Page 21 of Disappearance at Angel’s Landing (Red Rock Murders #2)

I see you .

It was exactly what she’d wanted to hear, yet Lila hadn’t been prepared for the full impact of the words.

Her bones felt too big for her body, heart still thundering after Branch had led her back to the tent last night and tucked her into his chest. Safe.

Accepted. Supported. Where she’d always wanted to be.

He had a power over her that would be death of her.

Because when he talked to her like that, when he held her and comforted her after spilling her darkest secrets, she could almost believe the man of her dreams—and countless fantasies—wanted her in return.

Ugh. Why did she have to be so…broken?

Why couldn’t she accept maybe he had meant everything he said last night? And why couldn’t she stop staring at the ceiling of the tent as if it held all the answers?

“I know you’re awake.” His voice was gravelly, deeper than usual, and her lady bits were the first to take notice. Holy moly, the man could do some damage with few words.

Branch pressed his chest against her back, shoulder to knee, though he was so much bigger than her.

She loved it, this sudden need for him to get as close as possible, despite a whole lot of reasons why he shouldn’t.

Number one: morning breath. His hand slid over her hip, across her low belly, and she wanted nothing more than to melt into him.

To forget all the bad outside these crappy canvas walls and live out one of the fantasies she’d built in her head.

Years of therapy had gotten her to a place of being able to hold her own in any given situation with a man, but there was something visceral that convinced her survival instincts that Branch wouldn’t ever hurt her.

“Your stomach announced your presence before the rest of you stirred.”

Traitor. Her stomach vaulted into her chest as Branch planted a kiss on her shoulder.

Forget butterflies. An entire Cirque du Soleil act had started up behind her ribs.

While they’d done nothing more than share that one kiss and fall asleep in each other’s arms last night, Branch Thompson had made her feel a whole lot of dangerous things that scared the crap out of her.

Pushing her upper body off the unyielding ground, Lila added a few inches of breathing room between them.

Didn’t help. Because looking at his face first thing in the morning was suddenly all she wanted to do with the rest of her life.

“You’re one to talk. I fell asleep to an entire orchestra performing in your intestines. ”

Okay. Those words were not sexy. At all.

But his laugh sure as hell was. It filled the tent with a warmth the sun couldn’t touch as it crawled over the horizon. His touch fell from her hip as he rolled onto his back.

“Touché.” Muscles flexed across his stomach and chest as he hauled himself upright.

And what an impressive show it was. In fact, Morning Branch just might be the new star of her unachievable fantasies from here on out.

If this whole investigation left her—and her heart—in one piece. “I’ll get us some breakfast.”

Yeah. There was little chance of getting out of this without more bruises.

They’d lost track of the killer and the gun that could’ve killed her, but Lila knew in her heart the hunt wasn’t over.

The man who’d killed Sarah Lantos might’ve convinced himself of his heroic role in this mess, but that didn’t mean he deserved to get away with murder.

One way or another, NPS was going to find him, and she wanted to be there when they did.

Grabbing her pack, she kept her attention on changing back into her uniform rather than watching the way Branch had jumped at the opportunity to feed her.

No one had really done that for her. Sure, her parents made sure she’d been fed as a kid, but once she’d hit ten or eleven, her mother had taught her to cook her own meals apart from dinner.

Even then, her mom had made it seem like feeding the family was more a burden than anything else.

None of her past boyfriends—however few and far between—had made the effort to ensure she ate.

Rather, they’d expected her to feed them. But Branch… He was taking care of her.

And maybe that was the scariest part of all.

She’d gone so long taking care of herself, she wasn’t sure how to let someone else do it.

And that kiss? Wow. It’d been deep and slow, and oh so intense, she was still feeling it in her nerve endings.

His touch, his weight—all of it combined into a dangerous cocktail.

That kiss had whispered promises of something she’d dreamed about since she’d met him.

It promised forever, but she and Branch didn’t have that.

Not with the gaping wounds she’d exposed.

The smell of cinnamon and apples hit her a split second before Branch offered a small plastic bowl and a spoon. “Can’t say it’s as satisfying as Cherry Garcia, but oatmeal should hold us over until we reach headquarters in a few hours.”

Right. All this was temporary. The real world wouldn’t wait forever.

Soon or later, search and rescue would set out to see what had become of them, and she and Branch would have to give their statements about the past twenty-four hours.

And explain why they’d failed to hold onto Sarah Lantos’s killer.

She could see Risner’s winning smile now—part hyena, part snake—as he found the last reason he needed to dismiss her from the service.

Ugh. Lila stared down into the over-sugared mush in her bowl and closed her eyes.

“I will not stab him for talking about ice cream. I will not stab him for talking about ice cream.”

“Not a morning person.” Branch settled himself on his sleeping bag as she peeled open her eyes. It was admirable the way he tried to fold his legs crisscross-applesauce with his size, but there didn’t seem to be any obstacle that held its strength against him. Especially her ovaries. “Noted.”

Her heart hiccuped. He said that as if he planned to wake up next to her after today, which was just straight-up ridiculous, but if he could read her mind, he would either be traumatized or turned on. Both, if he was as awesome as she believed him to be.

