fists. The wind flew into his face, roared through the tops of the trees at his back and was swallowed up by the forest.

  “Nothing gentle about it, is there?”

  “No. It’s good to remember that. A lot of Sunday hikers don’t, and they pay for it. Nature isn’t kind. It’s relentless.”

  “Funny, I would have said you prefer it to people.”

  “I do. Got your wind back?”

  “I hadn’t lost my wind.” Exactly.

  “If we cross the bridge here, then follow the trail another three and a half miles, we’ll come to the lake area. Or we can turn back.”

  “I can do another three and a half miles.”

  “All right, then.”

  Big Creek Bridge spanned the water. He heard the rush of it as they crossed, felt the push and pull of the wind and adjusted his body to brace against it. Olivia hiked ahead as if they’d been strolling down Wilshire Boulevard.

  He tried not to hate her for it.

  In less than a mile, his feet were killing him and his quads were screaming. She hadn’t bothered to mention the last leg was straight up. Noah gritted his teeth and kept pace.

  He tried to keep his mind off his abused body by taking in the scenery, thinking about the massage he was going to book the minute he got back to the lodge, speculating on what Olivia had brought along for lunch.

  He caught a flash out of the corner of his eye, glanced up in time to see something spring through the thinning trees. “What was that?”

  “Flying squirrel. That’s a rare sighting during the day. They’re nocturnal.”

  “No shit? Like Rocky? Rocky and Bullwinkle,” he explained when she frowned at him. “You know, the cartoon.”

  “I don’t watch a lot of TV.”

  “You had to catch it when you were a kid.” He craned his neck, trying to get another glimpse. “It’s not just a cartoon; it’s an institution. What else is up here, besides Rocky?”

  “We provide a list of wildlife at the center.” She gestured to a tree where the bark had been stripped and the trunk scored with deep grooves. “Bear. Those are bear scratchings.”

  “Yeah?” Rather than being alarmed as she expected, he stepped closer, examining the scar with apparent fascination. “Are they still hibernating now, or could we run into one?”

  “Oh, they’re up and about now. And hungry,” she added, just for the hell of it.

  “Well.” He ran his fingers down one deep groove. “As long as one doesn’t come along for a midday snack and mistake me for a tree, it’d be interesting.”

  He nearly forgot his aching muscles as they continued to climb. Chipmunks frolicked around the ground, up in the trees, chattering and scolding. A hawk sailed overhead with a regal spread of wings and a single wild cry that echoed forever. There was the glinting black passing of a raven and the first thin patch of snow.

  “We can stop here.” Olivia shrugged off her pack and sent Noah a considering look as she crouched down to open it. “I didn’t think you’d make it, at least not without whining.”

  “The whining was a close call a few times, but it was worth it.”

  He looked out over the three lakes, each one the dull silver of an old mirror. Softly reflected in them, the mountains rippled on the surface, more shadow than image. The air was sharp with pine and cold and the soggy smell of the rain-soaked ground.

  “As your prize for not whining, we have some of my grandmother’s famous beef and barley stew.”

  “I could eat an ocean of it.”

  She pulled a small blanket out of her pack. “Spread that out and sit down. You won’t get an ocean, but you’ll get enough to warm your belly and take your mind off how much your feet hurt.”

  “I brought some of my complimentary fruit.” He smiled as he snapped the blanket. “In case your plan was to starve me.”

  “No, I thought about just ditching you in the forest and seeing if you ever found your way out. But I like your parents, and they would’ve been upset.”

  He folded his legs and accepted the coffee she poured from a thermos into a cup. He wanted to slip off her hat so he could touch her hair. He loved the look of it, that sleek caramel cap with the sassy fringe. “You could learn to like me, too.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  He ruffled Shirley’s head when she came over to sniff at his coffee. “Your dog likes me.”

  “She’s Grandpop’s dog. And she likes drinking out of toilets. Her taste is not to be trusted.”

  “You’re a hard woman, Liv. But you make great coffee. If we got married you could make it for me every morning and I’d treat you like a queen.”

  “How about you make the coffee and I treat you like a serf?”

  “Does th
at include tying me up and demanding sexual favors? Because I should tell you I’ve recently taken a vow of celibacy.”

  She only laughed and got out a second thermos. “Your virtue’s safe with me.”

  “Well, that’s a load off my mind. Christ, that smells fabulous.”

  “My grandmother’s a hell of a cook.” She poured soup out of the wide-mouthed thermos into bowls.

  “So, can I come to dinner?”

  She kept her gaze focused on the thermos as she replaced the lid. “When I got home last night, she’d been crying. My grandfather had told her you were here, what you wanted and that he’d talked to you. I don’t know what they said to each other, but I know they haven’t said much to each other since. And that she’d been crying.”

  “I’m sorry for that.”

  “Are you?” She looked up now. He’d expected her eyes to be damp, but they were burning dry and hot. “You’re sorry that you brought back an intolerable grief, caused a strain between two people who’ve loved each other for over fifty years and somehow shoved me straight into the middle of it?”

  “Yes.” His eyes never wavered from hers. “I am.”

  “But you’ll still write the book.”

  “Yes.” He picked up his bowl. “I will. It’s already opened up, already gone too far to turn back. And here’s a fact, Liv. If I back off this time, Tanner’s still going to tell his story. He’ll just tell it to someone else. That someone else might not be sorry, sorry enough to tread as carefully as possible, to make sure that whatever he writes is true. He wouldn’t have the connection, however tenuous it is, to you and your family that makes it matter to him.”

  “Now, you’re a crusader?”

  “No.” He let her bitterness roll off him, though there were a few sharp pricks on his skin. “I’m just a writer. A good one. I don’t have any illusions that what I write will change anything, but I hope it’ll answer questions.”

