“I was looking for you.”
Noah’s expression shifted, as if he were trying to erase all emotion there. “Why?”
“So I could explain.” A jolt of pain shot through my foot when I tried to move.
“We should get you back to the resort’s medical clinic. That ankle needs to be looked at.” His voice was distant, all business, a clear indication of what I’d done to his trust in me.
He offered his hand to help me up. “No.” I crossed my arms instead of taking it. “Not until you hear me out.”
“You got something to say?” He planted a knee on the ground, now face-to-face. “Then just say it.”
“I was lying to them. Back there in the conference room. Lying to myself, actually.” What I saw in his eyes made my chest ache.
“Sounded pretty convincing to me. Just business. Generating content. Your words, right?” Each of my own words repeated back to me landed like a knife in the back.
“Yes, but ...”
“Marcus made it very clear what your priorities are, Sam. Sharing beautiful things so they can sell their beautiful lies. And I get it. I do. Your career is important to you. LuxeLife is important for your career. I’m just the local color to make it look convincing.”
“That’s not true.”
Noah stood back up and walked away, gathering his climbing gear.
“Okay, fine,” I yelled after him. “You’re right. I was scared and trying to save my job, but I realized ...”
“Realized what?” Noah whipped back to me, and for just a moment, his carefully maintained mask slipped, his words laced with something that sounded dangerously close to hope. “What exactly did you realize, Sam?”
Words piled up in my throat, a traffic jam of emotions I couldn’t untangle under the weight of his careful attention. “I ...” My voice faltered. “I don’t know.”
Noah laughed, shaking his head. “You don’t know? Unbelievable.” He turned back to his ropes, yanking them off the ground and coiling them in his arms like he was strangling something.
I struggled to my feet, then stumbled closer to him. “What I do know is that when I heard Victoria talking about replacing the Adventure Center, erasing your family’s legacy …”
Noah’s hands stilled, a length of rope clutched in his hand like a vise.
“I couldn’t be part of it.” I hopped a couple of steps more on my good leg. “And when you walked away thinking I’d been using you …”
The piece of rope he’d been coiling fell loose, unfurled to the ground.
I gestured helplessly between us. “Look, I don’t know what this is. Or what it could be. But I know I had to find you. To tell you what happened in that cabin, it wasn’t just content generation. That wasn’t business. That was real.” I took a deep breath. “So I came after you. A romantic grand gesture. That’s got to count for something, right?”
“You almost got yourself killed,” said Noah, pointing toward the spot where the moose disappeared into the trees. “That’s not a grand gesture, Sam. That’s reckless. Do you have any idea what would have happened if Yeti hadn’t been here? If you’d faced that moose alone?”
Something snapped.
“You don’t give me enough credit,” I said, limping closer through the pain. “I’m not helpless, Noah.” Three days of being treated like a helpless city girl, of being underestimated and overprotected, finally boiled over.
His mouth opened to counter, but I wasn’t finished. “I walked out on Victoria Sterling, the woman who will probably now destroy my career. I stole a golf cart, and when it crashed, I didn’t give up. I kept going. On a sprained ankle. And a head wound dripping blood down my face.” I ticked each point off on my fingers. “I followed your Jeep tracks like you taught me about animal tracking. And yes, I almost got trampled by a moose. Which would have really sucked. But I also survived a bizarre mating ritual from a disco chicken, so ...”
“A what?” Noah’s expression went from stern to confused.
“The disco chicken. That weird bird that puffs out its chest and does the bouncy dance.” I tried imitating the dance, but it was hard to do with a busted ankle.
“How hard did you hit your head when you crashed?”
“I know what I saw. The first one nearly got me killed on my hike to the resort. The second one caused me to crash the golf cart.”
“Sam, there are no chickens in these mountains.”
