Page 16

"Help? Psychoanalyze me? Use my past for your novel?"

I recoil as if slapped. "That's a terrible thing to say."

"Is it?" He gestures toward the photos. "You're a writer. Everything's material to people like you."

"People like me?" My initial hurt transforms rapidly into anger. "You didn't seem to have a problem with 'people like me' when you were taking my virginity in your kitchen."

His walls come back up, higher than before. “Get dressed. I'll be in the kitchen."

He turns to leave, but I'm not ready to let this go. "You don't get to do that."

He pauses, back still to me. "Do what?"

"Shut down. Push me away because I accidentally touched something painful." I drop the towel and pull his t-shirt over my head, finding courage in my anger. "I'm not trying to invade your privacy or use your pain. I just want to know you."

Before he can respond, a sharp electronic tone cuts through the tension. His radio.

"Brennan here," he answers, all business now.

I can't make out the words from the other end, but I see his posture change, shoulders squaring, focus narrowing.

"Coordinates?" he asks, already moving toward his closet. "ETA?"

As he listens to the response, he pulls out what looks like a go-bag and specialized clothing.

"Emergency?" I ask when he clicks off the radio.

"Hiker down on the north ridge," he confirms, already changing into his SAR gear with efficient movements. "Helicopter extraction required."

I step back, giving him space to prepare. "How long will you be gone?"

"Hard to say. Six hours minimum. Could be overnight depending on weather and location." He glances at me, his expression softening slightly. "Will you be okay here?"

The fact that he's asking, that he's concerned about me despite our argument, makes some of my anger dissipate. "I'll be fine. I have writing to do anyway."

He nods, checking his equipment one last time before heading toward the door. He pauses at the threshold, looking back at me.

"We're not done with this conversation," he says, voice less harsh than before.

"Good," I reply. "Because I'm not done with you."

Something that might be a smile tugs at his mouth before he's gone, the front door closing behind him with a decisive click.

I stand in his bedroom, wearing his shirt, surrounded by evidence of his carefully ordered life and the ghosts of his past. The cabin suddenly feels too large and too quiet without his presence.

I move to the window, watching as his truck pulls away down the mountain road, emergency lights flashing against the darkening sky.

The irony isn't lost on me: after years of creating fictional men who rush into danger while my heroines wait for their return, I'm living that reality. Except in my novels, I control the outcome. In real life, I have no idea what happens next.

I turn away from the window, gathering the borrowed clothes and my laptop. If I can't control what happens when Alex returns, I can at least control what happens to the characters in my novel.

eight

Alex

Thewindhowlsacrossthe ridge, driving rain into my face as I secure the guideline. Forty feet below, the rest of the SAR team works to stabilize the injured hiker—a twenty-eight-year-old male with a compound fracture of the tibia and early signs of hypothermia. The chopper can't land in this terrain, so we're setting up a wire evacuation system to lift him to a clearing half a mile upslope.

"Line secure!" I call through the radio, the wind nearly drowning my voice.