“Know what?”
“How attractive you are.”
Ben stared at her. No one had ever looked at him the way Charlie was looking at him right now—like he was someone worth keeping.
His chest went tight. Words crowded in his throat, three simple words that wanted out so badly he could barely breathe around them.
“I—” He stopped. Swallowed hard. “I think you're?—”
Charlie's expression softened. She reached up and touched his face, her thumb brushing his cheekbone. “I know,” she said quietly. “Me too.”
She understood. She felt it too. And she wasn't running.
Ben let out a shaky breath and pulled her into his arms. Not yet. The words would come when the time was right. But this—holding her, knowing she felt the same—this was enough for now.
Ben and Charlie got out of the truck. Flo hopped down after them, immediately sniffing the air. Up here at nearly twelve thousand feet, the wind was sharp and cool despite the relentless summer sun. Charlie pulled on a hoodie and grabbed her art supplies.
“This way,” Ben said, leading her to a flat outcropping of rock that overlooked the valley below. The view was spectacular—jagged peaks in every direction, patches of late-summer snow clinging to the shadowed slopes, and far below, the winding ribbon of highway they'd just driven.
Charlie stood at the edge, taking it all in. Ben watched her face light up with that artist's eye, already composing the scene.
“It's even more beautiful than I remembered it,” she said quietly.
“I’m glad you think so.” Ben set out a couple of folding chairs and a collapsible table he'd brought from the truck. “You can work here. I'll keep Flo entertained.”
Charlie settled into one of the chairs and opened her Moleskine. She untied a waxed canvas roll that held her pencils, pens, and other art supplies and grabbed a drafting pencil. Within minutes, she’d switched to her colored pencils and was lost in her work, her hand moving across the page in quick, confident strokes.
Ben sat nearby with Flo, throwing a Kong Charlie had brought along. The dog bounded after it, happy to run in the mountain air. But Ben's attention kept drifting back to Charlie.
She was completely focused. Every few minutes she'd look up, study the landscape, then back down to capture what she saw.
Beautiful.
After a while, Ben moved closer. “Can I watch?”
Charlie glanced up, startled out of her concentration. Then she smiled. “Sure.”
Ben took the chair beside her, careful not to block her light. On the page, mountains were taking shape in layers of blue and purple and gray. She'd captured the depth of the valley, the way distance softened edges and lightened colors until they almost faded into the azure sky.
“You're really good at this,” Ben said.
“Thanks.” Charlie added dark blue to a shadow. “Sean used to watch me sketch sometimes.”
Ben's chest tightened at the mention of his friend. “Yeah?”
“Yeah. Remember at dinner, when I said the river was what brought me to Lyons? That’s only partly true.”
“What?”
She added some crosshatching to one of the Seven Sisters. “Sean told me I’d love it here, that it was the St. Vrain that made him want to join the Navy. He wanted me to draw it for him.” Charlie kept working, not looking at him. “From a photo of you all as teenagers horsing around in the river.”
“I know the one you’re talking about. We all have a copy of it.” Ben remembered that day. Hot summer, cold river water, the kind of perfect afternoon that only existed when you were young and stupid and invincible.
“I thought about that photo a lot after Sean died. I was suffocating in San Diego. The Navy, the memories, everything. I needed somewhere that felt like hope instead of loss. Shane recommending me to Kyle was a lifeline.”
“So that’s why you came out. For Watchdog.”
“No. The job just made things convenient.” Charlie grinned at him. “I came out because one guy in particular in that photo caught my attention.”
