At Last

Chapter 9

A balanced diet is a chocolate in each hand.

Matt knew he had a reputation for being laid-back and easygoing. He wasn’t sure that either of those things was exactly true, but part of the appearance came from being prepared for anything at any time.

This ability had been honed in the military and then on the streets of Chicago. If a guy could survive warfare and SWAT, he could survive anything. Certainly one willowy, enigmatic, tough-nut-to-crack brunette named Amy Michaels.

He wanted to see her again. He’d resisted for two days now, but then he caught sight of her at the front counter of the ranger station. His office was down a hallway so she hadn’t seen him, but he’d seen her just fine. After she left, his junior ranger manning the desk had said she’d asked for a map to Four Lakes.

Matt had known she’d gone back up to Sierra Meadows the other day. He’d seen her there, amongst the diamond rocks, sketching. It’d taken all he’d had to leave her to the privacy she’d obviously wanted.

But why was she suddenly out on the mountain on her days off, hiking alone? He didn’t know, but he wanted to, so he made it a point to patrol today instead of trying to conquer the mountain of paperwork in his office. Just as well since he’d been taking a ribbing all morning for a certain Facebook post that had gone up the other day, something about how he’d added two new duties to his job description: rescuing maidens and playing doctor.

His staff had loved that. So had Josh and Ty, both of whom had called him with the news like two little girls, the fuckers. Matt could only imagine what Amy thought of it.

He found her just where he thought he would, up at Four Lakes. What he hadn’t expected was that she’d be about fifteen feet up a huge five-hundred-year-old spruce at the base of the first of the four lakes, which were connected by little tributaries.

Amy was holding a sketch pad and was talking either to herself or to the tree.

“If you fall,” she was saying, “you know who’s going to come get you, right? And just your luck, you’ll break your fat ass this time…”

“Your ass isn’t fat,” Matt said, staring up at the long, toned leg hanging down. “It’s perfect. And what the hell are you doing up there?”

She went still, then leaned over a branch and peered down at him. “I’m not lost.”

“Good. But that doesn’t answer my question.”

This was met by silence and a rainfall of pine needles as she began to climb down. Her backpack dropped to the ground and then the sketch pad. Then those long legs came within reach, so Matt grabbed her around the waist and pulled her out of the tree. “Hey there, Tough Girl.”

“Hey.” Her warm body slid down every inch of his, and there was a moment just before her feet touched the ground where he’d have sworn she even nestled into him.

Or maybe that was his imagination, because then she stepped free. She was wearing jeans shorts, emphasis on short, and a V-neck tee that was loose enough to be hanging off one shoulder, revealing a bright blue bra strap. She had a scratch on her jaw and a smudge of dirt across her forehead. “The tree’s taller than I thought,” she said.

“What were you looking for?”

“Nothing important.”

Nothing important, his ass. She wasn’t the type of woman to climb a tree just for the hell of it. But if he knew anything about her, it was that he couldn’t push for answers. He needed a diversion for now, then he’d work his way back to the subject at hand. “How’s Riley?” He’d heard back from Sawyer that the teen wasn’t a missing person, or even a person of interest, so there’d been no legal reason to interfere in her life again. But he wanted to know that she was okay.

“I haven’t seen her after the sleepover,” Amy said. “I know you were worried about her, and also about me taking care of her, but she’s gone. I’m sorry.”

Unable to stop himself, Matt stroked a strand of hair out of her pretty eyes. “I was never worried about you taking care of her.”

“Maybe you should have been.”

“Why?” he asked, confused.

“Well, it’s not like you know me, not really. I could be a horrible person, who’s done horrible things.”

“I know enough,” he said firmly.

“But-”

He put a finger on her lips. She stared at him for a long beat, as if taking measure of his honesty. Or maybe she was deciding on a way to kick his ass for shushing her. Then her gaze dropped to his mouth, and he hoped she was remembering how good it felt on hers.

Because that’s what he was remembering. Ducking a little, he cupped her jaw and eyed her newest injury-the scratch. It could use some antiseptic. He ran his other hand down her arm to her wrapped wrist. “How is this doing?”

“Better.”

He shifted his hand to her leg, his fingers brushing bare skin thanks to the shorts, before landing on the bandage there. “And your thigh?”

She didn’t answer as quickly, and when she did, her breathing wasn’t as even as before. “Better.”

“And your…” His hand slid around now and cupped her very sweet ass.

She choked out some reply and gave him a shove to the chest that made him grin. Turning, he scooped up her sketch pad for her. Before he could open it, she snatched it from him and shoved it into her backpack. “Thanks,” she said.

He watched her fiddle with her stuff a moment. She was clearly waiting him out, assuming he’d move on.

She was wrong. “So are you going to tell me what you’re doing out here?” he asked. “Or maybe you were hoping to find me.”

She laughed. “Nice ego. But no. Not hoping to find you.”

“Ouch.”

“Yeah, I’m sure you’re crushed.” She zipped her backpack. “My grandma came here one summer, a long time ago. She used to tell me stories about the places she hiked to and the things she’d seen.”

“It’s a pretty unforgettable place,” he said.