They’d return to headquarters, Risner would fire her, she’d pack her crap as Sayles looked on, and she’d never see Branch or any of the other rangers again.

They’d get what they’d wanted since she started working in Zion: a great view of her ass on the way out.

The end. She swallowed the groan in the back of her throat along with a chunk of apple.

“If you don’t terrify people a little bit, then what’s the point of all of this?

” Shoveling oatmeal into her mouth—and not thinking about the two pints of Ben & Jerry’s in her freezer in her soon-to-be former shoebox of a house—Lila finished off breakfast and shoved her hands into her uniform top over her sleep shirt.

The less they dragged this out, the better.

Then again, she never could rip off a Band-Aid without crying.

Within a few minutes, Branch had cleaned and packed their dishware.

They each rolled and stored their sleeping bags with a mental inventory of the supplies they had left between them.

It wasn’t much, but the hike back to headquarters shouldn’t take more than five hours if they kept a steady pace, though their injuries would add some time.

The sky had darkened some since she’d woken, but it wasn’t until Lila shouldered her pack that she caught a whiff of rain in the air. Storm clouds had started gathering in the north, bringing a gust of frigid wind. She hadn’t packed any long-sleeved protection.

Branch followed her gaze on the incoming clouds. They were moving in fast, rolling over each other and bringing nothing but dread. “Let’s move.”

The banter they’d shared evaporated as the wind picked up, rocketing her nerves higher.

It wasn’t as though they weren’t trained to survive in severe weather.

Both she and Branch had gone through hours of wilderness survival before signing on with NPS.

They both knew the potential of getting wet and suffering hypothermia despite the summer temperatures.

Additionally, search and rescue would call off any attempts made to recover her and Branch due to the storm.

Lila caught the briefest flash of lightning in her peripheral vision, and soon a backing track of thunder ricocheted off the surrounding cliffs. The hairs along her arms raised on end, driving her up the bowl-like incline of the valley.

Her legs screamed protest with every step, her bruised ribs limiting her breathing.

She’d never met a mountain she couldn’t conquer during her reign as a park ranger, but this little molehill would be her undoing.

Not to mention the fantastic view of Branch’s backside on the way up.

But she had to slow down. Her body had yet to recover its run-in with a landslide and a killer, and it was showing. “What fresh hell is this?”

“Almost there. Come on.” Reaching back for her, Branch intertwined his fingers with hers, pulling her to his side. He kept one hand at her low back, and his warmth instantly assaulted the nerves scraping up her spine. Then it was gone. “I’ve got you.”

“You say that now, but four of the five voices in my head think you’re too good to be true, and the fifth is deciding where to bury you.” She sucked down a deep breath tinged with humidity that hadn’t been there a moment ago. Rain was coming.

She was gifted another one of his laughs, but this one didn’t have any feeling to it. Not like the one back in the tent. Still, she couldn’t help but engrave it into her brain for recall later when he finally realized she wasn’t worth the effort. Or maybe he already had.

Static punctured through the silence between them, right before a low voice sounded over Lila’s radio. “Thompson, Jordan, come in. Over.” Another round of static.

Lila pulled up short, unthreading her arm from one shoulder strap, and pulled her pack forward.

They’d reached the rim of the valley, but the mountains and the incoming storm should’ve kept them from contacting headquarters.

Unless help was closer than she thought.

Pulling her beaten radio from the pack, she clamped down the push-to-talk button as Branch took position in front of her. “Jordan here. Risner, is that you?”

Two seconds. Three.

“Jordan, it’s about time. Where’s Branch?” Cold slithered through her at the district ranger’s instant demand to talk to someone who wasn’t her.

“He’s here. We’re approximately three miles northeast from the base of Angel’s Landing and headed back.” Apart from the very real possibility of not having a job when they returned to headquarters, she couldn’t deny the relief of knowing someone had been searching for them. “Over.”

“Stay put. We’re a mile out from you, and I want answers. Seismometers picked up a reading eighteen hours ago, but the geologists are telling me it wasn’t an earthquake.” Risner’s voice cut out on the last word. “What the hell is going on out there? Over.”

A mile? Another dose of dread prickled in her gut. This was it. Once SAR recovered her and Branch, they’d be separated to give their statements, she’d be dismissed from NPS, and all of this would be over.

Lila struggled to respond. The past twenty-four hours had changed her in ways she couldn’t explain.

For better and worse. And Branch had been there through it all, but she’d known—deep down—this fantasy she’d created between them hadn’t ever been a real possibility from the beginning.

It was only a matter of time before he realized how much work it would take to put her back together, and he’d barely made it out of his divorce in one piece.

His heart couldn’t afford another bond with the wrong soul. And she was…wrong. In every way.

Taking the radio from her, Branch lifted it to his mouth, his attention locked on her. “Ranger Jordan ensured we got out alive. Other than that, we’re going to need additional rangers to aid in the search. Over.”

Lila’s lips parted on a strong inhale. Oh, no. Branch Thompson had taken her entire heart, and she was pretty sure he’d never give it back.