"MREs?"
"Meals Ready to Eat. Military rations."
"Ah." I take another bite, savoring it. "Well, you definitely upgraded. This is restaurant quality."
He doesn't respond, but I catch a flicker of something in his expression. Pleasure, maybe. Or embarrassment. Hard to tell with him.
We eat in silence for a while. The fire crackles. Wind howls outside. I'm hyperaware of how close he is on the couch, histhigh almost touching mine, the heat of his body radiating through the space between us.
"Can I show you something?" I set down my empty bowl and reach for my phone. The battery is back to full thanks to his charger, even if there's no signal. "I want you to understand what I do. Since you're stuck with me and everything."
He nods, setting his own bowl aside.
I open my camera roll and start scrolling through my content. Hiking shots, sunrise timelapses, videos of me scaling rock faces and crossing rope bridges and standing on mountain peaks with my arms spread wide.
"This is what I do. Adventure content. I go places and document them and try to make other people feel like they could do it too." I pause on a video of me rappelling down a cliff face, grinning at the camera despite the obvious terror in my eyes. "This was in Utah last year. I was so scared I almost threw up, but you can't tell in the final cut."
Wolfe takes the phone from me, studying the video intently. "You did this alone?"
"Had a guide. But the filming was solo. I usually work alone."
"That seems dangerous."
"It can be. But it's also freeing, you know? Just me and the mountain and whatever I can capture with my camera." I lean closer to point at the screen. "Scroll right. There's more."
He scrolls. I watch his face as he takes in image after image of my life the places I've been, the things I've done, the person I present to the world. His expression doesn't change much, but his eyes are sharp, cataloging every detail.
Then he pauses on a photo I forgot was there.
Derek and me, six months ago. Before everything fell apart. We're at a winery in Napa, and he's got his arm around me, and I'm smiling at the camera with the kind of desperate happiness that I now recognize as denial.
"That's him." My voice comes out flatter than I intended. "Derek. My ex."
Wolfe studies the photo. "He looks..."
"Charming? Handsome? Like the kind of guy who'd never hurt anyone?"
"Like he's performing."
I blink. "What?"
"His smile. It doesn't reach his eyes. He's looking at the camera, not at you." Wolfe hands the phone back to me. "He wanted people to see him with you. Didn't actually want to be with you."
I stare at the photo with new eyes. He's right. Derek is angled toward the camera, his smile wide and practiced, his arm around me more like a display than an embrace. I'm leaning into him, but he's not leaning back.
How did I never notice that?
"You see a lot." My voice is quiet.
"It's what I was trained for." He's watching me now instead of the phone. "Reading people. Understanding motivations. Identifying threats."
"Is that what Derek is? A threat?"
The question comes out before I can stop it. I'm not even sure why I asked. Derek's a jerk, not a threat. He's probably too busy with his new fiancée to even think about me.
Wolfe is quiet for a long moment. "I don't know yet."
"What does that mean?"
