Page 109 of Wrecked on the Mountain

Now we're both willing to give up everything…

But neither of us wants to be the reason we make that sacrifice.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Brooke

I'm staring at the departure doors of the airport like they might disappear if I blink.

The hot chocolate Piper insisted on grabbing from Betty's café before she leaves sits untouched between us, steam curling up from our mugs like loitering question marks.

My purple travel mug. The one Jamie gave me in that brown paper bag in my first week here. The one that was so thoughtful, so out of character for anything I had ever received from anyone before, but now looking back… changed everything.

"You know," Piper says quietly, studying my profile from the front seat of my car that sits idle in the parking bay. "Watching you this weekend... you're not the same person who left Chicago."

I laugh and shake my head. "I know. I was a wreck when I lost Tyler. Poor kid."

"I know you were. That's why I helped nudge you toward this position." She shifts in her seat, designer coat rustling against the leather like a symbol of the life she's going back to. "And look what you found."

Jamie's words from yesterday at the waterfall ring in my ears.I'm coming with you.

The way he looked at me when he said he'd follow me to Chicago, like nothing else in the world mattered except keeping us together. Not his family. Not the mountain that shaped him. Not the community that depends on him for their safety.

Just me.

My throat tightens thinking about how quickly he offered to sacrifice everything. The man who bleeds Stone River Mountain, who built his entire identity around protecting this place and these people, ready to trade it all for a cramped Chicago apartment and a life that would slowly suffocate his wild, mountain soul.

He means it though. The thought should make me happy. Instead, it terrifies me.

Because I know what happens when someone gives up their entire world for love. I watched my father do it. Choosing treatments that kept him alive longer but stole his strength, his peace, his dignity. All for me.

"I don't know what to do, Piper. Jamie said he'll come with me, but I can't be the person who rips the soul out of this community. He belongs here. His family, his team, everything that makes him who he is… it's all here."

"Listen to yourself, Brooke."

"What do you mean?"

"You just said 'this community.' When did their problems become yours?"

"I know, babe. But even when I got home yesterday, Jamie was already making calls to Chicago departments, researching apartments—"

I stop mid-sentence, my words hanging in the cold air because of the look on my best friend's face.

"What?"

Piper raises an eyebrow, smirking. "When you gothome? Brooke, you've said that word six times in the last ten minutes."

My heart stops.

"What word?"

"Home. You keep saying 'home' when you talk about Stone River." She does enthusiastic air quotes to emphasize her point. "Your cabin, your team, your community. When did that happen, Brooke? When did Chicago stop being home?"

I stare at her, my mind reeling. She's right. When did I stop saying "the rental cabin" and start saying "my cabin"? When did Mountain Rescue become "my team" instead of "the temporary job to take a load off"?

When did Jamie stop being my boss and become the man I can't imagine living without?

"Piper—"