  Had he been this sure of himself before? She didn’t think so. They’d both grown up quite a bit in the last six years. “It’s too late for the answers.”

  “We disagree. I don’t think it’s ever too late for answers. Liv, hear me out.” He pulled off his hat, raked his fingers through his hair. “There are things I never got to explain to you before.”

  “I said—”

  “Damn it, let me finish. I was ten when all this happened. My father was the biggest hero in my life; I guess he still is. Anyway, I knew about his job, and not just the ten-year-old’s perception of him going after the bad guys. What he did mattered to me, made an impression on me. And I paid attention. When he came home after your mother’s murder, there was grief on his face. I’d never seen it before, not from the job. Maybe there’d be anger, God knows sometimes he’d come home and look sick and tired, but I’d never seen him grieve. And I never forgot it.”

  To give herself something to do, she picked up her bowl, stirred without interest at the stew. She heard more than frustration in his voice. She heard passion. And purpose. “Isn’t what you’re doing now bringing back that grief?”

  “You can’t bring back what’s never really gone away, and it hasn’t, for any of you. I saw you on TV,” he continued. “You were just a baby. They showed that clip dozens of times, when you ran out of the house, crying. Holding your hands over your ears. Screaming.”

  She remembered the moment perfectly, could relive it if she chose—had relived it when she didn’t. “Are you offering me pity now?”

  “So you can spit it back in my face.” He shook his head, studying her as he spooned up stew. She wasn’t a defenseless and terrified little girl now. She’d toughened, and if she didn’t take steps otherwise, she’d soon be hardened. “I’m telling you I won’t do that. I won’t crowd and push. We’ll take it at your pace.”

  “I don’t know if I’ll agree or not,” she said after a moment. “But I won’t even consider talking to you unless you promise to leave my grandmother out of it. Leave her completely alone. She can’t handle it. And I won’t have you try to handle her.”

  “All right.” He sighed at her suspicious frown. “What? You want me to sign it in blood?”

  “Maybe.” She ate only because she knew she’d need fuel for the hike back. “Don’t expect me to trust you.”

  “You did once. You will again before we’re finished.”

  “You’re annoyingly sure of yourself. There’s a pair of harlequin ducks on the lake. You can just spot them, on the far side.”

  He glanced over. He’d already figured out that she shifted over into the nature mode when she wanted to change the subject.

  “I’ll be here through the week,” he said. “My home number’s on file at the lodge. If you haven’t decided by the time I leave, you can get in touch later. I’ll come back.”

  “I’ll think about it.” She gave Shirley a biscuit out of the tin. “Now be quiet. One of the best parts of being here is the quiet.”

  Satisfied with the progress, Noah dug into his stew. He was toying with asking if there was more when the scream had him flipping the bowl in the air and leaping to his feet.

  “Stay here,” he ordered. “Stay right here.”

  Olivia gaped at him for five seconds, then scrambled to her feet as he turned to run toward the sound. “Stop, wait!” The breath hitched in her chest as she debated tackling him or just throwing herself in his path. She managed to grab his sleeve, yank, then nearly plowed into him after all as Shirley barreled into her, hoping a tussle was coming.

  “Someone’s in trouble.” The shriek stabbed the air again and had him pushing her back. “I want you to stay here until I—”

  “It’s a marmot.” She fought back a laugh. “Probably an Olympic marmot.”

  “What the hell is that?”

  She managed to compose her face. “Also known as rockchuck, whistle-pig or whistler, though the warning call it makes isn’t a whistle as it’s made with the vocal chords. It isn’t a damsel in distress, but a . . . there.”

  With her hand still gripping his sleeve, she gestured. There were two of them with grizzled coats of gray-brown, their heavy bodies lumping along toward an outcrop of rocks. One of them stood up on its hind legs, sniffing the air, then eyeing dog and humans with a jaundiced eye.

  “They’re just out of hibernation, usually go into torpor in September and don’t surface until May. Most likely their burrow is close by. The, ah, call is their early-warning system as they’re slower than any of their predators.”

  “Terrific.” He turned his head, eyed Olivia narrowly.

  “Well, you were really brave. I felt completely protected from any terrifying marauding marmots.”

  “Smart-ass.” He tapped his fist on her chin, then left it there. Her eyes were deep and gold with humor, her lips curved and soft. Color glowed in her cheeks, and the wind ruffled her hair.

  He saw the change in her eyes, the darkening of awareness as he’d seen it years before. He thought he heard her draw in one breath, sharply, as his fingers uncurled and turned up to skim her jaw.

  He didn’t calculate the move. He just made it. The minute his mouth closed over hers, his mind clicked in and shouted mistake! But his other hand was already sliding through her hair, his teeth were already nibbling on that full lower lip to enhance the taste.

  She jerked once, as if that touch of mouth to mouth had shocked her, then went very still. In that stillness he felt the faintest of quivers, and her lips warmed under his.

  The combination had him nudging her closer, had him deepening the kiss though some part of him knew he should never have turned down this road again.

  She’d meant to shove him away, to stop him the instant she’d seen the thought come into his eyes, the instant she’d felt the answering trip of her own pulse.

  He paralyzed her. The rush of feelings that geysered up inside her body stunned her, left her open to more, with her hand gripping his sleeve and the blood swirling dizzily in her head.

  The way it had b
een between them before. Exactly as it had been.

  The wind rushed by them, through them, sighing through the trees, and still she couldn’t move. Not toward him or away, not to hold on or reject.

  That drenching sensation of helplessness terrified her.

  “Olivia.” He skimmed his hands over her face, fascinated by the angles of it, the texture.

  Both of them had changed, and yet her flavor was the same, the shape of her mouth the same, the need swimming between them, exactly the same.