Oaks curses under his breath and hauls harder, muscle in his arms shaking with effort, determination hard enough to bruise.
He reaches shallow water. He doesn’t let me stand. He doesn’t set me down. He lifts me fully like I weigh nothing and water pours off both of us as he carries me up the bank, chest heaving, body vibrating with adrenaline.
The camp is silent, completely silent. Men stand frozen. Women stare. No one jokes. No one smirks. Even Bethany is quiet, standing at the edge of the clearing watching like she’s trying to decide if this is tragedy or a show.
Oaks doesn’t look at her. He doesn’t look at anyone. He carries me straight up the hill like I’m the only thing that matters, and the way my arms are still locked around his neck makes me feel exposed and weirdly safe all at once. I can feel his heartbeat hammering against my ribs, fast and terrified.
“You’re okay,” he mutters, and it sounds like he’s telling himself as much as me. “You’re okay.”
I’m shaking so hard my whole body feels like it’s trying to rattle apart. “Something touched me,” I whisper, and my voice cracks on the word because I can still feel that slow heavy brush against my skin like a memory.
“Probably weeds,” he says, but he doesn’t sound like he believes it.
“That wasn’t weeds,” I insist, and my stomach turns when I look past him at the waterline and see Royal scanning the shore like he’s trying to spot a problem that can hide under the surface. Holler is already moving toward the dock with two men, eyes sharp, posture tight. Legend stands farther back, watching the lake like he wants to set it on fire.
Bethany steps forward and finally speaks, voice cold and mean. “So now she falls in,” she says. “What is this?”
Oaks doesn’t even turn around. That is when I see the shift, not in words or yelling but in instinct. He is still on his knees in front of me, body angled protectively without seeming aware of it, blocking me from her line of sight like his body madethe decision before his pride could argue. Bethany sees it too. Her face changes. Not red with rage. White.
Because this ain’t lust and it ain’t gossip.
It’s reflex.
Oaks looks back at me, and his eyes are hard like he’s mad at me for scaring him, and that hits harder than Bethany’s insult ever could.
“You need dry clothes,” he says rough.
“I’m fine,” I say automatically, even though I’m trembling and my clothes are sticking to me like a second skin.
“You’re not fine,” he replies, and when I try to stand and nearly wobble, he catches me instantly. Of course he does.
Bethany laughs once, sharp and hollow. “Pathetic.”
He finally looks at her. There ain’t softness in his face, no apology, no patience. “Go back to your cabin,” he tells her, not angry, not yelling, just final. “It’s over, Beth.”
Oaks slides off his wedding ring, flicks it toward the lake.
He’s done with her.
Legend sees it. Sophie sees it from the porch of their cabin. Lottie presses a hand to her mouth like she’s holding in a sound.
Bethany doesn’t argue. She doesn’t scream. She just stares at him like she’s measuring something she already knows the answer to. Then she turns and walks away, heels digging into dirt, shoulders stiff with a pride that looks fragile now.
Oaks’ hand slides to my lower back as he steadies me upright, thumb pressing briefly into my spine like a groundingpoint. “You don’t go near the water again,” he says quietly. “You hear?”
“I ain’t trying to drown,” I snap, because I hate feeling small.
“I don’t care what you were trying,” he answers, and the words come out like fear dressed as anger. He starts to say something else, stops himself, and the unfinished sentence hangs between us like a ghost.
Then he says in a harsh rush. “You could’ve… disappeared. You could’ve… been pulled under. You could’ve… died.”
He strips off his soaked cut and drops it on the ground, then his shirt. I look past him at the lake again.
It’s calm. Flat. Innocent.
Like it didn’t just swallow me whole.
And somewhere beneath that surface, something moves. I know it. Oaks knows it. We don’t say it. He pulls me closer with a firm hand at my waist, and for the first time since this whole mess started, I don’t argue. Not because I’m weak. Not because I need saving. But because when the ground gave way, he didn’t hesitate. He didn’t calculate. He just came for me.
