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“Careful, okay?” His fingers grip my waist tighter as we start walking, pain shooting up from my ankle into my calf with each step, even though I’m barely touching the ground. Oliver is supporting all my weight without showing any sign of effort, as if I don’t weigh 140 pounds.

At the bottom of the hill, he stops. “Okay, I think I’m gonna have to carry you here.”

I shake my head. “Nuh-uh. I can manage.”

“No, you can’t. It’s too steep. And if I support you like this, we’ll never climb up. Not with the mud.”

I groan. What a nightmare. Rubbing my eyebrows, I mumble, “How are you gonna carry me anyway?” I nod to his bag. “You have that on your back already. This will never work.”

Amusement flickers in his eyes. “I’ve carried heavier, Charlee.” Oliver slings his backpack around to his chest, then crouches down. “Come on. Get on my back and hold tight.”

God, never would I have thought that I’d get a piggyback ride at twenty-six. From Oliver.

I hop up and clasp my hands around his neck as his hands settle under my thighs. “Ready?”

“No, but I don’t really have a choice.”

He chuckles. “Come on, sunshine.”

I slap his shoulder playfully, but squeal and sink my nails into his shoulders when he gets to his feet.

He grits his teeth. “I don’t usually mind nail marks, but a bit softer please.”

I flush hard and unclench my grip. “Sorry, sorry.”

“It’s okay,” he says, a flicker of a smirk in his voice. He hoists me higher up on his back, his hands cupped firmly under my thighs, as he starts the ascent. “Let’s go.”

My whole body is pressed against his, and I pray he doesn’t notice when I wrap my thighs a little tighter around his waist. The responding sweep of his thumb against my thigh dashes all hope. The throb in my ankle is forgotten, my senses narrowed solely on the feel of him as his every muscle shifts beneath my body with the strain of the climb.

“I think I’m gonna keep you there,” Oliver muses softly when we reach the top. “Easier than having you on my side,” he adds a bit too quickly.

I swallow. “Yeah, okay. I like the view from up here anyway.”

He clears his throat. “Good. Perfect.”

We travel like this for what seems like both an eternity and a brief second, only pausing so Oliver can stretch and rest before he hoists me onto his back again. And when he does, I lean in until my face is inches away from nuzzling the damp nape of his neck, where it smells the most like him.

“How long till we’re there?” I ask as we enter a rougher part of the hike. Oliver’s pace is suffering from the literal weight on his shoulders. Me. I’m the weight.

“Another hour at least,” he pants.

Above us, the clouds darken even more, until they’re as black as a starless night.

“Doesn’t bode well,” I say, and Oliver immediately knows what I’m talking about.

“I’m trying to hurry, but yeah . . . let’s hope whatever is brewing up there doesn’t come down on us too soon.”

The moment his words are out, the sky rumbles like a threat in reply.

“Fuck,” Oliver mutters. “We’re not going to be able to go any further.”

Panic claws at my stomach. “Why?”

“Can you see the fog in the distance?” He points ahead, and I nod. “That’s not fog. That’s heavy rain. Heavier than this morning. We won’t have any visibility.”

“Then what?”

Oliver gently sets me down. “We’ll have to camp.”