“Fine. Here’s the truth. I like you. I think you like me. We were having a good time.”
In other circumstances, my brain would have screeched to a hard stop when Noah said, “I like you.” My heart beat faster. The breath in my lungs came in short, shallow bursts.He liked me. He really liked me! Even better, he admitted it!
“In another world, yes, maybe there could be something between us,” Noah admitted. Duke snorted again, as if to put an exclamation on Noah’s point. “But in our world, therealworld, you’re the LuxeLife hired gun and I’m the one being blackmailed to help you.”
“I don’t know that I’d call it blackmail …”
“We’re being honest, remember?”
I gave him a nod, even though my eyes fell to Biscuit’s mane.
“That’s what this is. You and I never would have started any of this if Victoria hadn’t forced it and we both know it. We were stuck together. You pursuing your dream job and me trying to save the only life I’ve ever known.”
“Noah …”
“You wanted me to talk? Then let me talk. Please.” His tone was not unkind. More desperate. More pleading. “Come on, Sam, you know the score. This is a business arrangement. That’s all this is. And that’s all it should be.” His eyes drifted off to the mountains. “Maybe we just forgot that for a minute. That’s all.”
I swallowed down the emotion bubbling up from my throat. The raw emotion in his voice caught me completely off guard.
“Even if it wasn’t just business, when this thing is over, win or lose, the big-city girl is going back to the big city. And the grumpy mountain dude, or whatever it was you called me, is going to stay put where he belongs. Goodbye. The end.”
When Noah spoke, it was more like he was talking to himself than talking to me. He stared off at the mountains, and when he finally turned back, his eyes weren’t angry. If anything, they were sad.
“That honest enough for you?” I barely heard him over the clomping of the hooves.
“Actually, that was … maybe a little too honest.” At first, the bluntness of his response left me dumbfounded. But what was even more dumbfounding was … he was exactly right.
“I meant what I said, Sam. I do like you. I hope one day wecan be friends. But that’s about as much as we’re gonna get out of this little Colorado adventure.”
“Okay,” I said. I didn’t know what else to say. What elsecouldI say? “So, what do we do now?”
Noah thought about it for a moment. “I think the best thing we can do right now is get through Victoria’s little …” He waved at Yeti, then gestured at Biscuit. “Victoria’s little dog and pony show and then we go our separate ways. You can go take pictures of yourself with cucumbers on your face at the resort, and I can go back to trying to save the jobs of me and my friends. No hard feelings, okay?”
“Okay.” I nodded. And it was okay. There were no hard feelings, at least on my part, because I didn’t have any feeling left at all.
“Hee-yah,” Noah nudged Duke’s flanks with his legs and the big horse surged forward, Biscuit falling in line behind him.
Chapter Twenty-Five
As the horses plodded further along the trail, the world moved in slow motion. Birds chirped overhead, their songs mixing with the soft clopping of hooves against packed dirt and the occasional snort from Duke and Biscuit. The scent of wildflowers fused with pine trees and meadow grass in the mountain air. Noah and I rode in silence, pretending to enjoy the peace and tranquility of the forest.
He was better at pretending than I was, though. The silence was suffocating.
“I like you too, by the way!” I shouted toward Noah’s back, a couple dozen yards in front of me.
At first, he ignored me.
“Did you hear me, Mr. Grouchy Mc’Grumpy Grinch? I said I like you too!”
Noah pulled back on the reins, and Duke shuffled to a stop, kicking up trail dust. “What are you talking about?”
I somehow veered Biscuit alongside him. “You said, and I quote, I like you. I think you like me. Remember? During our honest talk?”
“I remember.”
“What I’m saying is, you were right. I do like you.”
“You’ve been spending this whole time replaying that conversation in your head over and over, haven’t you?”
