He slows down to meet my pace. “We’re nearly at the top but we can stop if you need a break.”
“I’m fine,” I say, pushing against the incline to get ahead of him.
He stops completely, dust brushing his ankles. “I’d rather you didn’t drop dead at the top of the trail. I’ll just have to carry you back down.” His silver bottle glints in the sunlight as he holds it out toward me. “I know exercise has always been a foreign concept to you but can you at least stay hydrated?”
I clench my fists as I turn back around to him. “Why? If I die on the trail you won’t have to work for the promotion. Just glide into prosperity as always!”
He laughs, wiping the sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand. “If you die now there’d be no one to ruin later, and where’s the fun in that?” He tilts his head to me in question.
“This isn’tfunfor me—this is my entire life.” I stomp further up the trail, legs burning.
He scoffs. “That’s pretty clear. Is that why you’ve sucked up to Susie for years despite never getting promoted?”
I stop and turn to him, my ponytail violently hitting me in the cheek as I whirl. I hate that we used to befriends, that he can now use truths I confided in him against me.
“You don’t even need that job! You just want it becauseIwant it. And now you’re going to be fucking handed it.” I’m so furious black spots start to appear like flies in need of swatting.
“Are you serious?” he growls, closing the stony distance between us in three quick strides. His bright eyes blaze with frustration. “If you think I only want the job becauseyouwant it then you’re fucking deluded.”
His voice quiets as he comes in closer, glaring down at me so I feel three feet tall.
“As much as you’d love to believe it, not every move I make revolves around you. The reality is, Hastings, I don’t think about you as much as you think I do. In fact, I don’t think of you at all.”
My eyes travel up the towering human iceberg and blink furiously. A wave of sweaty embarrassment washes over me at the amount of mental energy I’ve expended thinking about him, always assuming that he was doing the same.
“Piss off, Wankcroft,” is the only thing my foggy brain can think to say as I start back down the rocky hill.
All I care about is trying to maintain an ounce of composure despite the blood pounding in my ears. The gentle morning sun has evolved into a humid beam of heat, making my lungs constrict. I need to get out of here. My feet tiptoe down the steep, rocky hill as I try to not let my frustration turn into teary defeat. I feel asharp pain in my ankle and before I have a chance to grab on to a nearby branch, person, anything, my foot jerks unnaturally to the side.
My arms flail out to catch my fall as my knees buckle and I land on my side in the dust. A barrage of words too explicit for this early in the day echo from Bancroft behind me, followed by the pacing of designer-trainer-clad feet.
“Are you OK? Hastings?” he pants as he crouches next to me, a look of pure, unadulterated alarm in his eyes. “We should take you to the ER. Can you move?”
“No, it’s fine!” I say a little too loud, eyes scanning for the closest escape route. “I’ll be waiting hours and it doesn’t even hurt. I’m fine.”
Trying to stand and scrape back my lost dignity fails as I buckle under a sudden sharp, throbbing pain lancing through my ankle. I plummet toward the ground again—this time intercepted by strong, warm palms gripping my body and pulling me upright. He stands us face-to-face, so close I can feel his heaving chest as he assesses me. Instinctively, he rubs his hands up and down my arms, leaving a trail of goose bumps in his wake. The feeling pulls me away from the pain for a few moments. Our panicked eyes lock, then soften into nervousness as we both recognize the position we’re in. Until he breaks the charged silence.
“There’s a shorter trail on the way down. I’ll order an Uber to meet us at the bottom,” he declares resolutely.
I blink as his expression turns into gravely serious,tight-jawed control but, despite my embarrassment, I let out a breath of relief. “OK. My address is—”
“I don’t need it,” he interrupts, holding my arm with one hand and pulling his phone out of his pocket with the other.
I furrow my brow at the combination of pain and annoyance. “Are you a stalker or are you kidnapping me?” My functioning foot wobbles as I try and stand on one leg while on an incline, determined not to use him as a crutch.
He sighs, not looking up from the screen. “I don’t need your address because it’s already in my phone.”
He lets that fact sit between us for a moment; the whoosh of memory from the last time he had to wrangle me into a cab overrides my throbbing ankle. “But also because we’re going to my place.”
His eyes flick up and pin me with a defiant look, waiting for my protest.
“Kidnapping it is, then!” I say loud enough for us to receive weird looks from passersby.
He glances from my face to my airborne foot. “Your ankle is already swelling up. You need to rest it and I live ten minutes away.”
My gravel-scraped hand lifts up to intercept his explanation as I hop on one leg, giving him a pleading look to stop.
He steps in close; my heart pounds out a heady cocktail of anxiety, embarrassment and adrenaline as he loops my arm around his and grips my elbow with hisfree hand. Stabbing pain lances up my leg as we slowly descend the dusty path. We hobble in loaded silence for a few minutes until I finally let out a huff of a laugh when we pass a neon-green metal sign with the words “Beginner’s Trail” emblazoned in bold white letters.
