I scan the group. Matteo’s not the only one missing, I realize: Zoe and Joshua aren’t here, either.
“And the others?” I ask.
Trey looks perplexed for a moment, but then realization sinks in. “No idea.”
This particular area isn’t densely wooded like so many of the other campsites we’ve stopped at—there are only so many places they could be.
The first, the top of the cliff, is easy to rule out. That’s where everyone was when all the drama started, and Zoe had already rappelled down before Sadie even took her turn.
Second: the flat, rocky expanse where we slept last night—Sadie’s not the only one who set her tent up, so it’s possible they might be inside another one. But all three of them? To each their own, but I’m gonna go out on a limb and guess that’s not happening.
The only other place that’s out of sight is the cave behind the waterfall.
I can think of just one good reason for any of them to be in there together—that Joshua and Zoe are finally working things out in private—but then a movement near the tents catches my eye.
“There’s Joshua,” Trey says.
He’d be hard to miss on a normal day, but today his shirt is electric pink, bright against the pale landscape.
It only takes a moment to realize Zoe’s not with him—and neither is Matteo.
Ohhhhno. No, no, no.
“Thorn!” Sadie calls as I rush past. “Where are you going? What’s wrong?”
I can’t tell her what I’m thinking without telling everyone. Maybe my instincts are off—Ihopemy instincts are off. But Zoe’s performative flirting has been in full force this afternoon, and I’ve seen Matteo rebound twice in the past with people he hardly knew, forgettable girls who helped him forget his own pain. Hell, even onthistrip, he spent the night in Brittany’s tent after Blair broke up with him.
I have a strong suspicion about what I’ll find behind that waterfall, and the flash of anger I feel at the pit of my stomach burns. Not just for the hypocrisy of it all—Matteo has no right to accuse me of being distracted ever again—but also for Joshua.
I’m vaguely aware of the others trailing behind me as I retrace the path Matteo and Zoe must have taken when they slipped out of sight. It’s only a short walk from our climbing site to the cave, and on this side of the creek, it doesn’t even require a swim.
Despite the waterfall, it feels too still, too silent.
I’m the first to crash the party.
Sure enough, there’s Matteo—a very shirtless Matteo—and, by process of elimination, Zoe. She’s practically eclipsed by him; from all the clothes littering the cave floor, that’s probably for the best.
I clear my throat.
It echoes, bouncing from the rock walls, refracted back on itself over and over. I don’t have to say a word: they break apart—as if I haven’t already seen everything. At least she’s wearing underwear, and a bra.
Matteo keeps a neutral expression. No acknowledgment that he left the rappelling group without a leader by ditching his post, and definitely no acknowledgment that he’s just been caught rebounding in the world’s sexiest cave with the fiancée of one of our trekkers.
I have no words.
“Please don’t tell Joshua,” Zoe says, too busy rushing to gather her clothes that she doesn’t notice him slip into the cave right behind me.
“Don’t tell Joshua what?”
His voice is a live wire, steady but lethal.
The cave suddenly feels suffocatingly small.
I have my own issues with Matteo, but now Joshua does, too—with MatteoandZoe.
“What were you thinking?” I explode at Matteo, who’s casually shrugging back into his T-shirt as if two of the three people in this cave aren’t staring daggers at him. “This is completely inappropriate in so many ways, Matty.”
The smirk he gives me is absolutely infuriating.
