Wiggling the door handle, I find it still locked.
"Stop being so impatient," he grumbles, coming up behind me and placing his hand on my hip to move me to the side.
At his touch, my body sparks with an intense fire.
He punches in a code, and my heart literally leaps into my throat when I manage to see every digit. Four. Four. Eight. Three. Seven.
I repeat the sequence in my mind. I sing it silently, trying to remember the pattern of numbers. Remember it. Save it in your mind for later. That's your key to getting out of here.
Bardil pushes the door open and gestures for me to go ahead of him out into the fresh, crisp air.
I take a few deep breaths, grinning, immediately feeling better out here in the open. My eyes drift over the tree line, remembering the bear and the fear I felt, thinking I was going to die.
I don't want to die. By the hands of a bear or a man.My mind fills with warning again. Bardil could be up to anything.
He starts walking toward the forest, and I have to jog a little to catch up.
Stop worrying. Worrying will get you nowhere. Look around, take it in. Enjoy yourself.
My grin gets a little wider when we're beneath the tall trees, and I can see bright green moss and smell the richness of the earth our boots are disturbing.
"It's so beautiful out here," I say as my excitement builds.
Bardil hardly talks at all. His stoic quietness has me second-guessing everything, and I flip from happy and excited, enjoying the freedom of the hike, to stressed and worried he's about to do something terrible to me.
The deeper we get into the wild places, the more I flicker between the two extremes.
After about forty-five minutes of hiking, we come to a clearing, and Bardil leads me to the edge of a rocky cliff. He stands with his toes practically over the edge, and my stomach drops with vertigo.
"Don't go so close!" I blurt out.
He chuckles and eyes me. "Are you afraid of heights?" he asks, amused.
"Um, no, but… just be careful," I say, nervously walking toward the edge too.
The view is incredible. It's a long way down. High enough to break every bone in my body.
"You ready?" he asks.
"Ready for what?" I stammer, knitting my brows together.
"To climb," he smirks, kneeling down to pull coils of rope from his backpack.
I watch Bardil as he skillfully sets up the climbing ropes, hooking the ends into metal rings already embedded in the rocks at the edge of the cliff.
"You're really serious," I say in disbelief.
"I really am. You said you wanted adventure… so I'm giving you adventure," he explains, gesturing over the cliff."Come here, I have to clip this onto you," he reaches toward me and grabs my arm to pull me closer.
I stand stiff and hyper-aware of his hands touching my body while he clips a harness around my waist, threading the strap between my legs and buckling me into the whole contraption. While he's working, he talks to me, explaining safety things and how the belay device works.
I hold my breath watching him clip the last carabiner in place.
Bardil sets himself up with the same gear, then walks me to the edge. "We're going to abseil down and climb back up," he explains. My heart somersaults when I see his grin. Excitement and adrenaline replace any thoughts I had of what he was planning, and as he guides me over the edge, the rope pulls tight and he gently talks me through the descent.
"You've got this, just move slowly and trust the ropes," he says, talking me through each step.
In no time at all, I'm laughing and letting go of all worries to enjoy myself. I could be stuck at home right now, in my bedroom, wishing for something like this to happen while my brothers explain to me that it's not safe to go outside.