“Her stories were my fairy tales growing up. Her trip out here was important to her. It changed her life.”

“Are you looking to change your life?” he asked quietly.

She shrugged. “Maybe. A little.”

“Why now?” he asked.

“What do you mean?”

“Your grandma died when you were twelve, right?”

“Yes,” she said, looking surprised that he remembered. “And then I went to live with my mom and her new husband. Until I was sixteen.”

He waited but she didn’t go on. “What happened when you were sixteen?”

Some of the light went out of her eyes, but then she turned her head from him pretty quickly. She looked out at the water.

Okay, so this wasn’t up for discussion. He stood at her side and looked out at the first lake as well. There were wet prints on the rocky shore. She’d gone swimming. He’d have liked to see that. “So… where did you go at sixteen? Is that when you traveled around?”

“Yes.”

“What did you do with yourself?”

“I grew up,” she said flatly. “That took a while. And then, finally, I ended up out here in Lucky Harbor.”

“To recreate your grandma’s journey. To change your life.”

“Yes.” She paused, clearly weighing her words. “She wrote in her journal that out here she found… things.”

“Things.”

“Hope. Peace.” She paused, grimacing as if she was embarrassed. “Her own heart. Whatever that means.”

“In a tree?”

She gave a little laugh and told him about the initials at Sierra Meadows, about Jonathon, his illness, and how Rose had found hope there at the base of the diamond rocks.

“And what about you?” he asked. “Did you find hope?

She looked into his eyes, and the air seemed to crackle between them. “I found something,” she said softly. She held his gaze for another beat and then turned back to the water. There was a light breeze now, rippling the surface of the lake, raising whitecaps.

“What did Rose find here at Four Lakes? Peace?”

“Apparently. Her initials are on the tree trunk, up about twenty feet. I think she saw Jonathon swimming and feeling stronger, and she realized that they could fight the illness. And before you ask, I don’t know where she found her heart. The journal entries aren’t as clear when it comes to the last leg of her trek, something about going around in a circle.” She was quiet a moment. “Out here, it’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen. No buildings, no people. People always say the city is a scary place, but to me, this is scary. It’s big.”

He nodded. He knew exactly what she meant. In the city, there was always something right in front of you. A car, a building, people. Out here there was nothing but space, wide open space. “It’s just different from what you’re used to.”

“Very,” she agreed on a low, throaty laugh. “And it takes my breath the way the mountains cut into the cliffs and valleys. Everything’s so tough and rugged.”

“Like the people who roam here.” He got a smile out of her for that one. He wanted to ask her more about her past but knew she wasn’t ready to tell him. And he didn’t need to know, he reminded himself. This wasn’t a relationship.

She picked up a smooth, round rock and tried to skim it across the water, but it plopped instead. “When you saw me on the trail that first time,” she said, “I was having trouble locating Sierra Meadows and the wall of rocks there.”

He picked up a rock, flatter than the one she’d used. “You could have told me.” He skimmed the rock across the surface of the lake six times.

“Show-off,” she said. “And I didn’t want help. But then I fell down that ravine and found the meadows by accident. Four Lakes was much easier to find. The tree though…” She sent it a look. “Not so much.”

He eyed the entire stand of trees around them, at least ten. “How many did you have to climb before you found the right one?”

She rubbed at the scratch on her jaw. “Five. Not bad odds for a city rat.”

“Did you find peace?”

“No. I found sap, and the will to never climb another tree again.”

He smiled. “I bet.”

“But I enjoyed the day,” she said with some surprise. “It made me want to have more days like this one.”

He met her gaze. “Maybe that’s peace.”

“I don’t know.” Her expression was more open than he’d ever seen it, and he felt a surge of something swell in his chest.

Not good.

Not good at all.

She rubbed at her scratch again, and he brushed her hand away, then bent and kissed her jaw just above it.

She sucked in a breath and went still. Then she turned her head so that their mouths were lined up, a fraction of an inch apart. “What are you doing?”

“Kissing your owie and making it better. Consider it just another of the services I provide.”

“Maybe I should see a list of these services,” she said.

“For you, anything goes.”

Her smile faded, and her eyes went very serious, though she didn’t step back from him. Her warm breath commingled with his. It was an incredibly erotic feeling, alone on a mountaintop, surrounded by hundreds of thousands of acres of wild land, standing toe to toe.

Mouth to mouth.

Sharing air.

“Matt?”

“Yeah?”

A sigh escaped her lips. “I really want to sleep with you, but…”

“Damn,” he said. “That was a great sentence right up to the ‘but.’ ”

“But,” she repeated firmly, then hesitated and blew out a breath, “I have… qualms.”

“Tell me.”

“Okay. The thing is, I think the sex would be good-”

“Good? Try off the charts.”

She acknowledged that with a nod. “Yeah, probably.”

Definitely.

“But…”

He sighed. The “but” again.

“But,” she repeated, “if you want anything more than that, I’m not interested.”

Wait-What? Had he heard her correctly, or just projected the words he’d want to hear?

She was waiting for a reaction, and it was just so unbelievable, and unbelievably perfect, that he laughed out loud.