A wave of panic rolled over her as she remembered the last time she’d been in her father’s presence. The panic weaved up her throat, threatening to choke her.
No. She couldn’t lose it now. Not here.
He didn’t know where she was. None of her family did. And not only would he not be able to find her, he’d have no reason to look. Her mother had already taken her money. She was safe.
With a deep, calming breath, she turned and headed back toward the path, a million emotions rolling through her mind, threatening to break free. She hadn’t visited her father once in prison, despite pressure from her mother and brother to do so. As far as she was concerned, they should have locked him up for longer. Thrown away the key.
She made it about ten feet when she stopped and frowned. Wait…had she gone the wrong way? Where was the path? She walked a few steps to the right. God, everything looked the same. No wonder they needed a SAR team here.
She walked about twenty feet before stopping again. No. This was definitely the wrong way. She lifted her phone to call Cody, only the signal bar was down to one.
Dammit. It was like the entire freaking universe was against her today.
She growled—yes, actually growled—as she stomped through the forest. At some point, she vaguely thought she should probably feel fear over her current predicament, instead of the anger surging through her body. But honestly, was it not enough that her mother hadrobbedher and her brother hadhither? Now her drug-addict father—who’d made a habit of hurting his family—was out of prison! Getting lost in the woods was a vacation in comparison.
She wanted to yell. To scream. To throw her fist in the air and ask the universe why she couldn’t have been given one, justone, half-decent family member.
She was so busy cursing her family that she didn’t see the tree root. Her foot caught on it, and she yelped as she tumbled to the ground, her ankle scraping across a broken branch in the process.
With a quick glance, she saw blood slipping down her ankle. Crap.
“Harper!” Her head shot up as Cody ran toward her and dropped to his knees. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, it’s just a scratch.” She watched as he lifted her foot, his brows tugged together as he inspected the gash. “It’s fine. How did you find me?”
“When you didn’t come back, I tried calling but it went straight to voicemail. I heard you cry out.”
She cringed. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to move so far from the path.”
He looked up at her, the concern shifting to something a bit gentler. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
Her breath caught. Was he talking about more than the cut? Could he see every ugly secret she was keeping locked away from him?
“I am now,” she whispered, more truth to that statement than there should have been.
Before she realized what he was doing, he slid his arms around her back and knees and lifted her against his chest.
She gasped and grabbed onto him. “Cody, it’s okay. I can walk!”
“I need to get you back to the center so I can treat the cut.”
She opened her mouth to tell him that she was fully capable of getting there with her feet on the ground, but he was already moving, his impressive muscles flexing against her side.
Cody walked quickly, and they reached the deck behind the center just as Kayden was stepping out.
“Hey…everything okay?” His gaze shifted from her face to her ankle.
She nodded quickly. “Just a scratch.”
“We’re just gonna use the first aid kit,” Cody said.
“Yeah, go for it.”
Cody slipped past his brother. There were two doors off the deck, one which led to the room with the desk they’d walked past to enter the mountains, and another, she wasn’t sure.
He stepped into the entry, which was basically just a large space with a desk to one side and the front entrance on the other side of the room. There was also the small eco center opposite the desk.
A girl looked up from the desk. “Cody. Is everything okay?”
