Page 109 of Rise After Fall

“I might even wash my hair tonight, just in case they make me tabloid famous,” Joanna muses.

“Oh snap. We should shower too,” Scooter tells Clay as they walk to their door.

Morris chuckles.

“You ready to head in?” he asks.

I shake my head. “Not yet. I just want to sit for a little while longer and pretend that tomorrow isn’t going to happen.”

He reaches over and throws another log on the fire.

“We can sit here for as long as you want.”

Zoey

“US Ski & Snowboard is investigating allegations of sexual misconduct and inappropriate behavior on the US Ski Team, including charges against longtime head coach Tobias Taut. A three-count indictment, forty pages long, was filed in a Colorado court earlier this week. Although the name of the accuser has been withheld, as is protocol when dealing with an underage victim, our sources are getting reports that Zoey Phillips—one of Taut’s most prominent students, a former child prodigy, and onetime world champion skier—was seen speaking with federal investigators in Tennessee earlier this morning.”

We watch the footage of Tobias being led into the Denver County Jail in handcuffs. He shouts to the cameras that the charges are all lies and that he will be vindicated in court.

“Are you okay?” Morris asks as the broadcast goes to commercial.

“Better than okay,” I say.

“I assume that means that your meeting with Grant went well?”

Grant and one of his law partners met me in Knoxville this morning.

“It did. After the deposition, we went to breakfast and talked about my plans going forward,” I tell him.

“What plans are those?”

“Grant has agreed to be my new corporate attorney. He’s going to help me set up my new business venture and nonprofit.”

He reaches up and clicks off the power to the television. “So, you’ve decided to open a training facility?”

I nod.

“That’s amazing, Zoey,” he says, a crack of emotion in his voice.

“I’m glad you think so because I’m going to need your help.”

“With what?”

“With your brothers. See, I want their permission to bring a coaching facility here to Misty Mountain.”

“You want to compete with the ski school?”

“No, I want to coach. It’ll be a completely separate entity, but I’d like to pay them for the use of their slopes,” I explain.

“So, you want to stay in Balsam Ridge?”

“Yeah, I love it here, but I’ll have to have a headquarters in the Rockies, too, because I’ll be limited on these mountains with advanced students, but I want to plant roots, and if Balsam Ridge will have me, this is where I want to dig in. What do you think?”

He doesn’t answer me. Instead, he grabs my face and brings it to his. He kisses me with everything he has in him, and I just know.

I’m home.

Zoey